Put My Dream on This Planet

If you're not familiar with Jandek, I highly recommend reading the Wikipedia article on him, because it's one of the more intriguing stories in contemporary music, especially since rock and roll has lost much (read: all) of its mystique.

A quick run-down: a man (herein referred to as Jandek for convenience's sake) release a bunch of outsider folk albums in the late 70's/80's, disappears for a while, comes back with a trio of spoken word albums, experiments for a while, then randomly plays some live shows for the first time... ever in the mid-2000's. Why is this so interesting?

Well, we barely know who Jandek is.

He releases his own albums (on a label called Corwood Industries, which, in addition to being owned by Jandek, releases only Jandek material), has offered only 2 official interviews ever, and makes only sporadic, largely unannounced live appearances. During his hiatus, it was assumed his output was a result of a manic recording session resulting in over a dozen albums, but then he came back, decidedly older sounding, and we're led to believe he's still at it. Hell, there was no way to confirm that he was even the gentleman that appears on almost all his album covers until he played his first live show nearly 30 years after releasing his first album (which itself was released under a different pseudonym, under the guise that it was a band that released it).

Put My Dream on This Planet is one of his "experimental" albums: almost an hour of unaccompanied voice, half-singing and cripplingly depressed. "I Need Your Life" is a 28 minute plea of uncomfortable desperateness, that might be laughable if it weren't so serious and, well, sad, in every sense of the word.

I don't even care if I'm in a wheelchair
Or in a bed
Unable to move
For all I know
It's better than what I did today

"It's Your House", likewise, is a grovelling mess but a bit more poetic, as The Representative from Corwood demands a house made from granite and iron, denying all frills and extravagances in his quest for solitude and stability ("no glass, no wood, no plastic, no brick, no shingles, no aluminum siding, no syn-thet-ic [dramatic pause; our narrator desperately trying to find what he doesn't need] fibres") until he surrenders the building (presumably to whoever's Life he Needs), turning it into a symbol of commitment. Or trying to, anyway. Sad, really.

"I Went Outside" clocks in at only 1:18; for most of the song, he tries to find his shoes, and when he finally gets out, it's only snowy and cold.

Call it a sad mess of regrettable poetry or a brutally honest account of a personal crisis, either way Put My Dream on This Planet is enthralling, though difficult to listen to in terms of subject and presentation. Are you man enough?



Jandek - I Need Your Life
Jandek - It's Your House
Jandek - I Went Outside [COMING SOON - my internet's being a bitch]

If you want to buy some, check out this flyer and mail the man a cheque.

FORMER GHOSTS NEEDS YOUR HELP

I was incredibly psyched to see Former Ghosts (aka Jamie Stewart + Freddy Ruppert + Nika Roza, aka Xiu Xiu + This Song Is A Mess But So Am I + Zola Jesus) this Friday as a treat after a week of mid-term essays and non-stop reading, but alas, they've had to cancel because for reasons unbeknown to the public, the venue pulled out leaving these folks stranded.



Right now, they're looking for a place to play, otherwise there will be no Toronto show at all. So if anyone out there in the blogosphere can lend a helping plan, PLEASE contact ryancraven@theagencygroup.com .

This is guaranteed to be an amazing show, so someone, please, throw a bone to the fine folks in Former Ghosts.

Thanks

Beyond the Valley of Ultrahits

I'll just come out and say it: Richard Youngs is probably my favourite contemporary solo artist. He's been releasing music pretty much nonstop since the early 80's, and has dipped his feet in enough to genres that I suspect he'd have to graft a third foot onto his left ankle to become any more diverse. From drone, free jams and noise to minimalist folk and half-hour piano ballads, this guy's got his bases covered. And just to make sure he's got even non-existent bases covered, he'll quietly throw out some completely left-field albums. So if you aspiring free-acoustic/kazoo artists have something planned, just know that Youngs beat you to it with New Angloid Sound. And watch your back, Jandek: Summer Wanderer is stiff competition in the "Best Independent A Capella Album (Male)" category. And if any of you motherfuckers are planning on recording over an entire album with an alternate take of that entire album, you'll probably kill yourself after listening to Autumn Response, because you won't do better. Sorry.



Basically, every time you pick up something that says "Richard Youngs" on the cover, don't think for a second you can even guess at what you're getting. The only constant is his consistently high quality of output; this may be total fanboyism, but Youngs hasn't really done any wrong.



So what are you to make of Beyond the Valley of Ultrahits, then? It's synth-pop. Of course.

