LOU REED - METAL MACHINE MUSIC

So Beth McDonaaroooa sends me this link of John Oliver talking about this concert Lou Reed did called "Music for Dogs" with his wife, Laurie Anderson. I also thought that tonite would be a good time to talk about "Metal Machine Music".

This album is an hour of recorded feedback looped and played at various speeds. It never lets up (other than the few seconds between each track), and it might be my second favorite Lou Reed-related recording.

The sounds that come out here are just pure, unadulterated noise. Noise that sends family flying, eardrums bleeding, speakers shaking, wife's leaving and many many more. There's no rhythm, there's no melody, there's just oscillating noise for an hour (4 tracks, all about 15-16 minutes long).

To go with the topic of the Oliver bit, here's how Cabo (my dog) reacts to this album as I sit downstairs with her:

Part I - sleeping on fireplace, halfway through gets up, goes to sleep in living room, further away from me and the computer.
Part II - Cabo jumps on my lap, and begins licking my face while stopping my hand with her paw as I try to start writing this email. Eventually gives up, goes to lie down in the dining room. Now back on fireplace. (for those who don't know, the fireplace is two-way - one side is on the kitchen where I am, the other on the living room).
Part III - Still lying there. Eventually, I stood up while contemplating to get a piece of cake and she got up, ran to me, and looked at me while trying to jump on the counter, with a face that says "make it stop, please?". Now lying near the fridge.
Part IV - After the 4 seconds of silence in-between tracks, it kicks off, sounding just like the first 3 and Cabo looks at me like "JESUS CHRIST!". After this, just lies there and doesn't move until after it's stopped.

In other words, FANTASTIC ALBUM! "IV" ends with a locked groove and sounds like the dentist, and the other 3 are layers of sound that just keep going and going. Now to listen to "4'33"" for an hour...

OVERALL RATING - FREE SLURPEES!
KEY TRACKS - THE WHOLE THING

THE FLAMING LIPS - YOSHIMI BATTLES THE PINK ROBOTS

More like "Neal Battles The Urge To Not Fall Asleep While Listening to this Album"!!!

I mean, seriously! C'mon! What's all this dippy crap with the same beat, crappy Eno wannabe production, and whispered Wayne Coyne vocals! I mean, yes, you could argue that "Yoshimi Battles pt. 2" isn't any of this - but it sucks! It sounds like some guys trying to play funk under a bunch of sound effects of bubbles. WHY? the only redeming part of this is Yoshimi from the Boredoms screaming during the track.

I remember the first time I listened to this album - it was late, I was in my dorm, and like I would be for the rest of the year, I was sans-roommate. So on nites like this, I would just let music play and not wear headphones. And I got through the first song and figured I'd go to bed. Then the second song came on and that little instrumental part at the end happened, and it felt like it went on for 3 hours. Really, its about 80 seconds, but what the hell?! I don't want to hear guitar strumming and sound effects from "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" - I want to hear Wayne Coyne ripping off the Butthole Surfers, trying to sing about Jesus, Michael Ivins to be CLEAN SHAVEN and WEARING SUNGLASSES, and well, I'd prefer it Drozd stayed off the heroin, for his own life, wife and child. BUT MAKE BETTER MUSIC!

Not to say it's all terrible - "Fight Test", "Yoshimi pt. 1" and "Do You Realize??" are all great pop songs. But most of the album sounds like easy listening Lips. And why? I don't know! That's why I'm asking YOU! Why, Oriana Dunlop, does this album bore me? Why, Joelle Wagner, is this a great album to sleep to, only to awake in a friends pool of dead animals? Why, John Gargiulo begin_of_the_skype_highlighting end_of_the_skype_highlighting, don't we watch "Family Feud" together? We could be good at it!

And honestly, the teaming up of a drum set and drum machine has been done before - just ask Pat Byrne and Roland.

OVERALL RATING - overrated rat sandwich.
KEY TRACKS - "Do You Realize??", "Yoshimi Pt. 1", the last instrumental track, mainly for the trumpet. all brass, some class, mowin' the grass.

MOS DEF - THE ECSTATIC

I'm gonna be honest - I don't listen to much rap. It's not that I don't like it, but oftentimes, I feel like the people that I might be around that listen to it, listen to it for novelty. I mean, there's only so much "Straight Outta Compton" I can hear with a bunch of punk rocker guys and not feel strange. Really, are most 11 year olds at Channahon Junior High toting copies of "36 Chambers" really LISTENING, or are they just going "HAHA! He said bitch!" or "All the songs are about KARATE or something". But there is some good stuff, and I'm glad to say that this Mos Def album is pretty great.

