In honor of the one-year anniversary of its blog, Anti- is offering a free download of Middle Cyclone, the title track from Neko Case’s amazing new album (due out on Tuesday).
Previously, Neko (yep, we’re on a first-name basis) offered up People Got a Lotta Nerve, which helped benefit Best Friends Animal Society.
On Middle Cyclone, Neko sings beautifully over an acoustic guitar and the intermittent loop of what sounds like a child’s toy (a jack in the box perhaps?). “Can’t give up acting tough / it’s all that I’m made of.” Also, it’s a great excuse to run a picture of Neko eating a red rope piece of licorice.
Honestly, I’m not really sure who Sara Lov is, but she apparently is taking cover-song requests from fans and producing neat little videos of them (with an even littler piano … is “littler” a word?). For the latest, she covers Silversun Pickups’Kissing Families, which appeared on the group’s Pikul EP.
Stick around for the guest appearance … OK, it’s SSPU singer Brian Aubert, in case you didn’t recognize him.
This is also a good time to tell you that the new album from SSPU, Swoon, is due out April 14 and can be pre-ordered at Amazon.
It’s always a pleasure to hear from Chad Sundin, the frontman for local folk act The Via Maris, which actually played its last show in November, though Sundin promised then that The Via Maris is not dead, “merely the current manifestation of it.”
That said, Sundin got in touch to let me know about a show he put together, headlined by acclaimed Portland folk artist Laura Gibson, who is drawing high praise for her 2009 release Beasts of Seasons (Hush Records). NPR called it “nothing short of a masterpiece.”
To top it off, Sundin says he has assembled “a 3-piece wind ensemble to perform a set of old hymns with me and Zachary James Dodds, and maybe some others.”
The show will take place at St. Augustine’s Episcopal Parish (1735 S. College Ave., Tempe), inside of which Sundin’s studio is located. Since Gibson isn’t coming to Phoenix on the Damien Jurado tour, this is an amazing opportunity to see her at a unique venue.
The show starts at 8 p.m. Admission is $8 or $4 if you bring a non-perishable food or clothing item for humanitarian efforts at Arizona’s southern border.
Because Pigeon John is a guy who never seems to take himself too seriously, you’d sort of expect him to form a side project like Rootbeer.
From what I can tell – there are only two songs streaming on MySpace – PJ and Flynn Adam (both formerly of LA Symphony) take some shots at mainstream rap culture, perhaps in the vein of something like Plastic Little, while keeping the vibe upbeat and loose.
The Pink Limousine EP is due out March 10 and the duo is performing at Chaser’s in Scottsdale on March 17 as they head out to SXSW. (More info on this flyer.)
Bought my tickets on Tuesday for tonight’s Z-Trip outing at Bar Smith in downtown Phoenix. You can get ’em here if you haven’t already.
While we’re on the subject, Z-Trip is featured in comic-book form at BPM magazine with art by former AZ resident Jim Mahfood.
In more Z-Trip news, there’s a new video for the N.A.S.A. track The People Tree, featuring David Byrne, Chali 2na, the Gift of Gab and Z-Trip. Check it out below:
The 40th installment of I Used to Love H.E.R., a series in which artists/bloggers/writers discuss their most essential or favorite hip-hop albums and songs, comes from producer Enoch of Gainesville, Fla., hip-hop quartet CYNE, whose excellent 2005 album Evolution Fight was followed in ’08 by Pretty Dark Things (Hometapes).
Black Sheep A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing (Mercury/PolyGram, 1991)
This is the first album that I ever knew word for word from front to back. Up to this point, I had been familiar with some hip hop records such as De La Soul, Beastie Boys and Run-DMC, mostly from my brother. But when a friend played me this album in 6th grade, it was over. Hip hop officially became the only thing I would listen to for many many years.
Black Sheep is such a fitting title for these guys, because in my eyes, they were just as talented as any of the other Native Tongue artists, but completely unappreciated. To this day, they still have the song that can spontaneously cause entire crowds to chant “Engine engine number 9, on the New York transatlantic line” but you would be hard pressed to find a lot of people in that same crowd who actually know what it is that they are listening to. This album has so many classic singles, such as Similak Child, Strobelite Honey, Flavor of the Month, and of course, The Choice is Yours, but the album cuts are just as great. Flawless production and amazing lyrics from Dres and Mista Lawnge.
Tha Alkaholiks Coast II Coast (Loud/RCA Records, 1995)
So a couple years after I got hooked on hip hop, while I was more or less living at my friend’s house (the same one who turned me on to Black Sheep), we decided we were going to go see the Alkaholiks play. Now being that neither of us could drive and were not even remotely close to any sort of appropriate age for this sort of thing, his parents of course shut us down immediately. So we did what any self-involved teenagers would do: sneak out and catch a ride with an older kid. We get there and make our way to the front of the stage for the Alkaholiks set. Near the end, we look over and who do we see? My friend’s father, with steam coming out of his ears. He apparently figured out we snuck out and came to track us down. Now anyone who has seen the Alkaholiks play knows that the first few rows of the show can pretty much bank on getting covered in beer and all types of booze. So as if on cue, as soon as he starts walking toward us, all hell breaks loose and beer is being sprayed everywhere, including all over him. He drags us out, and on the way home while yelling at us, red and blue lights start flashing behind us. To make a long story short, my friend’s dad got pulled over and had to go through all kinds of sobriety tests to prove to the police that he wasn’t drinking and driving despite the fact he smelled like a keg party. Hilarious in retrospect. Oh, yeah, and this album is great.
