A guilty pleasure

The nice side effect of living under a rock is that you tend to get good surprises when you leave your little shelter.

Let's take the example of Calvin Harris. This young (he turned 24 a few weeks ago) Scot from Dumfries released his first album, the very modestly titled "I Created Disco", in June 2007 in the UK and in September 2007 in the US, and I just heard about it this very morning.

So you know the story, EMI discovered his myspace page in 2006, signed him and sent him in studio with his old Amiga to produce not only his album but also singles for Róisìn Murphy, Kylie Minogue and Sophie Ellis-Bextor. Two EPs and an album in the UK Top 10, a tour of UK and Australia fronting a full live band later, Harris will eventually cross the pond to attend the Winter Music Conference in Miami, FL at the end of next March, and Coachella next April.

OK, the album is not original, it really drags at times, it's a tad childish (yay! drugs! girls! drugs and girls!) and lacks the depth of, say, a LCD Sound System whose influence can be felt throughout the disc (the opening of "Merrymaking..." sounds an awful lot like "Daft Punk is playing..."), but it's a first album by an early twentysomething and it's tongue-in-cheek enough, so we can be forgiving.

In any case, a song like "Acceptable in the 80s" is quite infectious. "I got hugs for you/if you were born in the 80es", that's so totally like my love life. (OK, let's forget about the second half of the 80es, it's enough of a mess as it is that I don't want any legal complications on top of that).

MP3: Acceptable in the 80s (GTI)

This week-end in shows

Fri. 02/08

The Buddy System [40W]
Fifth show of our friends from the Buddy System, and a new animation ! TBS keep their CMYK trademark, but exit the cats, the cute monsters and evil horses. This time, Mat and Lauren's actual profiles appear face-to-face in their respective color, each pronouncing part of the lyrics. Musical departure as well from TBS' usual pop, as the song ends in a tribute to 2-tone (well, with some variations that you can guess). Excellent tune, quite original, one of their best so far. Moremoremore !


Dancer vs. Politician [Flicker]
Sanni Baumgärtner's Dancer vs Politician used to have two incarnations: one in Berlin (EU), and one in Athens, GA. Now that Sanni moved back to Athens for good, she recomposed the band's line up. The emotion is still intact, don't worry, you'll recognize the quiet and soothing ballads of "A City Half-Lost", a highly recommended album that has a very special place in my heart.
MP3: Mach Dich Los
MP3: Justin Fairborn


Sweet teeth [40W]
Sweet Teeth is a super band composed of members of Dark Meat, Long Legged Woman, among others. If you have never seen Sweet Teeth, picture some drony, hypnotic, improv' jam, with a million people on stage. It's actually better than you may fear.
MP3: Improvisation.


Mouser [40W]
I only caught a bit of Mouser, which is OK, as a little goes a long way. There are nights where the chaotic horn section really support the band, other nights where they don't. I can't tell which one was which, I wasn't very attentive.


Knyfe Hyts [40W]
More psychedelic heavy droning with Knyfe Hyts, a trio from Brooklyn, NY, who made me believe I was in the middle of some sun dance.

And then, I had to leave to attend some friends' dance party. And yes, I ruled the floor, thanks to the loveliest help possible. "Daft Punk is playing in my house, my house..."
__________

Sat. 02/09

There should be some kind of law or city ordinance for restaurants to have two waiting lists in parallel, one for kids under 24 (unaccompanied, I won't shoot myself in the foot more than necessary) and another for the rest of us normal people (put ironic smileys where suitable). Else, you'll end up waiting far too long before switching to another place, and you'll eventually be late for the first show of the evening:

Andy From Denver [Flicker]
Andy plays a very short set, so it's easy to miss most of it. I caught only three songs, about half the set, and that's a shame. It seems I missed some episode involving the famous Nintendo power-glove I mentioned in a previous post.

