Fork Hassle Advance Report, Part 4: Final Installment, Part 1

This is the beginning of the end of our preview of Forecastle Fest bands. Reality began to sway, and M Dodds and I struggled to stay on task. Tangents began to rule. Life changed. Tears were shed. Beer was spilled. Mudslides were shared. Hearts were broken. This is part one. This is part two. This is part three.

Reignwolf

MD:  “We gotta see some Reignwolf, baby. Maybe this will rule”

[We play a track]

MD: “Huh, he’s yelling stuff in the background. Maybe this is a blues song?”

[Some bluesy vocals begin]

MD: “Oh. No…but...you’ve got [this picture of] this guy leaping in the air…he’s just leaping… what note do you think he played?”

BM: “That’s a good jump.”

Avey Tare’s Slasher Flicks

MD: “Did you ever see that band Attic Ted?”

BM: “Uh-uh.”

[We read the description]

BM: “I’m kind of into this. Do they have music?”

MD: “They have a video.”

[We play the video] 

BM: “I do like his [Avey Tare’s] list of influences here.. .Arthur Lee’s Love, Misfits, The Cramps…”

MD: “Oh, you like the Misfits? You know who else liked The Misfits? Metallica. You see how they turned out.”

[A lengthy discussion ensues about the intense disappointment we both felt at seeing the video premiere of “Enter Sandman,” and the dark period that followed when we tried to convince ourselves for a couple of days that Metallica’s black album wasn’t  awful. The phrase “a textbook example of convincing yourself to live a lie” is used to describe this time. We eventually return our attention to the Slasher Flicks video.]

MD: “This is kind of giving me some hope for this band, I hope this is what it sounds like. I feel like maybe someone made a booking mistake booking them. “

The Soul Rebels

MD: “You ever listen to Dexy’s Midnight Runners? They’re first record- Calling All The….I can’t remember the name of the record. It’s something... Soul Rebels.  [Note: It’s called Searching For The Young Soul Rebels] So what I’m getting at here is that I’m hoping this is a Dexy’s Midnight Runners cover band.”

[We pull up the band photo and description]

MD: “Nope. Alright, these guys have horns, they’re a brass band. I liked Mucca Pazza a lot? These guys look kind of serious.”

BM: “They have a song called ‘Sweet Dreams Are Made Of This.”

MD: “Oh, so they’re gonna play covers in the style of ‘Brass Band’. Let’s hear some of this.”

[We listen to some of that]

MD: “I don’t mind people doing covers in the style of ‘Brass Band’, but I don’t know that I wanna listen to it for like 40 minutes. Although, maybe they’ll get weird somewhere in the middle.”

BM: “Well hopefully they’ll do this and then they’ll also play something else.”

MD: “Yeah, I don’t know, if they just play cover songs in the style of a brass band, I’d you’ll probably think its novel, if you don’t have any novelty in your life.”

Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors

BM: “Now don’t forget, you have your lifeline.”

MD: “Oh yeah that’s right, I haven’t called…”

BM: “Be sure to remember, you need to do that at some time. I don’t know, is Trampled By Turtles gonna be the time for that?”

MD: “I feel like I’m gonna need somebody’s hand to hold to get through that… Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors…. Man anytime it’s somebody and the somebodies… any time I see that…”

BM: “Wait, before you get started, you’ve got to read this. It beats wildly literate.”

MD: “’ Drew Holcomb, a Tennessee-born, duck-hunting, French-speaking, bourbon-drinking, 1st-edition-book-collecting, golf-playing Eagle Scout with a Masters degree in Divinity from Scotland's University of St. Andrews’ Jesus [expletive(s) deleted] Christ.”

[Brian laughs at my incredulousness.]

MD: “I’m just so…”

BM: “Sick of humans?”

MD: “Alright, let’s hear some of this….”

BM: “A song called ‘The Wine We Drink’”

MD: “‘The Wine We Drink.’ Of course. He’s super literate. So Literate.”

BM: “He’s like the Buckaroo Bonsai of music. He does everything.”

MD: “Man, Buckaroo Bonsai was an all right movie, right?!” 

Tourist

MD: “You’ve watched Twin Peaks, right? You know the character James?”

BM: “Alright, look, it’s on my list of things to watch”

MD: “It’s okay. He looks a little like James leaving town. Let’s hear a little of this guy”

[We hear a little of that guy, but before it starts…]

MD: “You know what I heard for the first time the other day? Snoop Dogg’s ‘Drop It Like It’s Hot’. Have you ever heard this? It’s pretty good.”

