1. St. Vincent - Marry Me 2. The Polyphonic Spree - The Fragile Army 3. Voot Cha Index - The Talking House/Cradle 7" 4. Fair to Midland - Fables From a Mayfly 5. Red Monroe - Red Monroe
OVERALL TOP 20
1. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga 2. St. Vincent - Marry Me 3. Los Campesinos - Sticking Fingers Into Sockets 4. The Polyphonic Spree - The Fragile Army 5. Black Moth Super Rainbow - Dandelion Gum 6. Ween - Friends EP7. Feist - The Reminder 8. Cat Power - The Greatest 9. Robin Guthrie & Harold Budd - Before the Day Breaks 10. Robin Guthrie & Harold Budd - After the Night Falls 11. Matthew Dear - Asa Breed 12. Justice - Cross 13. Ulrich Schnauss - Goodbye 14. Patton Oswalt - Werewolves & Lollipops 15. Editors - An End Has a Start 16. Bat for Lashes - Fur & Gold 17. Pharoahe Monch - Desire 18. Bishop Allen - And the Broken String 19. Montag - Going Places 20. Caribou - Melody Day
Fri: Rufus Wainwright / Neko Case / A Fine Frenzy (Nokia)
Sat: Observer Awards showcases with Faux Fox, Tame...Tame and Quiet, The Frenz etc. (Various clubs on Lower Greenville) My Education (Good Records instore) Ween (House Of Blues) The Sword/Saviours/High Cost Of Living (Rubber Gloves)
Sun: Alex Atchley Experience/The Show Is The Rainbow (Rubber Gloves) Jason Isbell And The 400 Unit/Centromatic (Hailey's)
Ghosthustler | Foxtrot | Bleach Boys (Secret Headquarters) Foxtrot remind me of some kind of mix between oft hyperlinked performers such as Yacht, Copy, Kavinsky,Extreme Animals, and Black Moth Super Rainbow. I'm not sure exactly how they put their tunes together, but it's pretty unique for this area and sounds like a live treat. Get it? And this might also be a good chance to hear some of the new material GH has been working on, which I hear is a bit different than what you've heard so far.
BARK BARK BARK (Monkey Bar) BARK BARK BARK is playing a show at Urban Outfitters in Tucson in a couple of weeks, and frankly, it's not very shocking. Essentially, BARK BARK BARK are one of the best approximations of "hip" that you can find these days. Honestly, you can hear at least a little bit of just about every musical reference point to have emerged in the past five years: post punk, hyper synth pop, dance punk. Basically everything but freak folk. But you know what anti-hipsters: sometimes "hip" things aren't bad. And these guys are one of them. Solid, danceable, sloppy post-hardcore stuff that people should eat the fuck up live.
Whale | Black Wizardz | Teenage Cool Kids (1919 Hemphill) Sweet Hemphill line up, although they said on their myspace bulletin that "jerks" aren't welcome at the show. Guess I'm out. Wish I could go though, as I'm interested in checking out both Black Wizardz and Whale.
Black Tie Dynasty | Red Monroe | Tree Wave | Voot Cha Index(Hailey's) Dudes- what are you doing? Let's just pretend this never happened, ok? I guess BTD goes on last, so you can cut out early before you get hairspray poisoning. Tyson Meade of the 90's next-big-thing-that-never-was group Chainsaw Kittens will be playing with Red Monroe tonight, and I believe they will be playing mostly CK material throughout the show. Haven't fact checked that, though. I've honestly only heard a few Chainsaw Kittens songs, and I guess I don't see what the big deal is-- seems like pretty standard early 90's college rock to me, somewhere between Smashing Pumpkins, Teenage Fanclub and the Posies. It's good enough though, and I'm sure the guys in Red Monroe will be able to add something to whatever material they end up playing.
Teenage Cool Kids | KojiKondo | Angry Businessmen | Dance of Days (Secret Headquarters) Great line up #2 of the weekend for SHQ. Teenage Cool Kids aren't exactly my cup of tea, but shit man, the last time I saw them play live was one of the best times I've ever had watching a band that wasn't exactly my cup of tea. They've got a great little army of fans, and they play tight, intense sets that said fans eat up all the way through. A lot of fun. And I dare someone to name a more intense live rock band than KojiKondo.
