LA Weekly

Ryan Adams - Royce Hall, UCLA, Jan. 30 and Bridges Auditorium, Claremont, Jan. 22. Both shows on sale Saturday

Avenged Sevenfold, Atreyu, Suicidal Tendencies - San Diego Sports Arena, Dec. 7 - All ages

Andrew Bird, Handsome Family - Orpheum, Dec. 7

Black Ghosts, Mezzanine Owls, Tweak Bird, more - El Rey, Dec. 10

Boom Bip, Junkie XL - Viper Room, Dec. 6

The Bravery, The Sounds - Avalon, Dec. 9

Garth Brooks - Staples Center, Jan 26

Cornelius, Plaid - Disney Hall, Jan. 17

DJ Shadow, Cut Chemist - Wiltern, Feb. 15 - On sale Saturday

Jonathan Davis of Korn, solo - Orpheum, Dec 4. Tickets still available

Aretha Franklin - Nokia, Feb. 14

KRS One - Rhythm Lounge, Dec 7. Roxy, Jan. 18

Datarock, Spoon, Pinback, Sea Wolf (Indie 103 Xmas show) - Avalon, Dec. 5

Dean & Britta (of Luna) and Keren Ann - El Rey, Feb. 19. On sale Saturday

Deerhoof - Avalon, Dec. 10, All ages

Eagles of Death Metal - Roxy, New Year's Eve

G. Love & Special Sauce - Vault 350, Long Beach, Dec. 13

Gimme Shelter Benefit with Pete Yorn, Matthew Sweet, Susanna Hoffs, Phantom Planet, more - Roxy, Dec. 11

The Knitters - Safari Sam's, Dec. 14

Lamb of God, Killswitch Engage - Long Beach Arena, Dec. 15

Lemonheads, Raccoon - Troubadour, Dec. 1

Melvins - Echo, Dec. 30

Moving Units, Scissors for Lefty - Echo, Dec. 13, Free?! Yea for Camel cigarettes.

Naked Raygun - Knitting Factory, Dec. 7

Nikka Costa - Roxy, Dec. 30

Willie Nelson - Nokia, Feb. 13. Tickets on sale Monday.

Paris a Go-Go: Rufus Wainwright, Belinda Carlisle - Disney Hall, New Year's Eve

Rev. Horton Heat, Hank III, Nashville Pussy - Wiltern, Dec. 27

Salt n Pepa - House of Blues, New Year's Eve

Snoop Dogg's Smokin' Christmas Party - House of Blues, Dec. 15. On sale Saturday

The Supersuckers - Viper Room, Dec. 29, 30, 31

Thrill Kill Kult - Safari Sam's, Dec. 13

U.S. Bombs, The Dwarves - Vault 350, Long Beach, Jan. 12

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About three weeks ago when I was in New York, Tal Rosenberg pretty much gushed non-stop about the Burial record's brilliance. At the time, I didn't even know that the London-based Dub Step producer had a new album coming out, which isn't much of a surprise considering fewer than ten people know his actual identity, he doesn't do shows and he's not exactly known as being PR friendly. Apparently, his eponymous first record was named last year's Album of the Year by The Wire, but since I have a hard-time justifying spending ten bucks on an issue of a music magazine, I don't read The Wire.

In fact, other than a spectacular track called "Unite" on a Dubstep primer I own, it's safe to say that all I knew about Burial three weeks prior was that "Ceremonial burial" was a crucial and awesome civilization advance in the greatest computer game ever made.
Since then, its been hard not to read about Burial, with every music magazine from London to Brooklyn to E. Brooklyn, rushing to heap it with praise. So I'm a little hesitant to even bother wasting any more words on an album that basically everyone knows is great and at this point, it feels almost bandwagonesque to even chime in, but fuck it.

