Goodbye JPG Magazine... I will miss you

I have Queen running through my head. Of course, it's "Another One Bites the Dust." I am saddened to report that JPG Magazine is shutting their site down and discontinuing the magazine. I'm especially sad because I just finally got a new subscription from C.A.S. for Christmas.

We've spent the last few months trying to make the business behind JPG sustain itself, and we've reached the end of the line. We all deeply believe in everything JPG represents, but we just weren't able to raise the money needed to keep JPG alive in these extraordinary economic times. We sought out buyers, spoke with numerous potential investors, and pitched several last-ditch creative efforts, all without success. As a result, jpgmag.com will shut down on Monday, January 5, 2009.

If you haven't checked out jpgmag.com before, now's your chance. You have two days to soak in its goodness. The print issues I've had are treasured and kept. There's a whole issue on Noir! An issue on live music! An issue on shattered things... and so many more.

Almost 200,000 people logged onto jpgmag.com at some point during their existence, and that's pretty swell. Thousands of amateur and pro photogs together on one site sharing their art. That's going to be gone on Monday, and it makes me a little sick.

Before the bell tolls its last, check out these suggestions from Editor-In-Chief Laura Brunow Miner, and enjoy.

Download the PDFs of back issues, outtakes, and photo challenge selections. We'll always have the memories!

Make note of your favorite photographers. You may want to flip through your favorites list and jot down names and URLs of some of the people you'd like to stay in touch with. You may even want to cut and paste your contacts page into a personal record.

Houses of the Holy: Andy Messerschmidt & Max Schollet

Andy Messerschmidt: Merry Krishnas at Fox Tax Gallery & Max Schollet: Journey to the Surface of the Earth at the MAEP Gallery at the Minneapolis Institute of Art.

“Matter matters.” –Carl Andre

The two sets of work could not be more different, the way an ornate golden reliquary is totally at odds with the bone fragment or wood chip it houses. The consideration of both can be a jarring experience and one full of questions as to the nature of worship, meditation, work and creation. So it is with two vastly different shows that inhabit the same conceptual space: Merry Krishnas by Andy Messerschmidt at Fox Tax Gallery and the work of Max Schollet in Journey to the Surface of the Earth at the MAEP Gallery at the Minneapolis Institute of Art.

Andy Messeschmidt produces large scale collage/paintings that incorporate doilies, cut stencils, magazine images and paper Christmas ornaments among other items. Occasionally jumping from the picture plane to the third dimension, the works are a measured explosion of color and pattern that are carefully balanced, symmetrical. Messerschmidt writes in his Artist Statement, “My goal is to stop the viewing at confounding confrontation, just sheer, unfamiliar, reverent confrontation- a grizzly on two legs in the middle of the trail.”

But the materials are recognizable and this is not confounding unfamiliarity, this is comfortable rearrangement. The titles are not reverent- It Freaked Out and Became a Jehovah’s Witness, The Meth-Heads Saw Their Lab Aflame as the Burning Bush of Ascensional Morphology and That’s All- these seem to be over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek, deliberately performative, a non sequitur one-liner. It is conceptual baroque on a five-and-dime scale. Messeschmidt goes on to say, “I am more interested in the deification of painting by objectifying reverence.” What is true about the pieces is that their layered intricacy do provide a titillating aesthetic experience, much like the Assume Vivid Astro Focus project is doing in the contemporary art scene. The difference is that Assume Vivid Astro Focus wholly embraces their surface play and silliness, whereas Messerschmidt’s uncomfortable relationship between his stated desire for reverence and the construct of the object is unresolved and undercut ground. The work pushes joyous wild mystic visions, abandon and worship, but pulls back into formal, static trope. The Abstract Expressionists that Messerschmidt notes as feeling kinship with in his artist statement (Fontana, Newman and Pollock) created art that never had an easy relationship with the viewer, and the challenge made people return to them for viewing and firther meaning. By contrast, the ready identifiability of the material and theatricality of Messerschmidt's work make for easy access that approaches a designed experience as opposed to organic reverence.

Max Schollet uses the least possible material in his work, and the objects are all everyday. That word’s connotation can be dismissive, but the everyday has been the subject of art from Vermeer’s serving girls to Duchamp’s urinal and beyond. Schollet work extends, quite literally, the object. Cub Food bags laid out in rows to pair up the black logo against the fleshy tones of the aged plastic, a single sheet of yellow legal paper cut to a single continuous line, a roll of masking tape unrolled into ox-bow bends, forming a snaking glyph on the gallery wall. Of Schollet’s production, critic Tamatha Sopinski Perlman writes in her catalogue essay that “Each repetitive action, each act of transformation makes the landscape of our everyday existence into a work of art.”

Unlike the excoriation that critic Michael Fried leveled against minimalism- that it was only activated by the presence of the viewer and therefore dependent upon a simple special relationship to function, Schollet inverts that criticism. Yes, there is an object that you would recognize, and yes, it has a spacial relationship to the viewer, but the object (and especially, as a quotidian object, the idea of the object) precedes the viewers presence and will continue past the viewer leaving. Schollet’s interventions set the stage for the transformative process that can be revisited by the viewer to changing ends. Schollet makes mendicant art, you can see the marks of construction repeated to an almost absurd breaking point- this is the process of mantra-recitation and koan study that push to Buddhist enlightenment and Shinto prayer. There is a reverence in using the thing as it is, but the austerity of it’s creation opens up the matter to the thing as it could be- furrows, bones, intestinal tracts, lotuses, cell diagrams, ideals, a change in perspective- that gives the work it’s pared down beauty.

Both shows could be expanded, and high promise is held in both. Mass can be experienced through the pageantry, robes, chants, incense, but also in silence, and reflection the direction of life. Whether the experience is catholic or liturgical, the matter is all in the viewing.

“Journey to the Surface of the Earth: Margaret Pezalla-Granlund and Max Schollet”
WHERE: Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 2400 Third Ave. S., Minneapolis 55404
WHEN: Nov. 14, 2008 – Jan. 4, 2009

“Merry Krishnas: Andy Messerschmidt”
WHERE: The Gallery at Fox Tax, 503 First Av. NE Minneapolis 55413
WHEN: Nov. 29, 2008 – Jan. 9, 2009

The Cherry on Top ...of 2008

No one really likes making "Top 10" lists, do they? I gave my team the option of making a list for 2008. Top 5, top 10, recommended, etc. and here's what we came up with. You'll notice there's not much overlap, and to me that's a good thing. We like variety. Hopefully you'll find something on these lists you haven't heard yet and can now go check out. It's not rocket science, and it doesn't count for much, but here are CakeIn15 staffer's top picks for the year that was (and is... for another 6 days anyway).

Staciaann

1.The Dodos, Visiter
Ridiculous trash can drums, excellent bleeding-finger guitars, and wonderful songs make this my top album of 2008. No matter how many times I put it on, I'm thrilled by the intricacies and emotion in this album.

2.Fleet Foxes, Fleet Foxes
Fabulous vocals that bring me back to groups like The Tolkens, Four Freshman, and Jan & Dean. An album any age can enjoy. Also a memorable live show with haunting reminders of the past.

3.Frightened Rabbit - Midnight Organ Fight
Continues my love of music from Scotland. Hell, I wrote about these guys back in June of 2007 here too. Since then they've only grown in their song-writing, and 2008 brought their best album yet. Well done boys.

