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MARCH 31,2010 FlAGPOLE.COM 21
#2: PLAY-Curator Didi Dunphy
Wednesday, April 7, 7-8PM @ Cine Lab
VIDEO, SOUND, PERFORMANCE
6 Minutes X 6 Works
Guest curators & themes each month.
Enter your work! Come see—it's
6X6
LA CHANSONS
The King and Queen of
the Dance Floor
Stickfigure
Atlanta's La Chansons never meant
The King and Queen of the Dance Floor
to be anything more than fun, and it
isn’t. Husband-and-wifetduo Greg and
Carson Keller released their sopho
more album Jan. 26 via local label
Stickfigure Recordings; it* 10 songs of
frivolous, synth-driven dance pop that
break no ground compositionally and
showcase often awkward and occasion
ally even embarrassing first-person lyr
ics. “Beauty Queen,* the most obvious
example of the record's artless, auto
biographical voice features a speaking
verse that goes, “My name is Carson
Keller/ I’m from Marietta, Ga/ Love
to dance and sing and rock out with
my husband/ Those are my hobbies."
During the following track “You Put the
Moves in Me,” Carson refrains, “I think
we're dancing soul-mates, 'cause boy,
you’ve got the key/ You move me with
your boombox/ Yeah, you've unlocked
me.“ Sure, there's something to be said
for honesty in songwriting, but The
King and Queen.,. reads frequently
like the Kellers’ love letters to each
other—ones that probably operate best
in private and really don't offer much
meaning to anyone else.
Which isnl to say the record isn't
pleasant enough or that it doesn't
come from the heart. But songs called
'Leotard Stores," ‘Totally Beachin"
and “Mall Magic' realistically can’t be
expected to hold any significance to
anyone who isn’t a wearing a corsage
and looking to move around under a
disco ball.
Julia Reidy
JOAHMA MEWJOM
HAVE OME OH ME
Have One on Me
Drag City
Joanna Newsom's last full-length
album, the Van Dyke Parks-produced
Ys, featured sweeping and densely
arranged strings, lyrics and Newsoms;
Joanna harmonized with her sister
Emily on "Emily,' that aiburrts opener.
On Milk-Eyed Mender, she played
with little accompaniment and kept
tracks short, sweet and hook-driven.
The best songs on Have One on Me,
on the other hand, creep up on you,
slow as ivy, and eventually take hold
of your body. They begin with Joanna
alone at the harp or piano, and then the
thumping starts. Neal Morgan—who,
like arranger and producer Ryan
Francesconi (The Toids), played in
Joanna’s Ys Street Band—introduces
thunderous timpani, a standard drum
set and other percussion, all of which
sound fantastic: live and measured.
Newsom's voice sounds cleaner
and warmer in tone, and her melismatic
leaps and vocal control recall Joni
Mitchell on Blue. The bluegrass inter
ludes, upbeat piano and seven-minute
narrative in ‘Good Intentions Paving
Company’ could stall listeners at track
four of this three-CD, two-hour album,
but only because it is so catchy. Wind
instruments, violins and drums pop up.
sporadically on 'In California." build
and then fall away to leave Newsom’s
voice and harp floating for a moment
“Does Not Suffice,’ the albumls last
track, revives and slows that song's
central melody, but with different lyr
ics. The album finishes'by confronting
■you,’ who ended the relationship and
caused her departure. Buy the album
and map your own way to her. lyrics
in hand.
Alex Dimitropoulos
ACRASSICAUDA
Only the Dead See the
End of the War
Vice
Only the Dead... is the debut
EP from Iraq's only-ever heavy metal
band, whose members' tumultuous
lives were captured by Vice's popular
2007 metalumentary Heavy Metal in
Baghdad. Honestly, the recording itself
isn't much to behold, but to understand
this record for the long-shot that it is,
and the relative miracle of its inception,
you have to understand the horrors that
Acrassicauda, as a band and as indi
viduals. have endured firsthand. Their
story is an awakening, both terrifying
and hopeful.
For five years, the band struggled
stubbornly against odds and reason,
playing metal in Baghdad amid death
threats, stray mortars and militia in
fights, all for the sake of sanity and
statement. By 2006 Iraq’s capital had
become what the band describes as
“Hell tm Earth.' where merety speaking
English on the street could invite the
judgment of gunfire. Meanwhile, these
guys were hooking up to gas-powered
generators in hotel lobbies, amplifying
English lyrics of political dissent over
a style of music that is indicative of
the western-most West (read: Bay Area
thrash metal) as grenades are lobbed
into the venue. Even their practice
space was destroyed by an RPG. And
they kept playing anyway; they loved
the music too much.
Acrassicauda eventually tied to
.Syria, where the bandmembers were
unaccepted as Iraqis and unable to gain
visas elsewhere. And so the documen
tary ends: the band is stuck with no
audience, no family and no admittance
to a better life. It was a sour, unresolved
note, and the unfilmed denouement
of their survival would not come until
now: the Vice Records release of Only
the Dead...
