In Between Sleep with Kurt Vile

Two great songs to be half asleep to, when time doesn't seem to exist:

Welcome To the Club

Do you ever have moments when you're listening to an album, however often or rarely you listen to it - it's just kind of on in the background - and then suddenly, a lyric or melody or some other part of a particular song catches your attention, and then you have to re-start the song, regardless of how far you've already gotten through it?

I just had one (but not my first, hence "Welcome To the Club") such moment with American dream pop duo Azure Ray's "Trees Keep Growing" from their 2002 album Burn and Shiver (Warm Records). I almost never listen to this album, although I've had it for ever (its opening track "Favourite Cities" is one of my favourite songs which deserves (and likely will receive) a post of its own). I was actually giving it one final listen to decide whether I even wanted to keep it. Although "Trees Keep Growing" alone has not saved Burn and Shiver from being deleted yet, I have been pleasantly surprised by this track. How it has gotten past me all these years while "Favourite Cities" hasn't is beyond me.

As I typed all of this, I finally stopped repeating "Trees Keep Growing" and let the next track "A Thousand Years" come on, and it's quite good so far too. Let's see where the rest of this album goes.

From the Vault: "Pop Went Halifax, Part Three: Timber Timbre, Little Girls, Zeus, You Say Party! We Say Die! and Japandroids"

October 24, 2009
The Marquee Club
Halifax, Nova Scotia

Preface: Steve and I met up with a couple of friends of ours Alex and Chapin. Alex and Chapin had driven up to Halifax from our hometown that day to see Girl Talk.


Chapin came with me to the hauntingly spellbinding folk ensemble Timber Timbre at St. Matthew's United Church. This has always been a fantastic venue. We watched from the upstairs pews, as I always do [there]. They were really able to create a brooding, haunting atmosphere with nothing more than an electric guitar, floor tom, violin and sampler. At times, they filled the church with animal noises and sounds of rustling plant life, thereby turning the entire church into a rain forest mid-downpour. Mesmerizing. Also, I went to this show for free. I ran into a guy the night before who, because of some convoluted situation, couldn't go to Timber Timbre, so he gave me his ticket. Much appreciated, bud.

[Chapin and I] skipped the second/last act to reconvene with Alex and Cara. I was going to a different show, but I went with Chapin to where Girl Talk was playing so Chapin didn't have to look for a scalper alone. It was far away from where I was supposed to [have been], but I went with him anyway because I knew he wouldn't have been able to find a ticket, and contacting him to come to the Paragon would have been difficult.

Little Girls played first. They were pretty good but not as good as I'd expected - way more post-punk than lo-fi, and the lead singer (in particular) was pretty damned goofy. Knocking over equipment and spazzing out on the floor are fine and can really add to a show when you're not the opening band playing to a VERY dispersed crowd of at most thirty in a somewhat big venue. Instead, he just ended up looking histrionic and stupid.

Next up were Zeus and You Say Party! We Say Die!. While I hated all of the stuff I'd downloaded by both bands, both were actually, again, pretty good. YSP was really energetic and danceable. Krista, the person [with whom] I [stood], is the biggest YSP fan, so it was really awesome when singer Becky Ninkovic 1) put her finger on Krista's forehead, 2) came into the crowd right in front of us, 3) put her arm around Krista and sang into the mic together, and 4) crowd surfed right on top of us (I was the first person to catch Becky). If a musician I loved did any of that with me, I'd probably never go to another show because nothing could top that. So yeah, good for Krista.

Lastly (for the night and for the festival) were Japandroids. I'd looked forward to them the most (since summer), and they were the only band for whom I bought an advance [Pop Explosion] ticket. Well, they turned out to be a HUGE disappointment, but that wasn't their fault at all. The bar was closing, so they were cut off after only a handful of songs. Surprisingly, after we started chanting "Fuck this shit!," they were allowed to do an encore, houselights on and all. It was hilarious seeing the bar's people watch from backstage with "How long is their encore going to be??" expressions on their faces. Also, the crowd got super-rowdy and not in a fun Japanther way. I don't like it when a person's foot is jammed in my crotch, and she gets pissed when I move her foot.