The Paper Chase | The Great Tyrant | BARK BARK BARK (Dan's Silverleaf) Great line up at Dan's Silverleaf, which isn't something I say too often. Of course, I haven't listened to the Paper Chase in forever, but I'm still waiting for the Great Tyrant to put a damn record out.
SUNDAY
Pelican | Clouds | Fatal Flying Guillotine (Hailey's) I'm not the biggest Pelican dude in town, but I figure they're worthy of argument at least.
Hippiefest feat. The Turtles/The Zombies/Iron Butterfly/Mountain (Nokia Live) I like turtles.
Guru's Jazzmatazz | Bavu Blakes | The Clever Monkeys (The Granada) Guru is easily one of the top five MC's of all time, and though I prefer Gang Starr over Jazzmatazz, it would still be great to see him perform live. I'm afraid of this being one of those shows that goes long on the "jamming."
The Lovemakers | Death Of A Party (Club Dada) The Lovemakers are willfully ridiculous but they played a pretty entertaining set of trashy glam pop when I saw them earlier this year.
The Frenz | Tyson Meade | Ezra Furman And The Harpoons | (The Cavern) The Frenz continue to change with every performance I've caught and I'm looking forward to hearing a full length. Tyson Meade is late of the Oklahoma nineties group, Chainsaw Kittens. Apparently he'll be backed up by members of Red Monroe.
This is the last post concerning this, I swear: Bryce Isbell has posted a video on Youtube where he appears explaining the band's side of the story on all this. I won't comment, I'll just let you judge for yourselves. Not sure why he chose this format, but to each his own.
100 Damned Guns | Spitfire Tumbleweeds | Or, The Whale (Dan's Silverleaf) Many cooks in the kitchen at Dan's Silverleaf tonight. Just three acts and they have 20 members (maybe more) between them! Who knew it took so many people to make country rock? Anyways, even though I can't put my finger on why this is better than most of the acts that ruin my dinner when I'm just trying to enjoy myself on the porch at Love And War Texas, it just is. Maybe it's because those groups don't distort their vocals. More people should.
Kinks Hoot Night with Happy Bullets | Klickitat | The Lash Outs | Zest Of Yore (Double Wide) Nothing wrong with the "Hoot Night" in theory, where lesser talents get together and perform the bulletproof material of widely respected bands. I love The Kinks, so this one might offend me. Or it might be really cool. But remember bands: your choice of song is just as important as your performance. So no obvious songs, only obscure deep album cuts, b-sides, rarities etc. That's right. No "Lola." I'm looking at you Klickitat. Get some guts and do "Misty Water." Of course, now that a new Wes Anderson movie is coming out, by the this time next year I'm sure everyone will be covering "Strangers", since it was featured in the preview and his films tend to breathe new life into those lost classics. For better or worse.
matthew and the arrogant sea: probably not the biggest local band you've never heard of
I received the following letter from Bryce Isbell this morning. Is it a publicity stunt? Has the whole thing been a publicity stunt? I'm not even sure if I care anymore. I'm just glad I didn't try to interview any of their "label contacts." Here it is:
If you ever had any relationship with Matthew (or the arrogant sea), please read
Matthew is not a liar. As of today I am totally convinced of this. Everything that Matthew told me, Bryce, his family, We Shot JR, etc. etc. he truly believed. His fantasy was incredibly complex and he created for all of us a convoluted world with many vibrant characters and minute details. Obviously, we were all enormously skeptical of the massive dollar amounts Matthew attributed to the deal, but he walked us through it so slowly and so... purely, that we rationalized it one way or the other.
Folks of all levels of involvement (including those with copious experience in the music business) would say things like, "Maybe this is just EMI's pitch and by the time the thing is signed it will be more reasonable", "Maybe their desperate for new markets", etc. When combined with anecdotal evidence about this or that obscure act being given X million dollars for being in the right place at the right time, Matthew's story was made plausible. The only other possibility was that he was lying, and if you've ever met Matthew and if you ever talked to him about any of this you would KNOW this wasn't the case. We never considered the third option, that the entire thing was completely real for Matthew and Matthew alone.
