rivercityvibe   “Puerile, smutty, schoolboy nonsense” – My Mom

I don’t get out much, since the fatwa. This has limited my exposure to popular culture a little so i have missed a couple of awesomes that I would usually have “early-adopted”, if you’ll excuse my corporate wankery.

One of these, drawn to my attention by one of my minions, is La Roux. Unbelieveably brilliant. My advice to you, young reader, is to put on your silk kimono, pour yourself a large-ish slug of electric-soup and sit back and listen to this. You might want to line up a flexible floozy of some sort for when its over.

The usual source mentions that La Roux is influenced by 80’s synthpop including Yazoo, Erasure, Depeche Mode, The Human League, Heaven 17 and Blancmange. That explains the awesome.

Unfortunately, it then goes on to quote La Roux herself talking about the band’s name in a way that makes her sound like a brainless fucking idiot:

To me, it means “red-haired one” – and it does, vaguely. It’s just a male version of “red-haired one”, which I think is even cooler, because I’m well androgynous anyway. So it kind of makes sense.

More than you do, you ninny. Preserve the mystery. Please.

It’s Pop Star 101. A week one/day one crow knows that……..

It was raining when I left Bones’ Hideout this morning, so I decided to forgo my customary experimental jetpack (I forwent it) and travel instead via the internet. It takes about as long to reach Bones HQ, but it’s drier.

However I travel, I do so to music. This morning I listened to Portishead.

They completely rock.

Check it out.

I know. I am fuelling trip-hop obsessions all over Florida. That’s how I roll.

I discovered something I did not know today. This is rare in my life. Really rare (go on, test me). You see, I knew that classic indie band Saint Etienne were named partly in tribute to French eighties songster Etienne Daho (Wikipedia is wrong on this one, believe me), but I had no idea that their classic She’s on the phone was a direct lift from Daho’s 1984 classic Weekend a Rome. See for yourselves.

Etienne Daho first (featuring Seth Rotherham on his Vespa):

Now Saint Etienne (featuring Etienne Daho [Doh!]):

How could I not have known this. My European assets have failed me.

It’s uncanny.

Nowhere near here, though. Despite the fan base I have built with my own hands for them in Florida. Family-ties, see?

They are in Los Angeles currently, playing the Viper Room tomorrow (@8.45 pm), then they have a couple of dates in Austin, Texas (?!), one in NY (Joes Pub in East Village), then a final LA gig before flying back to New Zealand, the legends.

Midnight Youth. Double-plus Awesome.

It promises to be seminal, in nature. The tour in which they set the US music industry on its ear. Readers in NY and LA should make a point of seeing them. I dearly hope I have no readers in Austin, but if there are a few, more information can be found on Facebook (search Midnight Youth), or if you prefer to slum-it (and we all feel that itch, occasionally), they are also on something called myspace, with which I have barely a nodding acquaintance.

Sorry the video of their debut track, The Letter, is disabled on the last post about Midnight Youth. Presumably some record label Nazi took exception.

(Seriously, for new bands, looking to break into American Markets, some kind of liberal blogger policy might be in order. I mean, for fuck’s sake, it’s the 21st Century.)

All their music, available on itunes. Go their now. You won’t regret it.

This is about the best thing I have ever seen in my life. Somebody took a Dr. Dre CD to band camp and the geeks created something awesome….

This is NSFW if you work somewhere where you cannot listen to songs which contain foul language (primarily, the words ‘bitches’ and ‘shit’. But worse ones too. Like ‘fuck’).

Now that’s a real conversation for your ass……

I have all but given up listening to NPR. I used to have Morning Edition on in the car, but lately I’ve found it makes me  stressed. Whether it’s Chinese influence in the Congo, or the mysterious absence of ecologically-vital honey bees in the central states, there’s always something that leaves me feeling vaguely ill-at-ease.

So I’ve ditched radio while driving and instead, pass the time by counting the number of Salt Life stickers on the back of cars. There are hundreds (Can anyone explain to me what is that about?).

There is one show, however, on Jacksonville station WJCT, which has the opposite effect. I am talking about the uplifting and ever-brilliant Electro Lounge. In a town in which (let’s face it) it is considered cool to play The Smiths (get OVER it, Five Points…..), it is great to have quality, modern music available.

nice helmet

Look at the line-up for the first hour tonight. Check it, check it, yeah yeah…….

9:00) Taj Mahal w/Jack Johnson – Further On Down The Road

9:05) Spearhead – U Can’t Sing R Song

9:10) Morcheeba – Otherwise

9:14) Cashbah 73 feat Mariella Gonzalez – Vinyl Junkie

9:18) Taj Mahal feat Ziggy Marley – Black Man, Brown Man

9:22) Dope Head Blues – Victoria Spivey

9:25) Rockerfeller Druglaw Blues – The Felice Brothers

9:30) The Drinking Song – Loudon Wainwright III

9:35) Aliison Moyet – That Old Devil Called Love

9:41) Botanica – Age Of Irony

9:44) Ezio – All I Really Want

9:47) De_Phazz – Something Special

9:50) Everything But The Girl – Single

9:55) Big Joe Turner – Wine-O-Baby Boogie

So, tonight’s homework is simple. Listen to the Electro Lounge.  Wallow in it. Do so, and you have taken an important step toward lifestyle optimization…..

I listened to AC DC’s seminal Back in Black for the first time in years at a buddy’s house on Saturday night.

Most of the cool folks know that Joe’s more of a trip hop, funk, soul kind of a brother, but this is a classic. It was also the first album I ever bought, in 1981.

Hearing the bells at the beginning of Hells Bells brought back memories….  I had won fiscal recognition of my dangerous intellect and as a reward, my mother and father bought me a Cassette Player and two cassettes of my choosing……

One of these two cassettes  was Back in Black. The other was the audiobook of Flash Gordon and the Lion Men of Mongo……..

Flash rescued Dale Arden in it. As usual.

Apart from the insight this gives you into the development of a child into an adolescent, it also says something about my taste. In music or science-fiction, it is faultless.

The best bit of the recent onstage attack on the chimp-faced Gallagher brothers was the reaction of Liam. If you watch carefully you see him adopt the classic aggressive stance seen only in British towns (and certain areas of New York) at about midnight most Fridays.

If you’d like to try it at home, it involves standing legs apart chin back and chest thrust out, arms by the side, hands in fists, and literally bouncing, stiff-legged toward the object of your aggression, led by your chest. All the while, you say things like. “You ‘avin it? C’mon, ah’ll fuckin’ ‘ave ya! C’mon! You ‘avin it…..?”

Oasis: The Legend of Greystoke

Good of Liam to do this, while his brother lay in a mess of broken guitars and ribs, groaning softly……

When I learn how to embed video, I’ll put up the footage.

Don’t hold your breath.

(Here it is. it turns out that “blogging” is laughably simple…….)