[The track continues to play while we talk about Drop It Like It’s Hot]

MD: “I don’t dislike this.”

BM: “Pelvis thrusting?”

MD: “Yeah, sure.”

BM: “That’s almost like a rating at this point”

[It would appear that Tourist is no longer scheduled to appear?]

Spanish Gold

MD: “Looks like there’s a heavyset guy in this band maybe. I’m into that.”

BM: “Does that change things for you?”

MD: “Shit yeah. Their band photo is kind of alright. I assume they’re not seriously into looking like this... This is a ridiculous photo…”

BM: “It’s got one of the My Morning Jacket guys in it, I knew we couldn’t go a festival without a My Morning Jacket guy somewhere”

MD: “Alright, let’s listen to a track”

[We listen to a track and end up comparing and contrasting My Morning Jacket and Pearl Jam for a while, then talking about Pearl Jam for a while, things get pretty confusing, as evidenced by the following]

MD: “…you know, Red Lobster also has Lobster Fest-  it’s already a thing.”

BM: “Yeah, but, I just like lobsters”

MD: “You like lobsters as… an animal? They’re not arachnids are they? What are they, what’s the name for… they’re not a…”

BM: “A fish?”

MD: “No, they’re definitely not a fish.”

BM: “They come from the sea…”

Charli XCX

MD: “Charli Ex-see-ex. Or are those Roman numerals? She probably hates it when people say it like that, but you shouldn’t call yourself that if you don’t want people to pronounce it like that.”

[We play a track, and render a first impression moments into it]

BM: “I’m into it”

MD: “I’m kind of already into it also.”

BM: “Let’s hear a verse and see what…”

[The verse starts]

Together: “Nope.”

MD: “I’m going to let you watch the rest of this while I get into some peeing.”

[BM listens in silence while I’m in the bathroom]

MD: “I’m not gonna say you should avoid this, I’m just gonna say you should maybe make sure someone call you like a third of the way through the first song so you can go do that and then come back to it and see what you think. Like especially if it’s kind of an upsetting phone call, like, if someone calls to say ‘I’m leaving you!’ or ‘You’re going to have to pay for your trash pickup from now on!’. And then come back to it.”

Nightmares On Wax

BM: “Are there any more mudslides left?”

MD: “Oh yeah.”

[I go to retrieve mudslides from the kitchen]

BM: “Nightmares on Wax”

MD: “You’ve heard their groundbreaking singles?”

BM: “Are you kidding?”

MD: “We’re gonna have to share this one [the “mudslide”]

[I tell BM the tale of why I know who Nightmares on Wax are, what little I know about them, and play him something I already have rather than anything on the website. The subject of music that’s appropriate for listening to during sexual intercourse comes up. I insist that the tape recorder be turned off while the rest of this discussion takes place. The recorder is paused. Eventually un-paused]

MD: “Alright, a little bit of off the record talk there. Look I’m gonna say go see Nightmares on Wax.”

BM: “What was the name of the one song? I’m gonna write it down..”

Lucius

MD: “You ever heard of Lucius Tate? Prank calls?”

[I begin looking for them]

BM : “Come on, we’ve gotta get through…”

[I make a sound of pure scoffing]

MD: “Let’s just not even look at that band”

[I look some more for the Lucius Tate recordings and do not succeed]

MD: “Do you have any idea how to spell Lucius?”

[BM spells it out, I find it, and we spend a while listening to some prank phone calls, discussing prank calls, and finally (try to) return to the Lucius who’s playing Forecastle.]

BM: “So what do you think about Lucius?”

MD: “Oh Lucius? Lucius Tate?”

BM: “All right. Let’s move on…”

Claude Vonstroke

MD: “Is it Claude Von Stroke? Is that seriously what’s next?”

BM: “Yes.”

MD: “Awww, you’re kidding me. This guy’s gonna be a comedian. [Reading the description] ‘Claude Vonstroke does not scowl while he DJ’s….’ that’s good to know. Let’s just hear some”

[We hear some] 

MD: “I don’t hate this immediately.”

BM: “He’s remixing a lot of things”

MD: “It’s fine, a lot of things need remixing. They need to have cowbell put in on them. He’s got quite a watch”

Brett Dennen

BM: “This is your man, Brett Dennen.”

MD: “He looks like John Denver.”

BM: “He’s got five records out, one of them is called ‘Smoke and Mirrors’”

MD: “One of them’s called ‘Rocky Mountain High’”

BM: “’His music career began humbly around the camps of the Sierra Mountain range...” 

