Archives : all posts by Dan

Wale - "90210"

A backwards A's cap, on a kitten, who's licking a baby mouse, who's sitting on a handwritten letter, written on ESL stationery, soaked in butter, on a plate of dainty grandmother china, all on top of a burger, which is on the hood of a cooper mini, which is being carried by a cruise ship, across a mirror-still ocean, leaving a pink wake of perfume and 100-calorie Caramilk Thins, all in a snowglobe, which sits dusty on a dresser, next to a framed production still from Scarface, a Taz-playing-darts statue, a copy of Tribute magazine, a few coins, a toast plate, a fingerless glove, an A's cap, some toe rings. [Pre-Order]

Von LMO - "Be Yourself"

Dennis rolls up in a stolen broken blue camaro, gets out with a pair of shades and a denim jacket. Dennis kicks the dust off the ground and walks up to the door of an open garage. An old relic is inside on cinder blocks, the sun is hard like hot metal, and Dennis looks around. The air is yellow and dry, the thin tin of a "work rock" station is coming from a small radio on the tool counter in the garage. Dennis steps back, looks past the garage to the house behind, still no one, quiet and dry and yellow air. Dennis waits. Dennis stands there, looking straight ahead at the garage, hands in his pockets, a battery in one, the bent and mangled keys to that hot camaro in the other. A voice comes from behind him, "You live here?" Dennis turns around, ready to run, but it's just the mailman. Dennis says nothing and takes the letters, the mailman, a rakish blue geezer, gets on his bike and rides dusty to the next house miles down the road. Creditors, debtors, haranguers, complainers. But one letter, in a beige, sparse envelope, with a neat print and a dime taped to the corner. "God dammit," Dennis looks over his shades. And up at the house, quiet and yellow and dry and dusty, as he rips open the beige envelope. I'll be home in two weeks. I'm in trouble. I need your help. Be ready for me. I love you and I'm sorry. -Dennis

[My(OUTER!!)Space]

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Jumbling Towers release a single on Half Machine Records today. With incredible cover art.

DuneBuggy - "W Thing"

Imagine you're me. It's two days before Hallowe'en, and you're in the dollar store. There's a CD there of "Hallowe'en Scary Sounds". It's got a shitty graphic on it that looks like it was designed by someone who had only ever read about H ween; like "cats, witches, orange and black, now get to work". It's a dollar, and it's a whole CD worth of stuff. You buy it, right? Of course you do. But then you get home, you had a long day so you forget it's in your bag until you pull it out, you put it on, and it's even lamer than you expected. It's a crappy weak organ and some intermittent moaning, some chain rattling, something that sounds like a plate smashing into mud, which I guess is scary. It's one 48-minute track, so you leave it on and giggle every so often while you carve a deformed pumpkin. But then. THEN. Buried in there, at about the 39-minute mark, is this pulpy gorgeous gem. Played by what sounds like a band that would call themselves Frankie Stein and the Halloweeners, with the vocals sounding like they're coming from behind the bathroom door, and the organ all naked and fat and too confident. It's a beautiful party costume Kingsmen dress-up travesty, it's just my thing today. [Buy]

Hollows - "Watch Out Sally"

Imagine you're me. You're a girl, 15, with catholic overbearing parents. It's 1961, you're wearing secret make-up, and it's bowling night for all the coolest. You're not allowed out, because tomorrow is Sunday and you need to be ready for church in the morning. You pour your nightly tea down the bathroom sink, run the shower and slip out the second-story window. These are the moments. You scrape your wrist climbing down the tree, and you practically ruin your shoes from running across the field to the road. Socks dark with wet and sweating and heart racing, exploding, you meet Tim (big Tim, such a nice guy, just a friend though, he has a beard) and he drives you to bowling. You meet up with all these people who are just on the edge of being your friend and the feeling like anything could happen is the only thing you can see, it's all around you. Matt is there, he looks so handsome, he's on Tim's team, and they win the game, but you laugh and share looks. So what do you do? Remember, you're me. Well, if you're me, you stop Matt on the way to the soda counter, you touch lightly his fingers as you spin to face him, and say with all the devil in your eyes but all the saints in your voice, "I don't want to go home tonight." And you think, suddenly a scared and desperate animal, truly afraid of what will inevitably unfold from leaving the shower running and breaking the tea cup, if you don't take me, maybe Tim will. [site]

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Jim O'Rourke - "Happy Days" (16 kbps, 47:33)

"It's like a spy story," she whispered, as they made love for the first time in six weeks. "We're here, gettin' off on each other--" he snickered through his teeth "--don't laugh, that's what it is, isn't it? We're here, and the whole rest of the bus is just sittin' there, they have no idea this is going on, you know? We could do anything, you could kill me, strangle me to death, or I could kill you I guess. Or I could have a baby in here. I guess someone would notice if I had a baby, I'd probably be hollerin' like a wounded dog, that's what I imagine anyway. But I guess what I'm sayin' is I like this. I feel lifted up, in a sorta way. Like lifted above the bus and floating above it, like nothing could hurt me, and I feel like I used to feel when I was kid I'd imagine floatin' in a space capsule only big enough to lie down in. Totally glass, just floatin' in space in a little glass tank, like a glass coffin I suppose, just floatin'. Well now I guess I'd like to be there with you, and there should be enough room so we can sit up and talk and make love I guess." He snickered again. "What's so funny? I'm tryin' to tell you something that's important to me and you're laughin' like it doesn't mean anything." He hugged her close and the moonlight came through a frosted skylight. "You talk too much."