4.Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend
You're lying if you say you don't like this album. It's summer wrapped up and rolled into a digital file.

5.Mates of State, Re-Arrange Us
Awesome harmonies from a husband and wife team who've only gotten better as they continue to create music. One of my favorite sing-a-long records of 2008.

6.Cloud Cult - Feel Good Ghosts (Tea-partying Through Tornadoes)
Fucking fantastic new stuff from one of my fav locals. Check out "Journey of the Featherless" or "Story of the Grandson of Jesus " if you don't believe me.

7.Caroline Smith & the Good Night Sleeps, Backyard Tent Set
My best new local music find this year. Old-timey without overdoing it. Every time I've played this at work, someone's picked up the album. No joke. Plus, her live show will pack them in and leave you sighing with pleasure.

8.Jeremy Messersmith - The Silver City
Messersmith again proves he's one of the better singer-songwriters out there. Put that together with super producer Dan Wilson, and you have one hell of an album about Minneapolis.

9.City On the Make - $1,000,000 EP
"Chicks on, chicks on, chicks on bikes" was my anthem for the summer as my girlfriends and I sang it repeatedly biking around the city. Lead poet Mike Massey is as fun to watch as he is to listen to, and with new bionic knees to keep him bouncing, I can't wait for the new material that's promised to come soon.

10.The Mountain Goats - Heretic Pride
Admittedly, John Darnelle has a voice that only a mother could love. Ok, that's not 100% true, but it's close. You either love him or hate him, but you can't touch Darnelle's dark lyrics mixed with lovely guitar rhythms and the driving force of his will.

*Side Note: While I would definitely put Bon Iver into my top 10, I owned the album in 2007, and so can't put it in without feeling strange about doing it. Justin, I love ya, but last year was your year. xo

Dan O.

1.Cloud Cult, Feel Good Ghosts (Tea-partying Through Tornadoes)
Having returned to this album again and again, it's the rare album that never grows old - it always feels like you're listening to it for the third time (the time when you finally decided that you really really liked it.)

2.Of Montreal, Skeletal Lamping
Of Montreal's new album (as I reviewed previously) continues to confound me at times, but I re-visit it almost weekly - It's ambition and scope place it in my Top 10 this year.

3.Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend
I wasn't actually sure if this album was released in 2008 - something made me feel as though it had been released earlier, but the back of the CD credits it as a 2008 release, so here it is! The buzz has faded, but it's still an entirely interesting album - reminds me a lot of Paul Simon's Graceland.

4.Grand Archives, The Grand Archives
What first brought me to this album was its Band of Horses side-project status, but it's much much more - One of the most consistent and enjoyable pop albums of the year.

5. R.E.M., Accelerate
As any R.E.M. fan will attest - thank god they're back to making relevant music. So long as it's R.E.M. and even half-way decent, it'll get on my top 10.

6.The Magnetic Fields, Distortion
I have heard murmurings that there are those who didn't enjoy this album, but I find it to be the most listenable Magnetic Fields album yet - made up of equal parts shimmery distortion and odd-shorn lyrics, it's a perfect summer album for a winter morning.

7.Liam Finn, I'll Be Lightning
Son of Neil Finn (Crowded House), Liam's debut album is a sort of Beatles hybrid that occasionally sounds like Elliott Smith. It's raw and pretty at the time. More importantly, I bought it eight months ago and still listen to it - rare longevity for a shot in the dark.

8.Sigur Ros, Med sud I eyrum vid spilum endalaust
Nothing different than before, but still - really frickin' pretty.

9.Dosh, Wolves and Wishes
Andrew Bird didn't release an album in 2008, so I'll toss the orchestral sound-pop tiara to the handsomely bearded Dosh, whose album is always good to wind down to after work with a beer.

10. Spiritualized, Songs in A & E
Written during and after a death-defying bout with pneumonia, this album is a great for late nights and headphones - makes you feel happy to be alive.

Alexa

The Gaslight Anthem - The '59 Sound
Chuck Ragan - Feast or Famine
I realize this came out in '07 but I didn't discover it until '08, have listened the sh*t out of it, so IT'S '08 FOR ME!
Langhorne Slim - Langhorne Slim
Parts & Labor - Receivers
Alejandro Escovedo - Real Animal

c.a.s.
(In no particular order)

TV on the Radio, Dear Science
Sonically, I still hold that Return to Cookie Mountain is a better disc, and if you think "Wolf Like Me" isn't dance track, then you're not trying hard enough. But Dear Science does for dance-pop what OK Computer did for rock and roll- inverted, electrified and re-invigorated it. Give it up for the band with the big ideas and the adventuresome spirit to follow. Live review here.

The Hold Steady, Stay Positive
We will, and we get jams that, even though they leave our fair state and Craig Finn's familiar stomping ground, just get bigger and more brash. "Lord I'm Discouraged" is "How a Resurrection Really Feels" told from the other guy's perspective, and that's a great way to grow up without losing your edge. Bonus points for dirty jokes and double necked guitars. Live review here.

City On the Make, $1,000,000 EP
It's easy to fall for chicks on bikes, as the grinding opening jam proved this summer. But it's even better when we get into the disc- it is a million bucks, one hundred percent, and when he wails "Poor Mike Massey's got eyes for your daughter" and Mischa Kegan tears the licks down behind him, it might as well be a lament for Savannah girls in their Nehi skirts walkin' walkin' walkin' down the block. Ain't they got no respect? Live review here.

Jeremy Messersmith, The Silver City
An exquisite journey through the the pop sounds of days of yore, deftly produced by Dan Wilson. It twinkles and shimmers, the starlight sharper for the darker underpinnings of Messersmith's razor-sharp storytelling. This is a great disc to give to people when they ask you where you live and what it's like. Interview here.

Johnny Flynn & The Sussex Wit, A Larum
An out-of-left field surprise for me that has become one of my most-listened-to discs this year. Comforting Irish vox, pop-folk with some rock heft and strings, writing that is both sharp, funny and poignant. From "The Wrote & the Writ": "They're taking pictures of the man from God/let's hope his cassock's clean./The burden of being a holy fellow/is your halo better gleam, better gleam." Kick up your heels and reel in your friends.

Kristoff Krane, This Will Work For Now
The earnestness, the fierce drive to make art work for the artists, to make it function, the need to make it and survive. This disc burns with it. Sometimes it over-extends, but it is always true to the artist as necessary creator- the disc runs from braggadocio to doubt and sincerity. And radio-friendly tunes like "Paul Still Loves His Daughter" and "Miracle" are the stuff of silver screen soundtracks. Review here.

Cecil Otter, Rebel Yellow
The poised counterpoint to Krane's manic spin, this disc is just-as-if-not-more dark, introspective and driven. In a banner year for Doomtree, Cecil's produced and written some of the most professional, honest and polished material. Plus, he played the Clapperclaw Festival. So he's the shit.

The Dodos, Visiter
From start to finish, this is one of those records that long-play vinyl was made for. The manic drumming that keeps the base shifting, bending folk guitars layered on top of eachother to make them San Francisco punk, the duo of Meric Long and Logan Kroeber work their asses off to make one of the fastest moving, most satisfyingly layered discs of the year. Live review here.