Yesterday, we did to Matthew what no friend should ever have to do to another. We went through every tiny step, every detail of his story searching for support or an answer to how NOBODY caught on to this sooner. We checked phone records, emails, made calls to his contacts and each path came to a dead end. We did all the stuff that we would have done much sooner (I'd like to think) if our attentions were not being devoured by the demands of the New Sabbath Festival. We love Matthew and consider him our dear friend. We don't feel manipulated b/c no one was more manipulated than Matthew himself. However, each of us radically altered our lives around this honest delusion and we have too much at stake to let this episode interrupt them any longer.
Magilum Records and The New Sabbath Festival are severing ties with Matthew and the Arrogant Sea. I am, obviously, no longer MATAS' manager. This is THE ONLY change. The festival is still on and is going to be powerful as fuck. The Magilum collective is still a real entity and Bryce and I will do our best to represent Denton with the love and respect Denton music deserves.
We Shot JR is still the most credible blog for news and information on the Denton | DFW scene and this episode cannot reflect on their credibility. Matthew's own family and closest friends were just as convinced as Matthew was that a deal of some sort was being negotiated with EMI. WSJR is in the same boat each of us are.
While I am sorry to all of those who stuck their neck out for MATAS, I say you did the right thing and I thank you for choosing to support your local creative figures over the cynical instincts that we have all, understandably, developed about the world of music. I hesitate to ask forgiveness because none of us did anything wrong. Our mistake was trusting the sanity of a dear friend and family member and that is the sort of mistake I feel no shame in having made. I do ask for your understanding. This is a deeply troubling and confusing time for all of us, Matthew most all. Do not allow this to color your feelings about the many other projects affiliated with MATAS and do not let this rob you of your faith in local music. Denton's potential is extraordinary, as the New Sabbath Festival will make clear, and we of Magilum look forward to strong relationship with all of you in the future. I'm already pretty sick of the past.
with love and gratitude, freddie & bryce (magilum records)
My short experience at last year's Dallas Video Festivalwas great, and fortunately for you, the nice people running it this year have decided to hook us up with a couple pairs of tickets to the 2007 festival. I know I know, it already started. But what can you do? If you want these tickets, just email weshotjrtix@yahoo.com any time between now and 6pm this afternoon. Just put "video fest" in the subject line, and we'll pick two winners randomly.
1. The first winner will get the Grand Prize Package, which is an all access pass to the entire video festival (this includes a showing of a series of short works by David Lynch on Friday, which I'm really excited about).
2. The second will win the Music Package, which will grant you admission to any and all of the following films (I wonder what that DFW Punk thing will be like? Sounds interesting.)
8 Bit Friday, August 3 at 8:00 PM Dallas Theater Center A melange of rocumentary, art expose, and culturecritical investigation, 8 Bit is a hybrid documentary examining the influence of video games on contemporary culture and artistic expression. Dallas-based Tree Wave appears in the film.
Rolling Like a Stone Thursday, August 2 at 10:00 PM Dallas Theater Center Stefan Berg looks up some of the locals seen in an old film from 1965, taken at a private party for the Rolling Stones in Sweden. Forty years later, see how these beautiful people on the edge of the pop scene turned out.
Air Guitar Nation Sunday, August 5 at 2:00 PM Dallas Theater Center Air Guitar Nation documents the birth of the US Air Guitar Championships and the experiences of the contestants to become the first World Air Guitar Champion from the United States. The directorial debut of Alexandra Lipsitz, a former prodcuer of “Project Runway.”
DFW Punk Sunday, August 5 at 8:00 PM Dallas Theater Center Featuring interviews with Bobby Soxx, Barry Cuda and MC 900 Ft Jesus, Laura Tabor-Huerta,,s DFW Punk documents the DFW punk scene from the early years in the late 1970s to the middle years in the late 1990s.
Black White + Gray (shown with "Smells Like Teen Spirit") Saturday, August 4 at 4:00PM Dallas Theater Center An examination of the life of Sam Wagstaff, an influential curator, collector, and force in the art world, this film explores Wagstaff’s particularly strong bonds with Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe. Director James Crump has served as curator of photography at the Kinsey Institute for Sex Research. Shown with a filmed interpretation of Patti Smith's cover of Smells Like Teen Spirit, a song originally recorded by Nirvana, from experimental documentarian Jem Cohen.
