From: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org (loud-fans-digest) To: loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Subject: loud-fans-digest V3 #311 Reply-To: loud-fans@smoe.org Sender: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk loud-fans-digest Friday, October 24 2003 Volume 03 : Number 311 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [loud-fans] FW: [paisley-pop] Go Todd! ["Larry Tucker" ] [loud-fans] shinny shin shins [Jenny Grover ] Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins [Roger Winston ] Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins [Jenny Grover ] Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins [Stewart Mason ] [loud-fans] Re: And... [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ] Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: [loud-fans] FW: [paisley-pop] Go Todd! Thought many of y'all would enjoy this. I loved it! Larry (listener) +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Commentary: 'Ignorant Thugs' Have Mishandled Downloadable Music Wed October 22, 2003 06:29 PM ET By Todd Rundgren NEW YORK (Hollywood Reporter) - Music is a sacrament. This has been true for thousands of years of human history, save the last 100 or so. I'm sure it was not Edison's purpose to debase such an important aspect of our collective liturgy, but what would one expect when something that was once ephemeral and could only be experienced at the behest of other humans is reduced to a commodity on a shelf. The mechanisms of music, how and why it affects us the way it does, are still mystical even to a cynical older record producer like myself. Anyone who denies the depth and power of this medium has simply forgotten, in the face of the relentless Philistine argument, that all things can be commoditized regardless of their sacred origins -- that all music is worth exactly what the RIAA (Recording Industry Assn. of America) says it is. Most musicians who have enjoyed any success under this model are in an ethical bind: On one hand, you may believe that your survival depends on effective marketing of a commodity; on the other, you realize that your truest expressions are being trivialized to fit properly into a prealloted space. How many times have I heard the argument, "Love the record, but we don't hear a third single -- back to the studio?" I must remind my fellow players that for the vast majority of history we have only been appreciated for the quality of human expression we could produce at the moment. Great performances were only memories in the minds of those who witnessed, each unique except perhaps for the calliope at the local merry-go-round which was, of course, a machine. The plain reality is that, except for a few notable aberrations, musicians will always be more appreciated, certainly in a financial sense, by live audiences than by labels and the listeners they purport to represent. The seemingly quaint idea that recordings were promotion for great performers is no less true today. Ask Phish. Ask also whether, as a musician, you ever believed the RIAA was actively protecting your interests until they got into a fight with their own customers and started using your name, your so-called well-being, as justification. And when the customers became skeptical they became the enemy. And to follow the RIAA's logic, customers are therefore the enemies of musicians. Let us ignore the fact that if you ever got compensated for your contribution, it would have been because your manager and lawyer (and many before) forced the labels to recognize your labor in financial terms. The reason why the RIAA comes off as a gang of ignorant thugs is because, well, how do I put this -- they are. I came into this business in an age of entrepreneurial integrity. The legends of the golden age of recorded music were still at the helm of most labels -- the Erteguns, the Ostins, the Alperts and Mosses by the dozens. Now we have four monolithic (in every sense of the word) entities and a front organization that crows about the fact that they have solved their problems by leaning on a 12-year-old. Thank God that mystical fascination with the world of music has been stubbed out -- hopefully everyone will get the message and get over the idea that the musician actually meant for you to hear this. The RIAA protects musicians like the musicians union protects musicians: They reward hacks and penalize those outside the system. The labels are not making this stink out of principle. They are not interested in the rights of musicians who don't sell any records for them. That myth was exploded when Warners dropped Van Morrison for "lackluster sales." This stink is about a bunch of dumb-asses blaming the public for doing what the labels could have -- and should have -- done 10 years ago. I know because I told them so, each and every one individually and relentlessly: Put the music on a server so you can deliver on-demand services to people's homes. Seems so stupidly simple now. After nearly 40 years in this business I know who my friends are. I know it isn't the labels who lost interest in my "fringe audience" decades ago. It is that fringe audience who still await any recording or performance I may come up with despite the RIAA trying to drive some symbolic wedge between me and my