I was feeling old and paralyzed last night as I drove home. It was my daughter’s second birthday (she has officially graduated from tiny baby to little person). It had been a typical case-of-the type of Monday; I was feeling ambivalent about the job that I like alright but don’t see myself doing forever. I was frustrated with my own lack of enthusiasm in “fun” projects that I had previously been excited about.

I was on the toll road because I had decided that I’d rather spend two bucks than another half hour in traffic. My iPhone was on shuffle, and launched into Japandroids’ single, Young Hearts Spark Fire (free download here). I’d heard this song a few times before–the album was released in April last year. It’s nice, with some yells and some strumming, but lo-fi in a way that Drew would hate (so much guitar noise!).

The chorus of that song, however, is made out of pure youth and exuberance.

“We used to dream
Now we worry about dying
…
I don’t want to worry about dying
I just want to worry about those sunshine girls.”

I found myself shouting along as I drove (substituting an Animal Collective-aping “sunshine and my girls” in place of just “sunshine girls” in the lyric above) and I loved it. I felt thrilled–energized to go and live as best as I could. My misheard lyric (the actual one referring, apparently, to pinup girls in the Vancouver Sun newspaper) invigorated me in a way that music hasn’t for a while. Sunshine and my girls are two of my favorite parts of life. I don’t want to dwell on the crap; I want to think upon pure, praiseworthy things.

So I did something I seldom do–I bought the album without listening to another track. I’m giving you a chance to hear the rest of the album below, but I needed to experience the album where I’d discovered it–my car. I just hoped that the album lived up to that monstrous single and clicked the download button. (physical product?! bah)

Guess what? Post-Nothing lives up to the promise of the single. It will make you feel 19 again, with enough do-it-yourself spirit to build a monster truck.

I injected myself with more Japandroid-enthusiasm-for-living-elixir on my commute this morning. Maybe it was the cold weather and the high, clear skies today–something in this album transported me back to my college days. It felt like the day before a long weekend, having finished my 7am statistics class early (only class of the day) and walking back to the red brick dorms with the blissful knowledge of a few days where I could shirk the responsibilities beginning to settle into my life. I understood this album in the context of the anxiety and potential of the end of my youth (emusic calls it the “soundtrack to a quarter-life crisis”). This album is made to echo off of cinderblocks and poured concrete, turned too loud on mediocre speakers at far too early in the morning for the rest of your floormates.

The band is two guys, pounding away at their instruments, which are turned far too loud. They sound so excited about just doing things. It reminds me of the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip where Hobbes pounces on Calvin as he wakes up in the morning. Calvin is preparing to get mad at Hobbes, who shouts “It’s morning! Now we can do stuff again!”

That’s how Japandroids makes me feel.

I’ve been running a Dune book club over at dunecember.com since December, in case you didn’t know. We (and I) just finished the book this week, and I wrote a looooong recap of the last 50 pages and discussed it a bit. I had some more that I wanted to share with regards to my perception of the book’s conclusion and the official Dunecember blog didn’t feel like the right place for it, so here we are.

Over in my post, I said:

This book seems to make the case for looking toward the unexpected, the uncontrollable, the “chaotic” over the planned and the foreseen. It’s an interesting way to look at things.

And I have found myself looking at things this way since I first read this book a few years ago. It’s not an easy way to look at things without a sufficiently-large view of God. The “chaotic” mentioned above is, to me, only literally chaotic to those (including myself) who are incapable of understanding God completely. I believe that God has ultimate authority in every situation and that nothing happens beyond His control. This is a tough way to look at things because, well, shit happens. Daily. From tiny things that suck all the way up to enormous, ghastly tragedies.

Either these things are out of God’s control, or they are part of his plan in a way that will eventually glorify Him. For God to be the supreme being He says He is (”the Beginning and the End”), He must be capable of thinking and planning beyond anything humans are capable of perceiving. Thus even horrible atrocities must have a place in His plan, since they occur and everything that occurs is part of His orchestration.

