YACHT + Bobby Birdman + E*Rock = Awesome
October 29, 2005
Check out the Broze Own Tour Trailer
YACHT, E*Rock, and Bobby Birdman are on tour and they’ll be making their way through california starting in November. Definitely check them out. They’re playing in Minnesota tonight, so forget about that halloween party and get to it.
OCTOBER
29th – SAT – Grand Rapids, MI @ The DAAC (115 S Division)
30th – SUN – Chicago, IL @ The University Of Chicago (Reynold’s Club 2nd Floor)
31st – MON – Ann Arbor, MI @ SPOOKY HOUSE SHOW! (121 N Division)
NOVEMBER
1st – TUE – Manhattan, KS @ The Dusty Bookshelf (8 PM – $5 – 700 N Manhattan)
2nd – WED – Denver, CO @ Le Crunk Manor (6 PM – 1366 York St)
3rd – THU – Phoenix, AZ @ Four White Walls (1023 Grand Ave)
4th – FRI – San Diego, CA @ Che Cafe (Building 161 on the UCSD Campus)
5th – SAT – Los Angeles, CA @ TBA (Disneyland? EMAIL US!)
6th – SUN – San Francisco, CA @ TBA
7th – MON – Sacramento, CA @ Fool’s Foundation (1025 19th St)
NeKo Windows/Keyboard Hybrid
October 25, 2005
Open Labs’ NeKos are powerful keyboards that pack a full-blown Windows PC, tuned software, and control surfaces into a single musical instrument. They’ve got some heavy-hitting celebrity endorsements, and they’re rugged: one NeKo managed to continue functioning after being being beaten with a baseball bat and set on fire by DJ Richard Devine.
This month, Open Labs unveiled the next-generation NeKo keyboard: sexier looking, more features, and cheaper. Porsche car paint, faster processors (up to a dual core 64-bit AMD CPU), Pro Tools software, and even Borg-like ability to clone your hardware synths and automatically create multisamples. Priced for mortals, too: US$2,295 gets you all the basics, up to US$5,995 for the absolute top-of-the-line. More after the jump.
Melloman – Home built Mellotron
October 17, 2005
“The Melloman, uses Walkmans and cassette tapes to play original Mellotron samples, or whatever cassette tapes you want to put in. Inside the box, there are 14 continuously running Walkmans mounted side by side. The first Walkman is designated for drums, and the next 13 provide sampled loops for 25 notes.”
~War Photographer~
October 5, 2005
Viking warlords playing guitar solos on the high-seas, what could be better?
“War Photographer is an extremely cool animated music video directed by the talented Joel Trussel for musician Jason Forrest. Somehow Trussel, along with a super talented group of folks consisting of Chris Fox, Leo Riley, Doug Gordon, Darin Bendall, and Gene Blakefield, were able to bring to life my every fantasy rolled up into once, super stylized, super awesome package.”
PS… it was built in flash.
The man who used math to make music
October 5, 2005
Exiled from Greece, Iannis Xenakis worked for the architect Le Corbusier before devoting the rest of his life to creating music as a kind of aural sculpture.
“Culture these days can be a burden for creative artists. There are so many accumulated memories, so much to be influenced by, so much to live up to. Not to be bothered by it needs a special kind of purity, innocence and single-minded passion.
The Greek/French composer Iannis Xenakis had all those things. His music hits you like a whirlwind, its hard, harsh melodies and granite-like chords coming direct from some fierce distant past. In the knowing world of new music, it seems magnificently out of place, a pure voice of nature.”
YACHT
October 4, 2005
YACHT is music made by Jona Bechtolt. YACHT is a varied and multi-hued exploration of sound and rhythm that tripsyou deeply and puts you in “the zone.” YACHT expresses, above all, a youthful feeling of rapture; the music glories inthe great mystery of life, flowing from one finite starting point to a slow dissolve. YACHT is pink headbands andrainbow belts; complicated yet innocent; self-aware yet sincere. The cold technology of electronic music is warmedthrough his kind hands and transformed into a living, breathing sound. In addition to this project, Jona has playeddrums in bands with his friends like Little Wings, The Microphones/Mount Eerie and Wolf Colonel. Jona is alsoone-half of the conceptual electronic art-pop group, The Badger King, who premiered their 13-part opera and film inSeptember of 2003 as part of the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art’s Time-Based Art festival.
There’s a storm a brewin’
September 29, 2005
The Go Team! finally released their album Thunder, Lighting, Strike (in america, the album has been out for a while now, but it’s just now finding it’s way over here).
The Winks are this very minimal sort of techy band that reminds me of Deerhoof mixed with Magnetic Fields and The Go Team! Definitely check out their site, they have a good amount of mp3’s posted there.
And check out David Dondero, who’s an incredible singer song writer.
We Say Party! You Say Die!
September 28, 2005
I really hate Pitchfork reviews, and the review for We Say Party! You Say Die!’s new album definitely keeps my hatred at a peak. The score is fine, the opinions are fine, but the way the authors go about describing albums is so over the top it becomes caustic. A while ago David Cross was asked to write a piece for pitchfork and did the perfect perody article of their reviews (since they gave him such bad ones), they posted it. “Like a gilded phoenix rising from the toxic ashes of the death of mercurial lead guitarist, Peter Chernin, Maximum Minimum snarls back like a taunted tiger on steroids (also on acid).”
Either way, WSP!YSD! is the newest band to come out of Canada. They’re a more lo-fi party rock version of Le Tigre/Thunderbirds Are Now!/Les Savy Fav