Incredibly lush synth-pop at that. Layered synths, twittering drum machines, and, of course, Youngs's brillaint voice, dubbed and sounding more majestic than ever. It's a charmingly simple album, too, contrasting sharply with some of his more multi-tiered epics like River Through Howling Sky: simple melodies looped and piled on to each other, catchy choruses... really, it's just a great synthy/poppy record.

And y'know what? I'm gonna give you the whole thing. This was released in only 2 pressings, each tragically limited to 100. It would be an absolute shame if more people didn't get the chance to hear it.



Richard Youngs - Beyond the Valley of Ultrahits

Since you can't buy this album, show some support and buy some of his back catalogue from the fine folks at Jagjaguwar.

Enjoy, and feel free to comment.

ALL TOMORROW'S PARTIES: PART THREE (Sunday)

Alright, finally wrapping up this tedious and boringly written review.

This was the day of the festival I had been really holding out for. A bunch of legendary bands doing legendary things, all in the same building, and things kicked off with Japan's almighty Boredoms. Let's just get this out of the way right now: the festival could've ended right after their set and I'd've been 110% content. The building could've caved in (sure felt like it was going to). I could've suffered from post-infant death syndrome. Heart failure. Spontaneous combustion. Anything. For the 70 minutes that the Boredoms were on stage, there was 70 minutes of the most hypnotizing, enthralling, exciting music I've had the privilege to see in person. Nine drummers in perfect unison, Yamantaka Eye in the centre with his seven-necked guitar, beating, jumping, wailing, crooning, calling, beckoning, yodeling, screaming, thrashing... screw words, this was positively transcendent. Someone posted the whole set on Youtube, so get on that.

Not to be outdone by ridiculous stage-setting, the Caribou Vibration Ensemble followed, with a huge line-up of 15 if I recall correctly. Three drummers, auxiliary percussion, guitars, brass, woodwinds, and electronic fuckery courtesy of Four Tet. Very cool idea, great execution, but almost every song had the same climactic "last song" explosion feeling, kinda of dampening all the following climaxes (insert your own joke here.)

Proving that Japan is the leader of eclectic vaguely-heavy nuttery (sorry, Netherlands), Boris handily cranked out another festival highlight by playing Feedbacker in its entire slow-burning, cataclysmic glory. Flawless, really, which makes it hard to talk about. But how fucking cool is a double-necked guitar in a red-light stage fog? Yeah, thought so.

Crystal Castles are right up there with Animal Collective in the "admittedly hipster-friendly faux-indie that is enjoyable on record but atrocious live" category. Painfully loud throbbing bass combined with Alice Glass's off-key and off-time shrieks and squawks were thoroughly difficult enjoyable. Which is a shame, because I want to dig this band more than I do, really. Danceable but not obnoxiously so, and a vaguely punk aesthetic should make for a good time; then again, maybe it's more punk to go on stage drunk and kick out some half-assed jamz? Let's not talk about punk, actually. We all know where that goes.

Arguably the most legendary of the day's line-up was Bob Mould (if you are Googling this name right now I swear I will kill you) playing Husker Du songs with No Age, which is the closest many of us youngin's will get to seeing Husker Du live. What I admired most about the set was how No Age wasn't just Mould's house band for the hour. Rather, they played together, trading off vocal parts, gelling very well and playing extremely tightly. And closing with "New Day Rising"? Pants = officially soiled.

Now, here's where I lose you: I don't really care for The Flaming Lips. I don't hate them, I'm just terribly indifferent. So when my options were "watch them play until 1" or "get a decent sleep for an early departure tomorrow", my girlfriend and I leaned towards the latter. That being said, the 10 minutes we caught seemed to be the wildly entertaining live show the Lips are known for: costumes, confetti, balloons, the whole 9. Fun time, to be sure.

Ah, I really can't wrap this up eloquently. I didn't enjoy writing this. I'm sure it was awful to read too. Sorry folks, things'll pick up from here.

ALL TOMORROW'S PARTIES: PART TWO (Saturday)

Let's get right into things: Sufjan Stevens kicked things off with by playing Seven Swans through; I can't say I particularly care about Mr Stevens (nothing personal), but it was a solid set of lazy folk that was by all means enjoyable, and probably something much more if you cared about the man/album.

I really want to love Grouper. On record, the dreamy/droney cave-born acoustic-thing works wonderfully. This is late night headphone music at its finest. As such, live it loses a bit of what makes it so great, since instead of walking through the snow at 2 am contemplating life and other such deep meaningful things, you're standing around with a bunch of other folks staring at Liz Harris for 40 minutes. I think I'd dig this a lot more if she met me behind an old church and played at midnight, but in a concert hall, it loses something.


