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[Rubin]

Hey You beautiful people.

I'm doing a dj set in a cocktail bar in Copenhagen soon, and I'm thinking I'd do it purely in slightly-to-highly pornographic rock and roll, along the lines og EoDM, Grinderman and stuff like that. I have lots of ideas, but thinking as you can never have enough, I'm wondering if you guys have some ideas you'd throw at me!?

[valley_parade]

Boris - Vein (hardcore version)

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?bcc71tjs11c

YESSSS BORIS THAT I HAVE NEVER HEARD BEFORE NOM NOM <BONER>

Have you heard the droney version of Vein? I think I posted it back there..somewhere.

[valley_parade]

It's getting so hard to find stuff I haven't either downloaded from here or have already uploaded. Here's some more goodies, three albums, two EPs and a live set from one of my favorite bands.

The Bye Bye Blackbirds - Apology Accepted EP

While hanging out with Yelley, Jason, and Patrick in California, we went to Amoeba Records in Berkeley. I found myself intrigued by the album cover for "Hollywood", which came out in '06. This is the only thing I've been able to find online (they have a higher bitrate version on their website). I like to think of them as a more mellow version of Teenage Fanclub. 

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?zn0mujzkin4
Chick Magnet 225 - '65 EP

This is the original incantation of my friend Noel's band, Next President. I think they put this out in '99? It was a few years before I met him, anyway. Next President is still playing some of these songs live (seeing that it IS 3/4 of Chick Magnet 225).

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?g4ylzqymmgj
The Lawrence Arms live @ The Fest 6

The sound quality is surprisingly good. This show was late in October '07, about a week and a half after I saw them in Boston.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?jw3inlwmwmm
The Broadways - Broken Star


The Broadways were another one of the bands coming of the breakup of Slapstick in the mid-90s. See also: Tuesday, Smoking Popes, and Alkaline Trio. After the Broadways split up, Chris McCaughan and Brendan Kelly went on to form The Lawrence Arms, which explains the two Broadways covers on the live set above.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?m2b31tzkar8
Stan Getz & Gerry Mulligan - Getz Meets Mulligan


Two of my favorite West Coast jazz artists collaborating on an album. This is from 1957, so it's as old as my mom.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?dwmdwogznxn
Death From Above 1979 - Romance Bloody Romance: Remixes & B-Sides


There's a remix of "Blood On Our Hands" by Justice that ended up on a mix CD Emilio had made for me as a part of Secret Santa. I also really dig Sammy Danger remix of "Black History Month". It's DFA 1979, do you really need more info? I will tell you that most of the mixes are either of "Black History Month" or "Romantic Rights".

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http://www.mediafire.com/?ynrz2l2wdfm

[valley_parade]

Jens, forget the title, are you looking at those sunglasses on the cover?

[Tyler]

A whole lot of Will, Part 1.

The Continental OP - Slitch Music



Could not find a decent review, but this is golden. Grab it.

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http://www.med!afire.com/?ytdaior3mkn
Amalgamated Sons of Rest - S/T

In September 2001, Will Oldham, Jason Molina of Songs: Ohia, and Alasdair Roberts of Appendix Out met up in Louisville to record what would become this EP, a one-off project called Amalgamated Sons of Rest. Given the core trio of forlorn voices involved, this seven-song (including a bonus cut) album sounds like about what you'd expect: dark, wistful, and sparse. A general format is followed: One singer takes lead vocals and the other two add backup. The instrumentation is mostly acoustic, with drums and piano making brief appearances. Roberts starts things off with a reading of the traditional "Maa Bonny Lad." Oldham follows with an almost spoken-word interpretation of the whaling ballad "My Donal," while Molina completes the circle with his own brooding tale, "The Gypsy He-Witch." Roberts' "The Last House" and Oldham's "Major March" pass somewhat unnoticed, but the EP ends nicely with Molina's "Jennie Blackbird's Blues." The trio finally jelling, it's the only song that doesn't sound at all tossed off. (The EP ends in earnest with an obligatory-sounding hidden track, "I Will Be Good," which was written by Oldham and sees the trio singing in the round, trading off lead.) While there aren't a lot of surprises here, Amalgamated Sons of Rest is a pleasant enough curiosity for fans of any of these three indie folk standard-bearers.