Fleet Foxes, Fleet Foxes
It is one of the continuing miracles of music that it always comes back around. Is it because of the moon, or the connection to orbiting planets? Or because sound is a wave, a sine and cosine along an axis that form perfect circles, whole, enveloping, harmonizing, sustaining circles? With the debut Sun Giant EP and the self-titled LP release in the same year, the Pacific Northwest bellows with beauty again.

Buena Vista Social Club, Buena Vista Social Club at Carnegie Hall
Nonesuch Records sent me back to my first concert with this disc, to a moment when the world opened up to pulsing sound, unstoppable rhythm and pure joy. I think that every other concert-going experience is measured by that yard-stick for me, and it's a tall order. When something measures up, it's worth it. These records and the concerts given by these performers this year (among others) have made it a great 2008. Thank you.

Plus: These Singles Rock
Esau Mwamwaya, "Tengazako"- I defy you not to dance, I defy you to not believe in the power of globalization.
Blitzen Trapper, "Furr"- Turns stock animal noises into proto-mythical creation stories, makes you sing along.
Vampire Weekend, "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa"- "Do you want to fuck/like I know you do?" I do.
Atmosphere, "You"- Performed on Letterman wearing an Obama shirt, mid-July. Bless.
Diplo, "Reckoner Remix"- Breaks it all apart, bends in Beirut, kicks it to the dancefloor. Thom Yorke should be proud.
Santogold, "L.E.S. Artistes"- Watch it, Santogold is out there and she is coming for your ass.
Plastic Chord, "Thang Goin' On"- A live staple put down for the groove-bustin' record.
Cloud Cult, "The Grandson of Jesus"- Because you could be one of those billion saviors.
Mates of State, "The Re-Arranger"- For you and your lover to mix it up and get down, indie-rock style.
The Black Keys, "Psychotic Girl"- Buzzing like the underwater universe of your broken head.
MGMT, "Time To Pretend"- Distills the hubris of youth to it's ebullient core.
Miles Benjamin Anthony Robinson, "Buriedfed"- He's said if he had had his success at 19 instead of at 25, he'd be dead. It's good to be alive.

This week in the economy...

...is not so good. The fallout from Bernie Madoff ponzi scheme is projected at about a $300 million hit to the Twin Cities. A lot of that hit goes to businesses and individual investors, but charities, non-profits and aid organizations are going to take it on the chin. The belt that was tightening is going to need a couple new holes to cinch in.

Intermedia Arts is the latest arts organization taking a big hit. This the 30-year old organization whose graffiti covered building on 28th and Lyndale is unmistakable. They put on the B-Girl Be Festival, the Naked Stages Performance Series and some of the most community involved arts and performance events in the Twin Cities. Now, much of their operational budget has dried up or been delayed, and like so many precarious but vital small-arts organization, they simply don't have the capital to sustain though. They will be shuttering the gallery and poetry library effective January 9th, moving staff to hourly and contract work. But they are fighting back, and need your help. From the Intermedia Arts website:

"Intermedia Arts can survive this economy. We can even come out on the other side stronger and more sustainable than ever before. But in order to do that, we need you to take action now—today.

This is what we need you to do:

1. RSVP now. We need you here at Intermedia Arts’ Community Townhall: Rally the People! at 5:30PM on Friday, December 19th. We are asking you to make it a priority to be here, in person. You will hear from artists, community leaders, Intermedia Arts’ staff and board. You will have a chance to ask questions and offer suggestions. You will find out what you can do to keep Intermedia Arts alive. We need to see you here: show your support by showing up. Free childcare available! RSVP right now!

2. Make a donation. Supporting Intermedia Arts is critical right now, and every dollar counts. We need your support to help us with our general operating expenses as we implement our plan for long-term sustainability. This isn’t about keeping Intermedia Arts open for another month; this is about keeping Intermedia Arts in our community for the long-term. Right now, that future depends on you. We need you to make a donation today.

3. Email us. We need to hear from you. We need to hear your encouragement, your ideas, your commitment of support, your suggestions and feelings. Send us your questions, tell us what you think, and look to our website for updates, responses, community FAQs and news each and every step of the way.

4. Rent our space for your next performance, event, meeting or exhibition. Our building is a valuable asset to the arts community and we want it to continue to stay active and alive.

Now is time for each and every one of us to draw on our passion and our conviction, and play our part. This is a rallying cry. Together, we will meet this challenge and lead our community forward. Because Intermedia Arts matters. Because your voice matters. Because Intermedia Arts is YOU."

Amen.

The Little Skeleton That Could Not- An Essay

Cake in 15 imagines itself as a "culture blog". Yeah, there is a good dose of music, but we are all omnivores here, with wide and variegated interests. As writers, photographers, actors, critics, commentators and god-knows-what-else, we are not just content to let culture happen around us, but attempt to be an active part of the discourse and agents of our own change. In that vein, and full of shameless self-promotion, I offer up an essay that I wrote following The Little Skeleton That Could Not by Lamb Lays with Lion, the theater company of which Cake in 15 contributors c.a.s. and Dan O. are members. It's not your usual blog fare, and if you don't like it skip it. Just 'cause you're in Blockbuster doesn't mean you have to rent a movie.

WHO ARE WE AND HOW DID I GET HERE?
The Little Skeleton That Could Not by Lamb Lays with Lion 11/20/2008, The Hexagon Bar

What just happened on stage? Nervous laughter is good, a punctuating belly laugh is better, seasoned, confounded silence is best. As one reviewer put it, “It all would have been in rather poor taste if it hadn't actually been quite funny.”

The Little Skeleton That Could Not, the latest group work by Lamb Lays with Lion played out like this at the Hexagon Bar on November 20th, 2008. It is a triptych of short scenes, each one growing with misplaced enthusiasm and senses of well-being.

In the first vignette, LLwL company member Jayne Deis takes the stage, obviously not in the best of health, hiding behind her notebook from the harsh illumination provided by the single handheld spotlight and proceeds to tell us that she is going to tell us about the 12 Steps of alcoholism. Instead, though, of reading from the Alcoholics Anonymous 12 Step program, she haltingly starts off on a list of her own creation that has darker, more personal overtones; “Number One. If you look into the mirror and find you have nothing to live for, you might be an alcoholic.” Pitiable down the list, she re-visits points until she is interrupted by Ashley Smith and Julia Mae Fairbanks Thompson, dressed in matching black pant and white t-shirts who inform her that this was last week’s performance, that she missed because she was “passed out at Memory Lanes.”

Debauched Identity Theatrics after the Jump

Smith and Thompson, having dispatched Deis, proceed into “an informative talk” about “an important subject”: AIDS. You can see the parenthetical quotes around their dialogue, the vernacular spins off from PSAs and After School Specials and Fairbanks one-ups Smith with biological details about the functioning of the HIV retrovirus. The discussion of transmission, a serious topic, devolves into scatological repetition of bodily fluids as the flustered twosome try to keep their place. Their scene is abruptly ended by the appearance of a skeleton onstage.