First off - Madlib produced 4 of the tracks! And remember how much I liked Madvillian? A lot! (Thanks again Seth Kaplan) J Dilla also did one other, but he's dead now (too many DONUTS!), along with some others I don't know - but Garret might. He can't stop listening to "The Dream"!

Really, here's what happens with the album - the first track is just, in all honesty, kick ass. The sampled guitar riff just fits the song perfectly and it's one of those where you are toe tapping or smacking puppies with a baseball bat. Then the 2nd track is this little ditty thing with a marimba thing and then it leads into the first Madlib track which is just like ARGHHHHH! AND THERE'S A VIBRA-SLAP! LIKE A VIBRA SLAP! IASDKNfafjd,fsdmfdjn jhjkgh hbhbhbh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111

"Quiet Dog" is solid with all kinds of percussions, but I'm not feeling "Life in Marvelous Times". "Pistola" is a jam! "Workers Comp" samples Marvin Gaye and gets better as it goes on. Oh! "Roses" has female vocals! "History" is the J Dilla track...and "Casa Bey" is a party! So much stuff! 400 MOS DEFS! ARSON! WEDDINGS! EAR PLUGS!

OVERALL RATING - worth your time, if you have any left!
KEY TRACKS - "Casa Bey", "Pistola", "Supermagic", "Auditorium"

JOY DIVISION - SUBSTANCE

Oh Joy Division, how I truly love and hate you.

I love you because you write songs that encapsulate so many moods at once - isolation, excitement, fear, worry, joyfulness.

I hate you because some of your songs sound like Ian Curtis singing 4 octaves too low while the rest of the band plays crap that's way too atmospheric and plodding to be enjoyed by anyone other than those that are clinically depressed.

So that's why I kinda like "Substance" - it's a compilation focusing mainly on the singles and none of that boring crap that stunk up chunks of "Unknown Lesions" and "Closer (to Me, by the Cure)".

It starts off with "Warsaw", their first little single thing - Ian sounds like a snotty little Mick Jagger-type repeating "3-1-G!" (where the label would get their name from), then "Leaders of Men" - WHAT? This doesn't even sound like Ian! Where's the synths?! Who cares?! Then "Digital", where Ian hit puberty, discovered his lower voice, developed epilepsy, and did silly dances - but it's a great song! Oh, crap, I lied - there IS slow boring crap - just listen to "Autosuggestion" - 6 minutes of ;< span>>hippidy doops. Oooh! But then there's "Transmission" - DANCE DANCE DANCE TO THE RADIO!!! Too bad this song ain't on the radio, but then again, if it was, I'd crash my car doing my Ian Curtis dancing impression.

I really feel bad - there's 4 other people in the band - Peter Hook on high-register bass, drummer Stephen Morris, guitar/synth MAN Bernard Sumner, and Martin Hannett on cocaine and recordings. And they can play their instruments!

Then, "She's Lost Control" in a different recording from "Unknown Erasers", then some pop thing called "Incubation", the "classic" "Dead Souls", pre-dating U2 ambient pop song "Atmosphere" which is actually kinda nice (in the parts without vocals), then "Love Will Tear Us Apart" - which despite all of it's hype, is actually worth it. The CD version has a whopping 7 more tracks - but to be honest, I don't really listen to them - it's silly to try to put more songs like this on a close to perfect (for Joy Division, anyway) album. But they aren't terrible, and might be worth your time - Me, I'll stick to crying while listening to "Atmosphere"...

OVERALL RATING - Dave Riley's weird eyebrows.
KEY TRACKS - "Digital", "Love Will Tear Us Apart", "Transmission"

SLINT - SPIDERLAND

What exactly am I gonna say about "Spiderland" that hasn't been already said?

Well, it was released on March 27, 1991. 18 years TO THE DAY later, I'd be doing my senior recital...on that day, Albert Oppenheimer would be turning 4 (if i'm correct)...

I'm not gonna lie - I got this album kind of late. It was probably junior year of high school...and while I thought it was fantastic, it didn't blow me away at the time. This whole idea of "loud-quiet-loud" instrumental passage crap was nothing new to me. Granted, I heard the lesser imitators of Slint, but still, one hears this album and they think the Earth shakes, the ground moves, the clouds part, Ray Liotta gets dentures, whatever - and for me, it's just a solid rock album.

Granted, I could go into the songs lyrical matter, but all I know about that is what I've read in other reviews. To be honest, I really don't care that "Good Morning, Captain" is based off of "Rime of the Ancient Mariner", or "Breadcrumb Trail" is about a fortune teller in a tornado, or even that "Nosferatu Man" is about the guy who was in that movie that Tortoise scored once. For me, there's key lyrics that stand out: "wash yourself in your tears/build your church/on the strength of your fear", "we said goodbye to the ground", "I MISS YOU!!" - and those aren't even GOOD lyrics - it's all within Brian McMahan or Britt Walford (depending on the song)'s delivery.