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Sometime after 50 arrived, the art of the narrative wandered into a blizzard of coke raps, artificial hood mythologizing and pandering simplicity. Complexity no longer moved units, and with sales sliding, Scarface xeroxes and ringtone rappers became the safe bets. You can't blame the suits either. They're just trying to save their jobs and besides, Young Jeezy went platinum, Rick Ross nearly did, and Mims, The Shop Boyz and Soulja Boy had the most popular singles of 07.

Of course, hip-hop isn't dead, but it's hard not to deny that over the last decade, the major label system has done an abysmal job of putting on talented young rappers. Outkast know this. Their latest song leaked from DJ Drama's upcoming Gangsta Grillz album is called "The Art of Storytelling, Part 4" and from the title alone, you knew it was going to be special, considering the first 2 are vital organs of Aquemini, with Volume 3, a remix aided by Slick Rick, arguably the greatest storyteller of them all. On the surface level, it's easy autobiography, Andre kicking a stream-of-consciousness rant about groupies. Big Boi playing Outkast's id, offering menacing backhands and boasts about the hierarchy of his harem. But that's just the frame.

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If home is where you hang your hat then Silver Lake is rapidly turning into the world's largest hat rack. Over the past 12 months, it has become de rigueur in hipster courting rituals for male hipsters (homo habilus hipstericus) to trot out increasingly ridiculous pieces of vintage head-ware in an effort to woo the female species of hipster (homo habilus hipstripesicus). A trend once confined to the deepest recesses of the Cha Cha Lounge has spread like wildfire, consuming most of Hollywood and threatening as far west as the Fairfax district. As a native Angeleno dedicated to the preservation of a sane, safe city, I have decided to compile a guide designed to help ameliorate this obvious hipster identity crisis. If you or anyone you know has this problem, please take them to the nearest Lids as rapidly as possible.

The Fedora

Unless you're a chain-smoking, hard-as-nails 1940s gumshoe who can say the phrase "private dick" with a straight face, you probably shouldn't be wearing a fedora. I know half of you guys went to private school with people named Humphrey and/or Dashiell, but unless you've actually solved at least one mystery in your life then you are forbidden from fedora-ing. And, no figuring out to the plot to Mullholland Drive doesn't count as a mystery. Of course, there is also the fact that Will I Am wears fedoras. And nothing Will I Am does can ever be cool. Nothing.

The Derby

If I wanted to see a walking, talking, ball of hair in a derby hat, I'd just go watch an episode of The Addams Family.

The Che

Fight the revolution! One $3.00 organic fair trade cup of coffee at a time.

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If you're going to listen to any aging punk rocker wax nostalgic for a cult-band like Flipper - and we've all probably heard more than we need to - is there anyone you'd rather give the benefit of the doubt to than Nirvana's bassist / Northwest political gadfly?

You're in luck. Krist Novoselic is now a regular blogger for our friends up the coast at Seattle Weekly. So in addition to his Flipper-love (Not to be confused with Mr. Splashy Pants), you can also hear Krist talking about the release of Nirvana's Unplugged DVD, FCC hearings and fun stuff like that.

It's also painfully obvious that LA Weekly needs its own punk icon blogger...

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Wu-Tang Clan
8 Diagrams (Loud/SRC/Universal)
By Ben Westhoff

The long awaited fifth Wu-Tang Clan album, 8 Diagrams, just leaked, and it’s fucking solid. After just a few listens, it’s already in my 2007 top ten, and it will surely battle Graduation for supremacy on hip hop critics’ year-end lists. That said, it has little in common with Kanye West’s latest; the hooks are much more subtle and there’s nothing radio friendly.

The back story is almost as juicy as the album itself. Not too long after Ghostface Killah complained publicly about Wu ringleader and beat maker RZA’s handling of the Clan’s finances, Raekwon came out in favor of all-out mutiny. In an interview with Missinfo.tv, he calls RZA a “hip hop hippie,” adding: “When we listened to the finals of the finals, we was like, ‘Nah, this album is rushed, that’s not it, it’s not what we want it to be […] The album ain’t weak, it just ain’t what y’all may be expecting […]We make ‘punch you in the face’ music.”