MD: “Oh did it? That’s shocking to me”

[We listen to a track]

BM: “You know, I can kind of get into it a little bit”

MD: “It’s all right. Is this gonna be a guy with a laptop, or is he gonna come with a group of people to perform this live?”

BM: “Do you think it sounds electronic?”

MD: “You know, it sounds fine, and… ‘fun’”

BM: [Laughter]

St. Lucia

[There’s 8-10 minutes of BM talking about the things he knows about South Africa, we get bummed out a bit, and then we listen to some St. Lucia and don’t really have anything to say about them. We seem to determine that they’re fiercely contemporary]

The Black Lips

MD: “Alright, look, I’ll go ahead and say I’ll arm wrestle any of these people”

[We listen to parts of a few tracks]

MD: “You know, this isn’t totally awful.”

Fork Hassle Advance Report, Part 3

Part three of our ongoing series of not understanding much of anything while consuming alcohol and looking at acts under the Forecastle Festival banner. What kind of world is this? M Dodds and I continue into the night. We're trying to mulch sense of it for you, as a pure and simple service. Simple is the main term here. If you feel the need to catch up: Part one is here. Part two is here. 

Benjamin Booker

MD: “It’s a dude. With a blue jean shirt on, and an acoustic guitar… ‘Benjamin Booker is a young New Orleans based singer/songwriter, influenced by The Gun Club, Blind Willie Johnson, and T-Rex. He is currently signed to ATO records’ That’s it. No songs, no tweets… based on that, I’m already saying yes.”

[We begin playing the video accompanying the description]

MD: “Alright, I’m gonna say yeah… and I feel like any time of day would be alright for this.”

BM: “I think eating Hardees is making me gain weight.”

MD: “It’s not making you lose weight. The [expletive deleted] bag says ‘Eat Like You Mean It.” Hardees is not playing around with their advertising….. alright look, the bottom line with Benjamin Booker is that that guy kind of rules. I would definitely go see that guy.”

Young and Sick

MD: “I’m gonna get more to drink. What are we on now? Young and Sick.”

BM: [Reading from the description] “’Young and Sick is a Los Angeles based music and art project… ‘”

MD: “I’ve got a soft spot for music and art projects.”

BM: “’They’ve created art for a variety of well known entertainers, including Andy Dick...’”

MD: “Andy Dick. That paradigm of human morality.”

[We begin playing the accompanying video] 

MD: “As a person who draws things with a black marker on white paper, it [would be] hard for me to hate this.”

BM:  “Perhaps they’ll have some art as part of their show.”

MD: “Good luck man, I’m sure Smirnov Vodka or whatever is gonna have first call on that….but let’s see, Young and Sick, I’m not gonna say don’t not go see those guys, I thought this was alright. I would definitely stand around and watch this band, I think.”

BM: “Alright, Young and Sick goes in the ‘Good’ pile.”

MD: “It goes in the ‘Stand Around and Watch Pile’.”

BM: “‘Stand Around and Watch Pile,’ I got it.”

The Districts

MD: “We get to scroll up [the list of bands on the screen]"

BM: “Maybe the font’ll get bigger.”

MD: “Nope.”

MD: “Alright, we’ve gotta blaze through some of these. We’ve got a long ass way to go. Jesus Christ! How many bands are playing at this thing?”

BM: “We’re only an hour and 53 minutes into this.”

MD: “Only.”

Hurray For The Riff Raff

MD: “You think it’s just her playing the guitar and singing?”

BM: “It’s very Lilith Fair.”

MD: “Lil-lith fair?”

[The rest of this review consisted of Brian laughing at me trying to pronounce the word “Lilith”. In my defense, if this can be said to be that, I had at this point probably drunk a rather distinguished amount of booze.]

Foy Vance

MD: “Foy Vance! I’m not against that name. That doesn’t make any sense at all. Ahhhh… he’s got that silly mustache. What? [Reading from the description] ‘Foy Vance was born in the North Ireland town of Bangor, but his love of traditional music was born in the southern states of America.’ For whose traditional music?  He’s got a video…,”

[We start playing the video associated with Foy Vance]

MD: “Holy shit, that’s a bummer. Sorry Foy Vance. Good effort on growing the mustache. “

Willie Watson

MD: [Reading incredulously from his description] “’… in the exploding world of acoustic music?!’” I feel like that… exploding!? What, in bedrooms everywhere? At goddamn Bearno’s Pizzas all over town it’s exploding? Alright look, there’s too many bands… “

Hayes Carll

MD: “Hayes Carll. With two l’s. What does this mean? [From the bio] ‘Wildly literate?’”

