Category: Rock ‘n’ Roll Photog

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Late Night Listening: Fiona Apple, Every Single Night

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Or Late Night Viewing, I guess. Viewing and listening. This is the video for her new single, Every Single Night, from her new record The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do, which will be out June 19.

All I’m going to tell you is she briefly wears an octopus as a hat, there are giant snails, and the power of her voice remains undimmed by time. Also, be sure to hang on to the end. The last frame is the best part.

 

Fiona Apple - Every Single Night

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Kebu: To Jupiter and Back

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Kebu is from Finland, and To Jupiter and Back is his debut record. All of the songs on the record were made with vintage analog synthesizers and recorded using only sequencers, tape machines and analog mixers.

The results, while mechanical – it is all made on synthesizers – and somewhat bleepy-bloopy, nonetheless transcends or possibly expands the possibilities of what I had previously come to expect from non-industrial instrumental synthesizer music.

Kebu lists Vangelis as an influence – and I can hear the echoes – but his style is fresh and distinctive: conscious of form, but also shimmery, light, and playful.

This is the video for Samba Saturn, the first single:
 

Kebu - Samba Saturn

 
And this is Pulsar, the second single:
 

 
Also on the record is Michael’s Anthem, which I just really like:
 
09. Michael’s Anthem by Kebu

And finally, Le Carnaval des Étoiles, another one of my favorites:
 
07. Le Carnaval des Étoiles by Kebu

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Y’all Need to Listen to This: Blind Pilot, We Are The Tide

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Right now, as I am writing this, it about nine million degrees in my apartment – hello, early summer heatwave, how are ya? – and Blind Pilot are like a cool refreshing glass of lemonade.

There are six of them – Israel Nebeker (vocals, guitar), Ryan Dobrowski (drums), Luke Ydstie (upright bass, backing vocals), Kati Claborn (banjo, dulcimer, backing vocals), Ian Krist (vibraphones) and Dave Jorgensen (keyboards, trumpet) – and they come from Portland, Oregon, bearing delicious harmonies and lush, complex lyrics.

(Which they provide in PDF format on their website, thus endearing themselves to me even further. GO TEAM LINER NOTES!)

This is Half Moon, the first song on their new record, We Are The Tide:
 


 

And this is New York, the last song on the record, which I am posting partially because it is lovely and partially because they are playing here, in New York, at Webster Hall, on June 5:
 


 

After that the tour winds around quite a bit. And finally, for those of you squinting at festival line-ups and trying to decide which acts you’d like to catch: they’ll be at Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, the Newport Folk Festival and Firefly.

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Late Night Listening: Danny Fujikawa

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Late Night Listening: This is what I’m putting on at the end of long days in a summer that is going to be chock full of long days. It’s also what I’m listening to while I’m making flash cards for bar review.

Some of it will be soothing, some of it will be weird. Some of it may be soothing and weird, since I’m into that kind of thing. In any case, I’m listening to it and I like it, so I’m going to share it with y’all.

Today in the category of soothing and also delightful: some new(ish) tracks from Danny Fujikawa, formerly of Chief, which represent one of his many on-going projects. These are rough mixes, but I’m fond of them anyway.
 
The newest one; one of the lyrics is True love is a lie, a sentiment which warms the cockles of my blackened heart:
 
True Love 2.1 by DannyFujikawa
 
This one is actually my favorite, shhhh, don’t tell any of the other songs. Also, I kind of wish I had a car so I could drive around with the windows rolled down and this tune turned up really loud:
 
Ballad of Prince Harry by DannyFujikawa
 
This one is heavier on the guitar, and, actually, just heavier in general. Don’t let the bouncy tune fool you, this is a sad song. (Click on the song title to get to the lyrics.) (GO TEAM LINER NOTES!)
 
The Gods Must Be Crazy by DannyFujikawa
 
Because tiny blackened heart or not, I’m also always on Team Nerds In Love:
 
Science Girl by DannyFujikawa
 
And finally, have some reverb-dusted choppy synths:
 
We Aren’t We In Love by DannyFujikawa

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Lukas Nelson and Promise of the Real : Wasted

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Album art by Micah Nelson

Lukas Nelson and Promise of the Real are: Lukas Nelson (vocals/guitar), Anthony LoGerfo (drums), Tato Melgar (percussion), and Corey McCormick (bass).

If I had to find a place in the canon for them, I’d put them in next to Dan Baird and Homemade Sin and/or the Kentucky Headhunters. They have the same kind of fusion of country, blues and pure rock and roll swagger.

For example, here they are performing Wasted, the first single from this record, on Letterman. Be sure to turn it up, and then get out of your chair, because you will want to clap your hands and shake your booty around.
 

Lukas Nelson & Promise Of The Real - Wasted - David Letterman 4-3-12

 
Though Mr. Nelson can croon with the best of them. Here’s another one from the record. It’s called Can You Hear Me Love You and it’s a sweet, beautiful love song that melts my heart every time I listen to it. Which is frequently, because I love it.
 
Lukas Nelson and Promise of the Real - Can You Hear Me Love You

 
And finally, just for fun, here is Mr. Nelson singing with his father:
 
http://youtu.be/aysCPYgMQlk

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Deafheaven: Roads to Judah

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Deafheaven was initially George Clark (vocals) and Kerry McCoy (guitar), and now includes Joey Bautista (guitar), Derek Prine (bass), and Korey Severson (drums). They are from San Francisco, and Roads to Judah is their debut album.

And oh, what an album it is, too. I guess technically their genre is metal, or hardcore, or something like that – I think I saw one description that referred to it as “metal sludge” – but all of those terms are either wholly inadequate or just wrong.

Roads to Judah is a lot of things, but mostly it is awesome, in the original sense of the word: both beautiful, and a little scary. It’s majestic. It’s orchestral, if the orchestra in question had listened to Metal Machine Music several times, meditated on it for a week, and then sat down to jam about their feelings.

Here is an example of what I mean. This is Violet, the first song on the record:
 

 

And in contrast, here is Tunnel of Trees, the last song:
 

 

And here is an excerpt from their SXSW 2012 set:
 

Deafheaven - "Language Games" @ The Bat Bar SXSW '12

 
For more information visit the Deafheaven official website.

Band photo by June Zandona.

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Hella Better Dancer: Living Room

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Hella Better Dancer is Tilly Scantlebury (Vocals/Guitar), Josh Cohen (Bass), Soph Nathan (Lead Guitar/BVs), and Chris O’Driscoll (Drums). They are from London, and Living Room is the dreamy, melancholy, low-fi masterpiece they recorded using just the internal mic on a laptop.

It is only about ten minutes long, but it is a very beautiful ten minutes.

This is the video for the first track, Brother:
 

Brother - Hella Better Dancer

 
This is After School, the second track on Living Room, which, you guys, this is a gem of a song. A dark, delicate gem, glimmering amid a pile of fallen leaves in a bruised post-rainstorm landscape:
 

 
And finally, here they are live and using regular mics, at Stop Look Listen at Native Tongue with Hands, which was one of their demos:
 
http://youtu.be/nSJ3ldZAmLo
 

They also have two other EPs out, Swimming and Please Stay Here; you can hear selections from those records at Soundcloud and the band website.

Upcoming shows:
May 11, Amersham Arms, London, UK
May 19, Power’s Bar, London, UK
May 21, Birthdays, London, UK
May 24, The Lock Tavern, London, UK
May 26, Spice Of Life, London, UK
Jun 10, Sebright Arms, London, UK
Jun 16, 93 Feet East, London, UK
Jun 29, Leefest 2012, Highhams Hill Farm, Warlingham, UK

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Residency with a Twist: Rock for a Difference Los Angeles with Decoded

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Decoded will be in residence at Amplyfi on Thursdays for the month of May, and they’re doing something special with it: every show will conclude with a raffle, and the proceeds from the raffle will go to a local charity. This weeks recipient is CreateNow, and you can see the full list of bands and charities on the flyer below.

And here are some of Decoded’s tunes!

Decoded – Lost No More by Decodedmusic
 
Decoded – Open Season by Decodedmusic

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Deathline: Ten of Clubs

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This is 10 of Clubs, a song by Deathline, who are Jennie Werlemar (Vocals/Bass) and Kaoru Sato (Guitar/Programming). They are from London, and they can shred.

They also warm the cockles of the cold heart of your aging gothy correspondent. Major grinning at the computer screen and chair dancing happening here. I’m ready to dig my stompy boots and jingle-bell faerie skirt out of the back of the closet and go out on the town.

Make sure the volume on your computer is all the way up before you press play:

Deathline – Ten of Clubs by Bright Lights Management

They are also running a remix competition for this song on their Facebook, which will conclude on May 20th.

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Video Grab Bag: The Beastie Boys

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I’m pretty sure this was the first video I ever watched on MTV, somewhere around 1986-1987:
 

The Beastie Boys - (You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party)

 
I have to confess, you guys, I was 11 or 12 and had very Victorian sensibilities and had just no idea what to do with what had just happened on my television screen. Actually, my grandmother’s television screen, since I’m also pretty sure I was watching MTV with my somewhat older cousins at the time.

It’s kind of difficult to explain now, when the Beastie Boys are Grammy-winning elder statesmen (!), but then they were like a cold bucket of water in the face.

And every time I hear the opening chords of that song I feel an echo of that heady mixture of bafflement and excitement and quasi-intrigued, quasi-horrified what the hell?? as I did then. This music was a jolt. A wake-up call. I wasn’t totally on-board at the time (see above re: delicate Victorian sensibilities) but, you know, I eventually came around.

And here, if you haven’t seen it yet, is Fight For Your Right (Revisited), a short film directed by MCA, which came out last year. I suggest you read this fantastic New York Magazine article, which is an oral history of the first 25 years of the Beastie Boys, before you watch it.
 

Beastie Boys - Fight For Your Right (Revisited) Full Length

 
And then, in closing, Intergalactic, from Hello, Nasty, because I love it, and there are giant dancing robots:
 
Beastie Boys - Intergalactic

 
Rest in Peace, Mr. Yauch. We shall miss you very much.