I'm Clearly Obsessed With Jonsi...3 must-see videos

Here's three videos that should get you insanely excited about Jonsi's upcoming album and tour.

This video is the trailer to the new movie of Jonsi playing the entire record in his home in Iceland, directed by the same director of Heima - so you know it will be life-changing. (you must at least check out the end of the video when Jonsi sings acapella and you realize just how gifted he is). Don't be afraid of the baby doll heads everywhere...it's totally normal.


jónsi - "go quiet" from Jónsi on Vimeo.

This video is the first official music video for "Go Do."  Spoiler Alert: Jonsi is in a bird costume with his sidekick parrot.  It's weird.


Jónsi - Go Do from Jónsi on Vimeo.

And for those who want to pay loads of cash, this video is a sneak peak inside the production of Jonsi's upcoming tour.  It promises to be epic.  We can only hope some of this appears at his Coachella performance.


Jónsi live show by 59 Productions from Jónsi on Vimeo.

Freelance Whales: Weathervanes

I don't care what you say, but Freelance Whales makes me feel like I’m in high school again…driving around with the windows down, drinking an excessive amount of Mountain Dew, and hanging out at the lake with my friends – the perfect combination of play & self-reflection.  Freelance Whales are mere calves, but their music is surprisingly mature, especially for a debut album. If Sufjan Stevens was less musically-pretentious and Hellogoodbye didn’t have ADHD and they started a band together it would sound something like Freelance Whales: high voices singing too many syllables and playing lead to a healthy backing of banjos, glockenspiels, tambourines, and steady bass drums.

Freelance Whales only recently started plugging in their instruments, as they got their start by playing acoustically around the streets and subway stations of NYC (see video below).  Impressively, they promoted this record themselves until they finally landed a record deal and a tour with Fanfarlo. The record is being re-released next month for a bigger and more deserving promotion as these kids are definitely on the rise.  This record will be the one guilty pleasure I have this year that I won’t actually feel guilty about.  It’s fun, it’s fresh, and it brings me back to a better time when life didn’t resemble the feeling I get when I listen to the latest Shout Out Louds record (see Matt’s review below). 

Grade: A-

Best Tracks: Generator (^ First Floor & ^ Second Floor), Location, Hannah, Broken Horse

Love Child of:  Hellogoodbye, Sufjan Stevens, not having a care in the world, teen angst, root beer kegs, pop rocks (you know, the kind you buy at the store and lick the plastic stick and dip in the tiny package…not the kind that hip, fine-dining restaurants use to make their food seem cool to attempt to get you to forget that you just paid $40 for half a bag of pop rocks as a garnish.)

Best Paired with: Running in circles through open meadows with a posse of hipsters, each playing some “organic” instrument. 

- Nate

ihatekidslikeyou collective rating: 4 out of 5 adorable root beer pony kegs

Watch Freelance Whales play in a NYC subway station before they discovered electricity outlets:

Stream the entire record below for free!

Shout Out Louds: Work

Take a look at the mock 20th Century Masters pictorial above.  Against a drab black and white backdrop stands your 5 very proud members of the Shout Out Louds. Don't they look cute in their little proletarian outfits?! How psyched do you think are that they managed to create album artwork that is as singularly uninteresting as their album title? Work, eh? I go to work...it blows monkey cock. Thanks for reminding me Shout Out Louds.

Anyway, I listened to this album at the office today and you know what struck me? Nothing, absolutely nothing. With the exception of the galvanizing, "Fall Hard," with its catchy chorus and Mighty Mighty Bosstones brass intonations, this album is utterly unique in its ability to leave you opinionless. Sure, there's like melody and song structure and shit, but the album neither enthralls nor offends with its mid-tempo odes to similarly bland Maximo Park. Call it the sonic version of English food and Swiss Politics... Work embodies neutrality to the point of disgust. Great job capturing your subject Shout Out Louds, but we all endure drudgery 40+ hours a week, the last thing we need is 40 minutes more.

Grade: D+

Best 3 Tracks: "Fall Hard," "Can't Explain (not on the album, on the Fall Hard single)." "The Candle Burned Out"

Love Child Of: Your office cubicle, East Berlin pre 1989, George Orwell, 20th Century Masters that had no business being 20th Century Masters, Page Boy Caps and Gray Suspenders, The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Shepard's Pie, A treaty brokered by Roger Federer.

Best Used For: Remembering that work (i.e. the kind you go to) ain't that bad.

- Matt

ihatekidslikeyou. rating: 1 out of 5 Balushek portraits of proletariats on strike

Check out the Shout Out Louds, Submerged in Darkness, Performing Live in Berlin (Seeeee, I told you!) P.S. This video sucks almost as much as the album does:

Johnny Cash: American VI: Ain’t No Grave

Back from the grave, Johnny Cash opens up this album with the line “Ain’t no grave can hold my body down.”  And you’d be a fool not to believe this as absolute truth.  This is a very special record, being the sixth and final installment of Cash’s American Recordings series and potentially the final Johnny Cash album with new material.  These songs were all recorded in the final four months of his life, and he wrote “1 Corinthians 15:55” in the last three years of his life which reads, “O death, where is thy sting? O grief, where is thy victory?”  Cash’s weathered and sometimes broken voice wind through stories told in first person conveying themes of death, suffering, and religion and expressing “I can’t help but wonder where I’m bound,” “I’ll leave this old world with a satisfied mind,” and “I don’t hurt anymore.” Listening to this record makes you feel like you’re sitting on the floor of a cabin as Cash reflects on the death of his wife, June Carter, and the final days of his own life. Aside from this being one of the greatest musicians of all-time, this is actually a very, very strong record, and I have had it on repeat for the past 24 hours; it has yet to get old.  I hope I can be as reflective of my own life during my final days as Johnny Cash was.  And if I can’t, at least I’ll have this record to play and let Cash say the things I couldn’t.