Miwa Gemini [Flicker]
Miwa Gemini, with Brian (on xylophone) and Sasha (her porcelain cat) delivered us her gentle, endearing ballads. Her cover of "Que sera sera" got the whole audience singing. Miwa's new album, "This Is How I Found You", will be released on Mar. 18. It definitely has a Southern feel to it, more so than on "Forgetful Ocean": in a way, it reminds me of Julee Cruise. You want it.
MP3: Crazy Over You
MP3: Forever For Never
MP3: Sad about Joe


Ham 1 [Flicker]
Athens' Ham 1 were headlining. Their shows remind me a family reunion where the cousins grab their instruments and start rocking out (supposing that on top of being great people, your cousins are also very talented musicians). Their first self-titled album had one of the best melancholy pop-folk song ever, "The Gift", that fortunately is now played live on a regular basis. The latest album, the excellent "The Captain's Table", was released last September on Orange Twin. Check the video of "Saluki", a track that would have fitted well on the second half of The Pixies' "Bossanova". A new album has already been recorded, and it should be available online some time next month. For now, there are no plan for the release of an actual CD, which definitely cuts costs, time and worries.
MP3: The Gift
MP3: Hare Lipped Bust
MP3: White Rat


Dark Meat / Face Off [40W]
Special evening at the 40W, organized like the day before by Mercer West. Take a member of the ever-expanding Dark Meat band/collective, pair him or her with another musician not from the band (a "civilian"), and give them 10 minutes. You can end up with some surprising moments. The last piece I managed to catch was disappointing, however, with some naive video made of old and new U.S. propaganda pieces overlaid by some droney keyboards and guitar that could have been interesting if the white-mask-wearing duo that was on stage had actually bothered writing a full tune, and not just an intro. Oh well.
__________

As a friend noticed, between Dark Meat and Ham 1, that was a butcher's delight night. That observation initiated another discussion: we already have several super-bands in Athens (Sweet Teeth, Supercluster...), all connected one way or another to Dark Meat. There's the need for a new one, The Vegan Option. Apply within.

[Edit 02/11: some spelling/grammar corrections]
[Edit 02/12: Go check out Mike White's photos of Friday evening !]

Frenchie Oldies #1

Mmh, according to google-analytics, I have a base readership of about 10 people, mostly from Georgia, US. Guys, I know who you are. I know as well you'll be kind enough to let me indulge in some educational nostalgia. So, let's start a new series, "Frenchies Oldies".

1981 was a pivotal year in France. Mitterrand was elected in May, the first socialist president of the Ve Republic. Hopes were high. Would times be a-changing ? What would come next ?

Then, that. Chagrin d'amour, "Chacun fait (c'qui lui plaît)" (which translates as "Everyone does (what they want)").
Written by Philippe Bourgoin and Gérard Presgurvic, performed by Gregory Ken (real name Jean-Pierre Trochu) and Valli Kligerman (a NYC native), remixed by Dominique Blanc-Francard, "Chacun fait" quickly became a hit. Remember that at that time, rap music wasn't popular at all in France, and you would have to wait 1982 and Grandmaster Flash's "The message" for rap to gain some mainstream visibility.

The plot is quite simple : 5:00AM, a lonesome alcoholic suffering from insomnia runs out of booze and cigarettes. He drives through Paris to get a last drink, ends up in a dive bar, where he picks up a hooker. Hotel, he doesn't come, she goes back home.

The story is narrated at the first-person (by the guy on the first three verses, by the girl on the last two, the fifth verse being an almost word-for-word repetition of the first one), with some interruptions by a third party on the mode of interview (or police questioning, as hinted by the video-clip ?) before the chorus, supposed to be playing on the radio. Partly psychological analysis, partly social commentary on a playful yet melancholy tone, "Chacun fait" illustrates a feeling of alienation, foreshadowing the individualism of the 80es. Of course, it's only now that I can understand the content(s) of this song. The lyrics were way over the head of the third grader I was at the time. But I knew some of them by heart, like many of my schoolmates, and they still resonates more than 25 years later...

