To reiterate and simplify, it became frustrating to, in a sense, lose the mystery and the magic of Ellen to the grabbing hands grabbing all they could (all for themselves, after all)-many of these were the verysame electronic nay-sayers who claimed the music had no life, had no breath, had no heart and soul. These rock kids jumping wholesale on the “tech train” were the ones who, as I’ve been quoted as saying in far too many drunken bitch (or is it bpitch?) fits now, claim their favorite song is“Daft Punk Is Playing At My House” but wouldn’t know if Daft Punk WAS playing at their house (and wouldn’t dance if Bangalter was there or not).
there's new AIR over at res_mag, the new resonator mag feed. a sample:
Pocket Symphony is a lovely little whisp of an album that replaces the more jazz-influenced touches of Moon Safari and Talkie Walkie with a French lushpop sheen akin to early St Etienne minus Sarah Cracknell's ego-it's a slow, moment-by-moment and minute-to-minute affair, one that's relatively down-tempo in mood but fluid in movement.
if you'd subscribed to the new, improved res_mag feed, from our new and improved doesn't-look-like-a-rave-threw-up-in-a-glowstick-anymore site, you'd know already.
that's what you want to add for the feed of our new, improved, more functional AND PRETTIER (take that, anonymous comment-leaver from the stereogum ip) resonator mag.
oh, you want content? holy crap do we have it. do. we. have. it. just. you. wait.
I'm going to give you 3 rock solid remixes he's done lately. These are all more hard glitchy-techno flavoured, with none of the dance-rock nicities a of my posts have (If you couldn't tell, I love me some bangers).
There have been quite a few "No More Conversations" remixes that have come around (with the original being quite good as well) but Switch's is by far the hardest of them. Starting out all innocent and playful, it falls into speaker distorting grime loops of.. steel? (wanted to say of flurry, but I think The Chemical Brothers beat me to that).
I first heard this in a 25min set he did for radio1 and instantly fell in love with it. He takes all the best of the original and then adds in his awesome ability to completely chop, screw and dismantle a track --its just sick.. I don't have any better way of describing it.
I used this to help open my ZOMGDeejay Mix (yes, i'm STILL plugging it) and loved it then, and still do now. Its got an almost tribal house sound to it, but then keeps up with the harder-edge basslines. Very nice if you haven't heard it yet.
If you’ve been following my posts at all, then you may I’ve noticed that I’ve mentioned Young Love a few times but haven't really gone into any detail on him.
Well now I am... bitches.
Young Love - Too Young to Fight it
Lets talk about man behind Young Love for a second: Dan Keyes (of former Recover fame). Both Rodeo & Picasso and Ceci N'est Pas Recover had heavy CD rotation way way back in the day. Realizing that this was the same front man was a huge surprise for me; its such a stark change from the old post-hardcore/punk sound his Recover purveyed. Have to love re-inventing yourself.
Check out his (Billy Idol-ish) video for “Find a New Way”
I first stumbled upon Young Love after hearing the Discotech remixes a while back and started to take interest. His MySpace was previously only offering a tantalizing sample of material, but not enough for my tastes; I needed more (its now been updated with album release tracks). So, via the PR magic we do, I'm informed the CD's in the mail. Sweet. So I wait... and wait.... and wait....
Finally, about 3 weeks later, it shows up in our mailbox (postmarked about 2 weeks prior to when it arrived, I may add). I was actually excited since, for those 2 weeks, I would sort through all the CDs from the mail and find disappointment that Too Young to Fight It was not there... (/me has emo moment). Needless to say, after all of this build up I was seriously hoping for this CD NOT to suck.
And it doesn't (mostly).
The first full listen confirmed my initial impressions of "Find a New Way": Too Young to Fight It is what The Killers follow-up CD should have been (if they didn't turn neo-con and follow up what was a groundbreaking album with absolute trite-shit). You can't deny the infectious sound of both "Discotech" and "Find a New Way" as they have that lingering song power; the kind where you find yourself idly remixing it in the back of your mind while envisioning a dance floor full of nu-rave kids mashing up indie seizures, ass shaking competition champs, big smiles and cheap beer... or maybe that's just me? Regardless, I've yet to find a single person who didn't like either of those songs (I rocked a house party with "Find a New Way" and Meagan -of DSC/Kiss Atlanta fame - dropped "Discotech" to an unsuspecting crowd on Friday night).