listeners just because their ass is in a sling. Don't do me any favors. Audiences and musicians are on the same side. Musicians come from the audience (unlike record execs who come from the ranks of failed musicians). We experience together the mystical sacrament that a musical performance can represent. Additionally, we will be comfortably if not handsomely compensated by that audience if we can deliver a suitably affecting performance with some regularity. It's time to let the monolith of commoditized music collapse like the Berlin Wall. Musicians can make records if they feel like it, or not. Wide open pipes are ready to transport us, mainstream and fringe alike, into the ears of an eager audience who appreciates us and is more than willing to financially support us. Get out of the way if you can't lend a hand because ... you know the rest by heart. (Musician Todd Rundgren is known for such 1970s pop hits as "Can We Still Be Friends?" and "Hello It's Me," but his wizardry as a producer, music video pioneer and explorer of computer technologies is legendary in the industry. Since 1998, his recordings have been underwritten by PatroNet, a subscription service that gives his fan base online access to works in progress.) Reuters/Hollywood Reporter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 11:24:57 -0500 (GMT-05:00) From: wsilvers@earthlink.net Subject: [loud-fans] Your favorite band Barsuks The excellent Seattle radio station KEXP has been simulcasting live performances this week from NYC, presumably in connection with the CMJ thing there. This afternoon they're featuring the following Barsuk performers that may be of interest of one or two of us. Thurs 10/23 2pm (5 EST): Death Cab For Cutie Thurs 10/23 3pm (6 EST) Long Winters Thurs 10/23 4:30pm (7:30 EST) Nada Surf http://www.kexp.org fwiw, b.s. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 10:11:12 -0700 (PDT) From: "Joseph M. Mallon" Subject: [loud-fans] Elliott & The Louds On Wed, 22 Oct 2003, Steve Holtebeck wrote: > Another candidate for my "songs by people who share my first name mix". > I saw Elliott Smith at a Loud Family show in Portland in 1998 (on the > DFD), and thought about going up to talk to him, but couldn't think of > anything to say to him besides "you ROCK, DUDE!". Alison Faith Levy was at the time an ardent Elliott Smith fan. When she saw that he was still in the audience, she asked me to give him some of her CDs, along w/ D4D. I approached him and gave him the CDs. He was quiet, but thanked me kindly. I also saw him at a packed show in '98 w/ Quasi. He wasn't a great live performer, but I love his music. Thanks to Scott for suggesting his music. Joe Mallon jmmallon@joescafe.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 13:30:29 -0400 (EDT) From: Aaron Mandel Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Your favorite band Barsuks On Thu, 23 Oct 2003 wsilvers@earthlink.net wrote: > Thurs 10/23 3pm (6 EST) Long Winters I just relistened to the second Long Winters album yesterday, and it has possibly the worst case of CD-era front-loading I can remember running into -- the first three tracks are brilliant, and the other nine are at best okay. There seems to be a fair amount of stuff coming out of the Northwest these days that sounds like very generic pop/rock to me, maybe inflected a little by Built To Spill... the other night I saw John Vanderslice, who fell squarely into that category, and Death Cab For Cutie have tragically wandered in that direction on the new album... a ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 12:58:30 -0500 From: Chris Prew Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Your favorite band Barsuks On Thursday, October 23, 2003, at 12:30 PM, Aaron Mandel wrote: > On Thu, 23 Oct 2003 wsilvers@earthlink.net wrote: > >> Thurs 10/23 3pm (6 EST) Long Winters > > I just relistened to the second Long Winters album yesterday, and it > has > possibly the worst case of CD-era front-loading I can remember running > into -- the first three tracks are brilliant, and the other nine are at > best okay. Even worse than Teenage Fanclub's Thirteen? This could turn into a fun thread.... Chris Who is listening to and enjoying immensely the Fanclub's best of CD as we type. Other than Catholic Education and Bandwagonesque, this is really all you need. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 11:12:35 -0700 From: "Michael Zwirn" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Your favorite band Barsuks > Who is listening to and enjoying immensely the Fanclub's best of CD as > we type. Other than Catholic Education and Bandwagonesque, this is > really all you need. Does it have "Escher (Up and Down)" on it? I seem to recall that one being missing, and it's one of my fave Teenage Fanclub tracks. That, and their collaboration with De La Soul. Michael last played: Robyn Hitchcock, Uncorrected Personality Traits - ------ Michael Zwirn, michael@zwirn.com http://zwirn.com (t) 503-232-8919 (c) 503-887-9800 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 20:02:47 -0400 From: Jenny Grover Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Your favorite band Barsuks Chris Prew wrote: > Even worse than Teenage Fanclub's Thirteen? Uh-oh... I just picked this up for $1 at Goodwill today. Did I invest unwisely? (I