Category: Pop Cult

Je Suis Dans Ta Vie! (Todeloo Doot)

We interrupt this program for a bit of nostalgia for the old European folk (preferably of the French persuasion).

Over the weekend Sharl and I watched Podium — wait, let me rephrase that. Over the weekend I gently persuaded Sharl to join me in watching Podium. Now before you get any weird ideas, Podium is a comedy about a Claude François imitator whose main character is played by Benoît Poelvoorde of Man Bites Dog fame.

Now who is this Claude François character, I hear you ask. Well, behold:

That’s CloClo performing the classic Alexandrie/Alexandra for you, somewhere back in the late 70s. Pretty shocking for those Young Sophisticates among you, I imagine. Yet I need only hear the beginning notes of that tune and BOOM — there I am: barely 10 years old, fresh out of the bath, hair neatly combed, gushing over those background dansers also known as Les Claudettes. Everything, needless to say, was much better in the seventies. Yes? (No? Discuss.)

Anyway, back on topic: imagine our surprise when during the end credits of Podium, this pops up:

To be fair, it was Sharl who spotted this. It was I who freeze-framed the screen and took the picture. But hey, see that? In their “thank you” list, they actually include Frank Zappa! One can’t but wonder why…

Moving on, here’s another tune that you may actually be familiar with:

Pfeh, a My Way cover, you shrug? Quite the opposite.

The Dresden Dolls — Post-War Trade

In a comment in a previous post I alluded to a new revolution in how new bands, their labels, and their fans are making music, selling said music, as well as interacting regarding individual merchandising. In this regard, The Dresden Dolls have developed a unique relationship with their fan base called Post-War Trade:

…so here it is, the age of over-inter-connectedness and the internet and it’s time to change the world. I want to create an internet exchange forum in which really talented artists and artisans can directly reach out fans instead of posting photos their wares to the internet to get feedback. this is awesome but i would really like to see these artists making MONEY and doing BUSINESS with our fans. so it was that after years and years of discussion, the concept of Post-War Trade was born.

my good friend and fellow artist Katie Kay has agreed to take on the job of trying to organize this conceptual nightmare into a daydream reality, but we obviously can’t do it without YOU. the main idea is to get as many artists and artisans as possible to submit their work, we will pick the stuff we think is amazing enough to be reproduced en masse, and the featured items will be sold on the net with the majority of the profit going back to the artist.

it’s the DEMOCRATIC FUTURE OF MERCHANDISING! how AWESOME!!!!

no artist is too professional or amateur to get involved. ANYTHING GOES.

The Dresden Dolls are an American musical duo from Boston, Massachusetts, formed in 2001, consisting of Amanda Palmer (vocals, piano, harmonica, ukelele) and Brian Viglione (drums, percussion, guitar, vocals). They describe their style as “Brechtian punk cabaret”.

Does their 2004 video, “Coin-Operated Boy” from their self titled debut record remind anyone of a late 1970s FZ song?

Live Albums — Dead or Alive?

I was tagging songs on my Last.fm account the other day (I like to listen to an eclectic mix of music while I work) when I noticed the sheer number of live albums which were being scrobbled from my music library. In no particular order or ranking (they are all equally excellent listening):

Perhaps it was the advent of the music video, MTV, the videotape recorder/player and the eventual evolution of the DVD player along with the rest of the technological wonders of the last twenty years or so that led to the gradual demise of the great live albums. Has any recent band and/or musician released a live album that measures up to the great live albums like those listed above? Where is the impetus for bands/musicians today to record great live albums if a video or a DVD will suffice? I don’t know. There’s something about a really well recorded live album that sticks with you long after you have heard it. It’s like an artifact of an other time. As much as a video or a DVD may attempt to (and in certain ways it may surpass a live recording) it doesn’t capture this aspect of the live album experience. Perhaps this is why field recordings are still so popular.

Let me ask, if and when a Zappa “Roxy DVD” is released, will it take away any of the mystique from the original vinyl recording?

King Of The Rickroll

I’m going to have to mention the name of Rick Astley now, but fear not: it’s for purely sociological reasons. You see, Mr Astley has been rickrolled:

Over the last year or so, Astley has watched with puzzled amazement as “Never Gonna Give You Up” has been mocked, celebrated, remixed and reprised, its original music video viewed millions of times on YouTube, all by a generation that could barely swallow its Gerber carrots when the song first topped the pop charts.

Here’s just one particularly puzzling example.

Tourette’s

Stanley Zappa writes, and does so admirably well.
On moving from Portland to LA (among other things):

Long after the radio had been turned off you could still hear construction dudes singing “yo soy back on el chain gang, “aaaaaaaaaa yiiii yiiii yiiiiiiiii !” and “los boys are back in town, back in town, “aaaaaaaaaa yiiii yiiii yiiiiiiiii !” as if they all had Tourette’s syndrome and Thin Lizzy and the Pretenders were their tics.

Believe it or not, that always started my day with a smile, even if that smile only lasted 10 to 15 minutes.

Barry’s latest pick: It Is Not Mean If It Is True.

Be sure to check out Stanley’s 2003 album Visions by the way:

Abridging customary delineations of foreground/background, or concerto grosso layout, the group has found means to telescope complex interactions into brief and concentrated spans.

Wowie Zowie…

Aphex Twin – Windowlicker

Aphex Twin (aka Richard David James) was born on August 18, 1971 in Limerick, Ireland and is an English electronic music artist. He has been described as “the most inventive and influential figure in contemporary electronic music.

While not to everyone’s taste, this particular video is both a hilarious and excellent example of Aphex Twin’s subversive and sardonic view of contemporary music culture (in plain English, rap videos).

Warning/Promise: the full uncut version of this video contains explicit language (lots of four letter words and words that people with a certain skin color are never suppose to use).

Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!

Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!

Australian sneer-rock vets Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds have come out with their 14th studio LP entitled, Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! Though there’s no tracklist info just yet, the album’s artwork is provided by British artists Tim Noble and Sue Webster. The disc was released in the UK on March 3 on Anti- (a U.S. release is due in the spring, though a date isn’t set yet).

Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! is the first single from the album of the same name.

Culture Jamming 101: ShopDropping

Shopdropping is a tactic used by artists and activists to clandestinely place altered or recreated objects into retail stores. Handmade labels were printed out for students to color, cut, and paste. The project featured real people who make the products, their name, and sometimes even a story. The intent is to reconnect the labor with the product.

Though their aim seems noble, I can’t help but think these people could be doing something somewhat more constructive towards actually changing the corporate environment for the better.

You be the judge.

The Cher Effect

You may think you don’t know it, but you most certainly do.
Hometracked has the skinny:

When used noticeably, an auto-tuner produces what most call “The Cher Effect“, named for her trademark sound in the song Believe. (In essence, we named the effect like scientists naming a new disease after its first victim.) Treated this heavily, a vocal track sounds synthetic, and obviously processed.