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http://www.med!afire.com/?jzy2yg50lmd
Dutch Harbor: Where the Sea Breaks Its Back - Original ST (Boxhead Ensemble)

The collection of musicians on this album is incredible: Jim O'Rourke, David Grubbs, Douglas McCombs, and many others. But, despite the caliber of the performers, something seems to be missing. This album was recorded as the soundtrack to the movie Dutch Harbor, and consists of improvised pieces recorded in one day. The film is a documentary about the fishermen of Alaska, and some of the scenes are rather bleak and depressing, but unfortunately most of the music is as well. This is not to slander gloomy music, but the compositions on this album are depressing from a thematic standpoint. There is no doubt that this is a collection of more than apt musicians, but the feeling perpetuated on this album is one of over-electronic and expansive monotony. This music might be ample accompaniment to the film itself, but lacks concrete direction and enthusiasm. The mere comparison of this effort to Last Place to Go, the improvised pieces taken from the movie's European tour, evidences the disappointing nature of the original soundtrack. Both O'Rourke and Grubbs experiment with ambient, synthesized guitar sounds on tracks like "Introduction" and "Ship Supply" to no avail. The highlights of the album come with the more organic sounding "At Sea," "In Closing" and the Will Oldham composition, "Ebbs Folly." Despite these high moments of more inspired playing the lack of continuity remains. Perhaps if more time had been allotted to record this album better results might have resulted. Although admirable for its completion in one day, the Dutch Harbor Original Soundtrack could still use some work.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?z5iyijdqyqn
Palace Brothers - There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You

Will Oldham's first album under the Palace rubric, There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You, seemed to emerge from under a cloud of mystery on its first release in 1993. The first edition had no credits save a list of names under the heading "Impossible Without," leading to all manner of speculation in the indie community about who was responsible; the album sounded as if some ancient songsters who had somehow escaped Harry Smith's attention years before had recorded a session in their living room, which somehow found its way to the offices of Drag City. On There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You, Oldham sounds like a lost-lost cousin of the Louvin Brothers who, after ending up on skid row, is equally convinced that Satan is real, since he smells his foul breath every waking moment of his life. Oldham's stark, intimate tales of sin, lust, alcohol, and hopelessness are fascinating, horribly compelling stuff, and while it would be easy for this material to sound ironic or condescending, it isn't -- Oldham makes his characters' shame, confusion, and desperate search for grace real and genuinely moving. There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You may not be the best Palace album, but it is the work where Will Oldham's obsession with sin and redemption shines forth with the most painful and absorbing clarity.

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Palace Brothers - Days in the Wake

The second album from Palace Brothers would seem to barely qualify on either count -- at a shade over 27 minutes, Days in the Wake seems a bit skimpy in the era of the 80-minute CD, and only one song, "Come a Little Dog," clearly features any musicians besides Will Oldham and his rickety acoustic guitar. But the stark simplicity and audio vérité ambience of Days in the Wake builds on the already dramatic emotional power of There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You, and if Will Oldham's obsession with sin and retribution is less forcefully stated in these songs, that's not to say it isn't clearly present on most of these songs, especially the cautionary tale "You Will Miss Me When I Burn," the mournful but fiercely proud "No More Workhorse Blues," and "Pushkin," which begins with the declaration "God is the answer/God lies within," without making it sound like a concept in which Oldham can take much comfort. Oldham's lyrics would become increasingly cryptic from this point on, but while the literal meaning of songs like "Wither Thou Goest" and "I Am a Cinematographer" is elusive, the emotional power of these performances is as eloquent as anyone could hope for. Days in the Wake is the simplest work in the Palace canon, and among the very best. (Days in the Wake was originally released simply as Palace Brothers.)

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Tortoise and Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - The Brave and the Bold

Well, this one is a surprise. The Brave and the Bold is an all-covers collaboration between Bonnie "Prince" Billy (Will Oldham) and Tortoise, and it's got a set of songs that has to be among the most eclectic of any such project, ever. From Melanie to Devo to Richard Thompson to Lungfish to Milton Nascimento, this is one interesting mix. Some of the songs are done reasonably faithfully to the originals. "Some Say (I Got Devil)" is so faithful that the gender is left intact! And while "Cravo é Canela" keeps the rhythm and melody of the original, it benefits from beefed-up instrumentation, great production, and a surprisingly spirited Portuguese vocal from Oldham. "Love Is Love" trades the guitar grind of Lungfish's original for an industrial synth sound. Others are completely transformed, like the brooding "Thunder Road" and the newly ominous "Daniel." The Minutemen's "It's Expected I'm Gone" loses its tense punk rock edge but gains a great "out" solo section, and the cover of "Calvary Cross" is fantastic, but they should have let the guitar outro go on longer. This is a fun project to be sure, but don't expect more than that. It sheds a bit more light on what kind of eclectic music fans these guys are, and shows that Tortoise are consummate musicians, able to tackle virtually any style convincingly. It's not the new Tortoise album (that comes later in 2006), and it's clearly not your standard Bonnie "Prince" Billy effort, either. Approach it as a slightly goofy one-off, and you won't be disappointed.