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By Jeff Shaw, City Pages

Compared with other holidays, Thanksgiving hasn't inspired bards overmuch. There are no traditional hymns, no instantly identifiable music associated with the day save possibly various football broadcast bumpers.

Nevertheless, here and there we find certain songs that -- in lyric or in spirit -- fit the theme of the day. For the first installment of a new, recurring blog feature, we hunted down five such songs for your Thanksgiving listening pleasure.

We plan to do a similarly-themed post once a month or so, with songs about different themes and events during the year. Use the comments to talk about the songs, or to suggest your own potential additions to the list.

5. Adam Sandler -- The Thanksgiving Song
Before Adam Sandler's magnum opus about Hannukah, there was his fractured effort about Turkey Day. Performed on Saturday Night Live with a brief assist from Kevin Nealon, Sandler's silly song may be the first holiday hymn to mention both Mike Tyson and venereal disease -- though hopefully not the last. (Due to NBC's video fascism, you can't see the original version, but this live version has the same feel. Note to the Peacock: Information wants to be free, tough guy.)

4. William Burroughs -- A Thanksgiving Prayer
Feeling thankful? Got a warm sensation of fellowship with other human beings? Smiling after watching the Sandler video? William S. Burroughs can take care of that for you. Okay, it's a spoken-word piece and not a song. If Kurt Cobain had lived longer, I'm sure he'd have performed musical accompaniment to this the way he did Burroughs' "The Priest They Called Him." Sadly, Cobain killed himself, possibly after listening to this concentrated burst of depressing.

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Van Halen
Staples Center, November 20
By Randall Roberts

Jack and Coke? Check. Bic lighter? You know it. Rocker passed out on sidewalk, girlfriend exasperated, before the show? There were a few of them here. This is Van Halen, after all, and them up there is Diamond David Lee Roth and Eddie Van Halen, on the stage together again. Mr. Sparkle and Mr. Fingers, the yang and the other yang, home, at peace, revived, rejuvenated, and re-dentured.

All photos by Timothy Norris

It’s been many long years since Van Halen haunted the Sunset strip, and many years too since Roth and Van Halen palled around on stage. Years of darkness, years that are gone and we can never get back. That Dark Period, when Van Halen lost its true lead singer and became this other creature, this Non Halen with that Dude Who Shall Not Be Named who’s actually a really great guy but who is not David Lee Roth. The songs created by the fake Van Halen, you can’t unhear those songs. “Why Can’t This Be Love?” Because it just can’t because, well, you’re not the one we fell in love with.

We fell in love with a couple: Eddie and Dave from Pasadena, and like a pair of divorcees who seem so lost after the break-up, so halved and lonely, one without the other is weird and wrong. And because we love Hollywood endings, Van Halen at the Staples Center was a joy to behold, even if Dave can’t jump as high as he used to and there was no Michael Anthony swinging from a rope and swigging from a bottle of Jack.

So what did they play? What do you think they played, a Pixies song? Of course not. They played all the hits. “Panama.” “Hot for Teacher.” “Runnin’ with the Devil.” “You Really Got Me.” “Pretty Woman.” “Jump.” All of them sounded excellent, sounded alive with pleasure, sounded whole again. The crowd lapped it up -- especially, of course, the men in attendance, men with thinning hair and expanding bellies who were in hog heaven, air guitaring like they were speaking in tongues, feeling like they had finally come home. There they were, back in the basement with the black light and the bong and the stereo and an air guitar tennis racket just in case the dude on the FM station played “Runnin’ With the Devil,” which was the show’s highlight if only because it’s the hardest song of the bunch. “I found the simple life ain’t so simple,” sang Diamond Dave, a man born to be up on that stage, and because we know his post-Halen life, the truth of the lyric has a certain resonance.