(This does not square with the concept of Buddy Christ–the God who’s totally your best friend and is going to make you rich. It also makes people uncomfortable to think that every terrible thing they have experienced has been for a reason–understandably, I might add, since people go through terrible things and have a tendency to blame God for making their life hard.)

In Dune, the best-laid plans of a powerful order are diverted by one woman’s decision, due to her love for her husband, to have a boy instead of a girl. (Within this order, women are capable of such minute control of their bodies that they can determine the gender of their child.) Centuries of careful breeding are thwarted by this one decision, and the son becomes the One that they have sought all this time.

While I know that fiction is not evidence of the manifestation of God in our lives, I believe that the act of creativity and creation can be a form of worship–that even non- and anti-Christians can reflect God in art. I think God is reflected in Dune.

Accepting the idea that “chaos” in our lives can be God’s path for us is weird and kind of difficult. In Dune, Paul (the aforementioned One) has limited precognition–he sees things that could happen based on his actions. Sometimes, though, his perception of his various paths dips out of his view. These are the times he knows that he must act–he fears and anticipates them because he knows that it is in these moments that change will come into his life. Our lives have similar instants where small decisions make a big difference later on. Sometimes, we can even see these decisions coming and decide whether to embrace or avoid them.

My encouragement for you is: embrace these decisions. Trust God. Know that things won’t always been perfect or even good, but that He has a place for you in a plan so complex that we aren’t even capable of comprehending.

(Before anyone brings it up–I’m not arguing for predestination 100%. I think that predestination/free will is not an either/or situation. The best way I can put it is especially for nerds: think of light. It is a particle, a photon. Also, it is a wave. Sometimes it acts like one, sometimes it acts like the other. But as far as we can tell, it’s both at the same time. That’s my answer to the predestination/free will argument–as far as we can tell, it’s both at the same time.)

I tweeted all this madness, so you have probably seen it before. But here’s all 55 (!) of my #best09 tweets rounded up. The first 10 are in order of preference, after that they’re in the order in which they were posted. For reference, the format is Band/Album//Witty review with the // link going to my tweet.

1. Akron/Family/Set ‘Em Wild, Set ‘Em Free//Embracing their jammy folkpop side, in the sense that they churn out a dozen monster jams.

2. Jookabox/Dead Zone Boys//Soundtrack for a zombie apocalypse, set in a decaying mall, by werewolves who’ll tear you limb from limb.

3. Cryptacize/Mythomania//Fractured pop held together by cowboy dreams. Beautiful.

4. DM Stith/Heavy Ghost//Haunting, spectral songs with arrangements like immense salt catacombs.

5. Grizzly Bear/Veckatimest//Gorgeous, well mannered songs that will politely blow your mind every time you hear them.

6. Dirty Projectors/Bitte Orca//An alternate-universe pop monster if ever there was one. Absolutely brilliant.

7. Phoenix/Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix//A Daft Punk album for the rockists that’s fun for the whole family.

8. Animal Collective/Merriweather Post Pavilion//Experimental music for the masses that’s as trippy (or lame) as its cover.

9. David Bazan/Curse Your Branches//The most moving and thought-provoking album out in ‘09, no matter your allegiance.

10. Viva Voce/Rose City//Kevin and Anita throw down the gauntlet yet again with an album of swirling, near-perfect rock monsters.

read the rest of my reviews after the jump Read the rest of this entry »

Hey Ryan, what have you been up to lately?

A bunch of stuff, actually:

Dunecember

I started a Dune Book Club for the months of December and January. There’s a blog, a twitter account and some other links. We’re only about 80 ages in at this point, so it is still very easy for you to join.

Mixtape

I did another combo mixtape with my good friend Fred. It’s called the Elephant Gambit. Go here to download it and read our commentary.