[Buy]

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Luc - "HI"

Appointed the position of outer palace guard at age 17. Three interior "rings" of guards follow his station, if he is killed, the royalty, the visiting dignitaries, the higher-up servant staff, the priceless art and collections, the as-yet-unannounced and unborn prince, will all still be protected by three sets of guardian warriors. To be the outer ring, to be the first line of defense, is to be deemed the strongest, he thought. He looked into his gray lunch case and took out an apple. A kind of madness sets in being an outer guard, the tension is constant and inescapable. The view of the valley is vast, and any black dot on the horizon could be a threat. There are peddling salesmen and hungry peasants and sick villagers and lost noblemen, and all of them deserve to be treated as the souls before God that they are. None deserve to be killed from 300 paces or screamed at with such force as to drive them mad with primal fear. None deserve that, and yet that would be so much the easier solution. A kind of madness sets in and makes itself at home, indeed, he thought. As it does with everyone eventually, he supposes, but particularly in this profession. Particularly when a nuisance lingers just beyond the far row of bushes, skulking and stalking and staring and waiting. He knows ultimately that it's a troubled village boy with no parents and no tongue and missing half his brain, swaying and moaning like the walking dead yet meaning not an ounce of harm, even laughing on occasion, but sometimes he can't turn away from the idea that he is performing an act, playing the sick and stricken spirit to weaken his guardly resolve and then once upon a dreary gloaming ram a sharpened stick through the side of his neck when he's turned to grab a fallen cherry from the ground. Yes, a certain madness sets in where going home will not wash it clean, where sleep will provide no solace, love no escape, faith no hope. No, instead, the tension slowly seizes from a spot in his back, constricts him into a board, an expressionless and emotionless board, standing guard outside the palace. The king, out for a walk amidst the spring flowers, sees this guard and says, "This. This is what I want a guard to look like."

Luc - "Backbone Nuance Give Millions Hope"

The sounds and plans and numbers of a soft sweater, a fire, a carpet and a kiss, reverse-engineered.

[Buy Peaofthesea]

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Au - "Ida Walked Away"

The Cloud King. His horrible reign of eons upon the skies. He shed the blood of millions of his own people to feed the mouths of the earthlings below. It was much told amongst the clouds that he hated his own people, that he was weak, and that he loved the petty earthlings below much more than even his fellow clouds. In a sense it was true, The Cloud King did feel a tenderness towards the people of Earth, though it was true he could live without them. The King in fact felt a duty to the plants, somewhere in his cloud heart he knew he needed the plants, and they needed him. So he would slay his cloud subjects, mostly the fattest and darkest, quietly and always from behind. He would come up behind, while they were gorging themselves on steam, smile in their ear, and slide his blade deep into their belly. He would sometimes hold them in his arms as their life emptied out below. He told himself he took no pleasure in this.

Eventually The Cloud King could not escape his own reputation. Tired of killing, he wanted to stop, but knew he couldn't. He instead chose a young cloud, a beautiful young cirrus, long legs and long eyes, and fell deeply and glacially in love. He silently swore protection on her, and felt comforted knowing somewhere in world there would always be one cloud that would never rain. However, no matter how much he told her of his love, she did not seem moved. He was The Cloud King, slayer of millions, and he had chosen her, and yet she only smiled with one side of her mouth and looked down at the ocean. He was embarrassed, humiliated, and looked around at his subjects. They all, as usual, cowered in fear. Ah, fear, yes. And the King threw his blade in the South Pacific, you can still find it in there if you try, and opened his arms for his love to come to him, a changed man, a man of peace, of love. But instead, she floated away, slowly, patiently, with ease and with grace. For what else could a cloud really do?

[Buy the jaw-dropping Versions or Verbs]

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New Science Project - "Poison Culture"

I took a tablespoon of cinnamon and headed out into the woods. My skin was burning and my head felt like a ball compass, my brain spinning in my skull. I had sweaty shivers, my clothes felt cold and sticky and my spine like a bamboo reed, stiff but bendy. Muscles hurt from disuse, my entire body filing a detailed complaint. I can't remember if I saw it or my eyes made it up, but I passed a tree that had scrawled on it "feeling sick is feeling good." [Buy 7"]

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Michael Hurley - "Don't Blame it On Me"

I inherited a dead man's jeans the other day. I spoke aloud his will when I found him hanging out the dumpster behind the A&P. "To whomever is listening to this message to them I bequeath my articles of clothing and anything that will keep another person warm in the coming cold. And may ever and ever be right around the corner forever and on and on amen." I took the jeans off and they slipped right over top of the pants I had on. I continued on my way and thought about his white and blotchy thighs as I climbed the steep hill to the lookout. I watched the sunset and sang a song to set it down just right, to sing the sun to sleep, and watched my breath hover in front of my face like a TV ghost. When the sun was gone I started for home and shoved my hands in my pockets to guard the cold. In the pocket was a 5-dollar bill. I spent an hour getting back to the A&P, fair is fair, and I wasn't left that money. I folded it into his grey and stiff hand and thought, "Gee, am I the last person to say hello to this man or the first person to say goodbye?" Either way I shook his hand and left it at that. [Buy]

Broadcast and The Focus Group - "The Be Colony/Dashing Home/What on Earth Took You?"

A concatenation of carefully lit candles and harp-struck notes, of bearded funky hooka-steppin' dudes and their hippie dead-eyed life partners, of eyebrow years and elbow days, of gift horses, hotel slobbies, mustard stains and lady pains, of steps taken through thin thresholds, and the humanization of masturbation, of girlie rolemodels and fascist hairdos, of rising past like waves of zombie promise, of future landslides and robot catch-alls, construction catcalls from honey-voiced angels, God is in the bassline, stretched out and laying naked in the honey sun. [pre-order]