It’s important to remember when contemplating Roth and the huge smile on his face that until a few years ago he was driving an ambulance in New York City. So I imagine that for a guy like him, last night was pretty special. For a long time he was a castaway, lost at sea, drifting, drinking salt water, hallucinating albums like Crazy from the Heat in thrashing seas. Tonight he seemed like he had finally washed ashore. He was overjoyed, overwhelmed, his face wide open in huge cheesy smile.

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...and then the cops came.

Jay Babcock of Arthur Magazine, the recently re-launched counter-cultural journal, sent out a hush-hush e-mail Saturday, Nov. 17 inviting people to an "L.A. River Beautification Meeting" featuring a performance from the much-loved band No Age.

Arthur's Babcock is known for pulling off cool and ambitious live events (like ArthurFest) that would make others give up while still talking through the logistics at a bar.

Staging a free, semi-secret show on the banks of the L.A. River with a little generator for power is a just plain excellent idea. And as with many excellent things, it was over too soon.

The set-up:

See more clips, including the arrival of the park rangers at Arthur's blog, Magpie.

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Tiger Army
Wiltern, 11/17

I love the stand-up bass. It's a ridiculously big, bulky instrument that looks cool as hell, especially when painted dark blue like Tiger Army's or sea green like the one used by the Guana Batz. Not the laid-back, smoky jazz club stand-up bass - those are great too - but they're too close to their natural environment. And definitely not the spinnin', jumpin', showy swing-band revivalists.

But psychobilly - well, there you go: You've got the speed, energy and aggression of punk mixed with (frequently) better musicianship than lots of other punk, and a wide spectrum of influences both musical (country, early rock, garage) and non (horror and exploitation movies, 1950s greaser culture, the odd chance of a switch-blade fight breaking out up at the Observatory). Psychobilly bands - and their fans - will much more easily embrace the kitsch than other punk off-shoots, leading to a more fun, genuinely enjoyable concert and all sorts of cool haircuts and outfits to boot.

Photos by Timothy Norris. Click here for more

Tiger Army definitely leans to the punk rock side of the psychobilly musical equation. Twelve years in, they've built a solid following that can easily fill up the Wiltern two nights running (and it doesn't even have to be Halloween) without a lot of commercial radio help. Still, KROQ had its vans hanging around, eager to associate themselves with the cool kids, even if they're still just hoping Blink-182 gets back together or that rap-metal makes a big comeback.

Despite a strictly-enforced "No Mosh Pit" policy taped on to every door to floor area, the room nearly exploded when Nick 13's band took stage. They was litlle pause for breath as the band tore through seven or eight songs at top speed, many from the band's ambitious new album, Music from Regions Beyond, such as "Pain, " "Ghosts of Memory" and "Hotprowl."

Just about to the point where you were beginning to wish they'd do something a little different, someone, maybe Greg Leisz, slunk out of the shadows to make good use of the pedal steel tucked far back on stage.

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Every week or so, we'll update a list on concerts announced, shows going on sale, and other things happening soon that you may want to know about.

James Blunt - Wiltern, Feb. 7 with Sara Bareilles. Tickets go on sale Saturday

Cave Singers - Echoplex, Dec. 3

Circle Jerks - Henry Fonda, Jan 4. On Sale Saturday.

Germs / Adolescents - Key Club, Dec. 28

Iron & Wine with Califone - Orpheum, Nov. 28

Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings - El Rey, Dec. 4

KRS One - Rhythm Lounge, Dec 7. Roxy, Jan. 18

The Knitters - Safari Sam's, Dec. 14

Avril Lavigne (yeah, yeah, I know) - Honda Center, May 3. Gibson May 4. On Sale Saturday.

The Locust - Knitting Factory, Dec. 2

John Mayer (Acoustic/Trio/full band) - Nokia, Dec. 8.

