Looking back, Arctic Monkey‘s rise to prominence with their 2006 fastest-selling debut makes a lot more sense than Susan Boyle’s similar honors. People had just gotten used to finding out about music from the Internet. The Arctic Monkeys were young, irreverent, and most importantly, British. What’s more, the band was enjoyable to people you wouldn’t normally see together at a concert: pop-punkers and indie kids, aging hipsters and tweens, mods and rockers. All in all, 2006 was a pretty great year for them.
The boys from Sheffield have maintained their swagger for the ensuing three, churning out consistently high-quality albums and a slew of exciting EPs in between. Last year’s Humbug was supposedly a bottom-heavy, Americana influenced deviation from the course, although the most apparent difference was in Alex Turner’s longer hair than in any shift in songwriting. They’ve rocked tighter and better than most of their indie-major contemporaries, and although Wednesday was the first time I’d seen them live before, I had heard that their style translated into a fantastic stage show. Read the rest…
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Sri Aurobindo are back again, this time with a release on Bmore Musically Informed‘s new imprint Friends Records. Cave Painting being their second full-length release, they really stepped up to the plate, delivering on expectations of a vital brew of psych goodness. The sound throughout the album oozes a primitivist feel, something less rooted in the realm of mind-altering psych and more in the ritualistic. You can easily imagine these songs soundtracking the Sris as a tribe, hovering around a billowing blaze barely contained by a stone circle.
Lead single “Soul Vibrations of Man” is a slice of classic psych, the blown out bass guitar line playing the foil to the lofty and crisp quality of the elevating guitar melody. Arinoldo’s vocals ring as if echoing through a metal canyon, and you get a solid sense of expanse and a bit of wonderment. “Don’t Know” roars to life with the rumbling storm of bass and rhythm guitars, a bed for the wailing the lead guitar to slowly percolate through. The doors are blown open when both guitars and bass tear into epic freakout solos near the halfway mark, gradually drifting off and dissolving into muffled, noisy moans. Easily my favorite track on the whole LP (aside from maybe the highly infectious “My Luv Is Stoned” with its ebullient, titular shouts).
Local psych enthusiasts already know they will love this (and most any) outing from the Sris, but this release manages to provide enough edge from other influences to make them sound much more unique than a simple homage to a genre. They continue to wrangle some fantastic guitar and bass tones (probably due in no small part to studio whiz Chris Freeland), yet this go-round they have crafted their most distinctive and cohesive offering yet. A blast to listen to, Cave Painting sounds ripe to give them broader appeal, something well-deserved and perhaps overdue.
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kick – shure beta 52
snare – shure sm57
overheads – shure sm81s
guitar amp left – shure sm57
guitar amp right – shure sm57
cello – di
violin – di
trumpet – at4033
tom – sennheiser 421
center stage – apex 460 tube (set to omni)
stage – mxl 990 (angled at 45 deg in towards the middle of the stage on top of pa)
mid room – oktava 012 (x/y)
back room – AT boundary
Jason Urick – “Fussing & Fighting”
Directed by Mark Brown
Password (if still locked): fussing
Thanks to the kind folks at Thrill Jockey (especially Paco Barba), we’re happy to premiere the video for the title track of Jason Urick’s new EP, “Fussing & Fighting.” Jason took a few moments to enlighten us on the EP: Read the rest…
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kick – shure beta 52
snare – shure sm57
overheads – shure sm81s
vibes – at4033
guitar amp left – sennheiser 421
guitar amp right – sennheiser 421
bass – DI
center stage – apex 460 tube (set to omni)
stage – mxl 990 (angled at 45 deg in towards the middle of the stage on top of pa)
mid room – oktava 012 (x/y)
back room – AT boundary
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
kick – shure beta 52
snare – shure sm57
overheads – shure sm81s
guitar amp left – shure sm57
guitar amp right – shure sm57
tom – sennheiser 421
center stage – apex 460 tube (set to omni)
stage – mxl 990 (angled at 45 deg in towards the middle of the stage on top of pa)
mid room – oktava 012 (x/y)
back room – AT boundary
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
guitar amp shure sm57
center stage – apex 460 tube (set to omni)
stage – mxl 990 (angled at 45 deg in towards the middle of the stage on top of pa)
mid room – oktava 012 (x/y)
back room – AT boundary
I woke up this morning at around 10:30 feeling like death. It was still raining outside and at this point I don’t give a shit anymore. The thing that pissed me off the most about the rain is that it made me think of that Garbage song. I don’t want to think about Garbage songs, like ever.
After shambling around and grunting at each other for a little bit, we got things together, got some coffee in us, and left the place we were crashing for the evening. Bye Maine. Unfortunately, we did not get to meet Maine’s biggest celebrity, Stephen King, but we DID get to meet a guy we’d like to think of as a celebrity by the name of Bob York (pictured below with Ira). He approached us in that town in New Hampshire… the one with the abandoned train station next to the bank of America that kinda looks like a log cabin. You know that town right? Bob has been CRUSHING ass in that town since way back and stopped to tell us everything he knew about trains and New Hampshire. It was educational and awkward. Read the rest…
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stereo DI’s of Jason’s laptop
stage – apex 460 tube (c12 modded clone-set to omni)
stage – mxl 990 (angled at 45 deg in towards the middle of the stage)
mid room: Oktava 012 (x/y)
back room: AT871R Boundary
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
stereo DI’s
stage – apex 460 tube (c12 modded clone-set to omni)
stage – mxl 990 (angled at 45 deg in towards the middle of the stage)
mid room: Oktava 012 (x/y)
back room: AT871R Boundary
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