The skeleton (Melissa Anne Murphy) smiles and has an upbeat, sunny, if flip disposition. She, too, is here with an important message. She is here to talk about anorexia, and how it may be right for you. Look at the wonders it has done for her. She talks of becoming a role model for other anorexics, her temptations and the support her community brings her. If she were talking about recovery from alcoholism it would be a downright heartwarming scene. But she is not, the crowd is uncomfortable, heckles a bit and then the skeleton is interrupted by Thompson and Smith who charge back on stage with “AI” and “DS” scrawled on their shirts and skull make-up smeared on. Look at what they’ll do to pull attention back to themselves. There is a back and forth, dramatically lit, of heavy breathing, statistics that are patently false, upbeat non-sequiturs of encouragement, building until the band that has amassed quietly behind them tears into a howling rock-blues number. “Die Die Die” goes the band and the trio onstage galvanize into a goofy show-tunes dance offstage right. Deis charges back on only to be chased away by the skeleton. The band keeps playing and goes into their regular set.

What just happened here?

The closest extant category that Skeleton could be dropped in to, and was in post-show discussion, would be agit-prop. But this is no cardboard cut-out protest with a single-minded end of revolution. If Skeleton is to be considered agit-prop, it must be considered so in newer and more subtle terms. Jan Cohen-Cruz outlines these terms in the introduction to her collection of essays entitled Radical Street Performance:

“Notwithstanding,… agit-prop is possible in ‘culturally pluralistic’ societies, but with these caveats: 1. as social contexts become more complex, agit-prop may serve a an educational function around a specific issue, not necessarily advocating general revolution; 2. the actors must believe that they know a solution to a compelling social problem and be prepared to take the same steps they are urging upon audiences.”

Vaguely, the work of Lamb Lays with Lion could be considered within these parameters, but subverts them both. There is an “educational function” implicit in the use of data: you now know that 1-800-CDC-INFO is the number to call and www.hivtest.com are resources about disease control. Jayne Deis serves as an apropos discourse on alcoholism, given the locale of the performance. Even so, Skeleton, is more about the conflict of datas, the falsity and truths of abutting statements and their uncomfortable relationships. The Skeleton character builds up a positive community taken directly from support sites by and for anorexics to keep them anorexic, but this is not disclosed to the audience, nor is it presented at face value- she is a skeleton! A happy, smiling, fulfilled skeleton telling you how great anorexia can be. No wonder there are uncomfortable laughs; even if it doesn’t fall into the category, Lamb Lays with Lion is surely trafficking in agitation.

Nor Lamb Lays with Lion does not posit a solution or bring down a moral judgment with which they exhort the audience. The show starts out identifiably strange and plunges into absurdity, and this keys into how the performers identify themselves. Jayne Deis’ “Jayne Deis” might just be a hungover Jayne, a slight abstraction- you know that girl. Therein lies some of the original humor. Telling stories of drinking cigarette butts the morning after appeals to a base-level gross out humor, but also, for the young bar crowd assembled, contains a mote of self-identification. If you haven’t done it, you probably know someone who has. Thompson and Smith’s “Julia” and “Ashley” step up that distance, transforming themselves into an empty sounding board from where their research and the data they hear echoes forth. The Skeleton is familiar in tone, but so far afield in content that it makes conscious and exposes that this is a performance, and not a testimonial. The malleability of our own identity and our desire to hear information that conforms to expected conventions is toyed with and exposed in subtle, disturbing ways. The sources of information are untrustworthy, what we identify with may be further away than we think, we should be able to describe that disconnect.

So again, what is it? It is rock and roll; self-indulgent and generous, it is theatre; playing with shifting identity and information, scripted and spontaneous and not what one would expect at a bar. The words you heard had come out of a process of discussion, research and play. The scene’s absurdity comes from our own senses and the barrage of information, all of them untrustworthy in their own way. As artist Jenny Holzer’s proposed in her series “Truisms”: “Description is more valuable than metaphor”. Lamb Lays with Lion is here to describe, channel and filter the world around you, not to make it easier for you to understand.

* De Young, David “Lamb Lays with Lion w/Plastic Chord video from the Hexagon” (How Was The Show Blog, http://howwastheshow.blogspot.com/2008/11/lamb-lays-with-lion-w-plastic-chord.html)
** Cohen-Cruz, Jan Radical Street Perfomance, (London: Routledge Publishing, 1998) 14
*** Holzer, Jenny The Venice Installation, (Buffalo, NY: The Buffalo Fine Arts Academy, 1990) 3

Also at the Lamb Lays with Lion website: www.lamblayswithlion.org

The Little Skeleton That Could Not will be presented at the Bedlam Theatre January 16-18 in conjunction with Paint the Town by Insurgent Theatre from Milwaukee and musical performance by To Kill a Petty Bourgeoisie.

Today in Awesome: Ms.Pacman

I went in to Blacklist Vintage on 27th & Nicollet to find a present for my aunt, instead I found Ms. Pacman. The beautiful old sit-down, cocktail table style game with bleeps and flashing embedded screen. So I played. And played and played. I felt guilty, here I am, in the someone else's store, in the season of giving and here I am indulging my own desires, doing just what I want. I make Baby Jesus cry. But if Baby Jesus was here, he would play Ms. Pacman with me. That is all. Happy shopping!

Oh, Noel and Liam...

I remember when I first heard (What's the Story) Morning Glory? On bootleg tape in my friend Alex Watson's bedroom- a chubby, beady-eyed Brit who hated everything about living overseas and who smoked cigarettes and drank- perfect for introducing me to the Brothers Gallagher. The bickering, the blasphemy, the beautiful roaring guitars. Go back to Definitely Maybe and the lure of sex and drugs an alcohol, the idea of escape and and those epic, self-indulgent lyrics: "I'm gonna start a revolution from my bed/'Cause you said the brains I had went to my head." I took fiercely partisan sides in the Oasis/Blur debate, tried to learn enough guitar to try and twang out "Wonderwall and "All Round The World". "Wonderwall" is still the only song I know the chords to. Anyway, years past, I moved stateside, I couldn't stomach anything from Standing on the Shoulder of Giants except for "Fucking in the Bushes" which was on the Snatch soundtrack. So it goes. But rockers die hard, especially ones with nation-sized egos and aspirations of Beatlesesque grandeur, not to mention some goddamn talent. So they come roaring back, and now they come roaring into town.

I suppose it is too much, since they are on tour with Ryan Adams, for some sort of giant cluster-fuck epic rock and roll meltdown. No, the boys made nice, Ryan Adams has put out the juggernaut disc he's always been promising, and everyone seems to be even keel to rock stardom and longevity. The Rolling Stones will needs a replacement on the aging rock circuit, and as Noel has reportedly said, "Who wants to be a drug addict at 40?" Keep the fights down, the spirits high, live forever. Here's some good old Oasis, live on Jools Holland, 2000:


Oasis with Ryan Adams & the Cardinals at the Target Center, December 10, 7:00pm.

(Oh, and who knew the Target Center had a blog?)

UPDATE: Via NME: Oasis are set to release an iTunes exclusive EP on the 9th, basically an "I'm Outta Time" single with some demo material and re-mixes. Sweet.

UPDATE UPDATE: Walking home Tuesday night and Liam Gallagher was smoking outside Ping's, talking to some of his entourage. Not so much worse for the wear, he looks pretty good, definitely not in Keith Richards territory. I did a double take, and kept on going.

Cloud Cult: Feed the Living

Cloud Cult at The Whole 11/21/2008“…We’re very happy to be back in Minneapolis- it’s been a long time- in Minneapolis- since we’ve played for such an intimate setting, so this is pretty cool. Thanks for being here.” Craig Minowa smiled out at the crowd, sleep-mask askew on his forehead, one bare foot tapping. The band tuned between songs, the painters- Craig’s wife Connie and Scott West- at work producing rainbow-mixed birds and tragically sad women. And then came another song, another rush of noise, another uplift into escape.