The music itself is solid - quiet stuff, LOUD stuff, stuff with time signatures (HUGE in the world of MATH ROCK LOLLOLLOLLOLZZZZZZ), and really great sounding drums. There's even a song without drums, and then another song without words (which seems to always be building up, but never exploding in your face like a pressure cooker on Christmas), and most of the words aren't sung, they are talked or screamed. It's like living with Ray Liotta.

I've been living with Ray Liotta for weeks now. I swear, he needs new dentures.

And to be honest, there are times I don't listen to the whole album - I mean, if I'm driving, I don't want to hear the six and a half minutes of "Don, Aman" - all 390 seconds of "Don stepped outside, it felt good to be alone" in a whisper with some guitar strumming. But perhaps this isn't a driving album...then again, it's pretty great to listen to "Breadcrumb Trail" or "Good Morning, Captain" because those songs are great.

OVERALL RATING - Santiago Durango's glasses.
KEY TRACKS - "Good Morning, Captain", "Breadcrumb Trail", "Washer"

BEAT HAPPENING - JAMBOREE

Beat Happening is a band I feel strange about.
Here's why:

A) songs like "Indian Summer", "Bewitched", "Drive Car Girl" and "In Between" are pretty close to perfect pop songs.
B) songs like "Ask Me", "The This Many Boyfriends Club" and "Jamboree" sound like a bunch of cocky non-musicians that are acting like 4 year old morons yelling and clapping out of time with lyrics like "I love you like a chocolate cake....but we both know that your my dream date!" over a tambourine and drum stick clicking for 63 seconds.
C) Calvin Johnson seems like an arrogant pervert who liked having pajama parties when he was 26 years old and writing lyrics like "Lori Lori what's the story?/Why do the boys think that you're so whore-y?".
D) On that same song, it's just guitar feedback for 3 minutes, which is pretty cool.
E) Calvin Johnson also feels like Ian Curtis by singing in a voice that is uncomfortably low, out of tune, and at times, stupid sounding (which was probably the goal).
F) The sparse nature of the songs serves them well.
G) Michael Azerrad clearly has a man-crush on Calvin.
H) There are two other people in the band - Heather and Bret.
I) There are times I love this album.
J) There are times I HATE this album.
K) Right now, I'm impartial.

OVERALL RATING - AWESSSSOOOTERRIBLLLEEEYYGREAT!
KEY TRACKS - "Crashing Through", "Indian Summer", "In Between".

LOVE TRACTOR - LOVE TRACTOR

Love Tractor is a band from a mystical land called "Athens, Georgia" - where people danced in backyards, ate barbecue, and formed bands like R.E.M. and Pylon. This here, their first album is 11 songs of purely instrumental, guitar driven hoopladashery. Some songs have a keyboard and others have a sax in there, but other than that, expect drums, guitars, and a bass guitar (note: bass guitar is a different instrument than a regular guitar - please consult the wikipedia article HERE for more information).

The guitars are all chime-y and the drums are just a constant dance beat that you can bop your head to or do the Peanuts dance to like I would (see example HERE). After a while, it's easy to confuse some songs with others, but since they are all fairly good, that's not a problem. There's also some whistling. As one listens more and more, it seems like the musick begins to grow (for a picture of music growing, click HERE). Err, something. Also, Bill Berry used to drum for them before this album. And the Feelies cover "Fun to be Happy" live sometimes...

So, what's the story?

Well, when I was in high school, I had this thing called the "Documentary Channel" and it was there I first heard the Pixies (in the doc. "Gouge") and then I saw one called "Athens, GA Inside/Out" where the description said "Profiles of early 80's rock scene in Athens. Featuring R.E.M. and B-52's" or something - so I watched it! And man, was it something! There was those two bands, Pylon and this band. There were a lot more, but I can't remember them. And I remember thinking "This Love Tractor band is kinda cool". Flash forward to this past March...after having some $43 in iTunes credit, I decided to buy an album and I thought of these guys because I bought some Pylon during winter break and that was awesome and I was probably listening to "Fables of the Reconstruction" a lot and crying while trying to figure out to do with the pile of dead birds in my 2nd closet in my dorm. So I bought it and thought "Man, this is cool"...Flash forward to today...I bought some stuff from Amazon this morning, including the "Athens GA" documentary and I listened to this while driving to Lil' Cher's Pist practice with Maques Stolarts, JB Holmesskillet and Davey "Crocker Pollard" Minnice. So I thought to review it.

OVERALL RATING - better than HARRY POTTER!
KEY TRACKS - Fun to Be Happy, Seventeen Days, Buy Me a Million Dollars