Sunday, March 14, 2010

I've Got Style, Miles and Miles, So Much Style That It's Wasted

Just a short update and some recommendations from your friends here at the Ideological Cuddle. The first week of big releases of 2010 was last week, and with it came 2 wonderful records. First, Ted Leo and his Pharmacists dropped The Brutalist Bricks - now fighting with Spoon's Transference for first place in the early Best of 2010 race. It's filled with Leo's trademark hooks, political rants, and enough guitar RAWK to satisfy the most jaded of rock fans. Leo always brings the indie cred as well, as most of our favorite indie outlets (pitchfork, Stereogum, et al) are drooling over this record. As usual, I suggest the vinyl version - available at most music outlets worth their salt, or at matadorrecords.com. Unfortunately, the local Ideological Cuddle turntable had to be sent back from which it came for repairs (it's never good when you can't get through a track without significant motor slowdown), but hopefully it will return very soon.
The second of last week's important new releases (ok, there were plenty more, including The Broken Bells record - Danger Mouse and James Mercer of Shins fame; Titus Andronicus' The Monitor; and The Gorillaz' Plastic Beach) is the first "greatest hits" record from THE MOST IMPORTANT BAND IN MUSIC HISTORY (according to Pitchfork and hipsters everywhere). That I am this late to this party (15-20 years by my calculations) comes from avoidance. There was just soooooo much hype around this band that I purposefully didn't listen. Now that I am completely obsessed, I wish I wouldn't have been so foolish.
The band is Pavement, the record is Quarantine The Past. Since the band only had one "hit" (90's alternative anthem "Cut Your Hair"), this isn't really a "greatest hits" album. It's more of a love note to fans old and new. Since most Pavement devotees will already have all of these songs, Matador likely put this together as a means to capitalize on the band's reunion tour and a means to rope in younger fans. Their plan worked with this new convert. When I initially considered picking up the record, I checked out Pitchfork's review - the critic described each of the album's 23 tracks as "unimpeachable gems" and gave the record a 10 out of 10. Hmmm. Sounded like typical Pavement wankery to me... until I actually listened. "Cut Your Hair", "Summer Babe (Winter Version)", and "Unseen Power of the Picket Fence" I knew. But tracks like "Stereo", "Golden Soundz", "Two States", "Shady Lane", "Range Life", and "Spit on a Stranger" just blew me away. Slightly off-kilter but genius none-the-less, I slowly began to agree with Pitchfork's assessment. Needless to say, the CD hasn't left my car's stereo. I look forward to digging deeper into the band's back catalogue (which isn't that extensive and has been exhaustively expanded through Matador's re-releases) along with Stephen Malkmus' work with The Jicks.
A final word for today's post. This month's issue of Paste magazine contains a great little one page editorial article by Maura Johnston that describes why MP3s and digital music don't have the power of physical forms of music like albums and CDs. I encourage all of you to check it out, as it beautifully sums up my feelings. Check it out at Paste's website HERE.

Until next time, check out Matador Records' latest two-headed monster - Ted Leo and the Pharmacists' The Brutalist Bricks and Pavement's Quarantine The Past - while thinking about thumbing through some albums that you might have forgotten about. Enjoy.

Sunday, March 7, 2010

I Don't Get Out So Much Since I Acquired St. Vitus' Dance

Greetings faithful Cuddle Readers. A quick one today. Have found myself listening to a lot of Spoon lately. For the uninitiated, their literate, minimalist approach to indie rock is unparalleled. Their roster of albums is as consistent as you'll find in all of modern rock. Their 2010 release, Transference, is the current leader in the clubhouse for The Ideological Cuddle's favorite album of the year (but faces a lot of stiff competition in the next couple months from the likes of The National, The Hold Steady, The New Pornographers, The Drive-By Truckers, and Ted Leo and the Pharmacists - whose The Brutalist Bricks comes out on Tuesday 3/9/10 and sounds FANTASTIC - check out the entire album at Ted's MySpace page HERE.)
After that exceedingly long run-on sentence, I think I should get to the point - here's a great soundboard recording of Spoon live in concert that was sent my way from some fellow Spoonophiles. It's got a great mix of songs from throughout the band's career to that point and showcases songs from the recently released Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. As always, click on each song to access the downloads. Enjoy:

Spoon Live at the Moon in Tallahassee, FL, November, 8, 2007
1. "The Delicate Place"
2. "Don't You Evah"
3. "You Got Yr Cherry Bomb"
4. "Stay, Don't Go"
5. "The Beast and Dragon, Adored"
6. "Rhythm & Soul"
7. "Metal Detektor"
8. "The Way We Get By"
9. "The Ghost of You Lingers" - TRACK FIXED!
10. "Everything Hits at Once"
11. "Don't Make Me A Target"
12. "It's Gonna Take An Airplane"
13. "The Two Sides of Monsieur Valentine"
14. "They Never Got You"
15. "I Summon You"
16. "I Turn My Camera On"
17. "My Mathematical Mind"
18. "Black Like Me"
19. "Japanese Cigarette Case"
20. "The Underdog"
21. "Fitted Shirt"


We here at the Ideological Cuddle are working hard to get some other live bootlegs uploaded to our server so that we can share some unreleased music with all of our faithful readers. Until then, enjoy this great Spoon concert. Feel free to leave a comment in the comments section (and I'd be impressed if anyone out there knew the medical origin of the reference in the title of this post - I'm happy to take a blog post request for anyone who correctly describes the medical cause and reason for the name - no fair Googling!!!!).
Until then, enjoy Spoon in all of their glory, and listen...