“We Took Back The Plague” by the Fiery Furnaces.

From Dino, by way of my brother.

Songs To Wear Pants To

Is it me, or does the site (and concept) seem very much like exploding dog? Oh…never mind. He talk about it here.

If the RIAA/CRIA/etc. claim to be looking after the interests of their artists when trying to stop music downloading (which no one actually believes, of course), but you have hundreds of artists who have no problem with fans downloading the music, why not just let the artists sign a waiver that says “Sure, fans can download my music for free!”?

Then the industry would be exposed as greedy little liars with their pants on fire, and we can all get back to enjoying the music rather than debate copyright law…

I got a nice surprise in the mail today: Amazon actually delivered something on the release date. With a little more work they can match Future Shop, who often ships new release items on Saturday so that they arrive Monday, the day before they hit the streets.

Season 2 of The Office (which I’ve already seen, but have been desperate to watch again as the episodes aren’t coming out fast enough on BBC Canada), Bows And Arrows by The Walkmen and Ted Leo/Pharmacists‘ Hearts Of Oak.

from startribune.com

“I was trying to write the ultimate pop song. I was basically trying to rip off the Pixies.”
— Kurt Cobain on “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” Rolling Stone interview, 1994

Thanks to Nirvana’s “Nevermind,” the first Lollapalooza and other bastions of the so-called alternative-rock movement, 1991 will go down as Generation X’s most pivotal year in music. Those of us who know better, though, point to 1989 instead.

It was the final year of the cheesiest, most manufactured decade in pop music (the current 10-year span not yet being eligible). Rock was between hair bands and the impending grunge boom. There were no trends or marquee bands to speak of, so the music industry was open to anything that sounded promising. Even groups like Sonic Youth, Happy Mondays and the Replacements — all brilliant but hopelessly unmarketable — were getting major-label record deals.

The PixiesThe best rock albums of 1989 demonstrate just how wide-open things were, and how forgotten that magical pre-grunge heyday is now. The Stone Roses’ self-titled debut. Nine Inch Nails’ “Pretty Hate Machine.” Bob Mould’s “Workbook.” World Party’s “Goodbye Jumbo.” Mudhoney’s “Superfuzz Bigmuff.” Camper Van Beethoven’s “Key Lime Pie.” Neil Young’s “Freedom.”

The best, though, was and is the Pixies’ “Doolittle.” A scorching, exhilarating, frightening album that opens with a song about slicing up eyeballs (oh-ho-ho-ho), “Doolittle” stood for nothing, really. And that meant everything. It was simple, loud, catchy, bombastic rock ‘n’ roll from a scruffy-looking Boston band.

In songs like “Monkey Gone to Heaven” and “Tame,” we heard soft breaths and mumbled lyrics give way to wicked, gut-wrenching screams. This was the trademark work of the quartet’s nefarious frontman Black Francis (who later became Frank Black, otherwise known as Charles Thompson).

Francis was a time bomb certain to blow, and his ticking was perfectly in tune with Joey Santiago’s style-less guitar playing. Santiago could pluck out the tender, twangy riff of “Here Comes Your Man” and then crank out the bleeding drone of “Dead” without batting an eye. Actually, he rarely looked up so you could see his eyes. As for the other two members, effortlessly cool bassist Kim Deal — who was about to form her own band, the Breeders — always seemed to be in laid-back mode, somewhat unimpressed by Frankie’s outbursts. Drummer David Lovering was higher-strung and constantly pounding out his every frustration.

Those soft-loud, happy-mad transitions were the cornerstone of the Pixies, and later Nirvana, and later Weezer, and later a lot of bands that didn’t matter. At the end of “Doolittle,” as Francis urges us to, “Gouge away, stay all day,” it’s like coming to the end of a roller-coaster ride. The album whirs by in a rapid blur, but the adrenaline rush it leaves you is proof it’s worth riding again.

“Doolittle” wasn’t the Pixies’ first great disc. “Surfer Rosa” got them a minor buzz one year earlier. There were two albums after it, too, which actually featured their best songs: “Planet of Sound,” “U Mass” and “Velouria,” in particular. (“Velouria,” by the way, was just recorded by locally reared jazz trio the Bad Plus, which also reinvented “Smells Like Teen Spirit” on its last CD. Coincidence?)

But “Doolittle” was the Pixies’ best album start to finish. It has been 15 years since its release, and 11 years since Black Francis sent a fax to the other three members announcing the band’s breakup.

It’s a good year for the Pixies to reunite. They’re doing so for the very first time ever on stage Tuesday at the Fine Line in Minneapolis. The band will rehearse here a few days before their tour kickoff, which will culminate with a May 1 performance at the prestigious Coachella Music Festival in California. Coachella is the perfect place for the band, where none-of-the-above acts such as Radiohead (this year) and the White Stripes (last year) are in their element.

Today, underground rock music is in a similarly fragmented, flustered and thus creative state as in 1989. The emo craze is over. The whole garage-band thing didn’t really take off, and neither did electroclash or the latest wave of Brit-pop. There are a lot of great bands, but there’s no overall marketing trend taking hold in rock ‘n’ roll — no musical catch term for Time magazine to herald. Thank God. I’m ready for another “Doolittle.”