[There follows a discussion wherein I recall reading Mutiny on the Bounty for a high school history class, Brian recommends a book called Dark Frigate, and I recommend that you stay home and read books based on nautical history instead of watching a good many of these “assholes with mustaches.” The laptop’s battery almost dies and we have to move to another room where I can plug it in despite it being “dead and defiled”. I then for some reason put on the R.E.M. record “Life’s Rich Pageant”.]

Chrome Sparks

MD: “I don’t hate this. I don’t know that I want to see it live. I would maybe listen to it in my car, or when having sex? You have to put in parentheses ‘makes thrusting motion with pelvis’.”

Waxahatchee

[Listening to a track]

MD: “It’s always weird when people say something is lo-fi, when what they mean is that there are very few instruments, or that it’s just not over produced. I don’t dislike this though. But I have been drinking for like the last 4 hours. Let’s listen to another one.”

[We listen to another one]

MD: “This isn’t really lo-fi sounding.”

BM: “Not to me. One thing I can’t do is pronounce the name of her new album.”

MD: “I feel like I’m on the verge of knowing how to pronounce it.”

BM: “She’s more wildly literate than Hayes Carll.”

MD: “’Wildly Literate.’ What kind of asshole… alright, I’m saying with Waxahatchee, I don’t know why it’s called that, but… [It confusingly transitions to the next band here, but I think we were generally in favor of Waxahatchee. Unfortunately it now appears that perhaps they’re not playing.]

Boy and Bear

MD: “Boy and… oh it says Bear. I thought it said Pear… ohhh these guys ... you know like I was saying it’s cool when bands don’t take their publicity photo too seriously… but then sometimes you see a band photo where all the guys are white guys where they all kind of have the same chin, except for maybe the bald guy over there, who’s got slightly more stubble than the rest of them…”

BM: “Is that Greg Ward?”

MD: “Man, he is a guy that as far as I know has often had a shaved head, but is so goddamn nice that I can’t  bring him into, I just can’t even involve him in…”

BM” “I’m not criticizing him… he just looks, that guy reminds me of him...”

MD: “If he had different eyeballs. He ain’t got no Gregory Ward eyeballs.”

BM: “This, this here though…”

MD: “I’m not even gonna listen to this”

BM: “I wanna hear it… ‘Milk and Sticks!’”

MD: “Milk and Sticks we do have to listen to.”

BM: “They played at South By Southwest”

MD: “Oh DID they? They played at ‘South-by?’”

[The track plays, we discuss cell phone contracts, and how our spouses know what they’re doing with them but we very much do not]

BM: “It says they recorded it at ‘the spiritual home of AC/DC’.”

MD: “Why? Why would you even say that? Why is that even a thing that you would say?”

To be continued....

Fork Hassle Advance Report, Part 2

 Fork Hassle Advance Report: Part 2


Part two of my meeting with M. Dodds, and his assessment of the bands that are playing at Louisville's Forecastle Festival during a magnificent and scary five or six hour meeting over libations. See here for part one.

Matrimony 

MD: [Reading from the bio, in an incredulous voice] “’It’s said that a great band is like a gang, or perhaps a family,’ I would like to see the notation on that. Who exactly who says that? I have never said that a great band is like a gang. Or perhaps a family. “

BM: “ I’m betting these guys are gonna be pop punk.. though Matrimony’s not a pop punk band name”

MD: “Yeah. Or maybe so?”

[We begin playing one of their tracks]

MD: “Oh shit! There’s a banjo involved. All right, I think I’m good, that’s enough…. I mean am I just insanely out of touch with things? I don’t know what I’m doing, but I wouldn’t do that…”

BM: “Says the guy [whose song] was on Jersey Shore.”

Blue Sky Black Death

these guys are Blue Sky Black Death

BM: “Alright, I’m interested in this next band. Blue Sky Black Death… could be a positive metal band”

MD: “Yeah, could be… something….”

BM: “You know what I think the worst band name is? They played at Phoenix Hill, and they’re from the 90’s… Hed Pe? It’s spelled like this [writes it down]”

MD: “I… don’t know what that means”

BM: “They played rap funk metal. They’re from the 90’s”

[A brief silence, then laughter]

MD: “Of course they do! I’ve gotta go use the latrine.”

[BM begins playing a Blue Sky Black Death track. MD returns]

MD: “Is that Hed Pe?

this is actually Hed Pe, so Dodds can see who they are.

