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Saturday, November 21, 2009
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
It's Been a While...
So, it feels a little strange giving my first post in almost a month the same title as a Staind song, but... so it goes. So where have we been, you're probably wondering. Well, like anyone we get caught up in the day-to-day, and though we often talk about resurrecting Range Life, we've been putting it off. (Maybe we've all been doing a little too much of what you see pictured here...)
There's plenty of good music to get caught up on, and recent concerts to ramble on about, and some fabulous pics to share, and so forth. Still, before I do anything I need to rant about some of my most recent obsessions... some new, some old, all awesome.
Cyann & Ben -- Sweet Beliefs (2006)
This one totally fits the bill when it comes to grower albums. I was immediately hooked by "Sunday Morning," so much so that I had difficulty getting into the rest of the album. Now that just sounds like blasphemy. So here's the deal. If you like Blonde Redhead, or Yo La Tengo, or any similar awesomeness, check these guys out. You won't be disappointed.
Apparat -- Walls (2007)
These guys are slick. What else would you expect from a blend of Icelandic pop and electronica? Just give "Arcadia" a listen. Now.
Yo La Tengo -- And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out (2000)
We talk a lot about going through "phases" with bands. Yo La Tengo is a band I've enjoyed for some time now, but I've always preferred their distorted guitars/SY/MBV sound. (Hey, that kinda looks like a personal ad. "Desperately Seeking Kickass Music.") Go to a YLT show, however, and everyone else goes crazy for songs like "Last Days of Disco." (Case in point: my Youtube video for "Let's Save Tony Orlando's House" has 800 more hits than "Blue Line Swinger" and 1700 more hits than "Decora." WTF?) In any event, it's taken me some time to come around to some of these weepier, spoken-word numbers, but you gotta love Ira's candor. And if I start to get too restless, BAM!, out comes "Cherry Chapstick"...
Atlas Sound Vs. Deerhunter (both with 2008 albums)
I've been listening to both of Bradford Cox's new albums like crazy. Now that Deerhunter is starting to sound like Atlas Sound, though, it will be interesting to see if the bands will stay together, or if Bradford will break off and do his own thing, or maybe just form a supergroup? Admittedly I haven't listened to Microcastle as much as Let the Blind Lead... but right now I'd have to say I'm leaning toward the Atlas Sound album as my favorite of the two. (Which surprises and kind of scares me.)
Thanks for dropping by the site. And let us know what you're currently jamming on.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Catching Up: Wakarusa Fest 2008
So while we haven't been posting much on Range Life, never fear, we're still obsessing over our beloved music (which may be WHY we don't post as much anymore). In any event, I thought I'd drop by and mouth off about some recent happenings.
Wakarusa Fest (June 5-8, 2008)
So this was my first experience with Lawrence's Waka Fest. Let me tell you, it was interesting. Let me also be straight with you. Without drugs, Wakarusa wouldn't be Wakarusa. And after hearing tales of tragedy from two years ago, when the drug dogs busted up the party, I was more than a little scared to see this sign as we approached the fairgrounds: "You Are Nearing a Check Point. Please Have Tickets Ready." Well, that didn't bother me so much as what someone had scrawled underneath: "HIDE DRUGS." And did I ever. (Thank you, Wendy's sack.) My terror only peaked when a hippie type on the side of the road told us not to worry, they were only going to search our trunk (location of Wendy's sack). Nonetheless, we made it into the festival unsearched, unarrested, unscathed. (Besides, I should have remembered that the penalty for MJ possession of in Lawrence has been reduced to a nominal fine.)
Built to Spill sounded amazing even at 4 in the afternoon. Highlights included "Time Trap" (finally! though it sounded a little rough) and "Stab" from There's Nothing Wrong With Love (killer). This set has got me all geared up to see them perform Perfect from Now On in New York this fall. P.S. Check out Doug's crazy hat.
The Flaming Lips were, as always, as high as we were. I take that back, more high than we were. They pulled out the giant ball. They got some crazy girls to dance naked on stage. (Damn you, stupid camera for stealing that golden photo op. And no, I was not one of the crazy girls.) Flaming Lips, if you're out there... Thanks for playing "Vein of Stars." But would it kill you to play something different off Soft Bulletin?
And of course, the reason we got into Waka in the first place... working a beer tent. How fascinating to be on the other side of the impending alcoholism -- to be the pusher, the peddler! What friends I made as I poured them their $5 beers! Then, when the hail came and the festival disbanded, the stragglers ended up huddling under our tent with us, singing "Rock Chalk Jayhawk" and trying to get us to feed them free beers while we all faced certain death. Well, the certain death part might be pushing it a bit, but it makes for a good story.