Grade: A-

Best Tracks: “Ain’t No Grave,” “Redemption Day,” and “Can’t Help But Wonder Where I’m Bound”

Love Child of: Your last thoughts before you die, the movie Tombstone, cabins in the south, Church, and withered, sage words. 

Best Paired With: This is Johnny Cash; it goes well with EVERYTHING…yes, even before you hit the clubs in Hollywood. 

- Nate

ihatekidslikeyou collective rating: 4 out of 5 empty black guitar cases

Listen to "Ain't No Grave" here...and let the ominous Johnny Cash picture steal your soul...

Local Natives: Gorilla Manor

Henry David Thoreau famously said that “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” Me?  I prefer loud desperation. That’s why I like stories about people doing drugs.  Favorite anecdote of the weekend? Girl who spent her high school weekends doing Whip-Its with her friends in coordination with DMX’s classic, “Here Comes the Boom.” They would lie in the back of a friend’s muscle car, two “tens” in the trunk, and right as that pulsating “boom” chorus would drop, they would let the Whip-It fly and huff away. Oh, youthful exuberance. (Note: the foregoing is not an endorsement of Whip-Its, nor of listening to DMX; frankly, I don’t know which will fuck you up worse).

Which bring us to Local Natives, which at first blush seems like the name of a band inaugurated by someone doing Whip-Its at the department of redundancy department. However, upon listening to the spritely, syncopated Gorilla Manor, I’m now more convinced that they accompanied the Dodos on a recording session meth bender, lured the extinct bird band into a closet with the promise of sugary soda, absconded with their sheet music, and while on the lamb, took refuge in a cabin with the Fleet Foxes.  Make no mistake though, this is music imbued with a fugitive’s sense of urgency, from the raised-voice (not quite a scream, maybe scream jr.) on “Sun Hands” to the pining, plaintive wail of “I want you back” at the end of the phenomenal, album-stealer “Airplanes.” At the very least, the ever-present, syncopated, “finger tap” drums make it clear that this band has somewhere to be…quite possibly to the apex of the indie scene.

Grade: B+

Best 3 Tracks: “Airplanes,” “Sun Hands,” “World News”

Love Child Of: The Dodos on a meth bender; Being on the lamb; The Fleet Foxes; Youthful Idealism; Being torn between a cabin in the wood and an apartment in the city; Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience;  A discounted screaming lesson from Justin Vernon; the department of redundancy department; The sugary soda “bait and switch,” yeah, I lost me to Meth.

Best Paired With: A shirtless, late night Jamboree near Walden Pond.

-Matt

Ihatekidslikeyou.rating: 3.75 out of 5 Deeply Touching “I Lost Me to Meth” Ads

Watch Local Natives’ live performance of “Airplanes” on BBC1 below: (And tell me what’s up with the one guy with no facial hair whatsoever: did he miss the memo or what?)

I Hate Your Weekly Playlist

Land of Talk - Some Are Lakes
The Temper Trap - Sweet Disposition
Earlimart - The Hidden Track
Class Actress - Journal of Ardency
Past Lives - Strange Symmetry
Dirty Projectors - Two Doves
Natalie Portman's Shaved Head - Me + Yr Daughter
Shout Out Louds - Fall Hard
The Brunettes - Red Rollerskates
The Bloodsugars - The Pedestrian Boogie
David Bazan - Hard To Be
M83 - Slowly

Class Actress: Journal of Ardency (EP)

Listen up, phone sex industry, i'm gonna turn your flailing cottage business around. Stop throwing away your money on advertising time opposite the obviously imperious P90x and start focusing on improving your product. Look, I know you're still smarting from the introduction of Youporn and Redtube into the smut marketplace, but get your head in the game. You're missing the key ingredients. Every red-blooded American male is a sucker for two things and two things only: 80's synths and a sultry voices. I mean, haven't you ever wondered why rich dudes still hook up with Madonna? Homegirl's arms look like she's been splitting reps at the gym with Thor, God of the Thunderbolt, and yet she gets more tail than penny-pinching grandmas at the Red Lobster. Towards this end, I have the perfect spokesperson for your newfangled electronic seduction campaign. Her name is Elizabeth Harper and she leads a Brooklyn indie rock outfit called Class Actress. Take one listen to the heart-melting liquidity of her pipes on "Journal of Ardency" or "Let me Take You Out" and then tell me that you don't want to stick your...finger in the rotary phone nodule and start blowing... $5.99 a minute. Plus, Harper's song titles already lend themselves to an entire menu of phone sex fantasies:

1. Careful What You Say: For the shy first-timer.

2. Journal of Ardency: For those inclined to explore the ins and outs of the Harlequin Romance novel.

3. Let me Take You Out: For the guy who wants the authentic experience of spending 500 dollars on a night out and still not getting laid.

4. Adolescent Heart: Self-Explanatory...for the ones helplessly drawn to jailbait.

5. Someone Real: Duhhhh, what to press when it's time to hang up.

Anyway, phone sex execs, I'm gonna leave you my proposal along with a copy of Journal of Ardency. If you'd like to move forward and retain me as a consultant, my per-minute fee will be discreetly charged to your phone bill. Until then, walkie-talkie, over out.

Grade: B+

Best 3 Tracks: "Journal of Ardency," "Careful What You Say," "Let me Take You Out"

Love Child Of: A phone sex line entitled 1-900-Synth Your Teeth Into Me; Ladytron; Madonna Pre sharing needles with HGH flunkie A-Rod; An unpublicized, mildly homoerotic game of twister between Debbie Harry and Crissy Hynde that occurred sometime b/w 1985 and 1987; Some hackneyed joke about the "stimulus package"; the perfunctory "Do I Turn You On?" Desperation mixed with scrambled tv porn, no Internet, a lack of eligible farm animals, and Madonna not being home from yoga yet.