The next highlight comes in the form of the title track: "Too Young to Fight It". Its a mixture of slightly recessed grungy bass lines, distorted almost 2-step percussion, catchy little keyboard melodies all of which is fronted with the strength of his Keyes' vocals
I'm torn from this point forward, though. The remaining tracks from the first half of the album serve as solid listens, but I feel the later half falls off into mostly B-side material. I skipped them initially, only finding a little more interest after accepting they had to be taken with a different frame of mind. While I'm not opposed to an album having diverse sounds and material, I feel it has to hold up all the way through to do so and, unfortunately, this doesn't. I wish I could just gush and write everything off as a huge guilty pleasure, but I can't.
Because of the trailing off towards the later half of the CD, I totally overlooked "Underneath the Night Sky" the first time around. Its one of those roll down your windows while driving out of vegas @ 5am type of songs that you want to just close your eyes and feel the sandy desert wind in your hair, but you can't because, you know, you're driving.
Overall I'm enjoying the CD and really looking forward to hearing what he does in a live environment; there's a lot of potential to rock out the more mediocre tracks and the outstanding tracks will be amazing, I'm sure. For those in the Atlanta area, he's assembled a backing band and is playing Vinyl on Monday, February 20th. I know Shaun and I will be attendance (I'm even trying to bring a date -- wish me luck!).
You’re shuffling around today, hands stuffed in the pockets of your black jeans with your greasy unkempt black hair falling down to hide your face like a funeral shroud, harrumphing at passer-by like some combination of the dude from Type O Negative and a Hot Topic employee, listening to your mp3 playlist of Disintegration interspersed with various My Chemical Romance songs on repeat on your iPod which, for the day, you re-colored black (from its’ original pink) with masking tape.
Fear not, oh ye of little love, instead of trying to remind you that Valentine’s Day is really just an olde pagan fertility ritual (because you’re probably not getting’ any anyway, especially not if you’re reading Resonator Mag instead of sucking face), we’ve put together a little Anti-Valentine’s mix-tape full of notlove tunes (that aren’t My Bloody Valentine or that inanely ubiquitous Andre 3000 track) that you can load up and shuffle around to today, instead of trying to time Gerard Way’s screams of “Vampire Bats are lovely and at times smell quite pleasant, skaramoosh skaramoosh will you do the fandango!” to the sound of your Docs scraping against pavement.
Former Throwing Muses frontwoman Kristin Hersh’s voice takes a lot of getting used to-it’s a combination of a world-weary husk and a moonshine jug-drunk Appalachian drawling yelp. Once you’re acclimated, though, it becomes evident that her songs hide absolutely nothing, regardless how masked her stream-of-consciousness lyrics are, simply because her voice gives every bit of the game away. “Me and My Charms” is the most harrowing, heart-wrenching piece of co-dependant lovepathetic, in the worst way-because it’s watching the door shut from the other side and sliding down its surface to find yourself curled in a ball on the doorstep of the one you love (who doesn’t love you back), listening for any sign of breathing.
The pompstrut and circumstance of GothSynthPop collective Pitty Sing’s debut album a few years back was lost and buried by the current slew of less-talented wanna-be-from-NY sound-the-sames like The Bravery or Snowden, but what Pitty Sing lack in awesome salon-perfect hair they make up for with the sort of biting, tongue-in-cheek, explosive sounding songs that their obvious inspirations of New Order and others from that time and locale perfected. This is the ideal rebuttal to the very idea of “love” for your cold, bleak day.
Mr. Magnetic Fields himself, Stephen Merritt, may very well be our generation’s love-broken troubadour. Following up 69 Love Songs, all of which are littered with the duality of pleasure/pain, came I, an album whose very titles mocks the self-entitled nature of love in an interpersonal relationship. The best song on there is “I Thought You Were My Boyfriend”, a painfully obvious and yet all-the-better-for-it ode to that moment when you realize you, in a fashion akin to Michael Bluth, have only been in love with yourself the whole time.
And, finally, your super-special middle-finger-to-the-candy-hearts treat. Who knows the ins and outs of love, of heartbreak, of waking to find yourself on the cold tile kitchen flooring shivering as a result of an anxiety-incited panic attack, butter knife in one hand and bottle of Paxil in the other, better than Nicola and Adam of ADULT.? This is from their forthcoming Why Bother?, which has some of the most upfront songwriting to date combined with some of the harshest NoWaveTech compositions they’ve ever made. Nothing says “I love you, you’re perfect, and I’m freaking the fuck out can’t breathe can’t breathe oh fucking shit I touched you need to wash my hands” quite like a little ADULT.
