Music: September 2008 Archives
Thanks to reader Kimye for the tip.
Daphne Oram was an early electronic music pioneer who invented a process called Oramics, which involves drawing on strips of 35mm to produce sound effects. She had a long career in sound mixing, engineering, experimentation, and composition, the details of which can be read at BoingBoing, Wikipedia, or this profile from The Guardian.
Apparently, she made much of the spooky music for "The Innocents," Jack Clayton's rad 1961 adaptation of "The Turn of the Screw." (Here's the trailer.) Her bio is amazing, but I'm mostly into her for the photo: there's just something so cool about the contrast between her era-bound secretarial wardrobe and styling and the sight of her elbows-deep in insanely complex musical machinery--so many shiny knobs and dials!
The Guardian has a full slideshow of Daphne and Her Amazing Music-Making Machines here, and you can listen to samples of her work here.
(via BoingBoing)
Apparently, she made much of the spooky music for "The Innocents," Jack Clayton's rad 1961 adaptation of "The Turn of the Screw." (Here's the trailer.) Her bio is amazing, but I'm mostly into her for the photo: there's just something so cool about the contrast between her era-bound secretarial wardrobe and styling and the sight of her elbows-deep in insanely complex musical machinery--so many shiny knobs and dials!
The Guardian has a full slideshow of Daphne and Her Amazing Music-Making Machines here, and you can listen to samples of her work here.
(via BoingBoing)
I swear I didn't use BabelFish or a random word generator to title this post.
(via the NSFW Queerclick)
We usually refrain from posting content from the amazing OMGBLOG -- if you come here, you've probably seen it there first anyway -- but this mindblowing sex-and-cartoon video for LA's Flying Lotus makes too perfect a companion to that Diesel ad from last week for us not to post it here too.
It's Not Safe For Work -- and also probably for epileptics -- and so posted after the pressy.
Continue reading Bedknobs & Broomdicks 2: Dancing Dale.
I had never heard of this 2007 version of the Pointer Sister's classic AUTOMATIC until a few minutes ago when i was searching for the original. It features an impossibly toned and greased-up man masturbating at his computer keyboard while an exotic house diva named "Ultra Nate" dances and gyrates sexily for him on the screen. I'm sorry, but if you are listening to a 2007 club update of the Pointer Sister's AUTOMATIC, are you really going to be jerking it to some LADY?
Anyway, this video seems to be an artistic comment on the effect of cybersex in today's high tech society. But is it pro or con? I can't decide!
The Pointer Sister's version of this song might not be quite as provocative as "Ultra Nate's" but it is still way better. Those sisters sure do have nice dresses and dance moves!
French eight-piece Eskaton recorded three albums during the late 70's and early-to-mid eighties. With their French female vocals laid over proggy, sometimes frantic rhythms they kind of sound like my favorite band meets Rush. I've been listening to their last album Icare all day and I think it's pretty special...but be advised that I have a history of getting overexcited about 80s era artifacts that merge prog and punk, like for example Magazine, who I have been assured by every punker I've ever spoken to are not as cool or interesting a band as I think. The track I'm putting up is the simplest, prettiest, least proggy and most overtly Stereolab-ish song on the album. Icare is long out-of-print; it wasn't that hard for me to track down, though, so if you like what you hear you should be able to find it yourself.
04 Icare IV.mp3
(For those unfamiliar with mp3 blog procedure: click to listen, right-click "save as" to download)
I was reluctant to post this because it's already up everywhere. But then it occurred to me that maybe just maybe we have a substantial number of regular visitors who only go on the internet to check their emails and to read Feyfriends. In which case these (imaginary) people would be deprived of Sonseed's "Jesus Is My Friend" just because I was afraid of seeming "lame," "late to the party," or "behind the curve." And that would just be too big a shame.
So here.
Is there anything George Michael loves more than crack and bathroom sexxx? Apparently not! The star was found with the deadly drug after police were alerted by an attendant in the public toilets near Hampstead Heath, notorious as a hang-out for drug dealers and gay men, on Friday afternoon.Do they not have DLIST in London?
JK! I'm glad she's getting the $$$z from HSBC for the use of "Clam, Crab, Cockle Cowrie." But this ad is really weird. Wouldn't these cops who arrive to tear the Newsomite clan from their neo-treehouse be doing so on behalf of corporations like HSBC? And what is the point? That clear-cutting lumberjacks and eco-terrorists make the best motorcycle buds? Sometimes the more creative and artful and ambiguous an ad's message is, the more I hate it.
Anyways, the only reason I'm putting this up is to notify you that a Joanna Newsom song is in an ad, and I know you all love Joanna Newsom as much as I do.
Oh wait. :(
Thanks to Brother Mike for the tip.
Like Judiths Light and Barsi, the inimitable Cynthia Plaster Caster is nothing less than a true American hero!!!Many of you will remember Cynthia from her famous plaster rendering of Jimi Hendrix's giant, but not especially handsome BURRITO. Indeed, Cynthia has been making casts of musicians' DONGS since the late 1960s.