Top Ten 2009 albums to play for your parents

The first part of my year-end music roundup is up at Super Secret Space Base here. The second part will be a Favorite Albums of 2009 post here and maybe somethin’ crazy on Twitter.

As always, I’m a twitter addict, though I do keep mini.prestigeformat.com pretty well-supplied with links.

Here is a short mixtape that I whipped up while wrapping up the first Scholastics + Moon Cities collaborative mixtape. “Caniculae” is a Latin equivalent of the “dog days” of summer, which have passed but seem to be lingering out here. All of these songs are from this last year except for the first track, which is from last year. The cover is from the beginning of the second volume of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, if you’re curious.

Right-click and save as…

Tracks: (artist – song)

1. Women – Group Transport Hall
Of all the lo-fi/noise pop bands that became popular in certain corners of the internet in 2008, Women were the ones who actually had some substance underneath their gruff exterior. This song is so short but has so many melodic ideas that it leaves a lasting impression.

2. The xx – VCR
The xx have released probably the sexiest album of the year. It’s so catchy and smooth and intimate. I love the simple production and the girl-boy vocals.

3. Dan Deacon – Jack & Jill
Wow, so this song is kinda nuts. A couple of years ago, Dan Deacon released an album of crazy synthesizer noise that didn’t sound all that dissimilar from someone playing with their electronic sound toys, but which held hints of compositional genius under the wires. This year, he released a far more brilliant album (which contains this song) that is far more mature, but keeps the madness of his older output.

4. Memory Cassette – Surfin
The mastermind behind Weird Tapes/Memory Cassette/Memory Tapes has gone from stay-at-home-dad to Best New Music on Pitchfork. Memory Cassette is his more shimmery 60s side, and this song is a great example of the shimmer.

5. Taken by Trees – My Boys
Animal Collective wrote the song of the year this year with My Girls. Victoria Bergsman, former lead singer of the Concretes and voice of PB&J’s Young Folks, came back with her cover version of the song, with Dan Lissvik of Studio’s sparklingly perfect production and awash with Iranian atmosphere.

6. DM Stith – Fire of Birds
David Stith’s compositional skills seemed to emerge, fully formed, from the internet this year. His songs are so dense and just suck you in. There’s at least 4 good songs bubbling to the surface in this fantastic track.

7. BLK JKS – Molalatladi
BLK JKS is math. Prog rock + punk attitude + chops + noisy, dirty atmosphere + heavy African influence = awesome. Yup, it’s just math.

8. The Widow Babies - Harp of 1000 Strings
This song took a couple of plays to hook me, but then I was forever devoted. Chris Schlarb does a great job of maintaining the rawness of the performance while giving us that stark, catchy afro-guitar and that unpredictable, hard-hitting percussion. Available for download here for free.

I’ve never been much for 8-track tapes. I grew up listening to my parents’ records, then graduated to recordings of those records on cassettes. Eventually I was buying my own Christian music tapes and then CDs (both Christian and *gasp* non-). I amassed quite a collection of CDs in the last twelve years. Right now, I’ve probably got somewhere around 500 CDs, give or take.

I love albums as an object. I see music as an objet d’art, encompassing the music, the album artwork, the (sometimes) printed lyrics, and the notes on the production. It’s a great joy to sit and listen to an album while looking through the art and getting a feel for the concept.

One thing I’ve learned since getting married, and especially after having a child, is that the space one has for objects is finite. And sure, one CD doesn’t take up too much room. But 500 CDs? Even if I only buy 2 a month, that’s 24 in a year–another 5% added on to my collection. Also, CDs are expensive. Because of the physical product (the jewel case or digipak, the printing, the disc itself), CDs can’t drop below a certain price without literally losing money for their publishers (and eventually the label and the band). Those jewel cases break like bottles in a TV bar fight. And that’s not to mention scratches.