Best Enjoyed while: Touching yourself inappropriately..."Does that feel good?"

-Matt

ihatekidslikeyou. collective rating: 3 out of 5 scantily clad phone sex workers "just waiting for your call" (since Nate's not here and I'm not nearly as advanced with my HTML skills, "use your imagination" for the other two).

Watch the Queen Bee of Sex Workers, Elizabeth Harper, in the video for "Let Me Take You Out" Below:

The Knife (in Collaboration with Mt. Sims and Planningtorock): Tomorrow, In A Year

If you don’t come away utterly frightened, mesmerized, confused, and blown away, then The Knife has failed.  There is no more creative band in the universe right now, and to be clear, it’s The Knife, so you know it’s going to be super weird.  But you can also guarantee that it will be like something you’ve never heard before, that demands a careful listen, and an EXTREMELY open mind.  The Knife was commissioned to create the music for an “electro-opera” based on Darwin’s life and works.  They took the mission literally and traveled to the Amazon to research and record animals and sounds and then twisted them into new shapes.  Sometimes it feels like the music is learning how to be music, much like a bird learning to sing or fly for the first time.  I promise you this will be the most experimental, unique, bizarre thing you will hear all year, and for that, you must devote an hour and a half of your life to listen through the entire opera straight through.  Just think…that’s like only 3 episodes of Jersey Shore, hardly enough to be called a marathon.  Following Darwin’s lead, The Knife have dramatically sped up the evolution of modern day opera…so much so that they might have initiated an explosive butterfly effect on all our lives.

Grade: A-

Best Tracks: Colouring of Pigeons (see weekly playlist), Seeds, Tomorrow, In A Year, and Annie’s Box (alt. vocal).

Love Child of: Not sleeping for a week and finding yourself in a doppelganger universe, monsters & creatures living under your bed, birds learning how to be birds, disproving the theory of gravity, and nightmares.  (In it's simplest form Tomorrow, In A Year = The Knife + Opera.)

Best Paired with: Absolute sobriety or else you might literally lose your mind…you’re going to hear some really weird stuff.  Prepare yourself.

-Nate

ihatekidslikeyou. collective rating: 4 out of 5 Darwin Finches

STREAM THE ENTIRE RECORD HERE FOR FREEEEEEEEEEEE!!!

http://www.theknife.net/

Watch 6+ minutes of the Opera here.  (A good overview of the various levels and musical experiences of the record)

Eberg: Antidote

I don't know about you, but before I get ready to sing the opening track on my LP, I like to ingest a little helium. Not enough to give me a "balloon high" per se, but just enough to give my vocals that warbled, "I'm drowning in the bathtub" type of flair. As the Pink Floydian sonic strangeness alluded to above would indicate, the title track, "Antidote," is a fitting lead-in to a particularly warped album. Brooding, dark, and downright icy, Antidote trades in the language of despair, conjuring up desolation with heavy reverb and occasional industrial scraping that calls to mind a less electro version of Scandinavian counterparts, the Knife. However, the melancholic landscape etched throughout yields a wonderful opportunity for contrast and the best moments on the album are those that starkly defy the overall bleakness. Accordingly, the XX-like female vocals on "One Step at a Time," the sense of melody rising from the depths of agony on "The Boy Likes Them Both," and the album standouts, "More Less than Now" and "The Right Thing to Do" are even more rewarding than they would be on a less suicidally-fixated album. Indeed, these glimmers of brightness bespeak the album's title, comprising the tonic for a world full of unrelenting doom.

Grade: B

Best 3 Tracks: "The Right Thing To Do," "More Less than Now," "One Step at a Time"

Love Child Of:  Pink Floyd's illegitimate Scandinavian son, Lars; drowning yourself in an icy pool of chemicals, the melancholy that preceded the former; Former tennis great, Stefan Edberg; Black helium balloons stolen from an unpopular (possibly leprous) child's party; The belated remedy to some disease that already gnawed off half your face; the world's shortest cameo from the XX's Romy Madley Croft.

Best Enjoyed While: Celebrating a job promotion that takes you to Iceland for its endless, monochromatic winter;  Weaning yourself off Dark Side of The Moon.

-Matt

i hate kids like you collective rating: 3.25 out 5 Industrial Strength Helium Jobbers

Check out Eberg’s Video for “The Right Thing to Do” below featuring a dude with the coolest mustache ever dealing with the everyday pitfalls of traveling with his TOILET on vacation (No really, I’m serious, this is a must-see): 

Julian Plenti: Julian Plenti is...Skyscraper

I'm all for band members doing solo projects, but lead singers must especially be careful not to waste time with a side project that sounds too similar to the band, because it dilutes the band as a whole.  Enter Julian Plenti, stage name of Paul Banks, lead singer of Interpol, destroying all my hopes and dreams.  It’s impossible not to associate this record with Interpol, because his voice is so unique.  But one drop of Julian Plenti and one drop of Interpol’s last record, Our Love To Admire, has been enough to dilute the oceanic depth and amazement that was Interpol pre-2007.  This record starts off great with “Only If You Run,” so much so, it sounds EXACTLY like Interpol…guitars, drums, everything. The record quickly drops off after that.  The record is much more experimental than Interpol and there are some notable gems (Games For Days), but the songs are disjointed, inconsistent, and lack the depth we’re used to with Interpol.  I know this is NOT Interpol, ok…but really...it IS, just like Conor Oberst is Bright Eyes and Paul McCartney is the Beatles. Overall, there are 4 decent songs and he should have just made an EP and let us think he was holding back, instead of disappointing us with 7 other barely ok songs, making me ultimately bored with this record.  I just hope Interpol’s 2010 release will rekindle the magic that once was.