BM: “No, that’s Blue Sky Black Death. It’s weird that on the Forecastle site, on each band’s page they have the latest tweets about the band that have been sent out. It’s right here under the Forecastle Radio”

MD: “That could be to the detriment of many of these bands. [Reading a tweet about Blue Sky Black Death] ‘All I wanna do is chill and bump. Glaciers all DAY!’…I don’t know what that means. “

BM: “I think ‘Glaciers’ is the name of their album.”

MD: “Oh, so it’s not a giant pile of cocaine.”

[More drinks are opened]

MD: “Is this still the same thing?”

BM: “Yeah, it’s Blue Sky Black Death, I put it on while you were in the bathroom”

MD: “This would maybe not be too bad, but I don’t get people who go to festivals to see this kind of music.”

BM: “I think if you did some ecstasy, maybe do some of this with some glo-sticks…”

MD: “I think this all boils down to that I’m just kind of an asshole who has fun by griping about things. I guess I’m just not the target audience. It’s not that I don’t like this style of music, I do, I just…. I guess I would say, if you’re really high, maybe go see these guys. And stand in the sun” 

Old Baby

MD: “I’m trying to pretend like I don’t know who these guys are and just judge them based solely on their band photo. I think I would think this is an all right band photo”

BM: “I like the band photo because it catches Neal in mid-drink”

MD: “It’s always good to see someone in a band photo who’s just not even participating in the photo. They’re just ‘Nah, I’m thirsty, I’m gonna have a drink’”

BM: “Jonathan looks like he’s making a break for it.”

MD: “I like that the description here is just a description of their album that [recently] came out. It’s always very nice to see people not participating in ‘band bios.’ “

[Shortly after this, somehow via a discussion of Twitter user names, the conversation takes a weird turn into 5-10 minutes about how every state in the US and possibly the entire world  is pretty much just full of terrible people and there’s really no place to move that doesn’t seem awful. This concludes with MD saying “every place just sucks. You should just live your life until you die and then you’ll just be dead and you won’t care anymore.”]

BM: “Alright, let’s move on”

MD: “Yeah, you might as well go see Ole’ Baby”

Leagues

MD: “ This band photo is… it’s ‘you look this way, you look this way, and the guy in the hat will look at the camera.’ Oh, but it says they’re infectious. We should probably hear a little moment of it here eh?”

BM: “Which one?”

MD: “Let’s hear ‘Haunted’”

BM: “ They have two ‘Mind Games’”

MD: “You think that’s like the John Lennon song?”

BM: “No way. That would cost them too much money? But then again, maybe these guys are rich.”

MD:  “This guy does have a pretty nice hat”

[“Mind Games” begins to play]

MD: “…no sir.”

BM: “I can tell you what this sounds like to me. I’m a big Billy Joel fan, but I did not like that one album he did with that ‘Walk The River Of Life’ song.”

MD: “You mean ‘Rock The Cradle Of Love?’

BM: “Did I make up that name?”

MD: “I don’t know what you’re doing…”

Johnnyswim

MD: “I kind of like the name actually. If they sound like Weird Al I’ll be totally into this band.”

BM: [reading the description] “’it’s a mix of Lauryn Hill and John Mayer’…”

MD: “Goddamnit… but they are very attractive people?”

[we listen more or less silently to one track, then start another]

MD: [sighing] “This is kind of weird right? Like a little bit?”

BM: “Hahaha, you’re just reaching…”

MD: “I know, I’m trying just to not be a dick. This sounds like ‘WB’ rock to me”

BM: “WB?”

MD: “Yeah, the television station? I don’t have cable.”

To be continued...

Fork Hassle Advance Report, Part 1

Introduction.

The day the Forecastle Festival line-up was officially announced, I half-jokingly suggested that a local music blog should buy me some drinks and then transcribe my opinions on the line-up, opinions that would likely for the most part be based entirely on the names and photos of the bands. This blog called my bluff and took me up on it.

What follows is the first installment of our Forecastle preview, heavily edited into a few of the mostly coherent moments from a sprawling 5-hour conversation.

To be clear, no one should take what I have to say at all seriously. BUT: If you were wondering what an aging maintenance mechanic and problem drinker from Indiana who's been playing/going to kind of weird shows in Louisville for a bunch of years thinks about bands he's never heard of that are playing a festival he's not going to attend, and if you're okay with him having a bunch of beers before saying pretty much the first thing that comes to mind, who am I to withhold that information?
---M. Dodds

More Introduction.