Cloud Cult had come back from tour to play one last show before their winter hiatus, and had crammed themselves onto the tiny stage at the Whole. The room in the basement of the University of Minnesota’s Coffman Union is best described by the removal of the “w” from its’ name; a long, low cave of a room. The assembled crowd had sat in patient anticipation, semi-circled like kindergarteners, through the opening set by Jelloslave. The four-piece of two cellos, Indian tables and a drums had played a warm opening set that had people clapping and swaying with occasional burst of surprise and recognition. Even though their regular drummer Greg Schutte was away, he was more than capably subbed by JT Bates, indisputably one of the best and most affable kit-men in Minneapolis. Tripping through mixes and medleys that swung between ragas and covers of the Beatles, Joy Division and closed with a bang with Led Zepplin’s “Whole Lotta Love”.

It’s not hard to give love at a Cloud Cult show, in fact, it is a prime motivation of the band. Unlike some feel-good jam band that their name would seem to imply, this is a serious rock band whose core- Craig and his wife Connie- have traveled through darkness and back into light. It was the sudden death of the Minowa’s 2-year old son in 2002 that galvanized Craig’s songwriting and dedication to the music- working through grief. 2007’s Meaning of 8 was so titled because that would have been the age of the lost boy. It would seem morbid, near exploitative to hold tragedy that close, but without it the escape, the honesty of sharing and hope that so embodies the canon of Cloud Cult would be nowhere near as sublime.

Standing pressed up against the stage with the bass amp by my feet the music literally vibrates against my body, and when I am told that everybody here is a cloud I look around and see other people around me, all intangibly happy and our mouths form the same worlds together and purpose is not something that we need to worry about now. Now we are all together and we know the darkest places of ourselves are not so dark with other people there with you. No, it is not a cult; it is transcendental meditation, Plato’s creation myth of being divided halves looking for our other part, it is meteorological metaphors for turbulent times. It is crystalline sense of purpose, womb of sound, it is rock and roll music. To cop another local band made good, it won’t save you but it can bring you to a place where you can save yourself.

Minowa looked sheepishly out into the audience and apologized- the band is all sick, he said- we have been on tour and passed the same cold back and forth. But, he promises, “we are going to put on the best show possible for you.” From the crowd, someone yells, “You always do!” And we cheer, and they smile, because they love us and we love them.

No One said It Would Be Easy into Chemicals Collide:

Party to Live: Rock + Roll Means Well Tour

The Hold Steady + Drive-By Truckers at First Ave 11/16/2008I tell you this - and I use the first person preposition because this post will be disgustingly self-serving and totally devoid of journalistic objectivity - that the Hold Steady can save a life. Yeah, yeah, the Hold Steady almost killed me... the killer parties almost killed me and when I was done trying to die the music was still there, talking to me about the syntax of trying - we won't save you, but we'll get you to a place where you can save yourself. Nothing's a fake fight when it's against yourself. I'll roll when I'm ready.

It's foolish 'cause I want it, want to feel a part of it and smiling kids are always screaming for more. There is a hard-bit sweetness for the scene before it got druggy, cutting our baby teeth and saving us from fangs. I say it, but I don't really want to be 17 forever...but I do like the warm feeling - bundling up against the wind coming off the Mississippi, carrying salt, cliques and hisses, the whole chorus of city kids trying to stay alive, stay real high.

Don't die! Any night they play half of Separation Sunday is a good night for absolution, and Craig Finn says it every time, every time and I go back to hear it. Need it so much so that I've stolen it for my own ends. I use this ending to a monologue I've been working out, stories about telling stories, trying to get the honesty ingrained in me so that it becomes reflexive but rock and roll. Rock and roll means well, but it can't help but tell boys lies. But hey, he gave it to me, right?

...And I'm trying to understand America,
to get it through a bar band and I still can't comprehend
why the Hold Steady need day jobs and night jobs as bar backs,
and how the acclaim doesn't mean they sell records.
There's something wrong with that.
Each song is like a benediction
to a country of half-hearted Christians
and backstabbing best friends,
kids are human beings and it says;
We see you, you're here and we are too.
Craig Finn, his arms flailing like busted wings
grabs the microphone and beams and twists
and screams, that he always says it,
he always does, he always does:
That
There
Is so much Joy!
In what they do onstage
And thank you, we love you,
Minneapolis/Saint Paul.

I suppose it doesn't even matter. I love you too, I love me too, it doesn't matter which city because we have gone out to find America, you and I. We have gone out to find America, you and I, and found ourselves in bars and reststops and schools and malls and found ourselves.
...
Oh yeah, the Drive-By Truckers were there too - see what I mean about lack of journalistic objectivity, they co-headline for crissakes - but I have never been a huge fan of theirs. I have dismissively said that their lineage is Lynyrd Skynyrd and not all that much else - and I still stand by that. But they have a good time. The Hold Steady guys seem to have a good time with them, and they played the two songs of theirs that I really do like, "Dead Drunk and Naked," and, as an encore, "Let There Be Rock." A damn fine story about fucking up and turning out alright. Now that's a benediction, and I've been doing just fine, thank you very much.

"Stay Positive" into "Stevie Nix":

"Constructive Summer" into "Stuck Between Stations":

Music as Discourse

My sophomore year at the U of M, I enrolled in an upper level Cultural Studies course called "Music as Discourse." We spent the large part of a winter digging deep into pieces of music - Laurie Anderson's O Superman, a version of Oh Danny Boy as sung by an Irish folk singer whose name has faded into the unreadable makeup of my memory, Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska, even Sir Mix-a-lot. We discussed authenticity versus superficiality, and how two almost identical songs can leave the listener feeling wholly different based on a variety of almost indeterminate factors. I took a test, got a B+ (which I am legitimately proud of, as my CLA adviser was taking the same class and could only manage a C), and moved on with college life. I have not directly applied the skills I was taught in that class in life, but if there was ever a chance to do so, I give you the new Of Montreal album, Skeletal Lamping.

To start with the title - Kevin Barnes (who pretty much is Of Montreal, at least in the studio) says, "This record is my attempt to bring all of my puzzling, contradicting, disturbing, humorous...fantasies, ruminations and observations to the surface, so that I can better dissect and understand their reason for being in my head. Hence the title, Skeletal Lamping. Lamping is the name of a rather dreadful hunting technique where, hunters go into the forest at night, flood an area in light, then shoot, or capture, the animals as they panic and run from their hiding places."

All right, good! Even Kevin seems to understand that making puzzling, contradicting, disturbing music is, how does one say, not commercially viable. This unflinching chaos and confusion (sexual and otherwise) is this fully realized and difficult album's main strength, and perhaps, if you're not into non-linear post-gender meta-intellectual sex philosophy, you'll find it to be the biggest weakness as well. That, and the beautifully poppy hooks that emerge from the sea of Barnes only last about 30 seconds on average, before moving on to some darker place (al beit momentarily - the last track on the album is an undeniable runway romp, complete with the empty eyes and turns of the runway model.)

Simplicity and Challenge After the Jump
Lyrics from the track Women's Studies Victims:
They had painted her face like a man's mistake,
like a mental state gang banging
A sad return to the eagle-shaped mirror
I'm the kind of mannequin that cheats and
opens its eyes to the ladies of the spread.