Grade: C

Only Decent Tracks: Only If You Run, Skyscraper, Games For Days, and Madrid Song

Love Child Of: Interpol B sides, Eastern Bloc Europe, Bipolar disorder, Paul Banks bored in his basement, Horror Film soundtracks, and sad clowns with painted on smiles.

Best Paired With: Boredom OR watching the Winter Olympics figure skating long program on mute. 

-Nate

ihatekidslikeyou. collective rating: 2.5 out of 5 sad clowns with painted smiles. 

Watch the video to Games For Days:

I Hate Your Weekly Playlist

Dead Man's Bones - Lose Your Soul
Two Door Cinema Club - Undercover Martyn
Idiot Pilot - To Buy A Gun
Fanfarlo - Drowning Men
Bat For Lashes - Daniel
Savoir Adore - Merp
HeartsRevolution - Digital Suicide
Cold War Kids - Audience
Miike Snow - Burial
Phantogram - As Far As I Can See
Bright Eyes - First Day Of My Life
The Knife In Collaboration with Mt. Sims and Planningtorock - Colouring of Pigeons

Hot Chip, One Life Stand

I remember being so excited a few months back when I heard that Hot Chip had been collaborating with Barry Manilow on a soon to be released track off their new LP…wait a minute, they didn’t collaborate with Barry Boy? Oh, my mistake. The track to which I am referring is entitled “Slush” and with it’s “Humina…Humina…Humina…” background vocal loop, it’s probably the most nausea-inducing, piece of saccharine trash that I’ve heard all year. Actually nevermind, that distinction would go to the preceding track “Brothers,” about which the band has this to say in the self-indulgently included One Life Stand (Track by Track Interview), “so yeah it simultaneously became about, kind of like, your brothers in terms of your mates and also about your brother, like your brother.” I’m sorry, what? I’m gonna have to call you out on this one Hot Chip.  Just because you have a British accents, doesn’t mean you sound intelligent when you crib the “Eugoogly” speech from Zoolander.  And yes Alexis Taylor, I’m sure when you say brother, you mean it in the way that black people mean it, which I think is much more meaningful.

Anyway, whatever drugs fueled the manic urgency found on the stellar previous releases, Made in the Dark and The Warning, Hot Chip needs to put to back in the medicine cabinet. Even the more upbeat songs contained herein, “One Life Stand,” “I Feel Better” “We Have Love” and “Take It In” have traded in the quirky verve of their iconic hits, “Over and Over” and “Ready for the Floor” for vocoder heavy, middle-of-the-road dance constructions. The worst offender of their decision to settle for mediocrity is “I Feel Better,” which is reasonable catchy, but sounds like they stole the synth lines from David Guetta or MSTRKRFT off Tabnabber. Even the song I really want to like on the album “Hand Me Down Your Love,” (emphasis on “hand me down”) was much better when it was called “Black and Blue” by Miike Snow. Long story short, if you threw any of these songs on at a dance party, you wouldn’t be able to distinguish them from anything else that came out in the last 2 years. For one of the most innovative bands around, that’s not good enough. I’m sorry, Hot Chip, you may have caught me in a sleep-deprived, hornery mood, but you’re gonna have to do better than this.

Grade: D+

Best 3 Tracks: “One Life Stand,” “Take It In,” “Alley Cats”

Love Child Of: David Guetta featuring Kaskade covering MSTRKRFT’s dance version of Barry Manilow’s Mandy; A Refrigerator Word Jumble featuring only the words Life, Line, One and Chance (so again, Kaskade); The Vomitorium; Self-Indulgence; Soiled Crib Notes; Affectation; Squandered Talent.

Best Paired With: Binging, but more so purging; having a completely unmemorable dance party.

-Matt

i hate kids like you. collective rating: 1 out of 5 Brilliant White Derek Zoolander “Eugoogly” Outfits

Watch Hot Chip's Video of "One Life Stand" below (or don't, because it's terrible).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPXPIx1LlPY

Wild Beasts @ The Troubadour

Fresh off bizarre encounters with Corky from "Life Goes On" and Angie Harmon (no, really she was awkwardly hitting on me) at a BH charity event, I went to go see UK's Wild Beasts at the Troub last night. Touring in support of 2009's sparkly, idiosyncratic gem, Two Dancers, the Beasts lit up the standing room only crowd with fantastic renditions of "We Still Got the Taste Dancin' on Our Tongues," "All the King's Men," "His Grinning Skull," and "Brave Bulging Buoyant Clairvoyant," among many others. Tag-Team vocalists, Hayden Thorpe and Tom Fleming (Center and Right, respectively), shared mic duties and belted out like crazy, both wowing with "oohs and aahs" that sounded downright filthy and lascivious when compared to your run-of-the mill, twee, "uh, oh, I might have a boner, what do I do with it?" Indie frontmen. Let's put it this way, if we were "in the stacks of the library..." a la The Pains of Being Pure At Heart, Wild Beasts raw, riveting sound would be Henry Miller's, Tropic of Cancer.  If you're unfamiliar with the band, get acquainted, based on their overall audacity and the pulsing energy of their live set, they might just have capacity to stick around for a while.

-Matt

Photo and "Hipster Flask" Credit: MvB ("The Belle of the Ball")

Check out the appropriately titled, Wild Beasts, in "All the King's Men" below.

