I like Clinic…but I like it better when it’s really Clinic

Took a new band called Suuns to task for sounding a little too much like one of my favorite bands in this review, up last Friday at Blurt.

Suuns never really establishes its own consistent sound, until, near the end, the band settles on an aesthetic of jittery, robot-funky beats, murmured vocals, and repetitive keyboard riffs. It's entertaining, but unfortunately sounds awfully familiar. "PVC", in particular, is a dead ringer for "The Return of Evil Bill", while "Organ Blues" cuts almost as close to "Goodnight Georgie," Obviously, no one's got a patent on beat-driven, groove-stuttering, reverbed pop, and if Suuns wants to do this, god bless. Just be aware that there's an elephant in the room, and it's wearing a surgical mask.

more

You can download the whole thing for free, if you want. You have to go here and enter your email address to get it.



Have any of you seen the French movie A Prophet?...we watched it over the weekend...really gripping story about an Arab boy who goes to prison and makes enough connections there to start his own hashish dealing business.

Lost Where I Belong

Somewhat off my usual beat, but really, really enjoyable...this new R&B/new soul record by Andreya Triana, who sang on Bonobo's Black Sands. I reviewed it for Venus.

Lost Where I Belong is a wonderful album, impressive on the first run and only getting better on repeat listens. In an era when most soul is recycled—or at least heavily referential—Triana is making her own way, with her own material and a refreshingly modern take on R&B sounds.

The rest


Here’s a remix of “Town Called Obsolete” by Mount Kimbie

A remix of “Draw the Stars” by Flying Lotus

And the video for "Lost Where I Belong"

I hate the 80s cos the 80s were shit

Surprisingly strong new album from the Vaselines...whose recording of new material came out in 1990.

My review ran in Dusted today, ending:

No one can be a teenager again, not after 20 years, and The Vaselines have lost some of the feckless charm of their earliest material. Still, as they’ve gotten older, they’ve held onto much of what made them special – the reckless fun, the gritty melodies, the taunting humor – and picked up some skills. They’re aging well.

You can read the beginning and the middle, if you like, by going here.

"Sex with an X"

"I Hate the 80s"

Mavis Staples

Mavis Staples has a new album out, produced by Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy, and pretty unabashedly excellent. In my review at Dusted this morning, I said, Its selection of covers, variety of arrangement styles, its suppleness in supporting Staples’ voice all speak to a real understanding of who she is and what she does. And so, unlike some May-December musical partnerships, You Are Not Alone seems less about updating the older musician’s image or making her relevant to a younger audience, and more about celebrating what is unique to her.

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Here’s the title track, one of two that Tweedy wrote for her

They say the things that must be said

I’ve been kind of a fan of Menomena’s herky-jerk pop since the last album, Friend or Foe, but it seems to me that this new one, Mines, is even better. Plus, bonus trivia, Brent Knopf and I went to the same college…though decades apart. Here’s to people who mortgage their futures to the Ivy League and then spend their lives farting around with indie rock. Go team!

Anyway, I said:

“Mines feels considerably smoother, sleeker and more premeditated than usual. There were always songs hidden in the mesh of conflicting rhythms. This time, they seem more obviously melodic, less manically crowded, fluid even, though certainly not predictable or clichéd.”

I said more, too, if that’s not enough


I put “TAOS,” which I like a lot, on my last mix. You can download that here.


Here they are playing “KILLEMALL” (Kill ‘Em All?) at PDX Pop.

Richard Thompson live album

I had some reservations about the new Richard Thompson album, Dream Attic, which I aired over the weekend in Venus, observing:

So, while Dream Attic supplies everything you want from Richard Thompson—the ornery humor (“The Money Shuffle”), the soul-searching lyricism (“A Brother Slips Away”, “If Love Whispers Your Name”), the slyly updated murder ballads (“Sidney Wells”), the striking folk-blues guitar work (“Stumble On”)—it also has intervals of forced, uncomfortable gaiety. There are penny whistle stretches in “Here Comes Geordie” that makes you wonder if Thompson has seen Riverdance one too many times, and an over-long, over-happy “dance, dance, dance” break in “Demons in Her Dancing Shoes” that leads one to speculate he may be plotting some sort of PBS pledge drive.

The rest is here

I put "Big Sun Falling in the River" on my August Mix, which I think you can still get here.

Or you can watch the man perform "Bad Again"

New back to school...nine years after 9/11 mix

Not that it has anything to do with either. I'm still not sure about the order. I had to put the Neu! track last, because it's got about 20 seconds of dead silence at the end, and Swans didn't seem to play very well with any of the other kids...there's a weird, weird transition going into Baths...but the songs are pretty good, some of them damned good. Enjoy if you can....it's only music after all.

Download

Tracks
1: Swans, "My Birth"
2. Rangda "Sarcophagi"
3. James Blackshaw "Part 6"
4. Sharon van Etten "Don't Do It"
5. Tortoise, "Charteroak Foundation"
6. Baths, "Indoorsy"
7. Menomena, "TAOS"
8. TV Buddhas "Fun Girls"
9. Major Stars, "Portable Freak Factory"
10. Superchunk "Learned to Surf"
11. Jeremy Messersmith, "Dillinger Eyes"
12. The Extra Lens, "How I Left the Ministry"
13. Neu! "Negativland"