Archives : all posts by Sean

Buckhingham Nicks - "Races Are Run". Tusk, Rumours and Buckingham Nicks were produced by different people. This fact is astonishing to me, almost incomprehensible. Because I swear that the magic of a song like this, its gentle heat, the timbre and harmony - these things seem more complicated & subtle than just the woodgrain of Stevie's voice, the way Lindsey's brings out new colours in it. The beauty of Fleetwood Mac's most beautiful songs, and this lost track included, is in the way the tape interprets the sounds; the way their sweetness is heard, remembered, recorded just so. Engineers are magicians, and apparently mimics. [Buckingham Nicks is out of print.]

Motorifik - "Secret Things". So as I understand it, certain rhythms were actually invented in the 20th century. See: the Bo Diddley beat. See: this one right here, a Phil Spector boom, boomboom. When I think about this, I explode with wonder. I get actual goosebumps. I've brought it up with friends, but no one has ever matched my enthusiasm. These simple things, so simple they seem self-evident - boom, boomboom / badda da da, da da - some of them were dreamed up in bedrooms, basements and porches within my grandparents' lifetimes. It's as if a new colour were discovered in 1958, and added to the spectrum. As if a Beat poet found a new integer, located between five and six. (There may have been precedents, Bo Diddley hidden in Brahms, but these are irrelevant: what's important is not who first used these rhythms, but when they - suddenly! so recently! - felt & sounded obvious.) If these new rhythms - thrilling, timeless, a priori awesome - were waiting in the ether for Bo Diddley and Phil Spector, then imagine what other rhythms might yet lie in wait. Treasures hidden between the measures. Undiscovered beats. [buy]

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Elsewhere:

One of our favourite new Canadian bands, PS I Love You, recorded a series of videos around their hometown of Kingston, ON. They asked us to tell you about one of them. "Exclusive!" they said. It doesn't matter that it's exclusive - it matters that it's good. Exciting, stifled, secretly brash. And I love that they don't have video of a new vocals track: "no, we're just gonna shred and play drums by the water." It's the title tune from their debut album, Meet Me At The Muster Station, and we think it's kinda killer.

(photo source unknown - found uncredited on a tumblr)

Belle & Sebastian - "I Didn't See It Coming". In the moment the car sails off the cliff, E has a great idea. It is such a great idea that is it at once the culmination of his career as an artist, and of his relationship with M. M is presently standing on the middle seat, hooting out of the sun-roof. First, E lights himself on fire. Next, as flames lick his sleeves, he skips the CD player to the track "Dancing Queen". Finally, with the ocean rocks hurtling toward the windshield (& M still hooting), he freezes time. He freezes it right before a downbeat. There is fire everywhere, and water, and a high-hat ridging the universe. He is plunging with his lover toward the end, and yet not. [buy Write About Love]

Weezer - "Long Time Sunshine (demo)". This is a song about giving it all up, packing it in, moving to Vermont or Maine. Why Vermont? The changing leaves. Why Maine? The sea. For reasons I am sure you can understand, the changing leaves and the lifting sea are often preferable to skyscrapers, failure and loneliness. But here is the lesson of "Long Time Sunshine": jesus christ does it sound nice to sing with friends. Yes, it is nice to say goodbye, sometimes; it is much better to sing it, and then to go for a beer, just around the corner. [buy the deluxe reissue of Pinkerton]

[photo by Eva Michon]