Monday, June 16, 2008
Finally -- A Tasteful Use of Good Music in Advertising
See what happens when someone is discerning about when and where to use their songs? Regardless of your feelings about the Grand Theft Auto series, you have to admit this spot was simply tailor-made to showcase this song. Wow.
Friday, June 6, 2008
"Nude" Performed by Technology
This one's self-explanatory... and awesome. The music starts at 1:10. The full story and a higher quality version of the video can be found here.
Monday, June 2, 2008
Gimme Fiction: Now Not Just the Name of an Incredible Spoon Album
So a while back I tossed around the idea of putting up another form of music writing on the site. I debated over it, talked it over with Ryan, and ultimately decided, why not? Let's call it an experiment.
Thanks, Josh, for making this graphic it's taken me so long to get around to using.
Enjoy, friends.
....................................................................................................................
Hideaway
By Nicole Pope
By Nicole Pope
They ascended the stairwell he’d only glimpsed through swinging saloon doors all those years. The loft was little larger than his studio apartment. Writing crowded the walls as high as an outstretched arm, or stool, or friendly leg-up could suffice. The multi-apexed ceiling and dim lighting reminded him of the elaborate tents he and his band mates had made as children, just years before they’d started buying this band’s records.
He helped the drunk girl round the corner on her ridiculous wedge heels.
And there they sat like common human beings.
They had spread out the money on ancient twin amps. The expressions on their unshaven faces suggested kidnappers on the wrong side of a foiled ransom collection. In the center of the couch, like the king of thieves, sat their front man. Seeing them he stuffed the crinkled, paperclipped stacks into a bag, knocking half-crushed beer cans in his haste, and smooshed it between the cushions.
His right eye twitched like wings on a preening fly.
“Who are they?”
It made sense he would want to know something about them, as if he already knew this twenty-something in the frayed tweed jacket knew everything about him.
He knew what any real fan would know. The front man was the master-mind of the band: lead singer, guitarist, lyricist. He had a basic American male name nabbed from the Bible or a Beatle. He had been married once in the early ‘90s, which he had spoken about just once in a June ‘92 Spin article, after which he’d stated, “I’ve said what I want to say through my music.” He had never spoken about his bum eye. He had insomnia, which he blamed on constant touring, and when he did sleep he sleepwalked, though he never got far before tripping over a slumbering band mate or bonking his head on the combination microwave/mini stove. He never posed for publicity shots. Promoters were forced to use band photos from fifteen years ago, photos like those squishing in the young man’s pockets as he steadied himself against a pile of dead speakers. It was really him.
“They’re friends,” the drummer lied. He slouched at a lopsided wooden desk posing as their buffet table. “I can make them too, you know.”
His band mates quietly absorbed his petulance, the singer itching at the cap he wore for every show, the one detractors of the band said made him look homeless; his bassist crinkling the mustache he’d worn in the eighties that luckily had become fashionable again. Like aging lions, they were pissy but too tired to attack, tails twitching idly as they eyed their intruders.
Alcohol and a likely sorority background emboldened the drunk girl. She wobbled toward the couch and thrust out a hand marked with a big black X, the flesh still red from all that futile scrubbing. Surely they would remember her from the show even if their drummer hadn’t, the young man thought. The girl whose hairsprayed nest had bobbed wildly as she screamed ironies at her friends like, “Just listen to that subtle guitar work!” The one who’d turned the only song they’d played off their first album into a spoken word piece detailing an inexpensive, low-fat chicken casserole. They would slay her and eviscerate him, the boyfriend who couldn’t keep his dumb drunk girl quiet. Except he wasn’t her boyfriend. He didn’t know her at all.
The band recognized her, all right. To his horror they shook her hand hungrily, like she was the famous one. They thanked her for her energy during the show. Then they invited her to sit. He watched them soak her up: those dull blue eyes, symmetrical face, skin the texture and color of a well-worn drumhead. She was attractive, he supposed, in an obvious way that made her completely unattractive. Still he longed to follow her, delirious for that last spot on the couch, until his fingers became so bathed in sweat he could offer only a feeble wave from across the room. For years he’d dreamt of meeting the band, of telling the singer what their music meant to him, how he’d learned to play guitar because of him and formed a band because of him, and how more than anything he’d made him want to make something beautiful in this ugly world.
“Great show, guys,” was all he could say.