It was a warm sunny Spring day around 2pm when M. Dodds and I met to discuss Forecastle. I was armed with beer and SideKicks, some fucking ungodly pre-mixed college drink made from butterscotch liqueur and cream. From there, other types of bottles were opened, some from the freezer. And we hunkered down to talk music. Specifically, these bands that Forecastle brings to Louisville annually. Both M and I are long-time musicians, and long-time fans and nerds of music, underground, new, old, popular and everything. But, over the years, Forecastle has come to represent some type of watered-down dementia that seems more about a basic fuel for ads and sponsors more than a fest I can immerse in or consider. Yeah, it's good for the city and the region financially and I appreciate that, but I'm a person that gives a shit about the local flavor here, and this festival has become a showcase for what seems like adult contemporary blow cut with all types of baking soda. The local representation is down to something like four acts, over the course of 70+ bands/performers. 

This isn't an all-out attack on the festival. It's great I live in a town that can support something this size, and that, y'know, Flaming Lips and DEVO and The Replacements play here once a year. I think the addition and showcase of more local music on the bill is an important and ignored must, because we live in a city chock full of interesting shit that people who don't hang out bars circling downtown every other night should see, and until they do that, I'll just honestly never give a fuck about this thing. But after somewhere near seven hours of talk over drinks and tangents, this is where we landed. I think, more than anything, I'm just happy we didn't die that night.

I also applaud Dodds for his editing, because we talked A LOT.
--B. Manley

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


thus, we present

Fork Hassle Advance Report: Part 1

Goodbye June

MD: “Alright, let’s see what these guys look like. They look like they’re all the same person maybe? Surely they’re brothers. They have to be brothers right? [I start reading the bio and give up almost immediately, realizing there’s no way I can read all the bios for all these bands] They don’t all have the same last name. What could this band sound like? It’s three guys… and what does it mean that they’re first on the list, ‘cause it’s not alphabetical. They’re probably playing Friday at like 10:10 am.

Are they from here? Are they gonna kick my ass when they- oh they’re from Indiana! Oh no! I’m gonna go ahead and take what might possibly be an educated shot in the dark here and say that if they’re from Indiana, there’s probably an acoustic guitar that’s gonna come out at some point…they’re from Southern Indiana, so I gotta have some solidarity… no, I don’t. Basically I have nothing constructive or helpful to say about this. “

The Wans 

MD: [reading from the band bio] “’if you like hard hitting rock trios, then you’ll love The Wans.’

What can we say about The Wans? I like that they’re at least laughing in their band photo. These guys at least have the common sense to either crop their photo or hire a band photographer that can draw a line from the bottom left hand corner to the top right hand corner with their heads… that’s what this should say, not ‘if you like hard hitting rock trios,’ cause, you know, you’re leaving out a whole demographic of people who like hard-hitting rock quartets.”

Jill Andrews

MD: “Jill Andrews……. The famous stage performer”

BM:  “Daughter of Julie?”

MD: “Yep. I’m assuming.”

 [we read from the bio that she had a song featured on the television show “Nashville”]

“I think that the mom from Friday Night Lights was also on Nashville. My wife was watching Friday Night Lights for a while, she seemed all right on that. I assume she’s also all right on Nashville? So let’s see, what can I say about Jill Andrews?

[She has a song] on a show which is an ad for Nashville, and it’s got the mom from Friday Night Lights, a show about football players, some of the people I care about the least  on the earth. I mean I don’t dislike them necessarily as a group of people, but…"

Jalin Roze

MD: “I am liking this guy’s picture very much from the start… I would go see this guy based on this photo. This is enough for me. I’m not even going to read any of this, I’m just going to say go see this guy based on this photo.”

BM: “I like how his shirt is…”

MD: “…the same color as the background! It’s amazing!"

The Weeks

 [I decide to start off listening to one of their songs. The track begins with an acoustic guitar playing]

MD: “(Sigh) I don’t hate acoustic guitar, but…”

[The vocals begin]

MD: “Is there a fast forward button?”

Seluah

MD: “ I think I’ve seen these guys… they played at that thing at the Palace? I think I had the flu… I did some stuff for Parlour with the overhead projector… they started playing while I was packing up my stuff, and I thought it was kind of cool, but I was so sick… and I had this wristband that got me into the ‘VIP Lounge’, so I figured I’d just go there and die and maybe someone would find me. But so I go into the VIP lounge, and I was the only person there, but there was this guy watching the door. There’s a curtain, and a guy, I guess he’s supposed to make sure you’re not sniffing cocaine or whatever, or just doing something untoward. There was a giant TV, it’s the biggest TV I’ve ever been able to have control of. I was looking through the channels, and there was a home shopping club for sex toys. So I put that on, but I also had a fever and was feeling awful and was just slumped back in the chair with my eyes barely open, and all of a sudden the guy [who was watching the door]  is asking me ‘are you alright?,’ I didn’t even notice he was there until he was this close to my face, so I was just like ‘YES!’ and tried to change the channel but it was clear that he had already walked in the room and had already poked me to see if I was alive…. And so that’s my recommendation. You should maybe go watch these guys play, but not if you’re watching the home shopping club for sex toys and there’s a guy watching the door.”