Man, I had to put this up: Khaaan!

Man, they had to split that down the middle. Kill Bill Volume 1 and Volume 2 were as far apart as…well, a grindhouse action movie and a spaghetti western.

scraps 51

1. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – Fail Safe
2. Below the Sea – Preface
3. Blue Oyster Cult – Don’t Fear The Reaper
4. Bob Mould – Nailed
5. Calexico – Sunken Waltz
6. Canyon – Play With Fire
7. Dave Gahan – Bottle Living
8. Dears – Expect The Worst Cos’ She’s A Tourist
9. Donnas – It’s On The Rocks
10. Doughboys – Shine
11. Eels – Numbered Days
12. Black Keys – Brooklyn Bound
13. Elastica – Line Up
14. Faux Jean – Drunk and Stoned
15. Flaming Lips – Can’t Get You out of my Head
16. Folksongs For The Afterlife – Death By Melody
17. Goldfrapp – Strict Machine
18. Gord Downie – We’re Hardcore
19. Jane’s Addiction – Strays
20. Low – Fearless
21. Super Furry Animals – Golden Retriever
22. Thorns – Blue
23. Single Frame – $7 Haircut
24. Deerhoof – Our Angel’s Ululu

scraps 52

1. Ocean Colour Scene – Hundred Mile High City
2. Blur – Battery In Your Leg
3. Dears – Lost In The Plot
4. Gord Downie – 12 – Pillform 1
5. Jane’s Addiction – Price I Pay
6. M83 – 0078h
7. Manitoba – I’ve Lived On A Dirt Road All My Life
8. Nada Surf – The Way You Wear Your Head
9. Northern Chorus – Fragile Day
10. Officer May – Smoking a Minor
11. Sianspheric – This All Happened
12. Sidonie – Let It Flow
13. Sigur Ros – Salka (live)
14. Single Frame – Mod Style ’68
15. Super Furry Animals – Golden Retriever
16. Thorns – Runaway Feeling
17. Goldfrapp – Train

scraps 53

1. Camper Van Beethoven – Take The Skinheads Bowling
2. Army of Mars – Run Dog Run
3. At The Drive In – Enfilade
4. Bonnie Prince Billy – Death To Everyone
5. Danger Mouse & Jemini – Bush Boys
6. High Dials – Silas, Please Come Home
7. Jealous Sound – The Gift Horse
8. Kitchens & Bathrooms – First One In, Last One Out
9. Low – Fearless
10. Medicine – Slut
11. Neil Young – For the Turnstiles
12. Northern Chorus – Take Your Canvas Everywhere
13. Sense Field – I Refuse
14. Sleepy Jackson – Vampire Racecourse
15. Soft Canyon – Hope’s Great Divide
16. Stereo Fuse – Superhero
17. Tindersticks – Say Goodbye To The City
18. Weakerthans – Our Retired Explorer
19. Wrens – Still Complaining
20. Remy Zero – Save Me

scraps 54

1. Mike Ness – I Fought The Law
2. Ataris – Boys Of Summer
3. Atmosphere – Cats Van Bags
4. Drive-By Truckers – Sink Hole
5. High Dials – Desiderata
6. Joan Osborne – Spider Web
7. Kinks vs Madonna – Music
8. Medicine – One More
9. Mirah – Don’t Go
10. New Pornographers – When I Was A Baby
11. Northern Chorus – Let The Parrots Speak For Themselves
12. Ramones – Spider Man
13. Singles – He Can Go, You Can’t Stay
14. Snow Patrol – How To Be Dead
15. Tindersticks – 4-48 Psychosis
16. Weakerthans – One Great City!
17. White Stripes – LaFayette Blues
18. Wrens – Surprise, Honeycomb
19. Neil Young – On The Beach

scraps 55

1. And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead – Crowning Of A Heart (demo)
2. 31 Knots – Played Out for Punchlines
3. Beatings – Transvestite Bar
4. Crash Test Dummies – Superman Song
5. For Against – Coalesced
6. Grand Champeen – One and Only
7. Joan Osborne – Right Hand Man
8. Little Birdy – Relapse
9. Mars Volta – Inertiatic ESP
10. Neurosis & Jarboe – His Last Words
11. Polyphonic Spree – Soldier Girl
12. Russian Futurists – Precious Metals
13. Sea Ray – Revelry
14. Slipstream – Healing Hands
15. Twin Atlas – Beautiful Surprise
16. UK Surf – Wave Of Mutilation
17. Medicine – Christmas Song

I read The Punisher comic books when I was young, so I liked the movie. My wife? Not so much. I seem to enjoy these Marvel-comics-made-into-movies more than most people I ask…maybe because I was partial to them when I was a kid, maybe because I’m willing to forgive the comic-like plot devices and cheese factor. I thought Travolta was for shit (my kingdom for another villain like Top Dollar in The Crow) and I can barely stand Rebecca Romjin in any movie, but Tom Jane made a good Frank Castle.

Certainly, the movie was nothing spectacular, just a re-telling of a story that I liked long ago. If nothing else, it was a good undercard for today’s main event: Kill Bill: Volume 2, followed by Habs/Bruins game 6.

Read what Canada’s Heritage Minister thinks about file-sharing, and then send her a message about it.