Circulatory System carries the rainbow-flame acid torch passed on from Olivia Tremor Control and played a lively set, with a comfortable mix of catchy pop and all-out psychedelic jams. Again, they continued the early-afternoon theme of "enjoyable but not remarkable", but [also] again, it ain't nothin' against the band. It's entirely possible I was too excited for the latter half of the day, but that would be unprofessional, wouldn't it?
& alas, no surprise Jeff Mangum sightings. Dang.


Bradford Cox played his first set of the day as Atlas Sound on the decidedly more intimate second stage. Sure, on any "technically" level this was a fairly atrocious set with numerous technical problems and restarts and "hold on just a minute"s, but fuck it, I love Bradford Cox. He could run over my dog and I would not be able to get mad at him. Infinitely friendly, charming, and a great performer. One of the festival highlights for me.




Unfortunately, due to major jet-lag in my travelling company, we had to retire for a bit of the afternoon, but there was nothing I was particularly dying to see, but I have heard that Black Dice and El-P kicked out some fairly serious jams.

Shellac welcomed us back and nearly killed us, easily eclipsing every band in terms of volume during sound check alone. I'm not gear-heady enough to tell you what kind of amps they were using, but it looked like some sort of military equipment: a large, chrome box for an amp head with a solitary oversized dial on the front. As expected, they were tight as hell, kicked out some riff-heavy tunes and generally straight-up^rocked a lot harder than any of the bands there. You know, in that "fuck art, bang yr head" kinda way. No nonsense. Well, as no nonsense as "Squirrel Song" can get.


As the evening came to close, I get the feeling that whatever mastermind-cum-evil genius planned this festival twisted his moustache and cackled maniacally as festival goers were forced to choose between a serious conflict: Deerhunter or The Melvins? Fuuuuuck. After great, great deliberation, I decided my love for the Melvins was too deep and had been going on since middle school and I could not pass up the chance to finally see them live. I was able to catch the start of Deerhunter's set, though; "Cryptograms" and "Never Stops" lead me to believe I missed great things. Dang.

But hey, it's the goddamn Melvins. The Melvins! Fuck! They did not disappoint at all, even if I still find the two drummers thing a bit superfluous. A great mix of new and old stuff, including some of my favourite tunes from each era ("The Talking Horse" and "Hooch", respectively), but with such an expansive discography, you really can't please everyone, you know? (I was secretly holding out for "Honey Bucket", but what can ya do?) That being said, that's by no means a knock against them; they've been at it for 25 years now and it definitely shows. Plus, I caught an interview with King Buzzo earlier in the day, and it really makes me wish his legitimately hilarious banter carried on to the stage.


The night closed with Animal Collective, a band which I want to like but infuriates me to no end. Feels is a fantastic record. Their earlier, more experimental material circa-Here Comes the Indian has some great hidden gems ("Hey Light"). They even have some killer pop tunes in their recent discography ("Peacebone", "Brothersport"). But live? It's one giant piss-off. They've seemingly abandoned everything pre-Merriweather Post Pavilion, save for "Fireworks" and ditched any semblance of organic music, sticking exclusively to samplers, save for the rare guitar. What results is a bunch of overly-indulgent jams on frankly annoying loops, and with a hilarious amount of reverb and delay on the vocals rendering the hooks indistinguishable from the electronic clusterfuck. Great songs like "My Girls" lose their punch and dynamics. Garbled, unfocused, and frankly boring. Which is a shame, because on record, even their new material is largely enjoyable; minimal but still engaging pop songs.

PART THREE, THE CONCLUSION, COMING SOON.

ALL TOMORROW'S PARTIES: PART ONE (Friday)

Feel free to skip the first couple of paragraphs; the meat of things starts below the personal back story, but if you wanna come along for the whole ride, go right on ahead, sailor.

The multi-day music festival is not something we really "do" here in Canada. We get some one-day things rolling through my neck of the woods (Virgin Festival, Warped Tour), but unfortunately, many of those one-day things all-day suck (Virgin Festival, Warped Tour). I remember reading through issues of Terrorizer (a British metal magazine (that is, about, not forged from, metal) in high school, and being absolutely floored at the weekend heavy metal camps, where European metalheads could congregate in a field out in Germany, bring a tent and some beer, and rock the fuck out for three days straight while an amazing line-up played from noon 'til dawn. Wacken, Bloodstock, Graspop... a dime a dozen over there.