Now, digital files are inferior to CDs in almost every way. They’re lower quality, and if they’re mp3s–the most common format–they’re actually less sonic data than a CD. (MP3s are considered a “lossy” format because they lose data compared to the CD.) They typically lack anything more than a 300 x 300 pixel representation of the artwork. They’re easily attained, but equally easy to accidentally delete or otherwise lose. Some companies sell you files but limit your rights to reproduce and back up your purchased files. But, mp3s and other digital files (aac/m4a, ogg, *shudder* wma) can be cheaper, since there is no manufacturing overhead. I argue, actually, that they should be cheaper. There is real no reason at all (besides greed) that mp3s on iTunes are the same price as an actual physical product in a store. (There is no reason (except greed again) that the legal penalty for stealing the freely reproduced files is so much higher than for stealing an actual physical product, either. But that’s an argument for another time.)

The benefits for mp3s are bountiful–they’re easy to carry, store, and share. While having a giant CD collection is a great way to maintain a physical backup of all the mp3s on your computer, so is buying a 500GB external hard drive from Costco and backing up your library regularly. A huge amount of the liner note information can be found online, be it on the artists’ sites or Amazon or Wikipedia. The loss of the art is a frustration, but how often do you read the liner notes to Kind of Blue, anyway?

Thankfully, not all mp3 stores are tyrannical with prices like iTunes. While Lala.com and Amazon MP3 both have relatively CD-like pricing structures, both offer regular deals (like @amazonmp3’s deal of the day–usually great albums for anywhere from $0.99 to $3.99) which make the digital files incredibly reasonably priced. Then there’s online subscriptions like Emusic. While Emusic has lost some members over a price hike and addition of thousands of albums to their catalog (can’t win with some people), it’s still a fantastic deal. I currently pay $20 a month (the price of maybe two CDs) for 50 downloads. With their structure, 50 downloads can equal 50 individual songs or I can buy packaged albums that are 12+ songs for the equivalent of 12 downloads (Recently I got Nigeria Special: Modern Highlife, Afro-sounds & Nigerian Blues and Kris Menace’s Idiosyncrasies, respectively 27 and 26 tracks, for 12 downloads each.) That works out to roughly $0.40 a song–definitely a steal compared to iTunes and others. Also, all of Emusic’s files are 100% DRM (Digital Rights Management)-free mp3s, compatible with all our mp3 players and both our car CD players. While it’s not perfect–there’s still a lot of labels they don’t have, so I have to keep an eye on new releases to know where I’ll be able to get them–Emusic is the best bang for the buck in terms of music purchases.

Before I started buying mp3s, I probably bought 20-30 CDs a year. Since then, I have been able to almost double that number, saving money in the process. And I’m no longer a slave to what’s in stock or how much for shipping. If you’re still a CD junkie, I highly recommend switching to mp3s. You probably already listen to all your music on mp3 anyway. Save room in your life for other things–like comic books, which are far superior as a phyiscal object–and start paying smaller amounts for just the ones and zeroes. But, for goodness’ sake, backup your mp3 collection. And if you miss the artwork that much, buy the vinyl.

Earlier this week (August 24, 2009), I was listening to music in my car on the way to work and I came across an album I had acquired but had not yet given an appropriate amount of time to. I proceeded to listen to it all day and tweet my thoughts [now annotated!]:

8:42 am – Cryptacize’s new album finally blew my mind this morning; I think I’ll tweet about it all day.

9:45 am – I think Cryptacize’s Chris Cohen could solve The Case of the Missing Les-Paulverizer. Probably got it at a yard sale.

11:25 am – Actually, there’s a definite Les Paul–Mary Ford interplay with Cohen’s ringing guitar sound and Nedelle’s vocals.

12:14 pm – This is as much future music as experimentalists like Animal Collective or TVOTR or big groups like Sufjan’s or Arcade Fire.

1:01 pm – Cryptacize is all over last century: Les Paul’s tone, experimentalism, Monk’s dissonance, Morricone’s atmosphere, Punk’s energy.

2:37 pm – How Cryptacize manages to sound huge with only a power trio remains a mystery to me.