He slumped beside the drummer at the children’s table. His jacket adhered to his chest, suffocating him, like the drunk girl’s coif clinging to his cheek during the show. He could not, would not, remove the jacket and reveal he was wearing the band’s t-shirt. He dug in his pocket for the joint he’d been smoking before the show until that rent-a-cop circled the lot with his accusatory headlights. He knew no better way to relax, or to make friends.
With two fingers he pursed the roach like it was the vermin of the same name and raised it inquiringly. The singer regarded his bassist, his best friend since childhood, identical twin, or lover, depending on which rumor you believed. In the span of that silent second they exchanged two decades’ worth of hard lessons learned.
“Not in here,” the singer said.
“Sorry dude,” his bassist said, as surely as he’d backed him up on stage.
The drunk girl hissed in disapproval.
He couldn’t understand it. He searched the room for confirmation he wasn’t completely out of line. That was when he realized the cans resting in the cooler beside them, lying smashed atop amps, being poured down their throats at that very moment, were non-alcoholic. He returned the dirty, ugly joint to his pocket, being careful not to injure the photos waiting hopefully there, and apologized. It was too late. The singer was glowering at him. The drummer stabbed cheese slices with an intensity that suggested he knew he’d only pretended to own the drunk girl in order to get upstairs. His fear was confirmed when the drummer brought his boot down on his foot like it was one of those old, worn-out drum pedals you really had to punish.
The bassist jolted upright like he was the wounded one.
“Quick snooze,” he said. “Then we gotta ride the dog another fifteen hours.”
They all drooped into their seats like dying party balloons. For a moment they forgot the imposter in exchange for far worse frustrations. There was talk of a haunted light house when they reached the coast, which they wouldn’t have time for, and fresh seafood, which they would make time for. Until then, nothing but cows and windmills and fields.
For some reason he was starting to get defensive.
“
They looked at him with genuine pity.
“Don’t get me started on
“Hours and hours of nothing but fields,” the bassist said. “No offense.”
The two band members arched their bodies toward one another like mirrored f-holes on a violin, and they were lost to the room.
“Is it corn they have here?”
“Wheat.”
“No, wait. It’s sunflowers.”
“I’m pretty sure sunflowers aren’t…
“Their money crop?”
“Yeah.”
The fluidity of their dialogue, the way they plucked thoughts from each other’s heads, explained how easily they knew which bass line would answer a fledgling melody, which vocals could use the lift of harmony. The display was so impressive he could almost forgive them for using that crucial interplay to trash his home state. The drunk girl was not impressed. Nor was she used to being ignored. She pressed two beer cans to her chest like some sad take on Madonna’s Blonde Ambition tour, as if Madonna weren’t already sad enough.
“Not everything’s flat in
Somehow the singer laughed. So hard he choked on his virgin beer, and his bassist had to whack him on the back. When he recovered he said he was going to start calling her Dorothy. “You can be Toto,” she said. He laughed at that, too, and shook his head like a big dumb dog.
So quickly they clung to clichés. He told the band they needed to visit the local record stores before they left town. And eat at a café on
“Are you a student here?” the singer said.
All eyes targeted him. It was that twitching one he worried about, the one that spasmed a Morse code of displeasure whenever he spoke. The one he could peer into but could never be sure was looking back at him.
“No. I mean, I used to be.”
They did not ask him what he had been doing while he should have been in school. They moved on to the drunk girl, who announced she was majoring in journalism because her teachers had always said she used good adjectives.
“Journ-a-lists,” the singer said.
“May they rotteth in hell,” the bassist said. “No offense.”
They spoke of the last interview they’d given, the last the singer said he would ever give, after which the reporter made it sound like the band blamed its lackluster recent album on their long-time friend and producer. They fell silent then, as if newly stunned by the blasphemy. He watched their expressions sour and decided he couldn’t let the conversation die like that. He had to defend them, even if they wouldn’t do it for themselves.
“I knew you never would have said something like that,” he said.
The singer didn’t want to talk about that anymore. He bashed a crushed can against the table, marking out the staccato clang of his anger, and aimed his fluttering eye like a half-cocked weapon.
“How would you know what I would or would not say?”
No one spoke for a while after that. Soon the silence filled with whispers of the Top 40 filth the venue owner played while he closed up for the night. At last the drummer felt sorry for him and forgave the lie their past hour together had been predicated upon. He offered a swig from the bottle of ’87 bourbon he kept in his bag, and showed him the atlas he used to mark their travels. All their travels since 2001, he explained as the young man already knew, because that was when their old drummer had a baby and a religious experience and quit the band.