Tonetta - "My Bro". Afterward we went to the loft and we met these three guys with amazing costumes. One guy was a cowboy. The second one was a mechanic, but he said he was a dinosaur mechanic; he had a wrench that looked like it was made of bone. And the third one was dressed up like an fireman but he had put some sparkle on his face or something, and you could tell he was an angel. I don't know how exactly but you could tell. "An angel-fireman?" I said, and he laughed and high-fived me hard. He guessed I was a girl version of Axe Cop. Anyway the three guys were awesome and we hung out with them and danced and partied, and then one of them, I think the mechanic, said he knew this great empty outdoor pool where there was a party. And we went, and there was a bonfire and someone had brought a pick-up filled with plastic flowers, and it started to snow for a sec and then faded to nothing, and we were all partying round the fire and throwing back mini Oh Henry bars. I remember I held one of the bars between my lips and let the fireman take it with his teeth. Just as the sky was getting light I looked over to where the cowboy had been sitting, and now he was lying beside that bench, on the ground, sort of weirdly. I went over and he grinned at me and he offered me a pill. I shook my head and he took it himself, and either he had a seizure or he pretended to have a seizure, and I screamed and called everyone over, but Stace and John had left, and all the people there were suddenly grotesque, even the fireman, and they laughed at my scream, and the cowboy stood up and took out a switchblade and opened and closed it, like some gang-member cliché. I said, "Fuck off." The cowboy snickered. A girl was beside me, then; someone I didn't know, with white face-paint. "Get the fuck out of here," she said. I looked for the fireman and he asked me if I had "any cinders", and then the girl was beside me again, and again she said, "get the fuck out of here", and then the fireman put my hand on his crotch. I got the fuck out of there. The buses were running. The sun was rising. I hate November.

[buy 777 by the incredible, inimitable Tonetta]

(painting by Mandi Morgan, thanks p)

James Irwin - "Old Cars". There are fish that flicker like flames, and others that glow like bulbs, but most are not luminescent. Most are as dark as the sea. It is these fish I watch, or imagine watching, as I stand at the porthole and look. We are still moving. After all this, we are still moving. There are red lights flashing, klaxons sounding, tremors in the frame of the submarine. Saltwater drips from welded joints. I pace the corridors, tightening seals, replacing fuses. The periscope was swallowed by a whale. The larder is filled with tinned kippers, bourbon, stewed cherries. On the bridge I tap the dials with the hard tip of my finger. The needles have stilled. I am not sure if we are sinking. [James Irwin used to play with My People Sleeping / MySpace]

Onra - "The Anthem". I sting like a bumblebee, frill like a peacock, punch like a hammer, kiss like a wineglass. I am immortal and loose. I am slipping toward royalty. I am fresher than a brass plaque, I'm tight, and I know how to tune a flower. [thanks john! / buy]

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Elsewhere:

I am grateful for evidence of time-travellers.

Tyler Martin and James Rabbit made a sloppy, overwhelmed video for their song "Candles". It's good.

Scientists have built a catapult for throwing pies at bees.

This is an exceptional mix whose title says it all: 1970s West African Psych/Funk/Highlife Mixtape.

And finally, I've made a mix for the end of October. Download it here [73:28, 105mb]. If you like this thing (above links included), you should follow me on Twitter.

image source unknown :(

Sea Oleena - "Island Cottage".

A song about plain things, sung in cold colours - blues, whites, silvers. It's the knot of these things, the lace of colours, that catches you. You can get lost in a sky, you can go swimming in a sea. Layering guitar, synths, voice, lost claps, Sea Oleena makes this stuff seem very simple. But there are ten thousand bedroom artists laying layers in GarageBand. The trick is the whole, the more-than-the-sum, the way Sea Oleena's gorgeous assembly does not feel made - it feels fallen.

[hear more / Sea Oleena is from Montreal]

Baby Eagle - "Child of the Weather".

