Ve

The Grunge/Alternative/Seattle Sound wave that arose and fell in the late 1980′s and early 1990′s brought a slew of truly unique and interesting bands to the forefront. It was one of those brief periods in time where weird little bands were able to somehow expand beyond the typical few onlookers, and make a mark. I’m not saying it was a perfect system. In the end it often killed what it couldn’t corrupt. I’m just saying, thank goodness I was able to hear about Morphine.

Morphine is by no means a small band, and it’s likely that everyone who reads this already knows who they are, but I felt like writing about them today. The band was composed of a drummer, bassist, and saxophone player. In order to forgo the dependency on guitar that most bands have, the band created a sound that was smooth and elegant, able to concentrate on a hook, but also free to explode into a jazz solo. Given the time and place of the band, it is especially true that their sound was unprecedented and unexpected. It filled a void in contemporary music, and as such, Morphine soon found a dedicated fan base. They started in 1989, and continued until bassist Mark Sandman’s death in 1999. There’s nothing about the band I can say that hasn’t already been said. Regardless, the band deserves all the credit they can get. Everything they do speaks to a part of the human spirit that is so rarely spoken to, and their contribution has ultimately changed the way we look at music.

Busking musicians are criminally under-observed by music reporting and scholarly study. I understand why this is, buskers aren’t recognized as legitimate, because they don’t use an accepted venue, and they usually don’t put out records. However, over the course of a day, buskers probably play to more people than big name bands with sold out shows, and certainly more than DIY punk bands.

Enter Seasick Steve, the man plays the blues with a gritty, sincere style that recalls the early blues of the Mississippi Delta, and while it is indubitably blues music, it is formatted in a completely original way that gives it a unique style. This is engaging (and beautiful) stuff.

It makes me wonder what other brilliance is hidden in plain sight by the buskers of the world.

Seasick Steve – A Take Away Show – Part 1 from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.

‘Andreas Dorau Und Die Marinas’ had one modest hit in Germany in the 1980′s. Admittedly, this is the only song that I know of theirs, but man, what a song!

This tune is more catchy than the plague. I dare you to play it once, then go about your day without listening to it again or humming it to yourself. The part where the chorus verse turns into a solo for a few bars somehow makes the song so much more powerful to me, without even knowing what they’re saying.

There’s very little information about this band (in English at least) to be had, but here’s what I gather:

Andreas Johnson (AKA Andreas Dorau, AKA Die Doraus) was born to a Protestant minister and was taught to play guitar by Holger Hiller, of the popular German band Palais Schaumburg. He wrote Fred Vom Jupiter when he was sixteen for a song-writing contest at his school. ‘Die Marinas’ consisted of Johnson’s school-mates, the oldest of whom was thirteen at the time. Johnson started his own record label to put out the song in 1981.

The song’s lyrics tell of a very handsome E.T. named Fred who comes from Jupiter and woos the women of Earth, to the dismay of the Earthling males. The song is a fairly good example of Neue Deutsche Welle (NDW, German for ‘German New Wave’) music, a stylistic movement of simple, synthesized, beat-heavy tunes that caught on with art-punk weirdos and occasionally found mainstream success (99 Luftballons and Rock Me Amadeus being two of the best examples of this success).

What Andreas Dorau or Die Marinas are up to now, I couldn’t say. If you know German, you could probably research this band a lot better. It’s a shame they never caught on in the states. This song is fucking great.

Check it out: And Then She Lied Again

Good morning all.

Shibusashirazu – Images 2004 from yotte on Vimeo.

THIS was worth re-posting. Grab this if you want a 40 minute glorification to 80′s blood bash movies. Karate Kid? Yes. Chuck Norris? Hell yes! Taking a chance? Risk it all!

EDIT:

Here is the original link with soundcloud and tracklisting: http://www.maddecent.com/blog/blood-bros-first-blood

2nd EDIT:

Ah, shit my google license needs to be renewed because I’m failing at this. Here is the 2nd mix which was released in January: http://www.maddecent.com/blog/blood-bros-mix-part-2-heaven-2-hell

Earlier today, singer Amy Winehouse was found dead at her Camden flat. The cause of her death is still unknown.

It’s too bad. I always kind of liked her music. People make a big deal out of her crazy personal life, which I always thought was really stupid. After all, as Hunter S. Thompson said, ‘Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!”‘ I think Winehouse lived up to Thompson’s standard pretty well. Also, her music was a lot better than most top 40s pop garbage.

