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Vivian Girls with Widowspeak and Ninjessa – Johnny Brenda’s (Philadelphia) – September 6, 2011
Please see my full review here.
The National with Yo La Tengo and Wye Oak- Academy of Music (Philadelphia) – September 8, 2011
A review is forthcoming. In the meantime, Dan DeLuca of the Philadelphia Inquirer summed it up nicely and succintly here. It was magical.
Vivian Girls – entire discography
Vivian Girls are hands down my favorite new band of the last 3 years and because they recently played here (see my review in spot #1 this week) and for other reasons, I’ve been playing them a lot lately.
Wipers – entire discography
In recent years, I’ve come to the conclusion that Wipers are not only one of the greatest bands ever, but that they’re also the greatest American band of the last 30 years as well. I’ve been playing their records as well as Greg Sage’s Straight Ahead a lot lately.
Leatherface – Viva La Arthouse: Live in Melbourne (No Idea)
Not a new studio Lp, but rather as the name implies this is a double live Lp from Sunderland’s finest. It includes tracks from their entire career up to last year’s excellent The Stormy Petrel along with a cover of the Nine Inch Nails song “Hurt” done in the manner of Johnny Cash‘s definitive version. The sound is great. Get it!
Wilco – “I Might” EP (dBpm)
The first release on Wilco’s new label is this 7”. The A-side comes from their forthcoming new Lp The Whole Love while the B-side is a cover of Nick Lowe‘s appropriate “I Love My Label”. In my view, this is the best and most energetic Wilco material in years with “I Might” resembling some of the material on Summerteeth. I hope the new Lp will be of similar quality.
All Saints Day – “It’ll Come Around” (Art Fag)
Had this single by Vivian Girls side project (it’s bassist Katy Goodman with Cat Power and former Delta 72 frontman and Junction guitarist Gregg Foreman) been released in the early ’90s, it would’ve fit nicely alongside all the dream-pop coming out then by Lush, Chapterhouse, The Heart Throbs and other similar bands. I think the A-side is a stone cold classic. The B-side, “You Can’t Be Alone”, is good as well, though not quite as strong. I hope that more material from them arrives at some point.
Rettsounds – Boys of Summer Mix (Viceland)
This is a mix put together by Tony Rettman, a writer for Viceland and several other publications and the author of Why Be Something that You’re Not, an oral history of Detroit’s early ’80s hardcore punk scene. It’s all over the place, but heavy, loud, riff-rock of all stripes is a constant here whether it’s late ’60s/early ’70s hard rock from UFO, West, Bruce and Laing and others to modern punk from The Men and The Night Birds along with a great new Scream track and an absolutely stomping early ’90s live Ride track and appropriately enough, some obscure early ’80s Michigan punk, this mix simply rages. You can stream it here.
Sonic Youth – “Rain on Tin”
This is my favorite Sonic Youth song and I’m listing it this week because it’s a prayer for New York City that was written directly after the events of September 11, 2001. Since today is the 10th anniversary of that terrible event, I thought it appropriate to mention here. Here is an article on musicians affected by the events of that day. The article includes Lee Ranaldo, who still lives two blocks from Ground Zero, and also mentions Sonic Youth’s studio on Murray Street, which is what they named the album that this song comes off of.
Dot Dash – Spark>Flame>Ember>Ash (The Beautiful Music)
After an extremely limited 3 song CD released last year, Dot Dash’s first full-length release is on the Canadian label The Beautiful Music. It’s more of the same and in this case, that’s a good thing. For those who don’t know, Dot Dash is half of the relatively recently-departed but already much-missed Julie Ocean (singer/guitarist and Big Takeover contributor Terry Banks as well as bassist Hunter Bennett) along with drummer Danny Ingram (a one-time member of Swervedriver) and lead guitarist Bill Crandall. The sound here is not too dissimilar from Julie Ocean with the lead track sounding an awful lot like The Jam‘s “All Mod Cons” and much of the rest hearkening back to early ’90s indie-pop.
