DAYDREAM HIBERNATION: Grizzly Bear, Johnny Brendas, February 1, 2007 [FLICKR] EVA SAYS: When Grizzly Bear took stage at Johnny Brenda?s, they had all odds working against them- their stupid band name, the pretentiously hip crowd (spotting a member of Man Man in the mass, my friend swooned over the time the two of them used to spend together at the Last Drop. GAG!), and most distractingly, the suffocating veil of hype generated from Pitchfork. But last night they faced an even greater challenge, otherwise known as The Dirty Projectors, who had just finished playing one of the best live sets […]
SERGE GAINSBOURG & BRIGITTE BARDOT
“The Comic Strip”
WRECKLESS ERIC: Whole Wide World LIVE 1977
TO: REDACTED FROM: Wreckless Eric Subject: Beretta 76 Date: Jan 26, 2007 8:32 AM What is it about Philly? First the Jukebox Zeroes, now you lot. Everything sounds great. I particularly like Pretty Baby where you actually sound just like Blondie without sounding at all like them, if that makes sense. I meant that as a compliment by the way. Eric
AND THEN NOTHING TURNED ITSELF INSIDE OUT
PHAWKER RADIO: Yo La Tengo‘s AND THEN NOTHING TURNED ITSELF INSIDE OUT Gregory Crewdson’s eerie photographs of suburbia at dusk require set-ups as elaborate as a film shoot. “My photographs are about the moment of transition between before and after,” he explains. “Twilight is evocative of that. There’s something magical about the condition.” The eerie effect of twilight crossed with strong artificial light — street lights, house lights, lights from the sky — is exaggerated by Crewdson’s choice of backdrop, which is almost always nondescript suburban America. He is not the first photographer to be drawn to twilight — “nature […]
SEX PISTOLS: God Save The Queen
She ain’t no human bean!
NOW PLAYING: Sloan’s NEVER HEAR THE END OF IT
NOW PLAYING ON PHAWKER RADIO/REVIEW BY ED KING At 30 songs long ? 30 songs! ? it’s a wonder anyone will hear the end of this album, but that’s why I’m here. Never say never, Sloan. It feels like only last week that I came home from high school — having made a quick stop at the Sam Goody at Roosevelt Mall — with Elvis Costello & the Attractions’ latest, Get Happy!!, in sweaty hand. Oh baby! Through the wonders of a hitherto described process of “groove cramming,” the band and producer Nick Lowe managed to pack 20 soulful, fractured, […]
BREAKING: Philebrity Smells FEAR OF A BLACK PLANET In Bob Brady YouTube, We Do Too
Watch it for a few minutes, and you begin to feel something weird; set to DJ Kool’s “Let Me Clear My Throat,” the clip ruminates on a clip of Chaka Fattah speaking on the House floor, before moving to stock footage of young black men dancing in the street, then Mayor Street, then, absurdly, Mumia Abu-Jamal and stills from pro-Mumia rallies. Suddenly, Bob Brady’s face appears on the screen. The montage continues, until just about the end, where a legend bears: “THIS MAY, DO THE RIGHT THING,” followed by a shot of a “Fattah For Mayor” placard with “Fattah” x’ed […]
CRADLE WILL ROCK, AGAIN: Original Van Halen Reunites For Summer Tour, Philly Date Inevitable
PEREZHILTON: ‘Is pleased to exclusively confirm – sources tell us – that Van Halen is 100% reuniting for a massive comeback tour this summer with original lead singer, David Lee Roth.The tour will kick off in May and travel through amphitheaters across America.’ ROLLINGSTONE: ‘The reunion that Van Halen fans have been awaiting for twenty-two years began in December, when David Lee Roth walked into Eddie Van Halen?s Hollywood home studio. There he rejoined the band for a rehearsal, singing fourteen Van Halen classics. ?They totally got along on a personal level,? a source close to the reunion says. ?And […]
NOW PLAYING ON PHAWKER RADIO: Elvis Costello & The Attractions LIVE AT THE EL MOCAMBO
The best rock show this week in Philadelphia happened 29 years ago in Toronto, which either means the winter doldrums are officially upon us or we’re just feeling especially knock-kneed, pissed-off, bespectacled and amphetamined for no particular reason other than it just seems right and natural. Either way, we’re amusing ourselves imagining the punch-up that will invariably ensue when we master time travel (muahahahaha!) and send circa 1978 Elvis Costello to the doorstep of circa 2007 Elvis Costello (a guy who seems more like a Declan MacManus these days, though isn’t that as it should be?). Imagine the mutual looks […]
Lost Album Of Local-ish Theremin Virtuoso Found
In 1927 The New York Times reported from Berlin about an astounding recent invention: a box with a brass rod and ring that, when the inventor moved his hands around them, produced a violinlike sound of “extraordinary beauty and fullness of tone.” “He created music out of nothing but motions in the air,” the article said. The inventor was Leon Theremin (born Lev Termen), a young Russian scientist whose fascinating life would later include spying for Soviet intelligence, serving time in a Siberian labor camp and inventing a host of things, including electronic bugs, an early television and an electronic […]
REM: Talk About The Passion
State Of The Union: Same As It Ever Was