She took me home and spit in my drink
She spoke of Jermaine Grier and freedom I don't know what to think
I took her standing in the kitchen ass against the sink
She draped me in a stole
(what kind?) I think Malaysian mink
She threw me out into the snow; I waited for the bus
Up come some values voters screaming, 'are you one of us'
I said of course man, can't you see I've got some text reconstruction?
(What does that mean?)
No clue
It must be an illicit pentagram
(What are you talking about?)
No clue


And if this doesn't make any sense out of context, some background. Midway through the last Of Montreal album, in the midst of a 12-minute long breakdown, Kevin Barnes allegedly becomes Georgie Fruit, a black man in his late forties who has been through multiple sex changes. Barnes has often taken on the Georgie Fruit stage persona (complete with cross-dressing and memorably captured last year by Pitchfork photographers in Vegas, full frontal nudity - showing us that Mr. Barnes, at least, has not himself undergone any outwardly evident gender shifts.) This album marks the first that he has written entirely in the voice of his alter ego. It's hard not to think of Ziggy Stardust in this context, but I think there's something more interesting going on here - Bowie and Barnes are quite different, both in sex appeal and personal background, and to simplify for the sake of simplifying would be a mistake.

Which brings us back to the album again! There is no simplification here - how amazing, in this day and age of sound bites and 3 minute hits, is that? There is no condescension present either, which for me is the key to this album's success. What makes this an authentic experience? Is it arbitrary? For me, it's the intense focus and darkness present throughout the album that keeps it from treading over the line of indulgence. The moment you might get a whiff of Mr. Barnes being "clever," or making music like an "asshole," would be the moment you might turn off to the album. In my opinion (certainly not shared by all), this moment of turn-off does not happen. I've listened to it over and over, first on headphones on an Amtrak train, watching the trees and buildings flash by in hypnotic fashion, listening the album and remaining vulnerable and open to it even after two straight minutes of stomach turning repetitious "CD Skipping" guitar riffs. There's a narrative somewhere, and the beautiful moments that you try so hard to hold onto the first few listens become somehow larger and warmer and more humanistic in repeat visits to the album.

If I had a thesis due, I'd pick this album to write about.
If I want to be transported and introspectively uncomfortable, I'll listen to this album.
If I want to make my guests comfortable at a party, I would probably NOT play this album.

Still - if you haven't listened to it yet, come on over and we'll have a listening party. It's well worth the hour of your time, even if you end up hating it. Challenge is good. Difficulty is good. Yes we can.

Buena Vista Social Club at Carnegie Hall

If anyone is looking to send an early Christmas present our way, head on over and order the 2-disc concert recording Buena Vista Social Club at Carnegie Hall that Nonesuch Records is releasing this Tuesday. Wim Wenders included footage from this concert in his documentary, but this is the first time that the full live recording has been made available. This is bittersweet, now that some of the greatest elements of the Buena Vista Social Club- singer Ibrahim Ferrer, pianist Ruben Gonzalez and guitarist Compay Segundo- have gone up to the big hootenanny in the sky.

I saw them, my first concert in the States, late fall 1999, cold and after the first snow, on a field trip with my Spanish class. Ms. Lundberg, whose Scandanavian surname always contained a cognitive dissonance in describing the tiny Cuban firecracker, rightly convinced the St. Paul Public School District that this was a cultural event that could not be missed and herded us all onto buses to Northrop Auditorium. I remember Ferrer grinning wildly and twinkling in the lights, the stately Omara Portuondo accompanying him and seeming to float above the rowdy joy from the band. They all lit up the stage, crackling with energy and a grace that made the music transcendent of the politics that had kept them unknown and almost scuppered the tour, and made a kid on field trip feel like things were connected at their very core by an excitement that could be made palpable- it was visible in the people standing, cheering, swinging out in the aisles to two-step, ushers standing to the side and everyone partying. Don't deprive yourself of that kind of feeling, either live or on record.

What I did this week - The Republican National Convention

This week I worked for a liberal media group called The UpTake, which consisted of 15 or so videographers and photographers who documented the convention. We had live streams online of events as well as video of protests, concerts, raids, etc. You can see it all here: www.theuptake.org.

I was at four protests which all ended in tear gas, pepper spray and concussion grenades. Interesting, to say the least. It was pretty disappointing that I couldn't get closer to the actual convention, however. Sort of hard to do with 15 foot metal fences throughout downtown. St. Paul itself was dead. No one was really outside the perimeter of the Xcel Energy Center and the police presence was very scary and it all seemed like major overkill. It was a police state in all sense of those words. Riot gear, police on horses, bikes, foot, snipers on buildings.

There was a lot of tension between the public and police for most of the RNC. Obviously there were people who aggravated the situation and deserved to be arrested or needed tear gas to be dispersed. However, there were a lot of altercations where I witnessed the police as aggressors. Police maced and pepper sprayed photographers who were following police instructions, tackled reporters who were well identified as reporters, and pushed unaggressive people out of the way before even asking them to move. Reporters and photographers from City Pages, KARE 11, FOX 9 News and The UpTake were all arrested. There were, of course, a few protesters who made things bad for everyone. The "Black Bloc" anarchists who infiltrated the "Students for a Democratic Society" march on Monday broke store windows, pushed anything not nailed down into the street, and attempted to create barricades against the police. These people were definitely the minority though. Most of the students in the protest yelled at them and asked them to stop the vandalism. It was a sad state much of the time.

The worst that happened to me was walking through an area that was pepper sprayed about 30 seconds earlier. Yuck. I can't imagine getting a direct hit of that stuff. It's gross. Any time I was in danger I got out of the situation. A few of our reporters were arrested or detained, but all had the charges dropped as they were just there to document and not participate or condone the actions of the protesters or others. I was within a block of the tear gas and such more than once, but always made it out of the area without incident.

You can view the photos I took (along with some from others at The UpTake) here:

Day 1 of the RNC
Day 2 of the RNC
Day 4 of the RNC

Cheers -
Stacy

Acceleration (a review of recent history & R.E.M.)

Ed. Note - This is an introductory post, originally written right after R.E.M's newest album was released. I'm not really this far behind.

Yesterday morning my coffee maker broke. A dull click indicated that it would not, despite the fresh grounds and ten cups of water inside, make any productive use of them.
It sat, unnoticed in its disobedience for a time. I returned for a cup of coffee to find it silent & sullen. My eyes narrowed. I unplugged it and plugged it back in again.

I ruminated on how interesting it would be if I could exercise a similar treatment upon myself.

The coffee machine still did not work.

Also, last night I lost Boggle. Not “loss” within the game itself—I physically lost the entire game. Last I can remember it had settled underneath our dining room table, having been opened and played once, and then left to gather dust and as a constant reminder that I really ought to straighten up the damn apartment. Sickness & business descended, the long process of opening and closing a show, and on one rather sunny day at home, I spent a hurried morning cleaning the apartment. I picked up Boggle and placed it in some other place. Some unknown place. Some hidden corner.

Suffice to say, it’s beyond me. I turned the whole apartment sideways, but the bright yellow and red box eluded me. We played Uno instead.