From all of us here at Resonator Mag, have an absolutely lovely Valentine’s Day. If you get a little down, just remember what that great poet Jon Bon Jovi once said: “you live for the fight when that’s all that you got (because nobody loves you)”.
(amazing images taken from one of the most fascinating blogs out there, mentalfloss)
In the days following the blackberry jamz there’s been so much fuss, so much controversy swirling around the Grammys:
“Were the Dixie Chicks used as the Recording Academy voter political statement, and therefore pawns of a force much larger than even Natalie Maines waist?”
“Did Brian Eno usurp control of the soundboard during The Police’s performance, or is Sting’s head so big that everything he sings now echoes?”
“Did Mary J. seriously know she was going to take home that many awards, and thusly stop off at Staples on her way for an index card 80 pack?”
“Who the fuck really gave a shit about Jesus taking the wheel? “
All good questions, but all dance around the real point and the fail to address the real reason the 49th annual Grammy awards were a complete and utter snoozer crapfest:
Why. The. Hell. Didn’t. Prince. Do. Anything?
Fresh on the heels of his phenomenal triumph over both meat-rock and God at the Superbowl, the purple one somehow magically managed to only grab about half a half-second of camera time before being transformed into…Beyonce, doing the most boring shit possible. Ok, well not as boring as the rest of the Grammys, because at least B wasn’t Mary J, but still.
If you, like I, am still reeling from the disappointment, don’t worry: your friends here at Resonator Mag are going to help you out. Since music right now is still at a stand-still for 2007 (note to Music: hurry the hell up and DO SOMETHING, I can only listen to Hissing Fauna so many times before I want to stab Kevin Barnes in his pretty, pretty glitterface), I want to revisit a few choice Prince jams that passed by the mainstream.
Essentially “unreleased”, this was on disc 3 of the billion-disc Crystal Ball set, Prince’s first and last attempt to put stuff from his infamous vault into the hands of the music-buying public. However, since most of y’all think that the album Prince release before 3121 was Purple Rain, it didn’t do so well.
(Or maybe it was the $50 selling price)
This is a criminally overlooked song-a more upfront take on the same territory as “Sign O’ The Times”-society being dragged, kicking and screaming, into a new age. This time around, the lyrical content’s enhanced by everything Prince was going through at the times-loss of record sales, a label battle, the hunger for freedom. It’s also a live take from Paisley Park, so it has some great crowd moments. Free. The Slave.
From The Gold Experience, which remains to this day my favorite Prince album of all time. It’s raw and fierce in the guitar work, and the synths were still being manned by mid-to-late 90’s NPG wizard Tommy Barbarella-so it has that walking-on-glitter sound that got so overlooked as Prince’s fight against his record label overshadowed any music he was making. In “Billy Jack Bitch”, which serves as complimentary piece of ‘Days Of Wild”, Prince responds to every-fuckin’-thing on his mind over a Fishbone sample. This is almost as fierce as he can be-and it indulges the dictionary fascination he had at the time.
The Emancipation album was where Prince started truly slipping away from “pop accessability”-though that slip was defined and determined by the number of discs he packaged together as an album, and not by the quality of the work on said discs. Emancipation’s three-CD set covered the gamut of love to heartbreak, funk to dance to straight-up ham-fisted rock, and, as a result of his then-recent marriage to Mayte, had some of his most joyous songs to date. Right *here*, though, with “Face Down”, he pulls the purple-colored gloves off and goes for the jugular. He’d been taking a lot of shit for the name-change and the appeals to go independent of a major label, and over one of his best self-crafted loops to date, a harsh marriage of James Brown and Trent Reznor, he raises his middle finger as he defiantly lays his cards on the table:
somebody once told him that he wouldn't take Prince through the ringer let him go down as a washed up singer ain't that a bitch thinkin' all along that he wanted to be rich never respected the root of all evil and he still don't to this day bury him face down let the motherfuckers kiss his ass, ok?
And, lest you think he’s getting “preachy”, the end of this’ll work your ass out like you’ve never moved before.
The “Days Of Wild” video (yes, a video for a technically unreleased, vaulted B-side…it’s PRINCE, what do you expect?), from the Gold Experience movie, made and only aired on VH-1…back when they, y’know, did those sorts of things.