Years later, the bandmembers
finally gained passage to America as
refugees and were swiftly befriended/
mentored by the very metal gods they
worshipped. Inspired by Acrassicauda*
dedication to the art. James Hetfield of
Metallica helped realize their expansive
instrument endorsements, and even
Testament's Alex Skolnick produced
theEP.
And that story truly is the content
of this record. On one hand, ifs a solid
study in tasteful reference, especially
ot the aforementioned heavy metal
legends; more specifically, ifs a spot-
on Gwar facsimile, with an even crazier
backstory. On the .other hand, however,
it’s a testament to music, a thesis
on irrational artistic passion and a
reminder to take nothing for granted.
Bryan Aiken
YUKON BLONDE
Yukon Blonde
Nevado
Yukon Blonde’s self-titled debut
plays like a game of “Ohh, this
sounds just like... Ifs on the tip of
my tongue..On “Wind Blows’ its
Crosby, Stills and Nash. On the next
song, “Trivial Fires,’ it's The Cars.
Mostly, ifs a grab bag from Time-Life's
Classic Soft Rock CD compilation.
Sometimes the right influences can
create the next chapter for an already
won-over fan base. Ifs exciting to find a
new take on an old sound. While Yukon
Blonde does the old sound as good
as anyone, this Canadian trio never
quite reveals what makes it unique.
There’s a moment at the end of *1,000
Years’ where lead singer Jeff Innes’
voice shows signs of cracking, and
he’s almost screaming, ft's too bad this
moment is hidden as the music is fad
ing out. This would be the perfect time
(o explore his vulnerability and find
catharsis through rock and roll. That is,
there’s no Young to compliment their
Crosby, Stills and Nash.
Michael J. Gerber
GOLDEN TRIANGLE
Double Jointer
Hardly Ait
With a strong debut full-length that
positions the band to be heavy-hitters
in the bustling garage underground,
Brooklyn’s Golden Triangle joins the
small but mighty Hardly Aft roster.
Besides keeping good alliances with
the likes of King Khan, Quintron and
the Black Ups, their ace is a distinctive
sound Besides the common garage
denominator of early rock and roll
touchstones and rough sonic treat
ments. the spooked-up sextet also
invokes goth dourness and a noir-ish
post-punk grind. The two female
singers—Vashti and Carly—dangle
between ‘60s girl sweetness and
Siouxsie Sioux* vaguely menacing
primality.
Highlights include the gigantic
walls of sound on “Neon Noose,’ the
surf-y stomp of ’Cinco de Mayo,’ the
woozy carnival psychosis of "Blood
and Arrow* and the feverishly swirling
psychedelic burnout of ‘Arson Wells.’
But the album's best, most open-
hearted moments lie in the deliciously
damaged and ringing '80s jangles of
’Jinx.'
Lusciously sonorous tones,
rough-and-tumble washes and dark
tendencies all combine to give Golden
Triangle a genuine hallmark to stand
apart and above in an increasingly
crowded garage scene.
Bao Le-Huu
BAD LIEUTENANT
Never Cry Another Tear
Original Signal Recordings
Let's get the personnel info out of
the way. Bad Lieutenant (dig that totally
crap name?) is Bernard Sumner and
Stephen Morris (old New Order), Phil
Cunningham (Marion, new New Order)
playing with Jake Evans and Tom
Chapman (Rambo & Leroy). Sumner
sometimes shares vocals with Evans.
Evans sometimes goes it alone.
Sumner* distinctive voice and full-
chord guitar playing, and the release's
conservative use of keyboards and
synthesizers, make the album familiar
enough to be inviting but different
enough not to make Bad Lieutenant
merely New Order v. 3.0. And dial's
great, too. because every song that
Sumner fully yields to Evans is bland
and rote. It* telling that these tracks are
grouped toward the end of the album,
too. (Conversely, the songs where
Evans merety joins Sumner tend to be
OK.) But it still sounds like New Order
because it can't not (Thankfully, it
sounds nothing like Sumner* cocktail-
hour, yuppie-rock band Electronic.)
Never Cry Another Tea/" starts
strong, and the first five songs or so
are as good as anything New Order
has done in the past decade. Sumner’s
talent lies so much within his ability
to powerfully strum but completely
prevent his guitar from chiming. The
effect is that everything he touches has
a cloak of moodiness to it Even the
most ridiculous, by-the-numbers^ong
has a false sense of depth. That* to his
credit though. Few players are ever
distinguishable in any way at all.
What bothers me most about this
record is how completely inessential
it all is. I wanted to love it, and only
liking it just Isn't good enough for me
when it comes to Sumner, Morris, et
al. This must be how Beaties fans felt
about The All-Starr Band.
Gordon Lamb