Wu-Tang Clan, Enter the 36 Chambers (Loud/RCA, 1993)
Raekwon, Only Built 4 Cuban Linx (Loud/RCA, 1995)
To me, the two best hip hop records ever, hands down. The reign of the Wu in the nineties is probably my favorite period of hip hop music, because it was just so incredible to hear what they would do next. They had so much style and substance and RZA was a machine with the production. Some of it was just so unorthodox at the time and it’s funny because 15 years later, you have producers like Just Blaze and Kanye who have used elements of the RZA formula to great success, which just goes to show how influential and timeless that style is.
Company Flow Funcrusher Plus (Rawkus, 1997)
This is the record that made me get a sampler and start making beats. The whole DIY aesthetic that Co Flow brought to the table was very innovative for the time, because without a label, it was virtually impossible for most hip hop artists to be heard unless you lived in NYC or a major city, or were selling tapes out of your trunk like Too Short. So when indie labels like Rawkus, Fondle ‘Em, ABB and others started popping up, it was almost like a complete rebirth for hip hop in a sense. There was so much talent coming from the underground at that time that it was just incredible. Company Flow really spearheaded that in my eyes and it was their “Independent as Fuck” mantra that really gave me that push to pursue production.
(Note: This album will be reissued in May. More info here.)
As promised when he released the Excursions remix a couple weeks ago, producer J. Period has now unleashed his Q-Tip tribute The [Abstract] Best, a comprehensive and career-spanning mix that meshes an all-star lineup with classic Tribe clips and Q-Tip interviews.
Fair warning: The file unzips as 49 separate tracks and the artist tags reflect the many guests (one of my pet peeves), so unless you change the tags, you’ll want to order your iTunes library by album to listen to this in order.
On another note … while Q-Tip is undoubtedly one of my favorite artists in hip-hopmusic, this project reinforces something I’ve been thinking about lately: What is Phife’s legacy? There is a 30-second Respect to Phife Dawg interlude on the mix that almost seems forced. Granted, neither Phife nor Q-Tip will go down as technically sound MCs in the class of, say, Rakim or Nas, but it was their camaraderie and chemistry that made each other better. Just wondering: Are Phife’s contributions to A Tribe Called Quest being forgotten as the years pass?
She probably didn’t know it at the time, but my wife got me one of the best gifts ever when she ordered Company Flow’sFuncrusher Plus for me in the first year or so of dating in 1997. Twelve years later, Definitive Jux, the label run by Co. Flow’s El-P, is reissuing what rightly should be considered an independent classic on May 5 in CD, vinyl and digital formats. The digital release will include the pre-1995 tracks Juvenile Techniques and Corners 94, as well as the last post-Funcrusher Plus songs Simple, DPA and Simian Drugs. The album, originally released on Rawkus (don’t ask El-P about that label) has been out of print since 2006; I still have my CD and I even kept the insert with questions you’re supposed to answer and mail back to the label.
At the time, in ’97, I’d been hung up and somewhat obsessed with the Native Tongues, Hieroglyphics and the like. Then Funcrusher Plus came along and pretty much rattled my brain, its desolate production and bleak verses pretty much living up to the album’s title. I’m still not sure I’ve completely wrapped my head around this album.
Check out Pitchfork for a great interview with El-P, Bigg Jus and Mr. Len about the news of the reissue.
Kinch has taught me a valuable lesson: pay attention to e-mail. You see, guitarist Brian Coughlin e-mailed me about two years ago to let me know about his band, a piece of correspondence I kept (because Kinch is from Phoenix) but one I failed to act on with a post.
Well, that was pretty dumb.
Kinch, whose Advances was named the best local album in 2008 by Martin Cizmar of Phoenix New Times, appears to be on the verge of breaking out. There’s upcoming West Coast tour dates with fellow Phoenicians Dear and the Headlights and an appearance at SXSW in March (including the I Heart AZ showcase curated by Psyko Steve).
On Friday night at Modified, Kinch celebrates the release of a three-song EP, The Economic Chastisement, copies of which will be given out with admission ($10) and made available online as a free download (or, you know, see below). Speaking of free, Advances also is available for no charge.
And that’s the thing about the guys in Kinch. They are savvy – in how they craft piano-driven hooks, in how they market themselves, in how they have built a fan base (someone from the band will ask you to sign up for the mailing list after a show, and you will). They make their breaks, and it certainly doesn’t hurt to have the pop-rock know-how to back it up. (I heard nothing but praise from friends and other bands after Kinch opened the Birdmonster show I put on in October.)
Black Sheep
Tha Alkaholiks
Company Flow