Unfortunately, Chagrin d'Amour never really made it and remained a one-hit wonder. They released two albums in 1982 and 1984 which never achieved any real commercial success. Gregory Pek was the voice presenting the programs on Canal + in the 90es, a trendie channel at the time, until he passed away in 1996 from a throat cancer. Valli got a solo career in the 80es, before having her own radio show about the music industry. Presgurvic wrote songs for several French artists, composed soundtracks and wrote a musical based on Romeo and Juliet in 2001 (with another based on "Gone with the wind" in preparation) (God help us). Bourgoin also wrote songs for other artists in the 90es. "Chacun fait" remains a classic. It has even been recently covered in Japanese...

The clip (an extract of):

Chagrin D'amour - chacun fait ce qui lui plait - clip video

MP3: Chagrin d'Amour: Chacun fait (c'qui lui plaît).
MP3:Tomuya: Chacun fait (Lost in Paris).

Super Ash Wednesday

No, I didn't vote (I'm not allowed to in the States), no I didnt' get to eat any bugnes, but I let the good times roll by attending a show in the Hidden Hamster, a famous DYI venue a few blocks away from my place.

Christopher's Liver opened the evening. I don't have to introduce them if you leave in Athens. If you don't, Christopher's Liver is a duo of very kind people, Christopher Ingham on guitar, Laura Swindall on drums, who play some very heartfelt folk-pop. It's lo-fi, it's a tad off-kilter at times, but that's just charming. The duo will soon take a break for a few months, as Christopher planned to spend some times in Lyon, FR. The bugnes' season will be over, but that shouldn't matter much, eh ?

Vytear is Jason Begin from Philadephia, PA, playing solo keyboards, samplers and loops for a fairly efficient cocktail of electro/drum and bass/industrial jungle, with the occasional reference to Aphex Twin. That kind of danceable electro is relatively uncommon in our neck of the woods, so that was a pleasant surprise. And Vytear produced the first album of our next band:

Pony Pants, a trio from Philadelphia, two brothers (Steve and Ryan Ellis) on guitars and Emily Kovach on vocals, with a drum machine for the beats. They play some kind of dance-punk with heavy metal riffs. Even if I'm slowly getting used to metal and its derivatives, it stills tend to get on my nerves rather quickly. However, it worked great with them.

Athens' Pegasuses XL closed the evening with their heavy synths and live beats, after a fairly long break (a couple of kids got robbed by gun-point on the other side the venue, which brought us police forces but got us rid of the polo-shirt parasites. Everything's fine, don't worry). The show was chaotic, with shoes and pants flying around, but that was exactly the point: they were full of energy, unashamed and unabashed, they were having lots of fun and it was quite communicative. Mercer West (Mouser, Quiet Hooves and many, many more...) even joined them for an harmonica jam, certainly an highlight of the evening. Remember that their EPs are available for donation download at Quote Unquote Records, and that their next record, "The Antiphon", will very soon be available on EJRC.

A side note as conclusion: DIY venues such as the Furtive Ferret provide a service to the indie community, it's a place where to discover new bands or support the ones you know already. The donations may be on a voluntary basis only, that doesn't mean it's free. It's not a keg party, it's a show. Don't look offended when you're asked for a spare buck, it helps the band to pay for gas. Kids nowadays...

MP3:
Christopher's Liver: Thank you for the nostalgia...
Vytear: Milli Vanilli Midi Moves
Vytear: Keyed
Pony Pants: Slay The Ego
Pony Pants: Haircutz
Pegasuses XL: Run The Gauntlet
Pegasuses XL: Every House Is Not A Homie

[Edit 02/08]: Spelling corrections.

Think about a happy place...

...and it may look like Athens, GA.

I mean, where else can you get a PBR and end up watching "A Midsummer Night's Dream" (the 1935 version) while listening to some indie-pop ?

Where else could you run into friends just past midnight, and find yourself in a restaurant attending a show from New Sound of Numbers ? That was Fri. 02/01 evening. Pretty good show, actually. Randy B. is a perfect addition to the band, bringing a more organic aspect to the music. And they sounded great !

