EDITOR’S NOTE: This is an excerpt from THIS WILL GO DOWN ON YOUR PERMANENT RECORD, the imaginary novel about the Violent Femmes’ classic 1983 self-title debut I am working on. BY JONATHAN VALANIA The year is 1984. I am sitting Indian-style on the floor in my freshman year college dorm room along with a half dozen other self-styled punk-rock refugees from the stultifying conformity and bourgeois pieties of mainstream campus life. Incense burns to mask the sweet leafy odor of burning marijuana from the nostrils of our RA, or resident administrator, the closest thing to a sheriff on the […]
CONTEST: Win Tix To See The Violent Femmes + Echo & The Bunnymen @ The Mann Center
The Violent Femmes self-titled 1983 debut is a deathless classic, a lightning-in-a-bottle masterpiece of teen alienation and post-adolescent psychodrama with the same trans-generational reach and cultural potency of Rebel Without A Cause, Romeo & Juliet and The Catcher In The Rye. The album indelibly mapped the frantic vicissitudes of teendom — the nihilistic angst, the desolate anomie, the hormonal riots — and scored the late-night dorm room soundtrack for a million private rebellions. Thirty three years later, the album’s power to provoke, amuse and connect with succeeding generations of angst-ridden post-adolescents of all ages remains undiminished. In the interim, […]
BAD MOON RISEN: Q&A With CCR’s Stu Cook
BY JONATHAN VALANIA Populism ain’t what it used to be. The word has been hijacked by crypto-fascists, white supremacists and heartless neoliberal hatchet men who have warped its principles and perverted its meaning. Despite the torrent of media coverage saying otherwise, Donald Trump is NOT a populist. Marine Le Pen is NOT a populist. They are the wolves of bigotry hiding in populist sheep’s clothing. Bernie Sanders is a populist. Woody Guthrie is a populist. Bruce Springsteen is a very rich populist. More to our point, Creedence Clearwater Revival is populist. All those iconic songs in all their ragged […]
BEING THERE: U2 @ The Linc
Photo by DAN LONG First, a word to the haters – you know who you are – and then we’ll be done with them: F*ck y’all. Keep movin’, nothin’ to see here. Now, about that U2 concert last night. Full disclosure: I have seen every Philly U2 concert since The Unforgettable Fire, with the exception of the Pop Mart tour, which I am fine with, and no, I wasn’t cool enough (or old enough) to see them at the Bijou in 1980 when they were just four no-name dorks from Dublin. U2 remains a sorry/not sorry guilty pleasure. I am […]
BEING THERE: Sigur Ros @ The Mann
Photo by JOSH PELTA-HELLER Thunderstorms were forecast for Friday night, but mother nature stepped aside, allowing Icelandic dream merchants Sigur Ros to roll into the Mann Center and electrify the audience with a distorted, bowed electric guitar, thunderous malleted drumming, ponderous piano, and ascending falsetto singing in Hopelandic — a hodgepodge of Icelandic, English and emoted syllables. Earlier in the day, I daydreamed about the sound of rain falling on the cavernous wooden covering overhead, the electricity from thunderbolts commingling with the electricity from the amplifiers and speakers on stage. After the show, though, it was clear that a thunderstorm […]
FROM THE VAULTS: No Sleep ‘Til Reykjavik
EDITOR’S NOTE: In advance of Sigur Ros’ show at the Mann Center on Friday, we present this encore edition of my 2012 MAGNET cover story. BY JONATHAN VALANIA Iceland isn’t the end of the world but you can see it from here. This is both a blessing and to a lesser degree a curse. Much less. It is the land that time forgot, and as such a place of uncommon purity. Primeval is the word that comes to mind: smoldering volcanoes, black sand beaches, towering geysers, geothermal hot springs, epic waterfalls, vast lava fields that recede infinitely out to the […]
MILESTONED: It Was 50 Years Ago Today