[After Japandroids finally reluctantly left the stage], the magic was over, and I caught a ride home with Alex and Chapin the next morning. Sweet tunes and reminiscing all the way home.

From the Vault: "Pop Went Halifax, Part Two: Ancestors, Devil Eyes and Japanther"

Ian Vanek of Japanther

October 23, 2009
The Seahorse Tavern
Halifax, Nova Scotia

Preface: I crashed at my friend Steve's place during Pop Explosion weekend. The weekend peaked on Friday, the day that would become the fourth best show of my entire freaking life (behind the two times I saw the White Stripes and the time I saw Les Savy Fav).


Pop Went Halifax, Part Two: Ancestors, Devil Eyes and Japanther

The show started with a hardcore screamo band called Ancestors. Maybe it was my previous summer of warming up to and even liking hardcore, scream-heavy music, but I surprisingly enjoyed them. Unfortunately, Ancestors probably spent more time setting up than actually playing. The singer into the crowd and started shoving people around (note: he only joined an already-moshing crowd), and pretty much right away, security shut them down. Well, that pissed off pretty much everyone, but the next band, Montreal barrage rockers Devil Eyes, lifted the entire room's spirits. This band was great - so energetic and just good, old-fashioned rock and roll. The best parts were 1) when the Chinese drummer sang their last song entirely in Cantonese (I never thought I'd hear Cantonese in a punk song (live)) and 2) when the guitarist smashed his guitar to bits. Unfortunately, I didn't get one of the several pieces he handed out to the crowd.

Finally ... FINALLY ... after all the smoke cleared and all the dust settled, the stage was set for another band I never thought I'd have gotten to see and the highlight of Friday night's show: Japanther. This was, without question, without hyperbole, the single greatest punk show and most energetic show I'd ever been to. I was three feet away from drummer Ian Vanek whom I told to make me deaf. I also got a bottle of water from him which I regretfully mindlessly left on the street. I've never been able to sing along to a band like that except, again, for The White Stripes. I left that show bloody and bruised. My knees were constantly shoved against the edge of the stage. I could barely walk afterwards, and I kept getting shoved really hard into the concrete wall. My arms and the back of my neck and shoulders were all scraped and bruised, and my neck was totally kinked the next couple of days. At one point, a guy suddenly turned around and spat beer in my and another guy's face, and I could not have cared less and just kept dancing. Obviously, the crowd was really rowdy, but it was one of those times when being rowdy was totally appropriate and only added to the experience.

I'd really looked forward to Japanther, but I'd never thought it'd have been THAT good. I didn't think it'd have been the highlight of the weekend, let alone of all of the concerts I'd ever seen.

After a fucking wicked night, Steve and I went back to his place, sweaty and smelly as all hell, and fell asleep with our ears ringing (it was the first time I had to wear earplugs). His roommate Kyle, who works in the restaurant above the bar, came down near the end of the show and said he'd never smelled the bar that bad. Needless to say, first on my agenda the next day was one of the most thorough showers of my life.

Post-Campus

I had a campus radio show for about a year-and-a-half with a friend, up until the end of summer 2010. Each week, our show featured a different theme. Making up these Halloween playlists as I go these past couple of years, as well as making a few mix-CDs for various friends, has reminded me of how much I like making playlists, especially within the contours of a theme or personality-type. Therefore, I've decided to start (or attempt starting) periodically posting themed playlists, each between sixty and eighty minutes in length (as was the length of my program and as is the length of an average CD-R). I had a lot of theme ideas I never got to suggest to my co-host, so maybe I can finally get around to them, whether by myself or via trans-continental online correspondence with him (and/or anyone else who may be interested). Stay tuned.