The Album Leaf: A Chorus of Storytellers

I love this record. I love this record for every reason you probably hate this record.  There are no standout songs, the music is repetitious, and it is probably 75% instrumental.  In fact, when there are vocals and song structure the record starts to bore me and I want to yell out the old adage, “Less Talk, More Rock!!”  The music is dramatic, beautiful and cinematic, and it feels like a cousin to Sigur Ros…the awkward cousin nobody wants to talk to but you’ll still play POGS with just to steal his Slammers.  The record is perfect to listen to on Valentine’s Day, think about “the one that got away,” stuff your face with the annual chocolates your parents send you (even though you’re in your late 20s), and feel manufactured emotion.  Actually, now that I think about it, this record is really just a glorified “sleep CD.” Perhaps we can look forward to an Album Leaf infomercial at 3 AM advertising just that.  Until then, I will just play the instrumental tracks on repeat and drift away.

Grade: B+ (the completely Instrumental Version would get an A)

Best Tracks:  Blank Pages, Within Dreams, Falling From The Sun (the only good song with vocals), and Until The Last.

Love Child Of: Feeling sorry for yourself, Sigur Ros, Explosions In The Sky, Death Cab For Cutie’s next record since Ben Gibbard will have nothing sad to write about since marrying Zooey Deschanel, Braveheart, sitting alone on a rocky beach with a broken kite, and convincing yourself you are actually a deep person just by listening to this record.   

Best Paired With: Lying on your bed, blurring your focus and making shapes out of your popcorn ceiling.  (Also, perfect record to study to)

-Nate

i hate kids like you. rating:  3.25 out of 5 metaphorical footprints in the sand.

Watch a fake youtube video of "Falling From the Sun" with links within the video to listen to every other song on the record: 

Buy the record here!

Watch the new Gorillaz "Plastic Beach" promo video:

Unfortunately, we have to wait until March to see how this story plays out...

Yeasayer: Odd Blood

WARNING: this review will not be funny, i'm so confused by this record, I can't even pull a rational thought together.  It usually takes me 3 listens of a record to wrap my head around it and make an opinion.  Yeasayer's "Odd Blood"has taken me at least 6 listens, and I still don't know whether to absolutely LOVE it or hate it...I kinda want to do both... I kinda feel like I'm being Rickrolled here.  Every track is so different that you really need a double dose of Adderall to stay focused to understand what you're hearing. Parts feel like an 80s dance hit, "Rome" feel like some new wave-50s jazz-rockabilly (i hope never to repeat that string of 5 words again), the end of "ONE" sounds like Michael Jackson's triumphant return from the grave (too soon?), then there are world beats, heavy M83 strings, and "Love Me Girl" sounds like a poor-man's Timbaland/Justin Timberlake single, and the bubbly keys on "I Remember" reminds me of Animal Collective (I hope never to repeat that string of 2 words again) which makes me want to vomit, but that song is really good.  I hate most of the individual styles I just mentioned, and yet somehow Yeasayer makes it collectively sound great.  Immediately, the intro of this record is slow and dark and the vocals sound just like The Knife, which makes you feel like perhaps they stole this song from The Knife's upcoming release - because it resembles nothing like any other song on this album.  However, track 2 quickly breaks into the record's first single "Ambling Alp," and this dancy pace carries through most of the record.  The vocals and beats on the record feel VERY 1980s, but the surrounding ensemble of music is much more experimental.  "Madder Red" starts off with the indie requisite "oooos" that kids will be singing along to at festivals all summer.  In fact, the entire record is almost a strange combination of every indie sound I've heard in the past decade, but somehow they pull it off and actually sound original. I think.

I gave myself 1,000 reasons to hate this record, but for some reason I keep going back to the next listen and I think you will too.  I still can't wrap my head around it, because it feels so disjointed. I'm not sure I actually know WHO Yeasayer is, I just know what they do...and they do it really well.  Each track is so different from each other that this band gives itself 10 lives to make a fan out of you.

Best Tracks: Ambling Alp, I Remember, Madder Red

Love Child Of: Mew, hipsters, being Rickrolled, glitter microphones, fog machines, robots with real drums - real people with robot drums, acting 14 and struggling to find your identity - so hipsters again.  

Best Paired With: Any activity that doesn't require you to stay focused...so just pick one; I'll go with driving.  Also goes great with anytime you're trying to impress someone with new, weird music you "swear they'll like," but they don't, they now just think less of you, and wonder how close you're allowed to elementary schools. 

Grade: B+???

- Nate

i hate kids like you rating: 3.75 out of 5 Rick Astley's singing you "Never Gonna Give You Up"

Watch Yeasayer's video to "Ambling Alp" below:

Buy the record here!

Toro Y Moi: Causers of This

Certain mornings we never wake up; the morning light descends, but it remains an extension of our gossamer dreams, and we stay firmly entrenched in the brilliant reverie of somewhere else. The world confronts us, but for a while it lacks its normal pull, as we float along ensconced in our womb-like sheath. This state, of course, is very fragile…the power drill from the construction site, the electronic chime of a million pressing emails, the blare of the radio’s saccharine pop...these are all affronts to our diaphanous immersion. However, for those of you that rue the inevitable loss of this divine morning grace, Toro Y Moi has constructed the musical equivalent of your undisturbed morning stroll across the memory dream continuum. From the swirling, opening notes of “Blessa” through the pulsing, sample-laden repetition of “Causers of This,” Toro Y Moi keeps you submerged in the shroud of your fondly fading fantasy. Of course, part of this effect is achieved through the lack of delineation between tracks. The songs merge into one another exactly like the dreams they conjure, without fanfare or causation. But akin to the futility of dream interpretation, it is almost silly to intellectualize or attempt to graft some sort of teleological importance onto the album. First and foremost, this album is a transformative journey into a realm of shades and feeling and its most trenchant qualities are those unfurled in the very personal language of patterns, layers, textures, colors, motifs, tones, and keys.  It takes you so far by taking you nowhere at all, conscious to never cross that line into abject reality, careful to preserve the good night in the guise of good morning.