Mount Moriah

MD: [Reading from the description in the bio] ”‘Fiercely contemporary’?! Man, come on, how are you gonna be fiercely contemporary? What does that even mean?! Goddamnit. Why would someone even write that? ‘Fiercely contemporary.’ What does that mean? They mix the intensity of waiting for the dentist with the soul crushing expectation of hiring a lawyer."

BM: “Let’s listen to a track”

[We start listening to a track]

MD: “I dunno. They’re not awful… and just to be clear, I don’t wish ill upon them, but I just, I’d rather be home taking a nap than out in the sun in a field listening to this happen.”

To be continued...

Ma Turner, ZOZ

At times we're mottled in a brittle lifing, bound by a daily grindstone that can sink your eyes into dark socket swamps and wear the brain's best parts to useless nubs. Too often, people succumb, see no shoulder, stick to the drill, drained face and drained recognition of the holies surrounding. You just see people crossing the street under hot sun and barely give a fuck enough to think about why the next day might even be real or matter while you wait at the red light. And those people crossing the street; they don't give a fuck, either.

ZOZ is Ma Turner's premiere outing as a soloist (he's also of the bands Warmer Milks, Cross, Salad Influence, The Elephants and many others). He's released a shit ton of solo releases, mind you, most of them digitally. I've reviewed some of his earlier solo recordings here. He released a giant collection of his music called ZOZ COLLECTION which was contained in an artistic twelve-cassette boxed creature. This Sophomore Lounge vinyl LP is a re-working, re-assessing, re-mixing, re-configured packaging of some of those sounds.


The music mustered here represents late night sonic experimentations that can also be included in a Ma Turner spiritual search. Ma has forced himself out from under the grind of the stone, grabbing the remaining meat of his mind and soul, and allowing himself and his art to predominate the blare of the addled, dulling racket that can be American life.

It begins with "Christ in a Garden," an incautious jangled reading reaching for that expanse of peace through chant and mantra, floored by a banged acoustic guitar. From there, the gloves ripped as "Rash Harvest" begins a journey adrift, wherein the mind is adriatic and no longer in control, but instead accepting and filled with the sounds surrounding it.

These are plums immersed in the lack of forethought but instead feeling and perception. Electronics, found noises, low, high, loud, soft, life. Sometimes seamless, sometimes broken transitions bounce between fear and hopelessness and midnight joy, walled by a sway of disjointed, hypnotic soundscapes permeated by breaks in consciousness with a stark banjo that speaks of friendship on a pedestal.

"Rotary" is a preemie reflection into arches, shades and ceremonies that is aided by the crusading trance of repetition found in the words of "For Every Night." "IUGY" is the chaos of real folk set in a David Lynchian tone. Madder. That mysterious background offbeat percussion is madder. Not angry. The other mad.

"Crucifix Cruiser" reminds me of the realizations-through-torment found in Brian Wilson's "Elements Suite," particularly "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow." And as soon as you think you have a grip on this final piece, you are yanked out of Turner's reality and back into yours. So suddenly. So suddenly, in fact, it's refreshing and eye-peeling. Tomorrow is unbarred.

Available on Sophomore Lounge. Recommended.









  

Andy Matter, Pacific Midwest

I think it was winter.

"Look for his car; I never know which house it is unless his car is on the street."

Soon inside, we hovered over Albini's version of Cheap Trick's In Color. We drank, smoked, rolled. On an exercise ball. It's here I heard some of the first rough cuts of Pacific Midwest. Shawn saved my notes and read them back to me:

Bullfrogs.
Tom Hanks in Big.
"Is it like you were milking a cow?"
"You have chosen wisely, son."
Jack journals.
"Don't take the Chalice from the palace."

I don't know what any of that fucking means (except jack journals, which I'll explain in person next time I see you), but I'll try and remain true to my gut drafts and fit them in here.

Andy Matter's kick-drummed himself into being a basic constituent element of the physical reality that is Louisville music. The Touched, Red Light Relay, Health and Happiness Gospel Band, Opposable Thumbs, Mimi Von Schnitzel, Furlong, Adventure, Butter, Legba Bentonia, Whiskey Dick, etc...His hands have been in so many cookie jars, both his crumbs and crud rock are strewn throughout this music scene.

Pacific Midwest has been a labor of love for the multi-instrumentalist/singer-songwriter. It's a potage that stews the experiences, sounds, influences and flat bullfrog weirdnesses Andy has performed and survived into one catchy postcard that culminates into a fun read. Almost like TOM HANKS IN BIG, Andy has moved from the toy store to dancing "Chopsticks" on the giant piano.  (wow...I can't do it anymore. that was painful.)
 
Less of the Stooges-influenced crud rock Andy marauded his drums to in the early 2000s, Pacific Midwest is more of a dissolve into a collage of garage anthems pitted with heart-on-sleeve vocal deliveries in almost storytelling frames. It's a mix of personable observations that builds upon clever lyrical delivery through a voice that hovers between assertiveness just as it might waver into a bettering worriment. Lines from these tunes are as likely to get across someone with ire and frustration as they are to put across something with aspiration and hopes.

As much emotion is worn on truth, so are influences. The melodic rock of Guided By Voices, The Replacements, even Sugar, posture themselves into tunes that create golden choruses. This has the drive of a bombastic rattled rock that can morph into the pleasures of a bouncy jangle pop and back again in a snap. The vocals can waver and shake like Eric Bachmann or Doug Martsch. Check out the first video from the record, "Carbonation," a barnburner brandishing a nailed slap-backed riff:






Carbonation - Andy Matter & Ten Wet Dollars .m4v from Andy Matter on Vimeo.
(directed by Shawn Price)




Pacific Midwest is loaded with these types of hooks: "Nova No Va," "Alive for Days," "Final War," "Tonight and Every Night," and the track list goes on. And more aces from heartful sleeves are pulled with bandmates from other L'ville bands guesting throughout the album, including J Glenn (Mimi Von Schnitzel), Bob Dixon (Health & Happiness), Eric Suplee and Bill Montgomery (Opposable Thumbs), Jaye Wood (Red Light Relay) and Benn Lally and Jason Walker (New Bravado/Ten Wet Dollars).

Fuck it, let's all just put this album on and go swimming at the quarry. Good beginning to summer.

PS: Is it like you were milking a cow? See: jack journals.

Andy Matter's record release show for the cassette + download Pacific Midwest on Gubbey Records will be Saturday, May 17 at Modern Cult Records. Also on the bill are The Teeth and Tag Team Guys.

New Bravado, Sol Similar

Chained to a crownwork of droll, lulling proles humming a repetitive low. A misunderstood hoof through the boredoms of a grey pod day. Stick this in the tape player. Play and blossom. Succumb to all these things that are cured in heat with hugs of distortion.

It is this. This New Bravado. This new cassette single. All and that. Sucked into the menage of instrumentation of this "Sol Similar." A slow drool of softly drifting vocals and camouflaged in strums and skies and drips from the reverb.

New Bravado returns to us from atop a golden star making golden showers of golden acid on our brown, dirty heads. Blueing and blacking, this band has appreciated further time travels, backpassing Sabbath and instead bounding into the heavy psych and power fuzz of the 60s, whence came Eden's Children, Banchee, Lincoln Street Exit.

Play and suddenly it's summer, 1971, a dirt yard, sweating out moonshine, dosing, and starting anew. Staring at the sun for years, until finally realizing it's the sun's reflection off the hodgepodge chrome from your front yard van, yawning with you, a magic arrow of Abaris abating your mind into a numb blur.

Then it's night, and the shift is unnoticeable, and you don't know how, and it all happens again with the Moon, and soon friends have stopped by, and the panning chants begin in the abracadabra of the dark, warm, narcotic Kentucky night.

"Sol Similar" and "Long Head Blues" are about the groove drowning in an analphabetic swamp of words and riffs. Ben Lally's voice retires further and downward into a retreat of reverb. Lower. Fading into soft echoes. Adam Copelin's bass leads everyone into a rabbit hole of misty strums lined on scriptured mirrors and near whispers, until the chords become heavy firefly trails.

This is about the clock and its banishment. And downstrokes onto Big Things like God and Zeus and Love. New Bravado just broke open some real shit and is passing it out, mad hatter style.

This band became one of my favorites in Louisville with the release of their debut full-length Unconscious Afternoon in 2013. The new "Sol Similar" cassingle shows the band has only upped its style and presence. Looking forward to more, hopefully in the near future.



New Bravado will celebrate the release of "Sol Similar" on Gubbey Records with a show at Modern Cult Records on Saturday, April 19, and will be joined by Opposable Thumbs.