Thursday, March 24, 2005:

Universal Pop

David Boyk, who I linked two posts down for his introduction to Bollywood for the Skeptical, has jumped onto the mp3blog bandwagon. Hurray for us! He's got some interesting and diverse tracks up already; check it out.
Monday, March 21, 2005:

Glorious Noise

I've gotten two emails now from Glorious Noise Records; the first simply sat in my inbox for weeks, one of those things I intended to get to, until today. They're a new, and small, record label; they can afford to release only a few albums a year. I think a side effect must be that they have to focus on only the albums they think are truly great, instead of putting out a thousand that suck in the hopes that one can be hyped enough to hit it big anyway (in other words, sort of the opposite of most of the RIAA cartel).

Anyway, so I think they've succeeded. Their songs do not suck. Also, they don't care if you put them on mix tapes, or on p2p; in fact, they want you to.

I'm smitten.

Give them a peek; it's worth your time. The Riviera tracks there are country/rock; the Quasar Wut-Wut are all over the map. I think I favor the Quasars, but they're both good IMO.

Riviera and Quasar Wut-Wut both have more mp3s on their sites.

Labels: , ,

Sunday, March 20, 2005:

Bollywood for the Skeptical

Oh, I've been meaning to post this for a minute: David Boyk's 'Bollywood for the Skeptical'. Lots of good picks there, and he seems like a nice guy in general. (man has a LiveJournal too, though it's low in the Google results).

Labels:

Wednesday, March 09, 2005:

Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash

Found via metafilter: Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan recorded some songs together in 1969 which were never released. Give it a listen.
Tuesday, March 08, 2005:

From Detroit to J.A.

I'm sure I'm behind the curve on this--I've been mostly unplugged lately--but I've just discovered the Kleptones' From Detroit to J.A.. Some of their work has left me cold, but this one is hot hot hot. Anything that mashes Marvin Gaye with David Bowie and Tears for Fears deserves high marks for ambition; fortunately it also deserves high marks for execution.

Labels:

Monday, March 07, 2005:

Dave Lippman

A number of miscommunications and non sequiters have led me to still have hosting until at least the 10th of March. (Yes, I wrote about it and yes, I cut it; it was not so interesting.)

So. Another post.

Dave Lippman -- I Hate Wal-Mart
Dave Lippman -- Thank You
Dave Lippman is a satirical folk/anti-folk singer with a career going back to Bush the First's tenure as Preznint. Lippman's alter-ego (or at least the most popular of them) is George Shrub, the world's only singing CIA agent; Shrub is a cold-hearted and borderline sociopathic bastard. But that's the kind of person you get when you're working to maintain oligarchy in the face of struggles for fairness and egalitarianism.

Lippman is not his character. Dave Lippman strikes me as intensely moral and clear-headed; he's got principles, and he's pissed when they're violated, whether it's the government or a multinational corporation violating them.

Which brings us to these:

"I Hate Wal-Mart" is a satirical song about some of the (many) reasons to hate Wal-Mart, most of them centering on its relentless hegmenozing of the cultural and financial landscape. What's so great about it, aside from its humor and its catchiness, is that it also makes the occasional stop to skewer hypocritical activists as well. ([I hate] "Starbucks ... not so much.") Would worker oppression by any other name would smell as dank? ... Why yes, I think it would; thanks for asking.

"Thank You" is a sincere number, sweet and thoroughly charming. It's a very peaceful track, one I put on repeat sometimes when I'm chained to this desk doing computer stuff.

Both of these tracks are from Lippman's CD I Hate Wal-Mart, available at his site. Other favorites on that disc include "Roy Jordan and Ed Morgan," "In My Younger Days," and his cover of "Teenage Immigrant Welfare Mothers on Drugs." I haven't heard his other discs, though I think I will.

Lippman and the Shrub are on tour now; in some of his concerts Lippman performs a show called Star of Goliath, arguing in favor of a Palestinian state.

Why hate Wal-Mart?
Not enough reasons for you?

Labels: ,

Wednesday, March 02, 2005:

Face Parade and Mordechai

I keep forgetting to post this: I got an email from the band Face Parade, asking me to check out their work, saying it was a bit like Pavement and a bit like Velvet Underground. So I checked it out and quite liked it; if you like those bands, you should too.

Also, in a fruitless search for an open-source violin solo for sampling, I discovered these lovely tracks at archive.org. Not what I was looking for (and rather more difficult for someone klutzy like me to sample), but still definitely worth the download. In the meantime I'm now looking for more realistic voices for my chintzy MIDI keyboard.

Labels: , ,