Naked Raygun - Knitting Factory, Dec. 7

Sea Wolf - Rhythm Lounge, Dec. 1

Siouxsie - Henry Fonda, Feb 15, 16. On Sale Saturday

Social Distortion - House of Blues, December 19, 30, January 11, 12, 13 -

Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band - Honda Center, April 7. Tickets on sale Saturday

Joe Strummer Tribute with Love & Rockets, Zander Schloss, Mike Watt and more - Key Club, Dec. 22

Vampire Weekend - Echoplex, Dec. 3

Velvet Revolver/Alice in Chains - Gibson, Dec. 12

Wu-Tang Clan - December 28, House of Blues.

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Remembering Mike Webber of the Nip Drivers
By Jula Bell

Being an underground musician in L.A., I'm inundated with music. Everyone is up there rocking out, and trying their best to communicate with the audience in hopes of getting a response of respect and/or admiration. I have found that most musicians are either concerned with expressing themselves or just trying to make it big. Sometimes it's both. The desperation is so prevalent in so many bands that very often musical depth and insight are laid aside for what is perceived as an image. As a musician, this process always saddens me.

There are but a few singers of our time who have truly moved me emotionally. One of them was Mike Webber of the South Bay punk band, Nip Drivers. Mike, who died a year ago this month, was a brilliant artist and poet and one of the most unique performers that I have ever seen. His profound lyrics spewed out effortlessly and his singing style was all about reckless abandon. When he performed he would throw his guts on the floor, and delight in the mayhem of it all. He had his demons and drug battles, and his singing was almost like a sassy “fuck you” exorcism at times. He would do these spastic dance moves and run around naked or in dresses singing horrifying covers in falsetto. We all lapped it up. Mike did the best covers of pop hits, hands down. He always made them his own, and usually did it better than the original (which is really hard to do).

Best of all, he had fun doing it. He was also modest about his brilliance. I always thought of him to be a kind of a South Bay Darby Crash -- but less into nihilism and more into the irony of our existence. He always had incomparable wit, was well read, and was very current on socio-political events. Add a sense of utter ridiculousness and rockingness; and the result was a plethora of amazing albums.

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Caetano Veloso
Pasadena Civic Auditorium, November 14
By John Payne

At age 65, sweet-voiced singer-composer Caetano Veloso represents perhaps the ultimate picture of the greatness of Brazilian music in all its deceptively breezy charm. As a member of the tropicálismo music and art faction back in the early ‘70s, he was considered a troublemaker by his government’s then-tightass cultural police, the tropicalistas’ relatively avant-garde approach viewed as disruptive to the social order. But subsequent years have seen the world coming round to Veloso’s charmingly quirky way of conveying a new kind of Brazilian music, one that pays indirect heed to the samba DNA that is its basic life-source but which eagerly cannibalizes the European and American influences (rock, jazz, hip-hop, electronic music, etc.) that has pushed Brazilian music forward and on up toward the stars.

Photos by Timothy Norris. Click here for more.

At the Pasadena Civic on Wednesday night, Veloso and his young, tough electric three-piece brought his varied catalogue of gently experimental songs into ever rockier realms, beginning with a hard-edged shuffle called “Outro” from his recent Cê album. The new-wavey tinge of the sound (kitschily so, even) via fuzzed-out guitars and hardbacked and decidedly unsambalike beats was initially just amusing in its brash glee, but assumed an oddly fitting aspect deeper into the proceedings.

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By Brick Wahl

Ya gotta love my buddy Dean, he's a nut. And inspired, brilliant, funny, knows everything and everybody Sicilian motormouth of a musician from New York City with a heart the size of Indiana. A place he probably hates. So Dean begins emailing and calling me at work on Monday morning (no kidding...it was a Monday morning) and starts in at turbospeed about some guy whose name I never did get except I think it sounded Slavic or Balkan, something central European and points east who’s a saxophone player from Cleveland and he's the best and yadda yadda freaking yadda. And something about a neighbor who gets his Sicilian heart and points south a-stirring, and they are new best buddies, and she's a sweetheart, and I'll love her, and she's an ex-dancer or something, and she comes from Cleveland, and she's a publicist now and has this new client who’s this saxophonist from Cleveland, and she's got him a gig or showcase at Catalina and you have to be there because I told her (in a drunken moment I am sure) that you are a "jazz journalist" for that weekly whatever it is you write for and I promised you'd be there.