Corey Hart - “I Wear My Sunglasses at Night” < The Cramps - “Sunglasses After Dark”

I'll take the Cramps' "Sunglasses After Dark" over Corey Hart's "I Wear My Sunglasses at Night" any time:

From the Vault: White Stripes Album Descriptions

I wrote the following White Stripes album descriptions in 2007. :/ It's often weird reading back on old writing, especially when there are a lot of things one would have written differently whether in terms of content or even punctuation and grammar. I think I neglected to mention the White Stripes' second album De Stijl (Sympathy for the Record Industry, 2000) because the post I was responding to asked what these specific albums sounded like or which albums he/she should have gotten after De Stijl:


Their self-titled (first album), while not their most diverse work, is a solid and consistent rock record. It has its slow tracks here and there, but most of the tracks showcase their signature sound of short, sweet, driving blues-rock. Their sound isn't completely developed here, but it's pretty much The White Stripes at their barest of bones. This is also Jack's proudest work, according to himself.

White Blood Cells is probably their most accessible album. It was their breakthrough album, afterall. It contains Fell in Love with a Girl, Hotel Yorba, and Dead Leaves - all of those familiar singles which launched them into the mainstream. As a whole, it's probably not their most consistent work. It kind of drops off, during the last four or so tracks, but it's still a White Stripes record, if you savvy.

Elephant is probably their most "sophisticated" album. It has a great balance of soft ballads, hard-rockers, (a few more) blazing guitar solos, and it's the first to feature Meg on vocals. This is also where Jack's lyrical aptitude really starts to shine through, and it continues on through their latest album. The balance of diverse tracks and The Stripes' ability to blend them all into a such a cohesive work gives Elephant a great all-around album feel. It's possibly The White Stripes best work, to date.

Icky Thump is also pretty diverse, insofar as it hearkens back to sounds that came out of or were prominent on their older albums (such as certain organ and guitar sounds). Not to mention The White Stripes stray further from the aesthetic of the number three (guitar, drums, vocals) - so far as to include (surprisingly successful experiments with) trumpets and bagpipes. To some, the hearkening back to old sounds is a bad thing, because they say The White Stripes have started to repeat themselves. However, I think they've managed to take most elements from their older albums, experimental and non-experimental alike, and refine them to their very best (odd percussion times, the use of mic distortion effects, etc).

A lot of people consider Satan The White Stripes' worst album, because it strays the furthest from their sound. Guitars were largely replaced by piano, and this is where they really started to break their own rule of the number three, with the inclusion of mandolin and marimba. The album is one big experiment and is the reflection of a frustrated man/artist. The time leading up to and during the album's recording was a tough time for the band (more specifically, Jack): things were going wrong in the studio (you can hear a tambourine stand or some other piece of equipment topple over in "White Moon;" the tape on which "The Nurse" was recorded was cut incorrectly and had to be re-pieced together); Jim Diamond was suing The White Stripes over production rights to their first two albums; Jack just went through a break-up with Renée Zellweger; his hand was still recovering from surgery after his car accident; and of course, he was still dealing with the whole episode with Jason Stollsteimer from The Von Bondies. All of these events served as the inspiration of the album's theme of broken trust (hence the title, "Satan" being all of those people and events "getting behind" Jack and allowing him to move on with his life and work). Satan is, subtly (and sometimes not so subtly), their most lyrically bitter and harsh album, but I think the band was able to turn their frustrations into something great. Definitely, IMO, their most under-rated and under-appreciated album.

Another thing that makes Icky Thump great to me (especially as a reflection of the band, at perhaps their best, overall) is that it's a complete rebound from Satan. The band is definitely rejuvenated, on Thump, after a prolonged hiatus with other projects (The Raconteurs and Loretta Lynn). Jack's personal life also took a turn for the better, during the time between albums (a marriage, a couple of kids, and a relocation from Detroit to Nashville will do that). I don't know much about Meg's personal life, but she also moved out of Detroit (to California). Overall, Jack and Meg were happier with their new lives, new loves, and new environments, and, most of all, the band was happier and eager to get back into the studio.


Note: The White Stripes' 2003 album Elephant (V2/XL Recordings, 2003) did not feature Meg's first appearance on vocals - only her first appearance on lead-vocals.