And so to the point—My favorite band of all, R.E.M., has released their new album recently, called Accelerate. I was too busy to rush out and buy it right away, and Katie Rose managed to get to it before me, leaving it fresh and new and still plastic-wrapped on the table when I arrived home from work one day. I put it in for a spin the next morning, and the whole thing rushed by before I was even ready to listen to it. I’ve returned to it again and again, but haven’t really PLACED it yet. It’s somewhere between the coffee machine and the Boggle game, and I don’t know where that is exactly, if only because the coffee machine doesn’t work and the Boggle game is missing.

More after the jump...

Perhaps it’s unfair, this expectation of automatic placement. Do you know what I mean by that? Automatic placement?

I’m nineteen years old, alone in Minneapolis a little less than a week after school has ended. All my sort-of friends have gone home for the summer and I have only just started my new (first in the cities) job at a painter for Twin Cities Student Painters. I applied for the job, met the boss, and he hired me, after which I said, “I don’t have a car, you know.” And he said “oh.” And looked at me long and hard and then said “I like you. Let me find you a team that you can car-pool with.”

The car-pooling was still in process though, and I was painting with a temporary team during my “training” period, and the locations spanned the wide unknown city in which I had only lived for 6 months. The first day of my new job our location was in Minnetonka. Living as I was in a garden-level studio apartment right behind Hard Times Café while the actual owner traversed Amsterdam, I had no access to the internet or computers unless I trekked onto campus and logged on at the Wilson Library. Instead, I utilized the call-service feature of Metro Transit in order to plan my bussing routes to the various different painting locations. The phone system neglected to point out that the route it recommended was an express—The bus would only leave once, at 7:35 am. Thinking I could catch a slightly later version of the route, I waited downtown for an hour before realizing my error. My eyes burned as they tried to fill with tears. I rejected the “crying on the street corner” approach, and resorted to kicking the curb instead.

Full of humiliated frustration, I found a pay phone and called Leigh, one of the only people I knew in the entire city. Remarkably, she picked up. Even more remarkably, she agreed to get out of bed, put some pajamas on, and give me a ride from the corner of Hennepin and 4th Street to the far reaches of some boulevard in Minnetonka. I did not lose the job, despite being nearly two hours late. The crew chief gave me a ride home that night, through sweltering rush hour traffic, covered in paint and grime and exhaustion.

I was broke—I had spent the last of my money celebrating the end of the semester by going out to eat a few times, and giving the owner of the apartment in which I was living her share of the rent, some $300. This seems remarkably inexpensive now, I suppose, but then, it left me quite literally with $8 in my checking account and nothing in savings what-so-ever. The painting job would not pay for two weeks. Until then, it was up to me to scrounge for every penny so that I could buy Totinos pizzas at the West Bank Grocery and a loaf of bread for toast in the morning.

My first day of work was on a Monday. The next day R.E.M would release Reveal, their first studio album since Up, which to this day still gets fairly regular playing time along with all my current flavors of the month. Cheapo was holding a MIDNIGHT SALE!, which meant that I could go at closing time and stand in a long line to buy the brand-new CD. I think that Dave Matthews Band had a new album coming out on the same day, as did some other band that was much cooler than R.E.M. at the time… Most of the midnight hipsters were there to buy some other record, but I was there for my favorite band. I had, two hours prior, collected up all the CD’s in my collection that seemed like they might have some retail value and that weren’t essential copies, and brought them in to sell. Cheapo had given my something like $22 for the lot, the only album receiving more than two dollars in exchange being some early Michael Jackson 2-disc set featuring his work mostly in Jackson 5. I had listened to it twice in vague befuddlement, having expected something inarticulately different. Relegated to the back end of my collection, it saved me that night. Without the $6 it fetched, I would not have had sufficient funds to purchase both the new R.E.M. and the loaf of bread that would feed me for the next two days.

I bought the record, and got some promotional stuff along with it free… a poster, which up until my last move hung on my closet door, and some post-cards that I still have in a box somewhere. And of course, the album, which I hungrily tore open and listened to twice that night alone.

Every song felt right—The rain poured around me, bubbled down the drain-pipes and rushed by at eye level, as I stared out at the street from underground darkness. Five of the songs had the word “rain” in them, and they resonated up to this day. I was utterly alone, utterly broke and almost starving, but for the first week every night in the rainy early summer/late spring of Minneapolis in 2001, I listened to that record every night before falling asleep.

I still feel there when I listen to it now. The songs, now so familiar and ingrained and anticipated, were once new and sustaining. The critics don’t agree. Reveal was mostly panned in the states (Although SPIN magazine gave it a perfect 10/10), and faded into obscurity. For me though, it was nothing less than a security blanket. It was absolutely specific, 100 % accurate, and indicated my exact global and emotional position to myself. There was no separation of self and music—We melded, and were the rain, the chord changes, the chipping paint, the missed busses, the incomprehensible loneliness and uncertainly of being alone in a new & unknown city. It all streamed together as one living organism, and when the CD ended I slept.

This is what I mean. It’s a round-about story to get back to my point, but here it is, just the same, in case someone is still reading: I want this new album, Accelerate, to feel like just that. The broken coffee machine and missing board game are a small substitute for the immediacy and desperation of my younger self. Each event that occurs now can be inspected.

“Is this it? Will this be what this record will feel like and mean to me?”

Maybe I’m too old—Maybe you can’t make those connections forever. But each R.E.M. album prior has been indicated, has meant something specific, transcended all the music around it to define a moment in my life.

I’m still waiting for this one to hit me.

This is me

This is me studying for the bar exam.

It's on Tuesday/Wednesday of next week. This is all I am doing (beyond seeing The XYZ Affair tomorrow night at the Nomad). It sucks.

So I will post after it's over. Promise. For now, on to property, torts, tax, family law, contracts, evidence, crim law, crim pro, partnerships, corporations, civil procedure, etc. etc. Woot!

p.s. I can't wait to get back to the music!

Mark Monogue - The Piano Man

A few weeks ago I found out a guy I sort of grew up with was gone. It wasn't something I expected, although I'd heard from family he'd had it rough after high school. He'd turned to some vices I'm sure some are familiar with. However, he had one of the most amazing families I knew - two sisters and a brother, great parents. He also had a child and a girlfriend. They had their problems. No one's perfect. People get frustrated, angry, depressed. I didn't know Mark during this time of his life.

I knew him as the piano man. My clearest memory of Mark is at an annual camping trip. I don't have any siblings so I grew up tagging along with my cousins and every summer we went on this ridiculous camping trip with at least two other families. It was great fun. In the photo below I'm the one in that hideous green shirt in the middle - Mark is in front of me, wearing the Pink Floyd t-shirt and the red hat. He was obviously smarter than I was.


Click here for the rest of the article
I remember Mark as the piano man because one of the things we used to do was lip-sync to our favorite songs. I remember being enthralled with the way Mark "played harmonica" as Billy Joel blasted from the boom box. I 100% blame Mark for my love of Billy Joel - and especially for my love of that particular song. I can't help but smile and feel happy when I hear it. Mostly because I picture Mark in my head. A 16 or 17-year-old kid, pretending to play piano and harmonica in front of his family and friends. It was damn fun. I also fault Mark for my love of Steve Miller. I remember him choosing "The Joker" as another one of his masterpieces as we sat tent-side. We all sang along after the 50th time it played on the tape deck.