And then, there are the local dens. Sat. 02/02 at Caledonia brought us The Buddy System, The Young Sinclairs and 63 Crayons.
Great show of TBS, as usual. With the upcoming free Jammy Jamm gig at the 40W next Friday (08/02), that'll be their fifth show, the third in barely two weeks. With such a busy schedule, they couldn't give us any new song this time, but they're working on one for Friday, the goal being to have a 20 min set for SXSW. The night's surprise was the introduction of the guitar hero controller to control some of the animations...
The Young Sinclairs, from Roenoke, VA, play some awesome 60es British invasion / psychedelic pop à la Kinks. They have already three albums behind them, none being distributed yet. And yet is the operational word here. The show itself was great, if you forgot some sound problems, the voices being far too in the foreground. And between us, I'm no big fan of the singer's voice. He must have heard this one fairly often, as one of their songs start with the lines "I know you don't like the way I sing my songs / But does it mean we cannot get along ?". Rest assured that we can, mate. Anyway, I can urge you enough to go and check them out. The lead guitar/singer used to drum for the next band:
63 Crayons broke their sampler as they were going on stage, which created yet more confusion soundwise, so much that I left relatively early. I liked what I heard, or could hear should I say. Yep, there are nights like these.

Or afternoons like today that remind you that in Athens, GA, springtime can be right around the corner. And before leaving, have a look on Saturday's pictures on Mike W.'s site. You'll get an idea of what you missed.

Another Z movie...

Blood of the Beast, by Georg Koszulinski (2003).

2012 marks the end of the Third World War. One third of the total population of the globe died from the chemical warfare, 98% of the surviving male population is sterile, and cloning becomes the principal mode of reproduction. "All is for the best in the best of all possible worlds" until 2031, where problems arise. Clones of the first strand start exhibiting strange behavior: nose bleed, epileptic convulsions, necrosis of the front lobe, hyper-aggressivity, and a certain taste for human flesh: in short, they become zombies.
Three groups of characters are followed in parallel: three hikers in their early twenties, one of them has been bitten to the arm by a zombie; three youngsters fleeing town and trying to catch up with the hikers; a father and his teenage daughter, who found refuge with a Southern Baptist preacher in the countryside. Meanwhile, chaos reigns in town, and some First Strand inmates escaped from the local military base.

Shot on DV with a microbudget around Gainesville, FL and the Ocala National Forest, Blood of the Beast is rather trying. Forget the Blair Witch Project meets the Night of the Living Dead plot, the inexperience of the actors that give rather terrible performances, and the overall very cheap-looking aspect, that's sort of part of the charm of the movie. My beef is simple : the whole movie reeks a UFL film school graduating project. As writer-director-editor-actor, Koszulinski aims at artsyness: slow-motions (oh, Atom Heart Mother), surimpressions, experimental soundtrack, weird camera angles supposed to emphasize the confusion of the protagonists, pseudo-philosophical consideration, heavy handed references (Brave New World, Murnau's Nosferatu...)... The end of the movie is characteristic: shot with a night-vision lens, the scenes are silent, the dialogs appearing as inserts. Call me square or bourgeois, but effects of this kind do not bring anything to the story and look gratuitous and fake. The movie tries far too hard for its own good (and the pleasure of the audience). According to imdb, it was Koszulinski's first full-length. Since then, he released a few other fictions and documentaries, that I haven't seen yet. I can only hope that they avoided the artistic pitfalls of this Blood of the Beast.

As you guessed, I didn't enjoy the movie at all. But I didn't enjoy hating it or laughing at it either, on the contrary. I feel actually compelled to support the approach: after all, it's a first movie, it's indie, and we all know what a dreadful place the world would be without alternatives to mass cultural products. Despite all its shortcomings, Blood of the Beast exists as a piece. That should be enough. Hey, not everybody can be Marker. So forget what I said, forget this movie, and keep it going.