haven't had a chance to listen yet, but for $1 apiece I also got Stew's "Guest Host", two Swell CD's, a Dreamworks sampler with an Elliott Smith outtake, Dionne Warwick's greatest 60's hits, a Verbow CD that was still sealed, and some SubPop band whose name I can't think of now, also sealed). Jen ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 19:07:22 -0500 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Your favorite band Barsuks Quoting Aaron Mandel : > There seems to be a fair amount of stuff coming out of the > Northwest these > days that sounds like very generic pop/rock to me, maybe > inflected a > little by Built To Spill... the other night I saw John > Vanderslice, who > fell squarely into that category This nonplusses me - someone else made a similar comment a year or so ago, and as someone who very much enjoys Vanderslice's music (including that of his old band MK Ultra, one of the best band names ever there too...), I'm wondering why my ears are so different. I hear a very clever, thoughtful lyricist, who actually tells stories, sometimes over more than one song (do not whisper the phrase "concept album"), I hear a talented and creative arranger, and I hear songs that fall into my range of "catchy"...but I don't hear "generic" at all. Maybe it's just me who's been buying his records... ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: "am I being self-referential?" ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 19:15:31 -0500 (GMT-05:00) From: Miles Goosens Subject: [loud-fans] John Vanderslice [was: Your favorite band Barsuks] Jeff: >This nonplusses me - someone else made a similar comment a year or >so ago, and as someone who very much enjoys Vanderslice's music OK, so Melissa and I finally bought the DVD of Neil & Crazy Horse's RUST NEVER SLEEPS, which I've owned (on Beta, no less) all these years, but she'd never seen it, so we screened it a few weeks ago. This time, I noticed that one of the names in the end credits was John Vanderslice, doing something like soundboard stuff. Is this the current-day John Vanderslice's dad? Chances are this is commonly known among Vandersliceians, but I couldn't Google anything on this. later, Miles ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 20:59:27 -0400 From: Jenny Grover Subject: [loud-fans] Burden Just got this from another list and thought some of you might be interested: SECTION: Entertainment News LENGTH: 167 words HEADLINE: Top acts shoulder 'Burden' soundtrack BYLINE: By JONATHAN COHEN, Billboard.com DATELINE: NEW YORK BODY: Foo Fighters, Dave Matthews Band, Tom Waits and David Gray contribute songs to the soundtrack for "Our Burden Is Light," due Jan. 13 via Madacy. The film, the score for which was penned by Foo Fighters/Fire Theft bassist Nate Mendel (he also co-stars), will be released on DVD the same day. "Our Burden Is Light" stars Mendel's real-life girlfriend Jessica Ballard as the vocalist for the fictional band Bleeder. Two songs Mendel and Ballard co-wrote appear on the soundtrack, and feature drumming by the Foo Fighters' Taylor Hawkins. Mark Lanegan, Rickie Lee Jones and All also appear on the album, the full track list for which has not yet been announced. The DVD of the film includes a commentary track, deleted scenes, rehearsal footage and a gag reel. No theatrical release for "Our Burden Is Light" has yet been lined up. Mendel is currently on the road with the Fire Theft in support of its recent self-titled Rykodisc debut, which bowed at No. 11 on Billboard's Heatseekers chart. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 21:13:55 -0400 From: Jenny Grover Subject: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins I'm a little surprised no one has mentioned the new Shins album. I think it's great. Catchy tunes, a bit more 60's based than the first album, interesting songs. I highly recommend it. Jen ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 22:48:24 -0600 From: Roger Winston Subject: Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins At Thursday 10/23/2003 09:13 PM -0400, Jenny Grover wrote: >I'm a little surprised no one has mentioned the new Shins album. I think >it's great. Catchy tunes, a bit more 60's based than the first album, >interesting songs. I highly recommend it. In what I'm sure was an age-related brain fart, I went to a Best Buy this week with the intention of buying it (it was advertised as on sale in their weekly flyer), but walked out without even having looked for it. I did buy some other things though, including the over-hyped debut from The Rapture (ECHOES), which was only $6.99. Sounds like a drum machine/keyboard heavy version of early Cure mixed with... something. Pixies, maybe? I dunno. I'm not sure yet if I like it. As I was driving back to work, I slapped myself on the forehead and screamed "Forgot the Shins!!" Latre. --Rog ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 00:54:06 -0400 From: Jenny Grover Subject: Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins Roger Winston wrote: > In what I'm sure was an age-related brain fart, I went to a Best Buy > this week with the intention of buying it (it was advertised as on > sale in their weekly flyer), but walked out without even having looked > for it. I did this enough times in my life (without having age as an excuse