FRESH AIR: Giles Martin says he included outtakes and raw performances in the new box set to show “how human the making of Sgt. Pepper was.” The original album was produced by Martin’s father, George. MORE ROLLING STONE: The surviving band members and their legatees have authorized the reconsideration of a major canonical work: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, originally released 50 years ago on June 1st, 1967, in England, and the following day in the U.S. The new Pepper comes in various packages: single and double CDs, a deluxe box of four CDs and two DVDs (containing videos […]
FROM THE VAULT: After Dark, My Sweet
EDITOR’S NOTE: In advance of The xx’s performance at the Skyline Stage of The Mann on Wednesday May 17th, we present the complete 2012 MAGNET cover story profile written by yours truly. Enjoy. BY JONATHAN VALANIA It is the tail end of another hot, dog breath day afternoon in early August. Mercifully, we are on our way to some place that is, for one night anyway, cool: Staten Island. There are many locales that you might associate with the sound, the look and the vibe of The xx — London after dark, Tokyo circa Lost In Translation, Manhattan around […]
Q&A: Jim Reid, Lead Singer Of Jesus & Mary Chain
BY JONATHAN VALANIA Hard to remember now but there was a time when the Jesus & Mary Chain divided the population of planet Earth into two camps: Those who were sure they were the Second Coming and those who thought they were the end of Western Civilization. Such was the response 30 years ago to the band’s debut, Psychocandy. History would, of course, judge it a seminal and deeply influential classic. After a lengthy hiatus, the band is active again, and recently released the most def Damage And Joy, their first LP since 1998’s Munki. Don’t call it it […]
BEING THERE: Metallica @ The Linc
Photo by DYLAN LONG “We don’t give a shit,” declared James Hetfield, frontman of the heavy metal machine known as Metallica, to the sold-out crowd Lincoln Financial Field last night. Hetfield then elaborated, stating that Metallica doesn’t care what you look like, what you’re wearing, what religion you practice, or your political beliefs. “We’re here to celebrate live music and being alive. This is family.” It was a touching and beautiful moment between Hetfield and the crowd, a moment which of course would be followed by imminent doom and riffs from the bowels of hell. Kicking off the night with […]
LORD OF THE STRINGS: The Feelies’ Glenn Mercer
BY JONATHAN VALANIA The Feelies are one of those inscrutable but beloved band’s bands whose influence far exceeds their royalty statements and, as a consequence, the period on the last sentence in their bio keeps turning into a comma. Borne of the suburban garages of North Haledon, New Jersey, they released Crazy Rhythms in 1980 to massive acclaim and minimal sales and then promptly split off into a myriad of minor side projects, only to resurface again in 1986 with the altogether wonderful The Good Earth, produced by Peter Buck, guitarist for REM, whose early sound is deeply indebted […]
BEING THERE: Chairlift + Kristin Kontrol @ UT
Photo by JOSH HELTA-PELLER/KOALA FOTOGRAPHY If the name Chairlift doesn’t ring a bell, search your memory banks for “Ch-Ching” and/or “Bruises,” both of which appeared on Apple commercials and probably burrowed into your brain. Still don’t recognize them after a quick Google search? Well, that’s too bad, because the band’s breaking up, and their show at Union Transfer on Friday night was their second-to-last. There’s good news, though, and it’s twofold; 1) we live in a digital world in which their music can be easily accessed, and 2) the art-pop duo is breaking up on good terms, so that bassist/drummer […]
BEING THERE: Why? @ Union Transfer
Photo by JOSH PELTA-HELLER/KOALA FOTOGRAPHY Why? is a band that I usually appreciate most while drinking alone in some dimly lit room, curled up in a ball, leaning into masochistic tendencies I picked up as a teenager. A musical project that started out as sound collage experiment, and evolved over the years into a white-guy-rap, post-rock, indie-pop amalgam, Why? won me over with Yoni Wolf’s nasal-vocals that never shied away from taboo subjects like suicidal ideation or masturbating in the bathroom at the art museum. The authenticity of Yoni’s voice in Why?’s bizarre, genre-fluid music engendered the band with a […]