3:16 pm – Tail & Mane might be a perfect song. Sing-along-able, fun, catchy, unexpected. I really can’t get enough of this song.

3:48 pm – Gotta Get Into That Feeling should be played during the “thinking of you” montage in the live-action Legend of Zelda film.

4:41 pm – Considering how sparsely used it is here, the bass makes a pretty serious impact on this treble-heavy record.

These can all be accessed by looking at the #mythomania hashtag.

I got it from emusic, but you can get it from Amazon and Asthmatic Kitty, too. I plan on buying it on vinyl from them in the very near future.

[Here's a link to a Les Paul/Mary Ford song, so you can get some of what I meant. I've used this song on a mixtape before, so if it seems familiar, that's why.]

It’s been a nice summer so far, but everyone seems broke. Prices are starting to drop, but disposable income is still at a low for most people. Musicians, it seems, understand what it’s like to have to choose between burgers and cds. Lots of people have put out free albums, eps and mixes for your downloading and listening please, completely free of charge. Here’s a roundup of some of the latest and greatest! (follow the links for the downloads)

Albums & EPs

Deastro, one of my new favorite artists this year, released his electro-shoegaze full length Moondaggers this year, but also put out two great electro eps: Grower and Orange Swimmer Red Summer.

Max Justus is another artist very much in a similar vein as Deastro, though his stuff is overall less dreamy and more 8-bit glitchy. His myspace (ugh, I know) has several free albums, from the instrumental Talk to Strangers to the great Kanye West remix set, 8 from 808s.

Remixer Phaseone has put his hip hop sheen on Animal Collective, Panda Bear, and Burial, but this summer he tweeted his debut album, Thanks but No Thanks. It’s dark, sparkling instrumental hip hop with plenty of ambience. Recommended if you like El-P’s production (high praise)!

New music mastermind Weird Tapes (aka Memory Cassette aka Memory Tapes) has put out quite a bit of great music on his blog. My favorite so far has been his ep More Tapes, but get it all.

Mixes

Fred’s Mix, called “Dear Summer,” is 48 minutes of wall-to-wall summer jams. Recommended if you like pop but can handle some electronic beats.

Michael Mayer, one of the head guys at Cologne’s Kompakt label, was recently interviewed at Pitchfork. In honor of his label’s 10th anniversary, he also dropped a great mix of 98-04 techno (mp3 is after the inteview).

Kevin Robinson of Viva Voce recently stepped out of his home studio to release a gem of a summer mixtape. Combining ancient, out-of-print psych songs with so-ridiculous-they-must-be-real radio promos for some crazy movies, there’s no way you can not enjoy Kevin’s Summer Mix.

Asthmatic Kitty’s newest star, Helado Negro (real name: Roberto C. Lange) just put out an unbelievably great album of “latin experimental” music that you can hear here. But he also dropped a nifty “Work-Week Mix” with Yeasayer’s Jaytram.

I’ll leave it at that. I could go on (if you still haven’t heard The Very Best’s mixtape, you really need to do yourself a favor–and Swedish perfect-pop labels Service and Labrador each have great comps up, plus I have several mixtapes available to download), but you get the idea. There is plenty of free, legal music to make you summer perfect. So, time to give that modem a workout and get downloading!

The pictures linked in the tweets below are also in the slideshow above.

Download the iPhone recording of The Grid here.

Read the rest of this entry »

This seems to be a thing, so I’ll go with it.

Top Ten

1. Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavilion
[[tied]]
1. Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca
3. Akron/Family – Set ‘em Wild, Set ‘em Free
4. DM Stith – Heavy Ghost
5. Yeah Yeah Yeahs – It’s Blitz
6. Grizzly Bear – Veckatimest
7. Bat for Lashes – Two Suns
8. Phoenix – Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
9. Viva Voce – Rose City
10. I Was a King – I Was a King

Read the rest of this entry »