OK....when is this?

Wednesday.

But I can't be there...I have passes for Caetano Veloso. And I really really wanna see Caetano.

But this guy’s great and it's a big deal and there's even a red carpet.

A red carpet?

Yes, she got a red carpet from someone and some big stacked blonde starlet to escort people in and there'll be lights and cameras and people, beautiful people. It's a big deal. Showbiz.

At Catalina?

Yes...and he began again with the showbiz and the carpet and the blonde with the big zambonis and this great tenor saxist from Cleveland.

This is a jazz gig?

Straight ahead baby!

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Spiritualized
the Vista Theater November 12
By John Payne

Praise the Lord and pass the collection plate. No, no, no, that’s bitter, I know. But then, the Spiritualized event at the Vista Theater on Wednesday night did leave one scratching one’s head a bit – about the very question of sincerity, and: Why are we (why am I?) so hidebound with irony and cynicism? The answer, I thought, is because the times call for it, and no use pretending they don’t.

Well, then, Spiritualized – on this trip accompanied by a five-piece string ensemble and three backing vocalists and nuffin else except mainman guitarist-singer Jason Pierce and electric keyboardist mate Thighpaulsandra -- brought their current vision of something akin to catharsis, atonement and prayer to Los Angeles, assuming correctly that this place if any could use a little of the aforementioned healing stuff. It was a night of pretty straightforward and even serious reflection by Pierce’s brood, a night that segued gently into varied modest moods of celebration, the Spiritualized crew and the crowd itself quickly agreeing that an attitude of something like gratitude for simple pleasures such as peace of mind or loving connections or perhaps hopeful dreams of peace on Earth were the order of the day. And it worked brilliantly, judging by how my own leathery pigskin was eventually pulled off to expose my – yes, my heart to the genuine, well-intentioned niceness of it all, the dignified, tempered grace of it all.

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Feist, with Spoon
At the Gibson Amphitheatre, November 12
By Sophia Kercher

A few years back among hundreds of urbanite Canucks, I stumbled upon Leslie Feist illuminating the night at an intimate Canada Day celebration in Toronto. Now a top-of-the-charts razzle-dazzler, Feist established Monday that even among thousands at a dual theme-park/concert venue with a sign that reads, “All You Can Eat, Adults 19.95,” she can engage a crowd with electric wonder. The zippy sets, complemented by flashes of color and floral silhouettes, displayed Feist as a wiry, larger-than-life sprite.

“What did you say?” my bud asked midshow, not hearing my enthusiastic mumble. I announced it louder, with Feist-like up and down octaves: a satisfactory “MmmmMMM.” Maybe because we think of Feist as more of a songstress, or we’ve heard one too many of her catchy tunes on Verizon commercials, it’s easy to forget that Feist is both a dynamic guitarist and a pianist too. The girl rocks it, and her range of tunings is, like, whoa.

Austin-based Spoon warmed up, feeding the audience a wimpy salad of standstill jams that paled when compared to Feist’s savory feast. Spoon singer Britt Daniel’s voice doesn’t fill a large venue as Feist’s shimmy-shinny vocal style does. But Feist was up to the task. Despite her, at one point, describing the amphitheater as “unsizable,” Feist totally satisfied the audience’s appetite — without overstuffing it.
—Sophia Kercher

All photos by Timothy Norris.

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Heavy Trash, Jail Weddings
The Echo, Nov. 10
Photos and review by Rena Kosnett

I’m just trying to understand why Jon Spencer is doing this. This egomaniacal vanity study called Heavy Trash, which I could take for ironic stagecraft if I wasn’t under the impression that his inflated id is all too authentic, is Jon Spencer’s current musical project, orchestrated alongside Speedball Baby’s handsome guitarist Matt Verta-Ray.

There’s nothing wrong with playing rockabilly music, which Heavy Trash is, in its most digestible form. There’s nothing wrong with twangy foot-stomping rhythms, which Heavy Trash most certainly incorporates. What puzzles me is that Jon Spencer, a man who built his career on wildly fucking shit up, first with Pussy Galore and then (for a while) with the Blues Explosion (the 1996 JSBX album Now I Got Worry is still a favorite), has become the living embodiment of the type of performer he once articulately parodied. Strumming on a pointlessly acoustic guitar—something that Elvis was known for, so he’s staying roots-true to showbiz excess—flourishing a persona that channels Chris Isaak channeling Joaquin Phoenix channeling Johnny Cash, Spencer played entirely typical rock n’ roll hillbilly fare Saturday night at the Echo. Kinda boring. I was ready for the set to be over at least three songs prior to its conclusion. One audience member commented, “It’s so formulaic—it just seems like he’s cruising on name recognition,” and I couldn’t agree more.

During one ill-fated attempt to “get real” with the audience, Spencer went on a fifteen minute mid-song diatribe about the importance of not being self-absorbed. The story, when he finally got it out, was about how a young lady he was dating got in a car crash, narrated over Verta-Ray’s non-stop guitar-picking backbeat, which was really odd. Like, can’t you hold off on the boogie-woogie while you’re telling us about a violent accident involving a loved one?

More after the jump.

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Ben Harper and The Innocent Criminals
November 9, 2007
Orpheum Theatre
By Ryan Colditz

On a night when everything was still all too complicated and lacking in humanity, Ben Harper and the Innocent Criminals rolled through town and brought smiles to the faces of everyone in their path and left a tap in our toes, sure to last for weeks to come. Dressed up for the intimate show, Ben and band took full advantage of the Orpheum Theatre’s elegant setting and delivered a knock out performance, from its mellow beginning to dance-party conclusion. Each song built on the previous, and by the middle of the set it seemed we would be giving standing ovations the rest of the night. We had no choice. He was delivering one amazing performance after another. It almost seemed like a dream when the lights came up, the band hit the stage, and how everything came together perfectly in a beautiful culmination of music and an appreciation for everything it means to us all.

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Architecture in Helsinki
November 6, 2007
Troubadour
By Jonah Flicker

Architecture in Helsinki is an ever-changing animal. Every show I’ve seen them play lately has been profoundly different; from their hippie-dippie Spaceland appearance while promoting their incredible sophomore album, In Case We Die, to last spring’s more rocking set at the Fonda in support of Places Like This, their first album for indie stalwart Polyvinyl Records. The Fonda felt like too cavernous a venue for this quirky little collective, although they usually number at least six onstage. But tonight’s performance at the Troubadour, the first of two back-to-back shows, felt cozy and just right. Bandleader Cameron Bird infuses his songwriting with a childlike sensibility, which bands like Los Campesinos try in vain to ape but end up sounding like cheap imitations. Innocence is such a clichéd emotion in indie rock; you’re not gonna fool anyone by forcing it.

photos by Jonah Flicker

AIH ripped through a wonderfully sloppy, unforced but cohesive set, or as Bird put it, they “casually pumped out jams.” Their newly appropriated disco and new wave influenced sound, very evident on their latest album, injected older songs like “It’s 5!” and “The Cemetery” with a joyful vigor.

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Dallas Observer has a nice set of disgusting album covers on their site worth checking out.

Above, an image from one of John Zorn's projects. Ahh, John Zorn! One could do a whole gallery of just his stuff, and it could take blue ribbon for squeamish-inducement.

Check out all the rest here.

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