Mark changed the way I looked at music. I don't know that I'd heard Steve Miller or Billy Joel before these camping trips, but I clearly remember going home and buying a Steve Miller cassette because of it - or hearing Billy Joel on the radio and freaking out. That was Mark's doing. It influenced what station I listed to (KQ back then) and steered me away from the Top 40 - which looking back was a huge favor. I don't listen to much Steve Miller or Billy Joel anymore, but I still own their CDs and vinyl.

Some people come into your life for a reason. That reason may seem silly at the time and it usually doesn't sink in until something tragic happens. I hadn't seen Mark in a long time before he chose to take his life. I wish I had. He's forever ingrained in my memory and I thank him for what he did for me. Partially because of what he did, I am fully immersed in music. It plays 24/7 either out loud or in my head. Mark is and was part of that. I'll miss him.

Billy Joel - Piano man
Uploaded by bebepanda

HOW does he do it? Deal with the devil. I swear.

Seriously. You can't tell me that Zach Condon is of this earth. He just can't be.

I keep meaning to post these on here, and then I forget. My apologies for not gracing your life any earlier with these utterly fantastic videos.

Enjoy. Breathe. Live. Love. Sigh... SWOON.



You can check out all the videos here. They were recorded in Brooklyn and in Paris and really show off the talent of the entire band. There is no need for Pro Tools here folks. Keep it real. Keep it simple. Keep it music.

Things Are What You Make of Them

It's official. This has become a monthly blog... or something. I've been overrun with work, school, and shows. It's truely ROCKtober here in Minneapolis and there's so much good music coming to town (or just did) that I gotta have a breakdown in responsibility somewhere. Unfortunately this blog has been the first thing to go.

Rocktober in Minneapolis brings bands like Elvis Perkins in Dearland, Girl Talk, White Rabbits (omgwhiterabbits!*&!), Tokyo Police Club, Spoon, Voxtrot, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Regina Spektor, Ted Leo, Final Fantasy, New Pornographers, Architecture in Helinski, Brandi Carlile, The Polyphonic Spree, and Bishop Allen. Oh, and that's just a smattering. Can you see why my head threatens to explode?

To give you a starter taste of my concert attendance, I decided to begin with a band I saw and fell in love with at SXSW this past March, and just again at The Entry on Monday.

Bishop Allen is one of those bands that most people don't love or hate. They're sort of in the middle somewhere. They make enjoyable music for all people. It's low key, it's intelligent, and it's poppy. It's great background music with a smattering of tracks that I have to have in my listening rotation. There's never been a Bishop Allen track I haven't liked, and there are a few I'm in love with. "Things Are What You Make of Them," "Click Click Click Click," "The News From Your Bed," and "Little Black Ache" are all must-haves for me. Luckily, I have a few of my favs, along with a few tracks from their newest album, Bishop Allen & The Broken String, for free downloading at the bottom of this post. Check it out... and keep going to shows!







Download mp3s:
Click Click Click Click
Things Are What You Make of Them
The Bullet and Big D
Calendar
Rain



Buy their new album!

An Unintentional Accident

So they've been around the Twin Cities scene for a while, so much so that they rarely play anymore, but how the hell did I miss Accident Clearinghouse? They slipped past my ears for far too long, and it's about time I remedy that. I also need to redeem myself by allowing these sweet alt-country boys to regale you with old-timey rock-tinged tunage.

I think you'll find your toes tappin' along even if you don't usually like this sort of thing. Believe me when I tell you that you will be singing along to these catchy lyrics in no time. Every person I know can relate to "That's The Way It Had To Go," in which lead Quillan Roe sings about someone he's currently obsessing over. She likes him too, but unfortunately, she's already taken. I was on you, like a vulture in the sky, hovering, waiting for your love to die. We were lovebirds, but our love could never fly. That's the way it had to go.

As I write this note, I see that Accident Clearinghouse is performing at Lee's Liquor Lounge in Minneapolis tonight. There are no other dates on their calendar, but keep your eyes peeled for future performances. If their recorded music is any indication, they are well worth seeing.

Download mp3s:
That's The Way It Had To Go
She'll Take Your Name
Pink, Not Blue
If I Said You Were A Nurse
Flamin' Hair

UPDATE (9/3/07): Accident Clearinghouse will be playing the Revival Show on September 16th at the Turf Club... Let's Go!

White Rabbits

Sometimes there are bands people rave about, but for some reason or another you brush them off. Why this happens I don't know. For me, I brushed off White Rabbits. I'd heard how great they were and blah blah, but didn't really make an effort to listen to their music.

Fate intervened, however, and White Rabbits played an afterparty I was lucky enough to attend at Lollapalooza this past weekend. I think my jaw literally hit the floor after about 30 seconds of watching this band perform. There are two drum kits, two guitarists, a bassist and a keyboard wielding madman... of course, none of the members of White Rabbit seem tethered to any one instrument so maybe it's pointless to tell you what they do - it might be easier to tell you what they don't do... accordion?

The best song they played was "Sea of Rum," which started with Steve Patterson hitting up a drum instead of piano keys. It continues with wonderfully free vocals by the other lead Greg Roberts. You can't help but be enthralled with the movement and the lyrics. My other favorite off their new album Fort Nightly, is "Kid on My Shoulders," which begins with a beat you can't help but feel the need to do some sort of ballroom partner dance to. It's reminicent of Beirut or We All Have Hooks for Hands. They boys are a joy to watch and when you get home from the show, you have their album to look forward to. Go pick it up now. DO IT.


Download mp3s:
The Plot
Kid On My Shoulders

Daytrotter Session - including 3 free downloads:
Click Here

Day of Fratellis

Yup. This past weekend found me rolling on the ground, swooning. Ok, that's not totally true... just mostly true. The boys that do this to me are again, from Glasgow, but they're a little more well known thanks to a commercial for a device called the iPod.

I was lucky enough to be able to see The Fratellis down at SXSW - in fact, that's one of the reasons I went to SXSW in the first place. They were ok, but I found them to be less than stellar as far as performers go. I was a bit disappointed. Music is easy to forgive, however, and I found myself getting more and more amp'd to see them play here in Minneapolis. They had two shows scheduled, one an in-store at The Electric Fetus, and the next a full concert at the Varsity Theater.

The in-store was what I was most excited about since I love the acoustic tracks I've been able to get from The Fratellis website and EPs. It's a bit easier to muscle through the accents and it shows that they actually have talent. The in-store was wonderful and they played some great versions of songs like "Ole Black 'n' Blue Eyes" and "Flathead." I got to meet the boys and had them sign a CD for me... I'm such a geek.

Next was the full-on rock 'n roll show and I found them to be much more (whew!) entertaining than I had in Austin. Probably because they played somewhere around 8000 shows in four days back then, and only had 2 today. One would think there's actually a bit more time for relaxation this go 'round. The set was tight, upbeat, and well choreographed. I don't say that to mean that it seemed stiff, because it didn't, but it did leave me wondering if they really meant it when they said "we haven't played this in a while" before "Creepin' Up the Backstairs." Regardless, it was an upbeat, Scot-pop (yup, new word) extravaganza and I can't wait to see them this weekend at Lollapalooza. Wheeee!!!

The rest of my photos from Sunday can be seen here:
Fratellis on my Flickr

For more information on the band:
Official Fratellis Website

Download for Windows (boo):
Flathead

If you sign up to be a member on The Fratellis website, there are nine free downloads - really great stuff:
Members Page (FREE)