I feel like I should tie this all together in some way, by explaining why every single sound that’s ever come from Paisley studios is vital, referential and highly forward-thinking, all at the same time-but the issue will always be that with the non-singles, you either “get it” or you don’t. No one can market him, no one can get him proper radio play-because, really, you can’t LABEL this shit. Unlike ANYONE ELSE, he doesn't NEED obnoxious MasterKraftWerkOrangeYouGladIDidn'tSayB-A-N-A-N-A-S remixes to completely own a dancefloor, and yet his shit still has enough heart and thought to spare. Prince’s music is sexyfreakintellectuadance, and with-or-without “Let’s Go Crazy”, he’s still the best damn hope the music industry ever had at staying relevant.
Oh, god, the hangover, the hangover. The R. Jamz Blackburry Surprize Hangover.
No tunes today in the empeethree format. However, if you're gathered 'round the cubes watchin' the tubes (oh. my. god. did. I. just. write. that?), wondering how to pass your day, and also wondering exactly *how many times* Mary J. Blige cried last night, check out our in-famous non-famous 2007 Live Grammy Coverage . I promise you you won't see Goldfrapp mentioned as much anywhere else, ever.
-EVER-.
For your daily amusement, and mentioned last night, we are also bringing back our inappropriate jams....today, our favorite offender:
KIDZ BOP
not going to tell you what the above is. Just. click.
And, from the vaults:
walrus on drums.
What, you wanted some form of writing craft? It's the post-grammy comedown...which, given the shit-ness of last night's broadcast, ain't much. Blue Monday this isn't.
We return to your regularly scheduled whatever tomorrow.
Aight, cats and kiddies. This is it. The big deal. The big bang. The wham bam thank you m'am. The somethingith annual Grammy Awards
And all that.
At the sound of the bell, the time will be 653 pm (special note to tori amos fans: FIVE MINUTES), and we at Resonator Mag are live and direct from R. Jamz crib, aka Sizzurp City.
We'll check in with the cast of characters as they arrive (fuck the GRAMMY red carpet, we at Resonator have the RAVE COLORED FLOORING), but for now, to getcha under way
as soon as the official grammy site makes the voting scorecards available, we'll make the Official Resonator Mag grammy scorecard public. why you should care:
Jay-Z’s Black Album is oft-cited ‘roundabout these parts as a source of major workday inspiration. The hustle, the flow, the bounce, the method-all of the major factors that went into what we at the Resonator Mag office see as his greatest work since Reasonable Doubt (which R. Jamz will one day illustrate the brilliance of in elicit detail) are also what makes the record “The User’s Guide to Getting’ That Paper”.
That’s why it took a minute to wrap my noggin around last year’s Kingdom Come-it’s not that it’s boring, it’s just that Hov fell off the wagon and made an album about the joy of being “all growed up” (watch that-it’s the theme of 07). In the wake and stead of the tremendous Rap records that dropped last year (Pharrell, Nas, Jigga, etc), the music-consuming public forgot ‘bout Luda:
It’s a shame that even Spankrock, doing their Backyard Betty sweet talkin’, overshadowed Release Therapy, and it’s a shame that I never gave the album a proper listen until recently, though I’ve had it kicking around my car since it dropped and have loved every fierce minute of it. It’s the first time that, on an entire record, Ludacris strips away the tweak-job exterior that he’s been using since day 1, the same goofy methodology that’s kept anyone from ever really taking him seriously on his own stuff while gobbling up every guest-spot verse he’s spit think about it: everyone knows his lines from Missy Elliot’s “One Minute Man”-c’mon, say it with me: “Ludacris balance and rotate all tires”. Release Therapy replaces the prat-fall goof that Luda’s known for with his own Black Album, a hungry push to just rhyme, a ferocious desire to detail the ins-and-outs as he knows them and to elevate those around him. Granted, this is a story we’ve heard before-mo’ money, mo’ problems-, but Ludacris’ skill with a pen and a mic are undeniable, and if they weren’t he’d never have survived his Clown Prince of Rap days, nor would he be able to have made an album both as serious and as quality as this one.