“
He sensed the drummer was trying to explain something to him. He didn’t want to hear it.
Across the room the singer and his bassist questioned the drunk girl about her thoughts on the media bias. She kept saying “cover age” instead of “coverage.” He wasn’t sure the booze was to blame. While she and the drummer babbled on he closed his eyes and breathed in the wooden rafters above. They seemed to hold the smell of the stage below, of cigarettes and sweat and spotlights so hot they sometimes caught fire. He studied the walls and tried to separate the maxims of musicians from the ramblings of wasted groupies. Above the veggie tray a Spoon quote shone through the tangled mess: “How come I feel so washed up at such a tender age?” Beside it, some sort of retort: “Stay off the sausage.”
Within minutes the drunk girl was passed out on the couch. The bassist might have been asleep, too, though it was hard to tell under those big sunglasses. Stealthily the singer swiped the beer at the girl’s feet. He squirreled it away under his unbuttoned shirt sleeve, obscuring its telltale label, while he guzzled with the voracity and endurance of a master. It worked magic on him. He started chattering about other bands that were touring at the time, and how they all plagiarized Sonic Youth and each other, and how one band, he wouldn’t say which, had made a smart comment to him about fan loyalty that turned into a fight. He chanted a tribal dirge completely uncharacteristic of the band’s style and drummed on the side of the broken amp. To conclude his set he tossed the pen serving as his drumstick into the air. He watched it spiral toward the floor before rescuing it at the last moment.
Perhaps tiring of these antics, the bassist who was very much awake rose to leave. He paused at the top of the stairs and pointed a long, bony finger, the one he sometimes used to dedicate an upcoming solo. “You want me to clear them out?” he said. The singer looked at the girl lightly snoring beside him and, across the room, at his drummer, who’d dozed after first returning the bourbon to his tightly zippered bag. His gaze settled on the young man sitting beside his band mate at the buffet table.
“Leave them,” he said.
After he’d gone the singer began clawing at his cap as if plagued by some invisible pest. With a frustrated shriek he flung his cap on the amps amongst the crushed cans. The young man fought the urge to stare. It was not the singer’s motivations for tossing the cap that bewildered him, but what lay exposed after that simple act. Long gone were the locks that had shielded the singer’s face during those first years on stage, during that first time he’d seen them play, when he’d had to peek between the thick strands, like a peeping tom parting the blinds, to see what mysteries lay there. They’d grown up together in the eighteen years the band had toured the world. Now his idol was an old man.
Watching the singer smooth those willowy wisps he wondered why he hadn’t simply done away with it all like Frank Black. Michael Stipe. Billy Corgan. Perhaps foolish optimism had kept him from wielding the razor. Perhaps pride. When the singer seemed satisfied he’d tamed the mad scientist look he leaned forward and said, “So let me guess. You’re in a band.”
He felt out the statement’s jagged edges and kept quiet.
“What’s the line?” the singer said. “The song might be before your time. It goes, ‘What the world needs now is another folk singer like I need a hole in my head.’”
With those words something boiled over within him.
“We’re not a folk band,” he said. “And I hate that song.”
The singer smiled. “Me too.” He consulted an imaginary watch. He nodded to himself and stood abruptly, as if he’d just come to understand something. As if he knew this kid was waiting for him to say something more, something different, and he just wanted to climb in his van to wait out the night alone. The young man sprung from his chair. Despite his every instinct the photos burned in his pockets, urging him. His mouth opened and the words of a self-doubting school boy tumbled out.
“Do you happen to have a writing utensil?”
Shifting like he’d stepped on something sticky, the singer fished in his pocket for the pen they both knew he had. As the young man accepted it, their fingers nearly touching, he imagined the pen being used not only for impromptu drum solos, but to sign meal receipts. To fill out crosswords with confidence. Maybe even to sculpt the lyrics he would someday use to coax a woman into bed. No sooner had he summoned the courage to ask his next question, the real question, when he saw something that dissolved that impossible request on his tongue.
A subtle but unmistakable smirk was crossing the singer’s lips. A smirk that said, I’ve known what you’ve wanted ever since you slunk into our hideaway. You want me to bleed myself for you. And you made me provide my own dagger. All the young man could see was that smirk, and then, backing away, that torturous eye. So close, so far from the allure of the stage, it looked less magical and more what is was, medical oddity.