Grade: A

Best 3 Tracks: “Low Shoulders,” “Talamak,” “You Hid”

Love Child Of: Michel Gondry Movies; Dreamcatchers; Ryden’s Eyes and Modigliani’s Necks; 85 degree Ocean Water; Waking up on the beach in Ibiza, the girl of your dreams coiled in your arms, and realizing that “yeah, that happened”; The Snooze Button.

Best Listened To While: Lucid Dreaming

- Matt

i hate kids like you. rating: 3.75 out of 5 Aurora Borealis Filled Skies

Watch Toro Y Moi's video for Talamak below:

BUY THE RECORD HERE: 

Monday Funday

Well, we did it.  We survived watching The Who perform the Super Bowl halftime show.  As for the above picture, I just figured DJ Lance Rock and the Yo Gabba Gabba gang would cheer you up on yet another Monday.

To start off the week we wanted to let you know about some music-related things we're looking forward to in 2010:

A Few Things (fromthelistofmany) Marked On My Calendar:

Past Lives and Jaguar Love - Well, one of my favorite bands The Blood Brothers broke the eternal bond and split in half and formed Past Lives in Seattle and Jaguar Love in Portland.  The jury is still out over who will win this sibling rivalry with both bands releasing records in the next 2 months, but my money is on Past Lives.

Jonsi - All eyes are on Jonsi, from Sigur Ros, this April as he releases a solo record and performs at Coachella.  I just hope he continues his whole "birdman motif" and shows up in a traditional yellow chicken costume.

The Dead Weather - I am a rare breed in that I may be a bigger fan of The Dead Weather than I am of the White Stripes.  Jack White is as busy as always with a 7th White Stripes record in the queue, but I'm even more delighted that he'll be serving up a second helping with Alison Mosshart and the rest of The Dead Weather gang.

- Nate

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5 Music Related Things To Get Excited About:

1.  Glow-Fi Revolution- Not only are bands like Toro Y Moi (see playlist), Dayve Hawk (Memory Cassette, Memory Tapes, Weird Tapes), Neon Indian, Small Black, and Washed Out  spearheading a movement that takes the best elements from Cut Copy and makes them even trippier, but they are also frequently collaborating with each other (Washed Out and Small Black just released a split EP). Nothing drives innovation like a close knit circle of bands pushing each other to break new ground.  Can’t wait to see Memory Tapes at Spaceland on February 26^th and everyone else in Austin at SXSW (even if I have to sit through Neon Indian’s craptacular live set again).

2. 1950’s Revivalism- If the 70’s and 80’s can have a resurgence in the hipster zeitgeist, why not the 50’s? Check out 2009’s How to Make an Ambient Sadcake from The Sandwitches (a band you’ve never heard of unless your name is Michelle von Bauer). “Back to the Sea” may sound like it’s lifted straight from the “Golden Oldies” section of your favorite now-defunct record store, but if you’re not pulling out your pocket comb and doing the twist after a couple listens, come see me at the flagpost for a wet willie. On another note, I may have necked with your “main squeeze.” Sorry.

3.The Fonda Make-Over- Favorite I hate kids like you venue, The Henry Fonda Theater, gets a sick facelift including a new rooftop club space. For all you electroheads tired of heading to Avalon for your glowstick fix, the Fonda’s DJ-fetching digs should be open in time for Spring.

4. Dinner Music That Doesn’t Suck- In addition to having food inspires you to ditch your blackberry and strike up a pen pal relationship with Grandma (that is to say, they’re worth writing home about), Downtown LA’s, Wurstekuche, and WeHo’s, The Hudson, also feature live DJ sets that decidedly do not suck. Within 2 minutes of sitting down in Wurstekuche’s neo-urban mess hall, the resident jockey served up a back-to-back offering of Hercules and Love Affair and Peter Bjorn and John. Indie and Truffle French Fries? Are you kidding me? The Hudson’s vibe is more hip hop oriented, but we’re talking the heyday of hip hop, a la mid 90’s A Tribe Called Quest. I promise you, these two spots will definitely carve their way into your regular rotation. 

5. It’s Never Too Early for a Reunion: This is purely wishful thinking, but three of my favorite bands (Pela, Harlem Shakes, and Magistrates) broke up in 2009. If any of you want to reunite, the headlining spot at I hate kids like you’s first annual music festival is open for the taking. So what if you’re playing to a rooftop of 12 people?  2010, I’m telling you, it’s the year of the comeback!

- Matt

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In other news, starting next week we're very excited to be posting reviews and the like from various friends of ours around the country, so stay tuned for those!  In the mean time, we have some great reviews lined up for the rest of the week.

- Nate & Matt

I Hate Your Weekly Playlist

Toro Y Moi - Low Shoulders
Throw Me The Statue - Ancestors
Y La Bamba - Fasting In San Francisco
Hockey - Too Fake
Volcano Choir - Island, IS
Magistrates - Anyway
Mew - Beach
Damien Jurado - Everything Trying
Klaxons - Golden Skans
Jonathan Boulet - A Community Service Announcement
Los Campesinos! - The Sea Is A Good Place To Think Of The Future
Louis La Roche - Malfunction

Vampire Weekend: Contra - "DUEL" Review!!

LOVER, by Matt.

Somewhere in between A Chorus Line leg lift and a Compton Crip Walk lies a special Vampire Weekend  jig, which I’m pretty sure I invented over the course of my 6 times seeing them live.  I just can’t help it, their music plays, something overtakes me, and I turn into a cross between Alvin Ailey, that dude from Riverdance, and a spastic that on a “special ed” cheerleading squad. “…But mom, I just wanna daaaaance!!!” VW makes me feel mildly euphoric, so my reviewing them is kind of like the equivalent of an E-tard stroking your arm at a house party, you put up with the googly-eyed freak because you were once that happy or one day you hope to be. So before you lose me to a paroxysm of giddiness, allow me to explain why I think Contra is such a phenomenal album.

