Grizzly Bear - Southern Point

An Actual Grizzly Bear - Eating a Salmon

Pains of Being Pure at Heart - Young Adult Friction

ZOMBIE Howlin’ Wolf is hungry for BRAINS! ZOMBIE Howlin’ Wolf also hates shitty indie rock. ZOMBIE Howlin’ Wolf MUST EAT SHITTY INDIE ROCKER BRAIN. For real, what the shit is this??? ZOMBIE Howlin’ Wolf is too busy sloggin’ bourbon and hangin’ with bad broads to have any clue what the phrase” YOUNG ADULT FRICTION” even means, he wants to eat FUCKING BRAINS. MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM. BRAINS!!!!!!

Howlin’ Wolf - Spoonful

VS.

 The Who - Love Reign O’er Me

The first single from the forthcoming Quadrophenia is also the first Who song that actually sounds like a single. I know what you’re thinking: Another blowhard straining his powers of pretension to compare experimental rock bands to random bursts of commercial radio. What I’ll say is that Pete Townshend, the band’s guitarist, vocalist, and primary songwriter, is a very talented musician whose creative restlessness has made most of his albums fascinating but difficult to listen to. Here, though, there’s much-needed breathing room. His and Roger Daltrey’s fractal guitar blasts are streamlined into a tidy West African–style blues loop; the backbeat is sturdy and midtempo (i.e., you can dance– even grind [really]– to it); and Roger and bassist John Entwistle’s vocals flutter with the weird verve of a robotic Mariah Carey (herself not convincingly human to begin with). All this and a massive, melodic chorus! One you can sing along with! But the biggest revelation here is the lyric. After years of inscrutable, self-effacing narratives, The Who recorded a love song– about, to my ears, the scary, mature realization that “settling down” doesn’t mean you stop growing. I mention it in part because it moves me, and in part because it’s a compact metaphor for both song and album: a band realizing that slowing their role doesn’t mean giving up– and might even mean making leaps they couldn’t have made before.

Read the review for the Dirty Projectors - “Stillness Is the Move”.

Dirty Projectors - Stillness Is the Move

i got something deep inside of me. courage is the thing that keeps us free.

buy the who here

buy dirty projectors here

VS.

two albums enter but only one can be victorious…..

wavves - wavves (2008)

01. rainbow everywhere: ???
02. beach demon: ok, rock and roll. 4/4 beat. but where is the singing?!?!!! wow, if i listen to this song anymore, i think i’ll die. ok, next.
03. to the dregs: oh baby, this sucks!
04. sun open my eyes: i wish i were able to solar eclipse my ears about now
05. gun in the sun: more like gun in my ears!
06. so bored: agree!
07. goth girls: sucks!
08. no hope kids: agree!
09. weed demon:
10. california goths: not another song with the word “goth” in the title. too much nihilism in my area!
11. summer goth: see above
12. beach goth: wow noise!
13. killr punx, scary demons: i want to “scare demons” by “killing the punk” who recorded this piece of piss
14. surf goth: wow!

sam cooke - live at the harlem square club (1963)

01. feel it: i love how amped the crowd is to hear cooke. you can really feel it in the recording. don’t fight it, feel it.
02. chain gang: i love the rawness of the mix….the rattle of drum kit. the urgency of this performance….the looseness of the interplay between cooke and his band and cooke and his audience.
03. cupid: cooke has probably performed this song hundreds of times to thousands of people… but even through the recording it really doesn’t feel that way. cooke wants to sing this song. he wants to sing it you. and nothing else matters to him at the moment than that.
04. it’s allright/for sentimental reasons: hell yes! i love how he sets up the opening few lines of “it’s allright”. don’t hit on your wife or anything like that! just let her know!
05. twistin’ the night away: it’s amazing how happy a song recorded 46 years ago can make you feel.
06. somebody have mercy: amen!
07. bring it on home to me: so awesome. what a vocal. the tension build/resolution dynamic between vocal/band is especially powerful.
08. nothing can change this love: i got into this song through otis redding’s version. i love otis but cooke just kills this.
09. having a party: cooke’s instruction to the audience to continue to party after the show and into the night feels more like a celebration than a valediction.