I never watched Aqua Teen Hunger Force, and was not aware they made it into a movie, but when they did, a pre-movie “don’t talk during the movie” reel was produced. It was scored by Mastodon, and is predictably hilarious.
Skip ahead to 1:00 for the best part.
This week’s earworm: Noel Gallagher’s High-Flying Birds, Council Skies. I always thought he had a better voice than his brother, and he’s more talented as well. I really like the melody to this song.
WOW. A long lost Steely Dan track from the Gaucho sessions was recently unearthed from the archives of the album’s studio engineer, released by his daughters who found it on a cassette while they were preparing a documentary on his life. The story goes that an assistant engineer accidentally erased the mix, and they tried to recreate it using a mix of lesser quality, but Fagen axed it. Gaucho isn’t the best Steely Dan album but it’s one of my favorites—it hits right at the age when I was really beginning to listen to music, and I knew there was something different about this band, from the way they wrote lyrics to how they arranged the songs. This song is pretty good; it would fit on Gaucho easily, probably on the second side.
This week’s earworm is the Cult’s She Sells Sanctuary. I remember dimly liking some of the Cult’s songs back in the day, and I went so far as to buy a copy of Sonic Temple on CD in ’89, but quickly realized I only liked two of the songs on the disc. This song rips though.
I’ve had Afterlife by Arcade Fire going through my head for the last couple of days. The original song is excellent; I didn’t know until I looked up the lyrics that James Murphy (LCD Soundsystem) produced the album; that explains the excellent groove this song sits upon.
I remember seeing the music video I’ve embedded above when it first came out nine years ago: Produced by Spike Jonze and starring Greta Gerwig, it’s an amazing live-action production and performance of the song.
I already had Welcome to the Pleasuredome stuck in my head last week, when I read that Frankie Goes to Hollywood was reuniting for the first time in 36 years; this rehearsal for the Eurovision contest sounds amazing, frankly. That bass line is tasty when played live.
It’s pretty amazing how much of a cross-section of popular music one guy touched at a particular period in time, and how much I enjoyed all of that very different music: Trevor Horn produced this album, Who’s Afraid of? by the Art of Noise, and 90120 by Yes.
Here’s this week’s earworm: Valerie Loves Me, by Material Issue.
I remember this song vaguely from college radio Back In The Day, but more specifically I remember seeing the CD cover at Record & Tape Traders on a mission for new music in college. Pitchfork did a retrospective of the album last week and I fell down a rabbit hole, which then got the song stuck in my head.
Songslikex is supposed to be a tool to suggest other songs you might like based on something you suggest. I’ve put in a couple of slightly off-center suggestions and it’s returned a list of songs that were OK, but I don’t know that I’d put them all in the same category. I don’t know how they’re developing their list, but I guess it’s OK.
Drug Church, World Impact. The vocalist gargles with razor blades, the groove is sludgy but fast, the chorus is killer and the lyrics are great. This shouldn’t work but it does. I found this band in an article about Turnstile and the future of hardcore, and it gives me hope. I want more of this to restore my faith in guitar-based rock.
Pitchfork did a quick piece on a band called Crushed, using touchpoints like the Sneaker Pimps, the Sundays, and Ivy, which is basically a Venn diagram of music I love. Their EP is pretty good; I can see some of the influences, and I think with a little more work and editing there’s something promising here. The first track is the one I’m replaying the most.