     She looked him over and said, "You're not as tall as you look."
     He wanted to laugh but he didn't. He was trying to steel himself, to not be smitten.
     "You're as short as you seem," he offered.
     "So-so," she said. She had hazelnuts in her eyes. "So, so, so, so."
     He wished he had said something funnier. The grass was green, and it was summer, and the garden was brightly lit despite the late hour. The yard was full of people, tipping bottles between their lips, quieter than you'd expect. Over K's shoulder, M saw a trio of owls sitting on the plywood fence. She saw him staring.
     "What?" she said.
     He had already realised they were fake. "Nothing."
     She looked. "What?" she repeated.
     "The owls. I thought they were real."
     "They don't look real," she said.
     "How would you know? Have you ever seen real owls?"
     "Yes," she said.
     "Yes?"
     "Yes," she said. "I'm from the sticks. Of course I've seen real owls."
     "Three of them, standing in a row?"
     "Yes," she said, smile curling, raising her beer.
     "On a fence?"
     "Sure."
     "At a party?"
     "Yep."
     "Just standing there, watching."
     "Sure, millions of times," she said.
     "What did they see?"
     "Bonfires," she said. "Barbecue. Stars. Lovers' quarrels."
     "Are we lovers?" he asked, emboldened.
     "We've only just met."
     "So not yet," he said. "Are you really from the sticks?"
     "Yes. Are you really from the city?"
     "No," he said.
     "I was born at the top of a mountain."
     "I was born in a tree."
     "I'm ten thousand years old."
     "I'm a torn newspaper."
     "I'm bonfires, barbecue, stars."

[MySpace/buy]

(artwork by Alex Roulette)

PS I Love You - "2012". In a corner of the Cavalho Forest, I kneel amid dry ferns and open the lighter I bought at a store. The flame stands up like a little soldier. It does not waver. I press it against the sunbaked bark of a fir. I do not do this out of spite or self-interest. I do it for the reason I tore the buttons on my coat; for the same reason as floods through dams, storms through skies, knives through muscle. It is not that the ends justify the means, it is that the means feel clean, rough, right; and nothing stops floods, or storms, or knife-blades; and nothing will stop me. [buy/don't don't don't miss on tour]

Young Man - "Just A Growin'". DUDE, CHILL. [MySpace/buy]

Little Scream - "Heron and the Fox". We measure distances in miles of highway. It doesn't matter how the bird flies, or how the fox runs. We are men and women, locked in cars and buildings and jobs and lives, parked a truckstops, and we cannot slip through the forests, swim through the lakes. We are far away, sometimes, and we cannot take the shorter route. Sometimes the shorter route is closed.

Oh I'll give you all the colours
that are left here in my box
if you would draw a picture into which we could both drop
yeah you
would be the heron
and I would be the
fox

I think there are a lot of people in Montreal who have been holding their breaths for The Golden Record, Laurel Sprengelmeyer's debut album. For two years she has been appearing under hot lights and then disappearing, bowing away into shadow; and by the doors there was never any music for sale. No CD-Rs, no 7"s, Little Scream had no MySpace page and scarcely a website. But every time I saw her perform, I wondered, How would you take this home? Laurel's songs were special not just for their beauty, their fragile lift, but for the space she created around them. She would sing a thin, silver phrase, and the light in the room seemed to change. When she raged, with ring & thunder, you could smell the petrichor of somewhere else. It was a secret of syllable, murmur, teeth and tongue.

Now and then Little Scream's concerts were disasters, undone by nerves and tech. But usually they were uncanny splendours. Accompanied by drums, cello, bass flute, or all alone, her music darted and flickered. She is one of those rare, wakeful interpreters, of herself and only. In one moment Laurel is fragile, weary; the next, wild and searching. She sings each separate instant, like Mary Margaret O'Hara (for whom she has opened). Sometimes instead of sounding pretty, Laurel sounds patient. And always, part-mystery.

Dan called Little Scream the best thing he'd seen since Tune-Yards, and Laurel has shared stages with acts like Atlas Sound, Stars, Bell Orchestre, Woven Hand and Superchunk. But she is still unsigned. And The Golden Record, which had help from Arcade Fire's Richard Parry, Stars' Patty McGee, and the National's Aaron Dessner, is still without a release date.

How do you take this home? You keep your breath held.

[Little Scream's website/listen to more songs/videos for La Blogotheque/ She is presently on a US tour with Owen Pallett, Land of Talk and solo; she plays Los Angeles on Friday. Full dates here.]

(painting above is Laurel Sprengelmeyer's Headlong gaze into the impending collision)