Emo kids of the world...

Yesterday, I ran into an article of Wired about demonstrations of Emo Kids in Mexico, protesting the recent raise of violent anti-emo acts over the country. As stated by Wired,

A series of attacks on dyed-hair, eye-makeup-wearing emo kids began in early March when several hundred people went on an emo-beating rampage in Querétaro, a town of 1.5 million about 160 miles north of Mexico City.

The next week, shaggy-haired emo teenagers were harassed again by punks and rockabillys in the capital, prompting police protection and a segment on the TV news. Most recently, a Mexican newspaper reported that metal heads and gangsters have warned Tijuana's emo kids to stay away from the town's fair next month.

But the so-called emos are organizing, too. Last week, they demonstrated against the violence, pictured above, and Wednesday some met with police in Mexico City.

My first reaction was a smirk: emo kids being beaten by punks and goths ? It's so sad I want to cut myself and cry about it. Typical.

But then, I realized that it's actually quite sickening and frightening: it is not because I personally find the emo culture ridiculous that I can condone the violence against followers, on the contrary. The situation is escalating: as reported by The Daily Swarm, the riots are now spreading to Northern Mexico, with attacks reported in Juárez and Tijuana. It is not especially new nor confined to Mexico only either. A month before, in Chili, an attack of emo kids by skinheads was also signaled. A few months ago, a gang of teenagers assaulted a couple of goths in Lancashire, eventually killing a young woman, as covered by the BBC:

A 15-year-old boy kicked and stamped to death a woman because she was dressed as a Goth, a court heard.
The drunk teenager was among a gang of five who “savagely and mercilessly” attacked Sophie Lancaster, 20, and her boyfriend, Preston Crown Court heard.
Miss Lancaster was begging the gang to stop beating Robert Maltby, 21, when they turned on her in Stubbylee Park in Bacup, Lancashire, the jury was told.

Now, substitute "emo" or "goth" by any other minority (racial, sexual) and be afraid, be very afraid of the world in which we are living.

Lost Post #1 - week 13

"Where did time go" was the motto of that week: following the lateness pattern initiated the previous week, I ended up missing most shows.

Tue. 03/04
I was pretty thrilled to hear that the HEAP (ex HEAP project) was playing at Caledonia, along Diet Rock Stars and Kenosha Kid. For once however, the show was early and on time, with HEAP opening, so they were already done by the time I showed up. Pity, for I'm a big fan. HEAP is fronted by Bryan J. Howard on bass and vocals, accompanied Jeff Rieter (bass), Ian Werden (drums), Jim Wilson aka Diego Catalan (percussions), Paul Kim (keyboards) and a horn trio (Jeff Crouch on trumpet, Marcus Gilley and Chris Costigan on sax). It's groovy in an indie-meets-funk way, it's roughly Athens response to Morphine, it's unique in our area, it's definitely worth many listens. An album is in preparation and should hopefully be available in June. A couple of shows will be announced before that. Stay tuned.

So I moved next door to the 40 Watt and caught Bomb The Music Industry!. BTMI! is a collective from Baldwin, NY, formed in 2004 around Jeff Rosenstock, with members as famous as Matt Kurz (the Matt Kurz one) or Jeff Tobias (We versus the Shark, Pegasuses XL). It's punk, with some horns: that's not sufficient to qualify it as ska, but that gives a nice Mano Negra feel to it... They ranted against our local institution, Flagpole, maybe because the journal nominated them for the Worst Band Name of 2007, category "OMG Get Excited!!!!". Anyway, that was the last night of their tour, they had to go back to their day jobs in Brooklyn, NY just after.

Pegasuses XL were headlining and celebrating the release of their first album, The Antiphon, on Ernest Jennings Record Co. Very efficient show, Becky "Cars Can Be Blue" Brooks on backing vocals on The Big Haunt. No running-around-the-block pre-show antics this time, just a big group hug, but the feeling was there.

I highly recommend you to lend an ear or two to Antiphon, for it is a very homogeneous album that you should find filed under electro-punk-rap. It doesn't sound as Add N to X-meets-Ladytron than their first EPs, it doesn't have the brutal impact The Midnight Aquarium had (I guess the surprise effect gets diluted with time), it is surprisingly subdued: at a time when twee kids listen to Bearsuit, one would expect Pegasuses to be more in your face. Take a song like Marathon Mansion from the Antiphon and compare it to Run the Gauntlet from their first EP: both are great, mind you, but my preference goes to the second. Still, go and get Antiphon, you won't be disappointed.

MP3s
Pegasuses XL - Run the Gauntlet
Pegasuses XL - Marathon Mansion
Pegasuses XL - The Big Haunt (that's the hit!)

Pictures of the 40W show are available on Mike White's site.
____

Wed. 03/05
A gazillion bands were playing at Little Kings that evening: Madeline, Heather Hines and Liza Sullivan (ex Flash to Bang Time), Ham 1, Nana Grizol, and we ended with the unfortunately too scarce Circulatory System. As usual for this kind of occasion, it's more of a family reunion than an actual evening of shows. Well, it is both, let's say.

____

Fri. 03/07
Second round for Liza backing up Heather Heyn (Vicariously Through Cats) at Flicker this time, with Andy From Denver headlining. I already gave reviews of Andy's shows, so I won't keep you longer. Andy put a very nice stunt by recording some of his between-songs banters, which gave a rather hilarious and surrealistic view of his mind's inner workings ("Oh, to fight the stress, I could just picture everybody naked. Not the guys, though, not the guys."). Andy is currently touring for 2-3 weeks with Keith John Adams in the East Coast/Midwest starting 03/20, so catch the mates while you can.

___

Sat. 03/08
If you have any idea of my whereabouts on that day, drop a line...


Photo by Mike "Deadly Designs" White

Back online, with Stars in my eyes...

Back online eventually, after some exhausting but fun weeks without regular internet connection. I missed several posts, prepared off-line but not quite finalized yet, so bear with me for a little while.

The big event of this past Easter week-end was a concert of Stars at the Georgia Theatre. Stars have a very special place in my indie-pop life. Just before I moved to the States, early 2001, my little brother gave me a couple of CDs of MP3s. On one of them was Nightsongs, Stars first LP, that I listened to regularly throughout that year (and still do, using it as an introduction).

Early 2002, I attended one of their gigs in a goth club NYC, and chatted with them afterwards. Overall, I must have seen them 6-7 times in the course of two years, sometimes in unfortunate but memorable circumstances - a CMJ where all their gear got stolen, another show in Rochester, NY where a botched promotion brought a total of 4 paying tickets, included my ride and myself and the drummer's aunt and uncle, a butt-freezing Valentine's day in Montreal, QC - sometimes in just plain awesome circumstances (with Broken Social Scene later that same CMJ).
Of course, we ended up sympathizing. It's through Stars that I discovered Metric (for a late-night show at the now defunct Coral Room, NYC and its mermaids behind the bar), BSS and consorts, it's through Stars that I met James Husband for the very first time (he was playing tambourine with them at the famous Stars/BSS CMJ show). I hadn't seen them since I moved to Athens: the last times they played in the area were in Atlanta, at times where I couldn't get a ride. So I was quite excited to learn they would play in town.

Early show, Pash (Washington DC) and Martin Royle (from Washington Social Club) were opening. I didn't think much of Pash, seeing Marty again was fun (he played regularly with Stars as soon as 2003), but all in all, I wasn't there for them. Stars then came on a stage covered with red roses that would later be thrown to the audience. They opened with two songs from their latest LP In Our Bedroom After The War: The Beginning After The End and The Night Starts Here (this one marred by some serious issues with the microKorg, Torquil would joke about not being in a folk band afterwise). They followed by Set Yourself On Fire from their previous opus, The Ghost Of Genova Heights, from IOBATW, and many more. Not much from their first works, but a completely new rendition of Going, Going, Gone. I was a tiny bit disappointed they didn't play Peak Hill, but it was a great show nevertheless.

Then, I should have run to the 40W where The Buddy System and Folklore were headlining a nth JammyJam Party. By the time Stars finished playing, I would have missed most of the TBS show anyway, so I hanged around backstage, greeted Dottie a happy birthday (Stars did so on stage earlier), and had long chats with Torquil, Chris, Amy and especially with Evan, about their growth from a four-piece bedroom-electro pop band from Ottawa/Brooklyn/Toronto to the internationally successful 6-piece they are today (Pat the drummer joined in 2003, and a 6th member was backing Amy on guitar), and their uncompromising attitude towards their career. Don't expect any Stars song in a commercial any time soon, they don't want that to happen, they want to keep their credibility intact. Stars are indie and proud of it, and I'm very proud of them. Good job guys, now I'll make sure not to wait 4 years before seeing you again.

MP3s
Going, Going, Gone (Nightsongs)
The Face (Dead Child Stars EP)(good luck finding this one...)
My Favorite Book (In Our Bedroom After The War) (dedicated to whom should have been here)
The Ghost Of Genova Heights (In Our Bedroom After The War)

FOG #5 - Marquis de Sade

New installment of our "Frenchies Oldies" series...
Most of the times, when people think about French music, they think ye-ye (Dutronc, Hardy, Gainsbourg in the 60es) or realist (Piaf, Brel), and that's about it. Fine, but we have more, far more to offer.

What about Post-punk, for example ? In a town that gave us Pylon and The B-52's, everybody loves post-punk, right ? And it's coming back among the cool kidz, so... Well, surprise, we had some in France ! Not a lot, true, but quite good nevertheless.

Marquis de Sade was founded in 1977, in Rennes (Brittany, FR), around Philippe Pascal (vocals), Frank Darcel (guitar), Christian Dargelos (bass) and Pierre Thomas (drums). After gaining some regional and then national momentum that materialized in a first single in 1978, despite numerous changes in members and management (such as Eric Morinière replacing Thomas, Dargelos quitting to be eventually replaced by Thierry Alexandre, Daniel Paboeuf joining on sax) that almost caused the band to split, the band released their first album "Danzig Twist" (a pun on "Dancing to East") in September 1979.
They spent most of 1980 on the road before releasing the second album, "Rue de Siam" (a famous street in Brest, Brittany), in January 1981. After a brief tour, the band eventually split for good in April 1981. Pascal will later form Marc Seberg (originally, an hoax invented during an interview), while Darcel will join forces with the latest guitarist and drummer of MdS and form Octobre.

Marquis de Sade sang mostly in English, occasionally in French and German. The themes were dark: psychiatric internment, alienation, authoritarian states, decline and degeneration.
Some influences are easily recognizable: Television, Talking Heads, the Velvet Underground (they covered "White Light/White Heat"). But keep the dates in mind, they were real precursors in their own genre, to such an extent that famous French rock critics at the time refered to Joy Division as "the english Marquis de Sade". In any case, they had a marked influence on many French bands of that time.

I discovered Marquis de Sade late in the day, around 1990, actually through Marc Seberg. I've never been a big fan of that latter, but at least, they got me into MdS...

A fairly detailed history of the band is available here.

Clip: Conrad Veidt (from Danzig Twist), live '79:


Clip: Set in Motion Memories:


MP3s:
Danzig Twist : Henry
Danzig Twist : Conrad Veidt
Danzig Twist : Skin Disease
...
Rue de Siam : Cancer and Drugs
Rue de Siam : Final Fog

Last week in show - Missed it !

Springtime is about to settle in Athens, at last, which tends to set me in a rather cozy mood. So, minimal review of last week's shows.


Thu.02/28 - 40 Watt

Showcase for Jimmy Hughes' (Folklore, Elf Power) bumbleBEAR label, back to activity after 5 years of slumber. I showed up far too late and missed most of the bands, but did catch Titans of Filth in their newest incarnation.
A few months ago, the band lost their multi-instrumentalist Emily Armond to her many other bands (Dark Meat, Mouser,Sea of Dogs) and their violonist Ann Rogers to her personal adventures. Since then, the Titans performed a couple of shows as a trio, before welcoming guitarist Spencer Rich among them. Replacing 40% for a band by yourself is no small feat, especially when the 40% in questions were so charming and talented. Nevertheless, Spencer did a fair job. I'm not completely convinced, however. The subtle balance the Titans had achieved and which materialized in some famous shows at New-York Popfest and at Hot Corners during Athfest 2007 will probably take more tweaking and practices to be fully restored. Still, the material is as good as ever, and I'm still fan.

Don't forget to lurk around the bumbleBEAR site, a true treasure trove of MP3s goodness.

MP3s:
Titans of Filth : Our Impending Announcement
Titans of Filth : Swinging Lovers

_____

Fri. 02/29 - Flicker

Following mostly the same pattern as the previous evening, I missed Everybody Everybody, the new band of Nate Mitchell (Cars Can Be Blue, Titans of Filth), Laura Swindall (Christopher's Liver), David Specht (Quiet Hooves), who were introducing Melissa Colbert, their new singer. From the reports I heard, the show was very dance-pop, fun and quite exciting, à la ESG. I know I should have hurried, but hey.
I was too busy drowning my regrets and celebrating my first day of Spring to really pay to the New Sound of Numbers the attention they deserved, but I liked what I heard. And the evening ended in yet another awesome dance party, but alas, my favorite partner was M.I.A. So I made more of a fool of myself on karaoke hero. I suck.

_____

Sat. 03/01 - Flicker / 40W

Talk about some confusion in the organization: the 40Watt was hosting Vic Chesnutt and Jonathan Richman, while Flicker was presenting Spring Tigers, another band named after a mall, and the Besties, more or less at the same time. Too many choices!
Spring Tigers followed their new motto "tighter, faster, louder" to the best effect. Really great show.
Vic Chesnutt was entrancing, but I spent most of the show fixing my nicotine levels and trying not to break in tears. I therefore missed the verbal altercation between Vic and a spectator that may or may have not been on his cell-phone during the show.
Despite Marisa's cold (she had to whisper before the show as to save a bit of voice for the actual performance), the Besties were faithful to their name and their reputation. It'd been too long since they last paid us a visit.
Jonathan Richman was as endearing as ever... He was again accompanied by drummer Tommy Larkins, and both were promoting the upcoming release of Jonathan's next album, "Because Her Beauty's Raw And Wild". Priceless, leaves me speechless.

MP3s
Besties: The Zombie Song
Jonathan Richman: Not So Much To Be Loved Than To Love

After such a song, there's nothing much to add...

[Update 03/07/2008: Mike White posted pictures of the 40W show. Go and check!]