A week in gigs

I'm behind in posts, so let's wrap up this week in shows:


Mon., Jan. 21st - 40W
Tin Cup Prophette + Murder Mystery + Little Francis

Despite one of the coldest nights of the winter so far in Athens, and... a Monday (glad you follow), there was a non negligible audience (understand about 40, 50 people) for that show. I assume that the Hillary's laudative review of Murder Mystery in the Flagpole and Gordon's plug helped, or maybe was it just the presence of Tin Cup Prophette, or the debut of Little Francis who brought their friends as support.

I caught only a few songs of TCP, but was still impressed. Amanda Kapousouz had definitely a huge stage presence, huge like in 8.5 months pregnant. Nevertheless, that didn't prevent her to give us a nice soothing dose of her folksy trip-hop. Highly recommended to fans of Portishead.

Murder Mystery is a quartet (3 guys, one gal) from NYC, currently promoting their first album "Are you ready for the heartache cause here it comes". They play what would be lazily described as indie pop with slight country western overtones, or a musical equivalent of sherbet: it's refreshing, quite enjoyable, but not filling. The show itself was fairly OK. They lost some points for complaining about the lack of dancers (only a couple of people were actually dancing, while the rest of us were cosily sitting on their chair), and for trying to play games with the Athenians: "Athens is a hip town, right ? So you'll know what cover we're about to play...". FYI, that was an Orange Juice song, "Poor Old Soul" if I remember correctly. All in all, a good show, but nothing extraordinary. Their album is definitely worth listening a couple of times. Of the two MP3s linked with this post, "Honey Come Home" is the most representative.

Little Francis are four dudes, three on acoustic guitars and the last one banging on some stuffs. Don't ask me more, I was not paying attention and left in the middle of their song, it was cold.

MP3: Tin Cup Prophette:Going Numb
MP3: Tin Cup Prophette:Speak or Spill Down
MP3: Murder Mystery: Love Astronaut
MP3: Murder Mystery: Honey Come Home


Thu., Jan 24th - Flicker Bar
Joe Rowe's Coming Out Party

First show of Joe Rowe's (of The Glands and Casper and the Cookies fame) new band. Joe sings and plays keyboards, along with fellow Cookie Jim H. on drums, Eli on guitar and Adam on bass. Good solid indie-rock, great first show (sounding even better when you know they practiced only four times as a 4 piece), with a cover of Echo and the Bunnymen as a bonus ("Villiers Terrace"? "Do it clean"? I'm not sure. Correct me in the comments). Most (all) of the songs were actually written for Joe's other, semi-aborted projects, The Ice Caps and The Goons. Guys, congrats again, and we want another show very very soon!
MP3: JRCOP: Green Umbrella



Thu., Jan 24th - Caledonia Lounge
Attached Hands - Caledonia Social Club

Attached Hands are a duo playing live keyboards on pre-recorded samples, with some psychedelic animations in the background. Boards of Canada, anyone ?

Caledonia Social Club is a shoegaze jam experiment involving members of Local bands such as Maserati, A. Armada and others. Fairly efficient, but you definitely have to be in the mood. It took me 15 min. to realize that in fact, no, not that night...



Fri., Jan 25th - Go bar
The Buddy System - Pegasuses XL

The Go Bar was packed for the third Buddy System show, so packed that it was easier to brave the cold and watch the animations from the outside patio than trying to peep through the crowd. If you still don't know anything about the Buddy System, I can't really do anything for you: check some previous posts, and go and see their coming fourth show on Sat., Feb. 2nd at the Caledonia Lounge, where they'll support 63 Crayons and an exciting band of Roenoke, VA, The Young Sinclairs . Note that Friday was the premiere of the Buddies' new animation,"Nature's Tiny Realm".

Because of conflicting schedules, I missed Pegasuses XL. Shame, shame, shame on me.


Fri., Jan 25th - Farm 255
The Ice Cream Socialists - Casper and the Cookies

Because of conflicting schedules, I missed the Ice Cream Socialists, but frankly... Casper and the Cookies delivered us an strong, honest show, mostly consisting of songs from the "Optimist Club". After all, that show was more a live practice before their Japan tour than anything. No big surprises here, a good time for all the family.


And that's all for this week. Stay tuned for more goodies.