blogging from the iPod touch:
I finally discover radiohead just in time for them to change the very fabric of the music industry.
News out of radioheadland: new album. $80 super disc/cd/vinyl/booklet/digital package. Sell through direct by the now labelless band
or you can just purchase the digital download: price? Donation only.pay what you want. Cut out the label! No middle man. No "agent"!
This is big.
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Seminal Sevens
Today I listened, I mean, really listened to Radiohead's OK Computer for the first time. Fine. Shut up. I've been busy. And snobby. And I even followed it up with Kid A and Liked that, if you can believe it. Maybe I've mellowed or perhaps it was that oatmeal with Vitamin MDMA I had for breakfast.
Anywhoo, it got me thinking.
In 1967 The Beatles released one of the most important and ifluential albums of all time. You know it. You love it. This was the 40th anniversary of it. Yes, I speak of Sgt. Pepper.
Ten years later, in the fall of 1977, The Sex Pistols unleashed Never Mind the Bollocks and a paradigm shift from "classic rock" (read:corporate) to stripped down three chord aggro rock changed how we thought about music and fashion.
Ten years after that, after New Wave and Disco and synth pop and new romanticism, U2 put out the era defining album The Joshua Tree. I can't believe it's been 20 years. And I can't believe they are still making records. The Joshua Tree is still listenable today, as are most classic albums but it is definitely OF IT'S TIME.
Then, in 1997, Radiohead's OK Computer came out. I can imagine this being the theme song to just about every rave. With its devotion to ProTools and Cubase and it's slavish adoration of all things PRODUCED, the album seems to have held up really well. And, for me, it really helps to (here's that word again) define the time. Artists seemed to be less interested in following the dictatorial pattern of record labels and due to this and the explosion of the single song download, the reemergence of the one hit wonders appeared. Or, rather, artists that, in a different time, one absent of publicists, trl and 40000 music rags calling themselves magazines, would have only had one hit and been gone. Can you hear me, Sisco?
So, I ask you this:
What is the era defining album this year? Has the pattern been broken? Did I miss something? I am so hard pressed to believe that Justin Timberlake's Futurecrap/LoveDisco will be looked at 10 years from now as the seminal album of the decade. So, what is it?
Someone? Anyone?
And, if you are a blogger who reads this, could you ask your readers the same question? I'm dying to know.
Anywhoo, it got me thinking.
In 1967 The Beatles released one of the most important and ifluential albums of all time. You know it. You love it. This was the 40th anniversary of it. Yes, I speak of Sgt. Pepper.
Ten years later, in the fall of 1977, The Sex Pistols unleashed Never Mind the Bollocks and a paradigm shift from "classic rock" (read:corporate) to stripped down three chord aggro rock changed how we thought about music and fashion.
Ten years after that, after New Wave and Disco and synth pop and new romanticism, U2 put out the era defining album The Joshua Tree. I can't believe it's been 20 years. And I can't believe they are still making records. The Joshua Tree is still listenable today, as are most classic albums but it is definitely OF IT'S TIME.
Then, in 1997, Radiohead's OK Computer came out. I can imagine this being the theme song to just about every rave. With its devotion to ProTools and Cubase and it's slavish adoration of all things PRODUCED, the album seems to have held up really well. And, for me, it really helps to (here's that word again) define the time. Artists seemed to be less interested in following the dictatorial pattern of record labels and due to this and the explosion of the single song download, the reemergence of the one hit wonders appeared. Or, rather, artists that, in a different time, one absent of publicists, trl and 40000 music rags calling themselves magazines, would have only had one hit and been gone. Can you hear me, Sisco?
So, I ask you this:
What is the era defining album this year? Has the pattern been broken? Did I miss something? I am so hard pressed to believe that Justin Timberlake's Futurecrap/LoveDisco will be looked at 10 years from now as the seminal album of the decade. So, what is it?
Someone? Anyone?
And, if you are a blogger who reads this, could you ask your readers the same question? I'm dying to know.
Friday, September 14, 2007
You got the Touch! You got the Power!
Yeah, I couldn't fucking wait. You don't understand. I HAVE NO IPOD! My 60g photopod goes "sad Ipod" when the battery is EVEN SLIGHTLY low. I lost the teeny shuffle that someone gave me for working on their commercial last year (hey, Apple! What? You can't make it even smaller and easier to lose??) And, since my wife has a Nano I have been relegated to using her gum stick sized shuffle. Which sucks. And doesn't even work right. And has no space.
And I don't wanna switch to the death star. And I can't be sure that iphone updates won't relock unlocked phones (even though T-Mobile is the iphone choice in germany! Fuck, why not here T-Mobile!?!?! I mean, TMo is a GERMAN COMPANY! The phone was offered to you first here....ugh....)
So, I got the touch.
Freaking great. Small glitches.
The blacks are so black they almost seem negative. Have to watch on an angle. But, christ, what a big screen. So, not reason enough to return it.
BUT
Occaisionally when I am on the web and listening to music at the same time the music just.....stops.
This is not good. Makes me think I have a dud.
Gotta call apple.
No matter.
Freaking great ipod.
And the download feature from itunes???? Got a bunch of Danko Jones that I would ahve normally....um....looked for on blogs.
So, Steve Jobs, you may have found the answer to combating piracy.
But, shouldn't this be the commercial? I mean, it's music. It's video. it's The Touch. And when you get one, you "got the touch!"
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Britney! Learn from the Brits that went before ye!
All this brouhaha about Britney.....allow Septenary to maintain perspective, please.
1963. Beatles "She Loves You" breaks the band stateside. Boys appear on Ed Sullivan. Phenomenon ensues.
1970. Beatles release "Let it Be". Then break up.
In between there are amazing albums, mind altering drugs, advances in technology and production, the Summer of Love, the riots of '68, Woodstock and man lands on the moon.
1999. "...Baby one more time" is released. Britney's schoolgirl midriff is all over MTV. Phenomenon ensues.
2006. Britney's mind breaks up.
In between boy bands come and go, twee comes, then goes, Indie Pop arrives, the White Stripes are the standard bearers for rock, George Bush starts a war and 3000 people die in the World Trade Center Bombings.
It's been 8 years since Brit's debut. Don't try to fuck with the laws of Septenary. You will lose every time.
1963. Beatles "She Loves You" breaks the band stateside. Boys appear on Ed Sullivan. Phenomenon ensues.
1970. Beatles release "Let it Be". Then break up.
In between there are amazing albums, mind altering drugs, advances in technology and production, the Summer of Love, the riots of '68, Woodstock and man lands on the moon.
1999. "...Baby one more time" is released. Britney's schoolgirl midriff is all over MTV. Phenomenon ensues.
2006. Britney's mind breaks up.
In between boy bands come and go, twee comes, then goes, Indie Pop arrives, the White Stripes are the standard bearers for rock, George Bush starts a war and 3000 people die in the World Trade Center Bombings.
It's been 8 years since Brit's debut. Don't try to fuck with the laws of Septenary. You will lose every time.
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