First of all, in an age where the most independent “dancey” music is overrun by computerized drum loops and coursing lead synths, Vampire Weekend creates kinetic music with the comparatively simple, organic elements. Case in point are the exuberant tandem,  “White Sky” and “Run,” which parlay rhythmic shifts in tempo into climactic choruses, where mere “ooohs” and “aahs” transform your head bob and your foot stomp into a rollicking stampede of swaying body parts.

I don’t mean to keep underscoring the inherent “danciness” of their music, but this was a band that, after the release of their debut, was skewered by the New York Times for epitomizing the death of “soul” in Rock Music. This particular school of thought pigeonholed VW as lily-white, elitist dilletantes, who appropriated African themes and Reggae rhythms, but could never embody them; Lacoste-wearing, country club send-ups that aped the style of “Black” music, but had not one scintilla of appeal for the African-American community. Granted, I’m not delusional enough to believe that Vampire Weekend has a tremendous following among African-American listeners, but any band that reaches number one on the Billboard charts in this day and age has to have at least some cross-over appeal.

Against this precarious backdrop of cultural unease and the tension regarding the authenticity of VW’s stylistic heritage, the most fraught and concomitantly thrilling moment on Contra has to be the penultimate track, “Diplomat’s Son,” which uses an M.I.A. sample as a foundation for a song whose central image, “a car all black with diplomatic plates,” comes to starkly stand for exactly the type of privilege and isolation that VW is derided for symbolizing. However, the imagery doesn’t stop there. I submit to you that in this muso-political metaphor, the tinted-windowed vehicle is Vampire Weekend itself, flamboyantly adorned with labels signifying its various affiliations…identified, but yet unseen. Who knows what VW is doing inside that car…whether they’re drinking “Horchata,” listening to Paul Simon on repeat, or plotting ways to take over the world. The point is that once you’ve been labeled as one thing, you’re paradoxically liberated to do anything you damn well please. And for me at least, Contra explores the very edges of that freedom. So free in fact, that I think I’ll do my jig…

Grade: A

Favorite Tracks: “Run,” “White Sky,” “Diplomat’s Son”

Least Favorite Track: “Cousins” (the album’s only weak spot)

“Always Walcott” Award for the song most likely to become a new VW encore staple): “Horchata”

Best “The Killers” Impression: “Giving up the Gun”

Love Child of: I’ll let Nate take this one…

HATER, By Nate

Can we all just collectively say, “WE GET IT.”  We get it. You’re white kids who went to Columbia.  Your favorite movie is probably The Graduate.  Seriously, just stop trying to be something you’re not.  You lack depth and you’re formulaic.  Ezra Koenig, who sings about private school, aristocrats and diplomats, just looks like a pretentious snob who needs to be punched in the face by Jack White.  This record mirrors those “indie” films that follows the 12 step program to “being indie and clever” just to appeal to kids who (1) think they are deep because they were moved when Zach Braff finally shed a tear in Garden State and (2) have an affinity for yellow block letters thanks to Wes Anderson.  This record is accessible “indie” music for frat boys, 40-year old women, and scenesters with thin mustaches – in other words, something for people who want to pretend they are “still cool.”  If you have to say “still,” you’re not cool now and you never were.  Vampire Weekend’s “Contra” is best digested with Tequila, Corona chasers, a round of beer pong, jello shots, and a keg stand at a Sigma Chi party.  Because if you were forced to actually listen to this record, you might stab your eardrums with your freshly sharpened #2 pencil you prepared for that Chemistry quiz you slept through.  It is pretentious East Coast music with no soul of its own…a skeleton of hollow, staccato-ey sounds geared to make you feel good about yourself, but ultimately lacking any real depth, leaving you feeling empty and unmoved.

In a nutshell, if Paul Simon took speed and covered Paul Simon, put on a “Harvard” t-shirt, turned up the treble, and took a dump, the bits of corn would be Vampire Weekend, because you just can’t properly consume or digest that garbage.  It’s all water.

However, Vampire Weekend has figured out how to fool the masses into thinking that this is what indie music sounds like today, so people can feel “in the know.” Unfortunately, they will have the last laugh, because they are making tons of money off these fools, and probably spending it all on salmon short-shorts, plaid collared shirts, Ray-Bans, and Sperry-Top Sider boat shoes. The record is barely tolerable, and the music feels quirky and whimsical just for the sake of pretending they are actually quirky and whimsical (kind of like this review).  Koenig’s vocal runs, quick note changes and “ohs” and “ooos” make it extremely noticeable that this record was produced by T-Pain with an extra helping of Auto-Tune. He literally sounds like a robot on “California English.”

More unfortunately, I actually enjoy “Cousins.” It’s a solid single, even though it might be the most annoying song on the entire record.  I can deal with 1, ok; I can’t deal with 10.  Beyond that track, I find myself clicking “next” until my iTunes player starts playing The Velvet Underground.

Vampire Weekend is unoriginal and contrived.  The End. 

Grade: C-

Love Child of: Paul Simon and Paul Simon, layering polo shirts with polo shirts, drinking beer with your pinky out, crew, tweed, truffle oil, and unread books on your shelves to appear educated, all mixed up in a Margaritaville blender.