Free Album: SPIN Magazine arranged a tribute album for Nirvana .

Who else grew up with Nirvana, yo?

Get this shit!

Your morning is about to be ruined.

Courtney Stodden became big news about a week ago when, at the tender age of 16, she married the guy who played the mean guard in The Green Mile. The whole universe, unable to ignore the discouraging antics of a barely celebrity, began talking about this shocking marriage. As for myself, while I think there’s a huge difference between being 16 and being 51, I don’t really care what people do with their lives. However, I caught word that Stodden was an ‘aspiring’ singer, and I had to check it out.

When I listen to her music I can’t make my mind up. At various points in the song I go up and down the scale of ‘This is okay I guess.’ all the way to ‘This might be the worst thing I’ve ever seen.’ I have to wonder if my opinion would be different if the song wasn’t attached to such a poorly done video. Just off the top of my head after watching it about ten minutes ago, here’s my list of things wrong with the video.

1. There’s a dog with dyed hair that clearly doesn’t like being on the boat, and judging from it’s hair/expression I really feel sorry for the poor mutt.
2. She’s awkwardly sipping nothing out of one of those bone cups or whatever their called, which might suggest a party-rific lifestyle if it were done at a chic social gathering, but alone on a boat with a dog just looks weird, and alcoholic (except there’s nothing in the cup, so ‘nothingholic?’)
3. She can’t get her hair to stop blowing in her face.
4. For crying out loud, one of her boobs is hanging out. Not in a sexy way, mind you. It looks unintentional and goofy, like it flopped out of her outfit and she hasn’t noticed.
5. That is the worst lip-synching I’ve ever seen.

I have nothing wrong with boobs hanging out of shirts unintentionally, or hair flying in a person’s face, but forgive me if I’m wrong, isn’t the point of this video go showcase her being sexually appealing (at 16 years of age)? Who directed this? Somebody who hates Courtney Stodden and wants to make her look bad?

Stodden has also chosen to demonstrate that, for some people, post 9/11 jingoism will never die, no matter how tacky and superficial it becomes.

America! Fuck yeah!

All I can say about We Are America is that, were I a soldier in the US military, and I fought hard protecting our freedom, and I died valiantly in battle, even if Stodden had never done the song, I wouldn’t feel any gaping void in my tribute (if I could feel, that is, because I’d be dead).

One more. This one deals with more complex life issues than the first two.

If it wasn’t for the very obvious lack of a rhyme at about 0:47, it’s not that bad. I mean, I could see it being a mildly successful hit in the 80′s. Maybe like a Tiffany B-side.

Okay. Enough being nasty. That’s not what Ve is for. I’m going to promise myself that the next post will be one of praise for a musician that I like. Snarky isn’t very becoming, and it’s not nice.

This is off the hook. There’s so much going on in this music, it’s hard to classify. It’s certainly, obviously metal, but it takes cues from so many genres and styles, and is able to blend them so perfectly that it look (or sounds rather) easy to do. This song will blow your mind:

I can’t believe how put together this is, and yet it sounds spontaneous. There are lots and lots of metal bands, and it’s hard to be good enough to be exceptional. Menace Ruin is fucking incredible. They’ve changed the way I look at heavy metal. No fucking lie.

Check it out: Myspace, Encyclopaedia Metallum, Last.fm, Cult of Ruins, Erode The Person

If there’s a way of keeping music interesting without a manifest inspiration to thousands of people to start bands, I don’t know what it is. That’s how punk rock became what it is. That’s how rap became what it is. But nowhere is it more true than for garage rock. I mean look at the name, the style is named after it’s average Joe roots. The implication here is that this is the music of people who came together and said ‘Let’s do this.’ and not every band is a solid ten, but I can’t off the top of my head think of any that aren’t worth at least a listen.

Which brings me to The Ugly Ducklings. They were a Canadian garage band that had three minor hits in the 1960′s. Originally, they were intent on sounding like The Who and other world famous bands of the time, but the eventually found a very unique sound, that’s clearly blues influenced, but at the same time, carries this mysterious, haunting tone that overshadows all the songs in a pensive, dreary fog. This is totally legit stuff.

Check it out: Garage Hangover, Chicoreve, Sweatsoaked