He mounted the chair beside the sleeping drummer. On tiptoes he reached a spot just big enough for the signature he’d practiced hundreds of times while listening to this band’s records. His own. When he climbed down the singer pointed to the drunk girl. Her teased bangs rose and fell with her breathing. Her unhinged mouth resembled that of a dead fish. She wouldn’t remember anything that happened that night.
“Will you take care of Dorothy for me?” the singer said.
His eyes were old and worried, like a father’s, even though the young man knew he wasn’t one. They left the drummer in the metal folding chair clutching his bag. “Serves him right for not sharing,” the singer said. Together they walked the drunk girl downstairs with her arms looped round their necks. He carried the heels that thumped along the stairwell, the singer his wimpy money bag. That sticky-sweaty hair smothered them both. When they reached his car the singer slipped something into his pocket. He patted it, cold and hard, against his chest. The pen. Then the singer saluted and, straightening his cap, stumbled toward his trailer.
And it was just him and the girl outside in the breezy night smelling of fermented wheat. She was awake and so much different now, but no less drunk. He piled her into his car. She didn’t know where she lived, so he drove in blind loops until she looked like she was about to pass out from all that booze and the joint they were smoking. He drove past the venue to see if her friends had come back for her. But
Roadtrippin at the Gates of Gasoline Hell
So, ACL is releasing its festival schedule tomorrow, and I'm hoping the stars don't align. Why? Well, now that gas is threatening to cross that $4 threshold, can we just imagine what that 700-mile journey would cost (not including hotel and ticket prices)? What used to be a matter of hopping in the car and trekking across the country may now be a virtual impossibility for us music lovin' cool kids.
I know, it's so uncool to complain about gas prices. We're all getting nickled and dimed and dollared to death. I'm just afraid the roadtrippin' pastime might become a passed time, you know?
Really this is the only pump I feel like pulling up to these days.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
New Sigur Ros Album Due Out June 24 (Updated at 2 PM by Sonic Ryan)
...which means it should be available on your favorite bit torrent site any day now! Let's hope the new album is as balls-out (literally) as this album art.
And did I mention there will be one track sung in English? Does anyone else worry it might suck? Or maybe, it just will sound exactly the same? (Maybe the lyrics will be, "I saw you... I saw you... I saw you...")
Now I must return to ransacking my house for the SR tickets I held in my beloved hands for one day before losing them. If any Olathe garbage collectors happen upon them, I will reward you handsomely for their safe return. Perhaps you can be my date?
UPDATE:
Head over to Sigur Rós' website to snag a high quality mp3 of the album's first single, "Gobbledigook." While you're there, watch the balls out video for the song, unless you're at work, then you may want to wait until you get home. No, Femme, it doesn't suck, nor does it sound like Sigur Rós as we've come to know and love them. If anything, it sounds like Sigur Rós just picked up a copy of Sung Tongs and decided to have some fun with acoustic guitars. Is this their freak-folk record? Find out on June 24, when the album hits stores in North America. Or, pre-order the album from their website starting on June 2, and get access to an mp3 download a week early. Let's not forget Sigur Rós are playing at the Uptown Theater on June 12. Tickets are still available, and you'd be crazy not to pick one up if you haven't already.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Sonic Youth, What Are You Thinking?
OK, sounds cool.
But why oh why does it have to be compiled by Starbucks????
Anyway, the track list for the thing is after the jump. Did anyone else wish Radiohead would have been a little riskier with their choice? I do have to give props to Dave Eggers and Mike Watt, though. And, uh, Flea.
01 Bull in the Heather [selected by Catherine Keener]
02 Sugar Kane [selected by Beck]
03 100% [selected by Mike D]
04 Kool Thing [selected by Radiohead]
05 Disappearer [selected by Portia de Rossi]
06 Stones [selected by Allison Anders]
07 Tuff Gnarl [selected by Dave Eggers and Mike Watt]
08 Teenage Riot [selected Eddie Vedder]
09 Shadow of a Doubt [selected by Michelle Williams]
10 Rain on Tin [selected by Flea]
11 Tom Violence [selected by Gus Van Sant]
12 Mary-Christ [selected by David Cross]
13 World Looks Red [selected by Chloë Sevigny]
14 Expressway to Yr Skull [selected by the Flaming Lips]
15 Slow Revolution [exclusive]
Monday, May 19, 2008
Liars Photos
I intended to put up a couple Liars photos with my Radiohead post, but I was too busy paying homage to Thom Yorke to remember. Nonetheless, regardless of what your feelings about Liars are, the dudes put on a pretty deadly show. Frontman Angus Andrew is a sight to behold.
So behold.
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