back then) that I started taking a list with me whenever I went record shopping. Something about walking into a store full of records would just wipe my brain blank. Jen ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 23:02:04 -0600 From: Roger Winston Subject: Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins At Friday 10/24/2003 12:54 AM -0400, Jenny Grover wrote: >I did this enough times in my life (without having age as an excuse back >then) that I started taking a list with me whenever I went record >shopping. Something about walking into a store full of records would just >wipe my brain blank. I carry a list also, for the same reason. I even had it on me, and I even looked at it. The Shins disc was on it. Why didn't I buy it??? Distracted by all those shiny video games, I guess... Latre. --Rog ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 01:04:18 -0400 From: Stewart Mason Subject: Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins At 09:13 PM 10/23/2003 -0400, Jenny Grover wrote: >I'm a little surprised no one has mentioned the new Shins album. I >think it's great. Catchy tunes, a bit more 60's based than the first >album, interesting songs. I highly recommend it. On a couple of listens, it's...pretty good. There's nothing on it as knock-you-out-on-your-ass fantastic as "New Slang," but given that James had written several albums' worth of songs before OH INVERTED WORLD without coming up with a masterpiece of that calibre before, I wasn't expecting another one right away. My one concern is that it seems like this is frankly a James Mercer solo record in all but name, with the other guys' contributions taking even more of a backseat than they had before, and I would be very surprised if there's another Shins record after this one...or if there is, it's going to be just what the Shins were to begin with, a band name for James' solo recordings. I don't know if anyone here but me cares, but the new Barenaked Ladies album is pretty seriously fabulous. S NP: COMEBACK SPECIAL -- R. Stevie Moore ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 00:30:00 -0500 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: [loud-fans] Re: And... Quoting Miles Goosens : > >>>>Talking Heads/The Name of This Band is Talking Heads > E) TNOTBITH is a two-LP set that is longer than 80 minutes, > i.e., the capacity of a normal CD. Warner Brothers says to the > band "we'll lose money on a two-CD reissue; cut it down to one > CD and we'll put it out." Band says "No way, we want the whole > thing on CD or we won't do it at all." Warner Brothers doesn't > do it all. > > It actually got a catalog number in '87, but Sire/WB was going > to do the truncated single-disc version, which the band nixed. > I think they did this little dance again a couple of times in > the '90s, too. The inutterable stupidity of this strategy is that it's not the disc itself that costs most. Why not do like a million other bands have done and put out a 2-disc set priced like a single disc? Hell - - Warners owns (all? part of?) Rhino, who's reissuing the entire friggin' Elvis Costello catalog as 2-disc sets priced more or less the same as single-discs... Speaking of, I'm wondering about their endgame on EC: the remaining titles are Goodbye Cruel World, King of America, The Juliet Letters, Almost Blue, Kojak Variety...and a raft of live stuff, including the El Mocambo thing, the Costello/Naive 5-EP set, and the bonus disc w/the Ryko ed. of KoA. Rhino's been releasing them in groups of three...I wonder how that's going to play out? (I'm also noticing that they probably should have saved at least one other relatively popular EC album: of that batch, only KoA is regarded as first-rate and likely to motivate sales of its two partners in "what the hell, I'll buy all three" purchases. I like 'em fine...but I can't see rushing out to buy a combo of Juliet, Blue, and Cruel World... ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: As long as I don't sleep, he decided, I won't :: shave. That must mean...as soon as I fall asleep, :: I'll start shaving! :: --Thomas Pynchon, _Vineland_ np: rough mix of Stef's swap mix CD - right now Brian Eno's "Seven Deadly Finns" ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 00:44:59 -0500 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] shinny shin shins Quoting Roger Winston : > In what I'm sure was an age-related brain fart, I went to a > Best Buy this > week with the intention of buying it (it was advertised as on > sale in their > weekly flyer), but walked out without even having looked for > it. > > As I was driving back to work, I slapped myself on the forehead > and > screamed "Forgot the Shins!!" It would have been a real age-related brain fart had you slapped yourself on the shins, driven back to the store, and asked for a copy of that new CD by The Foreheads. ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: As long as I don't sleep, he decided, I won't :: shave. That must mean...as soon as I fall asleep, :: I'll start shaving! :: --Thomas Pynchon, _Vineland_ obJossWhedon: Something's wrong with me...every time I think of Spike calling Angel "Captain Forehead" two weeks ago, I *still* giggle idiotically... ------------------------------ End of loud-fans-digest V3 #311 *******************************