- Nate

i hate kids like you. rating: 3.5 out of 5 pink Lacoste polo shirts

Watch "Cousins" below:

Woodpigeon: Die Stadt Musikanten

It's hard to warm yourself to the idea of liking a band named Woodpigeon (that is, unless you’re a 12-year old boy going through his I giggle at every conceivable utterance containing “wood” phase). It’s not sleek, nor cool, nor sexy and for better or worse, it sounds like the subject of a discontinued calendar you’d find in the overstock aisle at Costco. Me? I’m straight, thanks, I already have one hanging over my mantelpiece. But aside from belonging with “shuttlecock” in the pantheon of odd vaguely ornithological monikers for things no one cares about, Woodpigeon does an admirable job of crafting listenable and often memorable Indie Folk. The album lives and dies on the voice of frontman, Mark Hamilton, who presents a bit of a paradox range-wise: his voice is melodious enough to carry a tune (and certainly he carries quite a few), but not dynamic enough to carry an album. Accordingly, when he is surrounded by vibrant arrangements that enhance his steady vocals (see “Die Stadt Musikanten” and “…And as the Ship Went Down, You Never Looked Finer”), his economical approach is surprisingly effective, but on less variegated numbers like “The Street Noise Gives You Away” and “The Pesky Druthers,” he gets swallowed by tepid, forced, orchestral pop. This is actually the rare album that I like less the more I listen to it. Which brings me to my ultimate pet peeve: even if you’re trying to be hip and artistic, under no circumstances may you end an album with close to four minutes of silence. Like hello, would I end this review with four pages of blank space? If I may remind you, your name is Woodpigeon… you’re trying to make people like you. Let me be unironic when I say, “I hate bands like you.”

Grade: B-

Love Child Of: Taxidermy; Otto Van Bismarck; Blind Pilot; Redwood Trees; Flocks of pigeons shitting in a forest with no one around (do they make a sound?).

Best Tracks: “Die Stadt Musikanten,” “…And as the Ship Went Down, You Never Looked Finer.”

-Matt

I hate kids like you rating: 3 out of 5 Cometa (Let’s go huntin’) Air Rifles

Watch Woodpigeon giving a performance in what looks like a makeshift aviary to an audience consisting of Mrs. Gilliam's Transitional Kindergarten class.  The students all agreed that this was the best field trip ever in which a red-bearded lumberjack sang about his dissolving relationship with the Brawny Towel Guy and nearly got struck with a stray shot from a U-8 AYSO game.  I miss childhood...

Buy the record here!

Los Campesinos!: Romance is Boring

It's like this band was meant to be together, considering every member shares the same last name “Campesinos!”  I mean, what are the odds that 7 people with the same Spanish last name that includes an exclamation mark would meet in Wales and form some super-group??  Not since Hanson, did I think I’d ever see the day.  Don’t get me wrong; I’m all for solidarity, but someone needs to exercise some population control on this family of dirty British rockers before these “peasants” start spawning on stage.  

If “Romance is Boring,” not much else is in the lives of Los Campesinos!, with lyrics about eating disorders, drunkenness, drug-use, death, sex, and tragedy.  And this band has a lot to say, so much so, occasionally the music will stop and the lyrics just keep going.  This record is a snotty, sloppy, post punk-rock, pleasant kick in the face.  Los Campesinos! is what Conor Oberst would sound like if Conor Oberst had some balls, an electric guitar, no sense of rhyme scheme, and 6 friends.  The band has greatly evolved from their previous records and they now have a much bigger sound; and I would expect nothing less from 7 people wailing on instruments like it’s their last hope to express themselves. The emotional screams, chaotic instruments, and uncomplicated and literal lyrics prove that this family isn’t seeking perfection, just honesty.

This is a nice album to have in the rotation this year, especially after listening to all this delicate folk garbage I’ve been listening to lately.  And for the record, I’m so annoyed that I have to keep typing this damn exclamation mark!

Grade: B+

Love Child of: The Cure, wearing the same clothes for a week, beige high-top Converse sneakers, Matt & Kim, teen angst, scabs from a skateboarding accident, and being 23.

Best 3 Songs: “Romance is Boring,” “There Are Listed Buildings,” and tie between “The Sea is a Good Place to Think of Your Future” and “Plan A.”

The Entire Lyrics of “Heart Swells/100-1”: “By now it’s just the 3 of us: Me. Your shadow. Your echo.  I do not believe I have ever felt more alone.”

- Nate Campesinos!

i hate kids like you. rating: 3.5 out of 5 rainbow glockenspiels

Watch the videos to “There are Listed Buildings” and “Romance is Boring” (this video is INSANE!) below:

Buy the record here!

Fredrik: Trilogi

Oh, the Swedish...at it again with their odd and dramatic icy musical renditions that make us feel like we are mythical creatures navigating the winter with an 8mm camera finding meaning in our black and white etherial dreams.  (Odd Fact: I actually wrote this before watching the Viskra video – see below – ...just proves my point). Fredrik follows their previously solid record Na Na Ni with Trilogi, a dark and soothing "electronic-euro folk" piece which includes Swedish song titles, but English lyrics.  Cool.  You're Swedish. We get it.  Do you have a prescription for that sweater? Their videos are fittingly bizarre...and who doesn't love someone singing into a typewriter and some guy holding a record player, how RETRO!  No. Also, this record is supposedly a concept piece.  Of course it is.

Besides that whole "trying WAY too hard" vibe this band gives me, this is actually an enjoyable record.  The music is unique and the vocals are outstanding.  It serves as great background music, kind of like early Sigur Ros...great to study/work to.  There are many instrumental songs on the record, so be warned, but the production on this record is flawless.  If you're looking for more traditional song structures, check out Na Na Ni.  Trilogi serves as a great second helping, but it is much more experimental with dark instrumentals and few lyrics.

Download “Vinterbarn” and “Viskra,” show some people this "new band", and feel good about yourself.

Grade: B-

Love Child of: Sigur Ros and Sea Wolf B sides, Ligers, icicles, and Gregorian Monks.

Best 3 Tracks: “Vinterbarn,” “Viskra” and “Milo”

- Nate

i hate kids like you. rating: 3 out of 5 build-it-yourself IKEA coffee tables

Watch the "Viskra" and Vinterbarn" videos below: