2009 June | dailybeatz

Posts published during June, 2009

06/14/2009

bonnaroo preview – phish – peaces en regalia (live)

phish

well, here we are at the final day of bonnaroo. its been pretty crazy so far and we’ve done a lot of things we never thought we would do and seen a lot of things we. again this is all based on assumptions and expectations, but i hope it was all awesome. what i do know for sure that this excellent weekend will be closed out with a second performance by phish. ive seen phish probably about 10 times total over the past several years including the mud-laden coventry festival, which im praying has not been repeated these past few days. while im partially talking about the music and the performance, im mostly referring to the ridiculous insane crazy quicksand mud that seemed to engulf everything and everyone in its path. while it sucks being all muddy, the real problem i have is that youre already completely exhausted from walking, standing and dancing all day at these fests, and to have to trudge through the mud the entire day only saps away lots of that precious festival energy that youve been stocking up on for the last few weeks. it definitely wouldnt ruin my time there, but id really prefer it to not even have the chance.

phishs time slot tonight is 8pm-12am and then im sure there will be some crazy partying and then we will pass out forever and have to drive home 10 hours tomorrow. im hoping theyll be in top form after playing a few shows in the week before but anythings possible really. im looking forward to their famous light show, which you get a glimpse of above. the shot at the top of this post was my computer background for quite some time back in the day and one of my favorites, but there are a multitude of moments like this in the course of any show of theirs.

ironically, the phish track im bringing you today isnt a phish track at all. its a cover of frank zappas “peaches en regalia”. they used to play it all the time, but the legend goes that zappas family asked the quartet to refrain from performing the song in the future. im not sure why, but supposedly they did, and i dont think theyve played it since. trey has been quoted as saying that he drew a lot of inspiration from frank zappa. namely in that he inspired him to use instruments in ways they arent typically used (on a side note, i believe st. vincent aka annie clark has said the same thing about all the instrumentation on her latest album “actor”). for example, in one of his recent solo tours, he performed “sultans of swing” by dire straits regularly. instead of playing the crazy guitar solo himself, however, it was played note for note by an entire brass section. its pretty cool to hear. anyway, enjoy the track below. and dont ask what show this is from because i have no idea. i think theres also a little blip in the middle, so please ignore that.

phish – peaches en regalia

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BONUS!!!! since phish played twice at bonnaroo, im providing you with another track thats pretty neato. its called talk from the billy breathes album. soft chromatic descending baselines overlayed with jazzed up piano chords? youll like it. and it will quietly close out the weekend just as our exhausted drive home will close out our weekend. have no fear, i will spend all of tuesday at rest.

phish – talk

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06/13/2009

bonnaroo preview – yeasayer – tightrope

day 3 of bonnaroo. things have been pretty good so far, except for the herd of hippos that rolled through the campsites last night eating everything and everyone in their paths and the patchouli flu thats been spreading around the festival. just kidding, that didnt happen, or at least if it is going to happen, i dont know about it yet, because its only tuesday and i havent even left. but im going to pretend that im posting live from bonnaroo, even though theres no way in heck im bringing my computer and im pretty confident that i wont get cell phone reception in manchester, tennessee, much less a wireless internet signal. this is a little trick we use in the blogging industry called “saying its one day when its really not”. its pretty sneaky and only us insiders of the biz know about it. lucky for me, the secret dead poet free mason blogger society anonymous teaches you this little trick of the trade after youve had a blog for 3 weeks or more, so i just made the cut.

im pretty excited for the late night shows tonight. i didnt know about the late night shows until a few weeks ago, and if my prior festival experience is any indicator, i have no clue how im going to stay awake for the late night shows, but im gonna try. tonight is going to provide us with the 1-2 punch of yeasayer and mgmt. i was supposed to see mgmt at lolla last year, but we missed them due to the “brand new” debacle (for which we also missed explosions in the sky). ask me about that one later. im not still bitter at all. not in the slightest. what gave you that impression?

anyway, yeasayer is one of those groups for me that has a sound all its own. their album “all hour cymbals” is a strange mix of dark and light. id say 60% dark, and 40% light. if not, then id say 55% dark, 30% light, and 15% viking. that was an obscure reference to the drink order of jeff lewis on bravos “flipping out”. i tried for a long time to find the video clip and couldnt but you should try, its worth it. todays track, tightrope, is part of the red hot compilation entitled dark was the night, put together by the national’s aaron and bryce dessner to help fight hiv. this track is a favorite of mine from the compilation because it shows the brighter and happier side of yeasayer. what say you of this tune?

yeasayer – tightrope

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06/12/2009

bonnaroo preview – phoenix – love like a sunset

phoenix

day 2. but really its day 1 for us because based on the time we’re planning on leaving, by the time you read this we will probably have already missed all the musics from day 1. but thats ok because i didnt really really want to see anyone on day 1 except passion pit, and theres still a glimmer of hope that we made it in time for them. either way we probably had an awesome time last night because if we missed the music that means we were maybe slightly mad about it and that we probably partied really hard to make it up. maybe thats why my stomach hurts right now.

todays problem of the day is two-fold. fold 1 is that phish is playing at the same time as crystal castles, one of my “bands i really wanted to see”. the second fold is that phish is playing at the same time as phoenix, one of my “bands i really wanted to see”. but i suspect i will have many opportunities in the future to see aforementioned “bands i really wanted to see” so im quasi ok with it all.

since i will not be hearing any music by phoenix today, i decided that you probably should. ive just recently become a fan of this uber-french uber-fun uber-pop group and planned on posting 1901, a great ditty from their latest album “wolfgang amadeus phoenix”, but then i decided to post this song instead because it shows how versatile they can be even though at first glance and first listen you would think that they are straight up pop. this post is bad because i have tons of errands to run and packing to do. but enjoy the track anyway in all of its obscurity. its a 7:39 cloudy day turned dark dreary thunderstorm turned pretty excellent sunny day at the beach. i urge you to listen all the way through to the sunny day and reward yourself. if you want the straight up pop, check out “lasso” or “consolation prize”.

phoenix – love like a sunset

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06/11/2009

bonnaroo preview – passion pit – sleepyhead

passion pit

by the time you read this post, i will be well on my way to my first bonnaroo ever. i have kind of no idea what to expect, and its been a long time since ive done any sort of camping so im nervous and excited. im traveling and camping with a bunch of seasoned pros though, so im sure all will be well. the disappointing part is that out of all of the bands that i wanted to see the most, they seem to all be playing at the same time as another band i wanted to see the most. so there will be difficult decisions to be made but im going to make those decisions on the fly. itll be based on the mood im in at that moment, so ill always be seeing the perfect band for whatever mood im in. sounds like a pretty fail proof system if you ask me.

here at dailybeatz, we would like to give you a little taste of the bonnaroo experience, which is why the next four days will feature songs by artists playing each day of the festival. today we will be driving most of the day and will likely miss most of the bands that are playing. but todays track is “sleepyhead” by passion pit, who will be playing at 11 15 tonight. if we make it there by then were going to be cutting it real close, so hopefully we get there in time. this isnt even really my favorite passion pit song, but i wanted to post it anyway because i think overall its an extremely well produced song. all of the pieces work together in perfect harmony. its also a very good use of what i like to refer to as the chipmunk voice. you know what im talking about — when a regular track is sped way up to sound like the chipmunks. you may all remember the chipmunk voice from circa 2002 when it was a part of just about every rap song that made its way to the radio. it was kind of really overused and annoying, but every once in a while the chipmunk voice actually feels right in a song and adds a lot to it. this track is one great example. the other example is a cocorosie song that ill probably be posting at some point in the future so keep an eye out for that. this track was on passion pits “chunk of change” ep and it was so good that they decided to put it on “manners”, their full length debut that was released in just that past few weeks. for anyone keeping track, “the reeling” from the aforementioned full length release also made my scant summer/running playlist this year and was very nearly the topic of todays post. but the great production of sleepyhead won out in the end.

passion pit – sleepyhead

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06/10/2009

lcd soundsystem – 45:33 part III

lcd soundsystem

two or three years ago, i was getting a late night burrito when i ran into my friend dan. he and his friends had just graduated from law school that day and were having a little party at his friend vinnys place just up the street. we headed over there and were playing beer pong listening to a pretty cool electronic mix when suddenly something sounded familiar. it was “something great” by lcd soundsystem, but it was only the music, not the lyrics. i assumed that he had just gotten some sort of dj track of it that was music only and that the cd we were listening to was some kind of mix.

i asked about the track and he just told me it was lcd soundsystem, which i already knew, and that he was going to see them in a few days at the majestic theater. i, too, went to that show (on my top 10 most fun shows list i believe) and anticipated hearing this song live but they didnt end up playing it. the coolest part about their show is that while theyre an electronic group at the core, their live show is almost completely played live and without recordings. i also just learned that al doyle is also a member of hot chip. that is kind of awesome. definitely a talented group of kids if you ask me.

i planned on looking for the instrumental track when i got home from the post-graduation celebration but completely forgot, until today when i heard “someone great” on the radio and remembered this instrumental track id heard a few years earlier. so i googled “someone great instrumental” and kept getting results for something about 45:33 and part III but i had no idea what this meant. after a little further investigation, i discovered that nike had actually commissioned lcd soundsystem to create this 45:33 minute track as a reward to all of their nike+ users in celebration of the program logging its 10 millionth mile. pretty cool/crazy that i never heard anything about this. but now i know all about it and am eagerly anticipating listening to the whole thing again. the 45:33 track was later re-released by dfa records (of which lcd soundsystem front man james murphy is the co-founder) and split into parts, so what youre hearing today is part III, which later became the music for the track “someone great” on lcd soundystems “sound of silver” album. the track below is a little lengthy but i still like it a ton. the little bit that comes into the mix at around 1:20 kind of just ties everything together for me.

lcd soundsystem – 45:33 part III

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06/09/2009

blitzen trapper – furr

blitzen trapper

todays track is “furr” by blitzen trapper. im not sure why this theme keeps coming up, but it does, so im just gonna go with it. anyone whos probably ever heard of blitzen trapper knows this song, but that doesnt make it any less good. plus, like i told you before, these are really just songs i like, and not necessarily the newest or most underground tracks. its even better when you realize that its a basic three chord song that seems like a whole lot more. i know that most songs are really just three chord songs but its still surprising to me to look up guitar tabs to a sound that sounds really interesting and find out that its only three chords. its probably the tons of other great guitar stuff thats going on over the three chords.

my friend and i were going to see blitzen trapper a few months ago and shes the one that really got me to listen to the lyrics of this song. she was also a big fan of the opener, alela diane. i had never heard of her but my friend was a huge fan. her sound was very traditional and sounded very western and mountainy and slightly native american but really really nice (i guess shes best friends with mariee sioux whos got a similar type sound but more native american. im pretty sure thats not a genre though). and her father, who is her lead guitar player, may have been one of the most flawless guitar players ive ever heard. her first song was chock full of bends, and he played them all without missing a beat while making it look extremely easy. it was juicy guitar playing at its finest.

during the show, my friend was telling me how she really liked this song because its kind of about feral children, and she has this huge fascination with feral children. for anyone who doesnt know what a feral child is, its a child who essentially grows up with little or no contact or interaction to any other human beings. feral children are a result of a variety of circumstances, but one type of feral child is one who is “raised” by animals, and i think this is the kind that interests my friend the most. so she was instantly drawn to this song when she heard the lyrics. and when i listened to them again it was kind of ridiculous that i hadnt noticed it before. their albums might lead you to think that their show would be somewhat low key, but they could really rock out when they wanted to.

blitzen trapper – furr

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06/08/2009

radiohead – like spinning plates (live)

thom yorke

ive been having a minor internal struggle with the song selections ive been making. on the one end, im trying to bring some new tracks to all of you that you may not have heard before. but on the other hand, since im not that cool that i have an endless supply of these (and since youve probably heard most of them before anyway), ive been trying to find a balance between new stuff and other stuff that i like even though many have heard it before. i felt the need to post a radiohead song to round out my musical background, but couldnt think of the perfect one, until i remembered this live version of “like spinning plates” from many moons ago. reasons for awesomeness other than the obvious are that i was at the show where they first played it, and i found it online a few days later and learned to play it on piano myself.

it was a midsummers night back in 2002. at least i think it was 2002. we had driven about 4 hours to the blossom music center near columbus, ohio for our first taste of radiohead, in all of their live glory. the show did not disappoint as we waited for the group to return from backstage for the encores. mr yorke sat down at the piano and issued us a challenge of sorts, something to the tune of “if you can name that tune within the first 30 seconds, youre doing pretty well.” he also informed us that they had never performed this song live, so that narrowed down the list quite a bit, but who could even keep track at that point? there were a thousand reasons not to recognize the song right away. first, it was a track that seemed to sort of fly under the radar. second, it was musically ambiguous. you could hear the chords, but only in the context of some looping effect played in reverse. the live piano version of the song gave a whole new appreciation to the overlooked and complicated album version. the best part? we actually sort of get a glimpse into the real lyrics of the song, which are played in reverse on the studio track and pretty incomprehensible.

radiohead – like spinning plates(live)

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06/07/2009

handsome furs – i’m confused

handsome furs

today was the official start of summer for me. we went canoeing down the huron river for several hours and it was my first canoe trip of the summer. combine this with my first use this year of the bathing suit, and it is officially summer people. so i decided to bring you another track from my famous summer playlist. this began as 6 or 7 songs that sounded like summer to me and i was supposed to be adding new tunes. but i didnt do that, so its still only 6 or 7 tracks, but this ones on there. it also became my running playlist because i decided this was the summer that i was gonna start running on a regular basis. it went great for the first few weeks, but just like my summer playlist, it fell to the wayside. despite that, i did give this playlist a good 10 runs or so, and all the songs were high energy and fast-tempoed (is that a word? it looks pretty funny).

todays track is by montreal husband-wife duo handsome furs. im pretty sure the guy is in wolf parade, but im not positive. theyre both on subpop records, so that would make sense. it is inevitable that they will get compared to the white stripes, solely for being another husband-wife duo. does anyone else think it must be really awkward for jack and meg white to tour together now? i do. but since they never come to detroit we may never know. but this comparison shouldnt be made, because theyve got totally different sounds. handsome furs sound is very simple, full of catchy guitar riffs and 80s synthesizer sounds. their sound is pretty gritty overall, probably best exemplified by the slow rocker “evangeline”. its raw but polished. and check out the picture above. dont they just look like they make some pretty solid music? additionally, they like to party.

this track imparticular really really reminds me of the 80s. the verses even remind me of a specific song, but im not able to put my finger on it. does anyone know what song i may be thinking of? i think this made the summer playlist because of the contrast between the quiet of the verses and the screaming guitar riffs of the chorus. theyre some real screamers, those screaming guitar riffs. plus, im confused a lot (ask anyone i work with) and my mind was set on you. so i can relate to it. and its super catchy which doesnt hurt its cause. in fact, the whole album is pretty stellar in my opinion and now im kind of excited to listen to it again, and you should be too.

handsome furs – im confused

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