Here is her description of a *sticky* experience she had with Jimi's bush:
Jimi's pubes got stuck in the mold because I didn't lube them enough. I spent the next 15 minutes pulling out each individual hair one by one, while he had intercourse with just the right sized repository — his negative impression! This unexpected delay made him late for his show that evening, where he was seen scratching his crotch a lot onstage.Yikes! For a pittance, Jimi's plaster COCK is available for purchase from Cynthia's website, where several other rock star penis molds are up for sale too. 75% of the proceeds from these WANGS goes to the Cynthia P. Caster Foundation (founded in 2002) and 25% goes to the musician whose MEMBER has been cast. (In case you were wondering, the CPC Foundation "is a legally sanctioned not-for-profit institution whose mission is to give money away to 'cutting-edge' musicians and artists in financial need.")
More NSFW rock star DICKS after the JUMPY!!!
Continue reading Masterpenises.
Does anybody hear me? Does anybody hear me? Cause I don't. Cause I've lost my hearing!!!!
Poor Shannen Doherty! Has she gone deaf?? Yesterday's Shannen/Shenae controversy reminded me that FRIENDS TIL THE END is truly one of the greatest films of all times. It comes from that glorious period of the post-grunge era when all that was good and true about the early 90's had trickled down in the crassest possible way, and what you wound up with was Brenda Walsh channeling Alanis while singing bizarre socially conscious (yet strangely catchy!) schlock-rock ballads in a floral print Jane Pratt babydoll dress. That sounds horrible, right!?
WRONG! IT'S COMPLETELY AWESOME.
By the way, the plot of this movie is also really good as you will see if you watch the above clip.
This makes a nice companion video to The Fire Gang's' immortal "Chilly Down." Worth the wait, but if you must skip to the good part it starts at 2:30.
(via FunFriends)
Troll Troll Troll.
Out has put up some pretty decent argument fodder, a list of the 100 Greatest, Gayest Albums of All Time. But because the poll includes both records by gays AND beloved-by-gays records by straights, and because this kind of listicle really has no interest in nor makes any attempt at being authoritative, and most of all because they actually allowed Darren Hayes of SAVAGE FUCKING GARDEN to vote, it's all really a big wash.
It's total schmuck-bait, but I'll bite: Bikini Kill's Pussy Whipped is included--good--but where t.f. is Huggy Bear's Taking the Rough With the Smooch? Or Hole's Live Through This? Nevermind gets some love but Incesticide and In Utero are totally shut out? That's insane, as they were far queerer records than Nevermind. I used to read and reread the liner notes to Incesticide because they contained Cobain's at-that-point totally heroic assertion "If any of you in any way hate homosexuals, people of different colour, or women, please do us this one favour for us - leave us the fuck alone! Don't come to our shows, and don't buy our records." That single line meant more to me than Sarah MacLachlan's entire Fumbling With My Vibrator, coming in at a shamefully high #31.
On a similar note, it's weird not to include anything by Pansy Division. I could never tolerate their music, but their album covers and 7" sleeves were the closest thing to actual gay porn I could get my sweaty hands on when I was 14.
Also: Tracy Chapman's Tracy Chapman all the way at #3? If you're going to reveal your age and indifferent-yuppie-from-the-80's record-buying patterns, why not just throw Paul Simon's Graceland and Peter Gabriel's So on the list and be done with it?
Also: the Rent soundtrack? VOM.
Full list after the kling klong.
Continue reading Dumb List Alert: 100 Greatest, Gayest Albums.
"I feel completely f---ed over." That was fey hero Nancy Wilson's reaction to the Republicans' unauthorized use of Heart's "Barracuda" last night to revive the audience from John McCain's coma-inducingly boring speech.
The Wilsons' statement from EW:
"Sarah Palin's views and values in NO WAY represent us as American women. We ask that our song 'Barracuda' no longer be used to promote her image. The song 'Barracuda' was written in the late 70s as a scathing rant against the soulless, corporate nature of the music business, particularly for women. (The 'barracuda' represented the business.) While Heart did not and would not authorize the use of their song at the RNC, there's irony in Republican strategists' choice to make use of it there."
Aren't they Canadian women? Jake Tapper also notes the oddness of the song choice considering it's lyrics.
If the real thing don’t do the trick/No, you better make up something quick/You gonna burn, burn, burn, burn it to the wick/Ooooooohhhh, barra barracuda."
Without a doubt the best hagiographic music video about an erstwhile President of the Russian Federation since the Putin Girl's immortal "Must Be Like Putin."
To view the video in HD, go here. (I know caring about HD is for douches, but this video actually benefits from crisp resolution.)
Thanks to Jack for the tip.
I know all about Serge Gainsborg, Francoise Hardy, and France Gall...why have I only just discovered onetime French pop megastar Claude Francois, aka CloClo? He had a long career in francophonic pop, beginning with a nightclub act on the Riviera in the early 60s and terminating roughly around the time he was reinterpreting Bee Gees hits for French telly in the late 70's. I could watch him do this crazy sexy dance all day long...and checking my watch, I'm already off to a not bad start.
For an earlier version of his peculiar twist-n-shimmy, check out this video of his breakout single "Belles, Belles, Belles." Sadly CloClo was killed in 1978 when he decided to repair a broken lightbulb while standing in a half-full bathtub. We will never forget him.
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