As time went on, my tastes changed, but I was nonetheless jealous of the folks across the pond. How's this for an idea: take a really great band, have them pick a bunch of other really great bands, and have them all play over the course of a weekend? Bloody brilliant!, I'm sure they said over tea, adjusting monocles, etc. And so for many a year I was insanely jealous of the UK's musician-curated festival called All Tomorrow's Parties.

Eventually, ATP found it's way to North America, specifically New York, but actually specifically to Monticello, a nowhere town two hours from New York. And fuck, the line-ups were just as stellar and the whole experience sounded absolutely incredible.

So I went.

Earlier this summer, my girlfriend and I were browsing the line-up of old festivals, drooling and gawking and how cool would that be-ing. It would be so cool, it was decided. So a after a few extra shifts at work, some emails, some bus tickets, we set it up. September 10, we are leaving on a Greyhound bus from Toronto to New York, arriving the next day. Rad.

(At this point I will spare you the boredom of the 10+ hour bus ride, but just for the record: the new "extra leg room" Greyhound buses? Bullshit. They're uncomfortable as hell. The leg room is fine, but they went and fucked up the back and neck room, which made sleeping next to impossible.)

Unfortunately, due to Manhattan traffic and a missed transfer we missed The Drones playing Wait Long By The River and the Bodies of Your Enemies Will Float By. So I can't say much about that. Or anything, really.

The Feelies were up next and we were able to catch 80% of their set, wherein they performed Crazy Rhythms in its entirety. The jangly post-punk felt kind of flat on record, but the songs are definitely there, and live they absolutely nailed it. Super high energy for an album conceived almost 30 (!) years ago and a rock-solid performance. Here's hoping the reunion isn't just for touring.

Continuing the night's "Don't Look Back" agenda, where bands faithfully recreate entire albums live, Dirty Three (with Nick Cave on piano) did as much of Ocean Songs as they could fit into their one-hour set. Hyperdelicate post-rock doesn't normally translate into thrilling live show, but Warren Ellis was able to bust out all matter of kicks and jumps and wildly frontman-like behaviour all while cradling a violin and more than making up for his lethargic bandmates. Luckily, Cave's appearance didn't overshadow the material; his additions were subtle and tasteful, and the set was flawless. Definitely a highlight.

Suicide performing Suicide (as the ATP website affirmed, "their first LP", not actual suicide) was one of the main things that sealed my decision to make the journey to New York. Nothing short of legendary, the duo were wildly inventive for the late 70's; when punk was a guitar-bass-drum affair, Suicide worked as a duo, with drum machines and keyboards, with songs often being just an abrasive, industrial rhythm under half-singing punctuated with manic shrieks and bursts of noise. Now, 32 years later... things are bad. Real bad. A set list is one thing, but lyric sheets? For your own music? And having the sound guy read them was just sad. A deadpan roadie saying "Ghost rider. Motorcycle hero." into the microphone made me cringe. And so did Suicide themselves. It was like watching that drunken, creepy, "funny" uncle do Suicide karaoke at your family reunion. "Rocket USA" was especially embarrassing, as Alan Vega mumbled and groaned and generally showed his age. Admittedly things clicked a bit as the set went on, but it was still kind of... sad.

I never really got why everyone went apeshit over Panda Bear. Sure, Person Pitch was groovy, but it wasn't as mindblowing as you'd be lead to believe. Reverb-drenched minimal loops and Mr Lennox's soaring chorusy voice are lovely and all, but each song is just that on top of a creative sample, and it all becomes very samey very quickly. So live it's no surprise that the loops become more annoying (and unpleasantly bass-heavy) to the point of incoherency, the vocals do their normal Panda Bear thing, and the "show" consists of a man standing at a mess of wires in front of a projection for an hour. Monotonous, really.

David Cross did a funny, if extremely drunken, set, and I don't know what else to say about a comedian. He spoke well, I guess? Nice voice? Good jokes? He was a comedian, and he was funny. What more do you want?

I only caught about 10 minutes of The Jesus Lizard before being so impossibly tired I could not stand it, but much unlike Suicide, they seem to still be hauling ass despite their age. David Yow immediately found his way into the crowd, and right off the bat people/fists/feet/bottles were flying. Would've been a great time had I not been dead on my feet.


Stay tuned for parts 2 and 3... sometime. This is kind of a tedious thing to write. Is it tedious to read? Let me know.

COMING SOON

- All Tomorrow's Parties write-up (PREVIEW: shit was dope brah)
- something droney
- the best band name ever?
- frequent updates

STAY TUNED