This is the second track on Release Therapy and yeah, Young Jeezy’s on this, and yes, the hook is built around a Biggie sample-both of those may be draws, but neither of those are the point. This is the song that constantly drew me back to the album, and the one that puts a fire in the gut-Ludacris’ moment of inspiration, or “moment of clarity”, and I’m thankful for it. Over that pounding B.I.G.-sampled chorus (“I grew up a fuckin’ screw up/Got into the game and fuckin’ blew up”), Ludacris takes his youth apart and puts it back together in a way that makes it plausible to go from the gutter to the stars without selling coke, which, in the RapScape of right now, is a revolutionary concept. His last lines always draw me back in:
Reach ya hand in the air, you can play wit tha stars Ain’t the hand thatcha dealt but how ya playin your cards
I had Release Therapy in my car the other day, in dire and desperate need of the title’s promise, and, for the first time, I let the album play through. Scattered amongst Ludacris’ tales of coming up from nothing, delivered in his rapid-fire Burberry-laced throatpunch style, I found:
The quirkiest slow-jam in recent memory-an ode to post-coital naptime. As Ludacris slows down and plays with his flow to match the mood of the song (one could label it his “nappy patter”), R-Kel sings about how, and this is a DIRECT quote, “I always wanted to go down on a girl that reminds me of me”. It’s not old-skool Ludacris, and feels a bit mis-sequenced on the album, but my god what a concept for a song. It makes me think of how utterly, compellingly and oddly sexy I always found Madonna’s Bjork-penned “Bedtime Story”, with its’ chorus of “let’s get unconscious, honey”-there’s something about the idea of mixing sex and sleep that’s undeniable.
Ok, look: I can’t post on Ludacris without this track, which has the single greatest Kanye-penned verse of all time:
”How you ain’t gon’ fuck, bitch I’m me I’m the got-damn reason you in V.I.P.”
Sheer and absolute genius when it comes to expressing the mindset of Thee Bling’d Out Star, and inspiration for, hopefully, thousands of Hip-Hoperas to come.
I’m finding Release Therapy worthy of a re-listen, especially now as the 07 dust just begins to be kicked up, while we wait to see what the year’s going to offer. It’s an introspective look at a powerful, major lyricist and cutting-edge artist who, uh, let’s face it-we didn’t really THINK had introspective qualities.
Just an FYI kids: we're switching our DNS this weekend to point to a new server. I've set up everything on the other end, so there shouldn't be any down time. The new server gives us near limitless bandwidth (no, seriously, we're talking over a terabyte of transfer per month) so you'll (hopefully) never see those pesky "Bandwidth Exceed" errors anymore.
Along with the new server will come a much improved website and new RSS feeds, so stay tuned!
I first heard him via a link from Ocelot's myspace page and instantly considered him to be one of those guilty pleasure bands. You know, one of those bands you listen to even though you know you shouldn't like them but can't help but do anyway? All the while trying to hide it from showing up in your last.fm player?
Shush. You totally know what I'm talking about.
His sound reminds me of hellogoodbye's at times, who's latest endeavor ended up in my guilty pleasure list for a few spins (though that faded with repeated listens), but there's a lot more potential in his sound, especially with some production work being done by Ocelot.
Anyway, this remix landed in my inbox a few days ago and its a much danced up and fun version of Too Young, so here you go:
Show The Secret Handshake some love if you like it, his EP is about to drop pretty soon.
What 2 people can we love/hate more than yoko ono & peaches? What about peaches AND yoko ono on the same track? This dropped earlier this week as part of the upcoming yoko ono album and its way waaaaay better than it should be.
This remix has been out for quite some time now, but it found its way back into my playlist, so I figure I'd re-share it all with you. Besides, what's better than 2 of my favorite guitar bands on the same remix?
We've got a funny story about gang of 4, you should ask us about it some time.
Ok, this last one is a older as well (I've rocked it out in quite a few sets myself), but more people seem to finally be jumping onto the (much deserved) goose bandwagon, so I'm posting it for your enjoyment. Goose, made up of part soulwax members, had their album Bring it On drop in the later part of '06, is very solid from start to finish, and the dancefloor remix possibilities are endless. There's also a Surkin remix of Low Mode coming out soon and I personally can't wait to hear it.
Think that's all for me. My head still hurts from the Flosstradamus last night. They dropped sandstorm.. fucking sandstorm of all things, and the kids were still dancing (though the hipsters were in very few in numbers). Overall a lot of fun, but I wish more people were there to experience it. Oh well. They're coming back in march sometime, so the fun should be had then as well.
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