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Matt Sweeney and Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - Superwolf

Will Oldham's musical personality is strong and distinct enough that when he collaborates with another artist, with rare exception he firmly takes the lead (whether or not that was the intention). And while guitarist Matt Sweeney (formerly of Chavez and Zwan) gets equal billing with Oldham's alter ego Bonnie "Prince" Billy on 2005's Superwolf, one listen confirms that this is primarily Oldham's work, with Sweeney obviously second in command. (The liner notes state that Oldham wrote the lyrics and Sweeney wrote the music, though to these ears Sweeney is either remarkably gifted at channeling Oldham's musical notions or the lyricist passed along a few melodic ideas as well.) However, this isn't to say Sweeney's presence isn't strongly and clearly felt here -- Superwolf exists in a musical landscape very much like Bonnie "Prince" Billy's earlier recorded work, such as Ease Down the Road and I See a Darkness, but Sweeney's periodic interjections of hard guitar lines give this a firmer musical texture and a stronger structural backbone than one might expect. Also, with Sweeney on hand, Oldham has kept some of his less appealing musical eccentricities in check -- this is one of his strongest and best-focused works in years, with the slow tempos adding drama to songs that manage to go somewhere in dramatic fashion despite their deliberate pace, and Sweeney's spare but evocative guitar lines fill the spaces without cluttering the frames. Even if Oldham ends up being front and center on Superwolf, the results make it clear the man works best with a strong collaborator, and it's hard not to hope Oldham and Sweeney continue to work together in the future.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?jmzxzr2dzdw
Will Oldham and Rian Murphy - All Most Heaven

One of the more perplexing of Will Oldham's between-album projects, All Most Heaven is also one of the most satisfying once fully digested. A joint release with well-traveled Chicago sideman Rian Murphy (who produces here), this release is the lighthearted counterpart to the somber and prayer-like Get on Jolly EP, which was released around the same time. Grandiose and overblown in almost every way except it's length, this four-song, bite-sized EP has the sound of a Disney movie soundtrack. Arranger Jim O'Rourke leads an indie rock all-star team which includes a good chunk of Drag City label roster -- from Smog's Bill Callahan to David Grubbs to Edith Frost -- not to mention Stereolab's Laetitia Sadier and Archer Prewitt. On top of this lush, intentionally overwrought musical backdrop, Oldham, with his trademark warble, belts out some of the best nonsense verse since Lewis Carroll, which, hilariously, is printed on an enclosed lyric sheet. (Sample: "fame I'd a said all a ba hoo/fame all a nod is a game/a fagen horror/and a low berra don.") The effect of all of this, because Oldham only just hints at actual English words, is that not only do you hear something different instrumentally with each listen, but you hear different words too. For those willing to put in the effort, All Most Heaven has one of the best four-song payoffs of anything in Oldham's canon, not to mention a ridiculous must-see rear cover showing he and Murphy leg wrestling.

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Palace Music - Arise Therefore

Once again, Will Oldham emerges out of the murky, Midwestern haze with another helping of lovely, low-key musings on his fourth full-length album, Arise, Therefore, this time recorded under the name Palace Music (previously Palace Brothers, Palace Songs, or just plain Palace). Much quieter than Viva Last Blues and less-Appalachian in its folk spirit than Palace's earlier music, the songs on Arise, Therefore shift and moan with breathy cracks and shivers; Oldham's meandering, poet-speak vocals; and guitar accompanied by his brother, Ned's bass, David Grubbs' piano, and (surprise!) a Maya Tone drum machine. The lyrics (included for the first time) are beautiful in their stark, pale honesty as often as they are indecipherable. "I watch things painted on public walls/Now but I see other things as well/Behind but right f*ck in front of my spirit is how the real road's laid out in a line," he sings on "Kid of Harith." Don't ask for an interpretation: It will come with time, or it won't.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?mbgzdynyxyy
Palace Music - Viva Last Blues

This incarnation of Palace, one of its more impressive, sees frontman Will Oldham turning out some of the strongest bleak country-rock in his career and taking the music in a few intriguing and even upbeat directions. With a great supporting cast that includes, among others, Sebadoh's Jason Loewenstein on drums and Oldham's brother Ned on bass, the group busts out laid-back twangy tunes that can really rock when the opportunity comes up. Most notably, tracks like "Work Hard/Play Hard" and the opening "More Brother Rides" are brimming with energy that may not overwhelm, but certainly provides a hefty backbone. Alternately, slower brooding tracks like the longing "New Partner" see the band proving their chops in a more refined setting. Oldham's cracking backcountry voice may be a bit of an acquired taste, but it's worth the time, as his inflections are capable of powerful feelings and certain honesty. The Palace team has put out many a record, but as far as accessible and slightly upbeat musical ruminations go, Viva Last Blues certainly sees the players near the top of their game. Things are a little thicker and dirtier than on the more laid-back acoustic records this prolific artist has put out, but the rock approach adds worlds to the delivery and creates a powerful palette for the equally important lyrics. Oldham is a truly underrated American talent, and this is among his best work, so take the time to find it.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?jtzqihanyjy
Palace Music - Lost Blues and Other Songs

Despite the overall excellence of albums like There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You and Viva Last Blues, Will Oldham tended to save his best Palace offerings for the group's singles; Lost Blues & Other Songs is a career-capping collection of those 7" releases which serves as a superb overview of the Palace project's mercurial history. Although a few stray tracks (like the German-only "Gezundheit," a cover of Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Every Mother's Son," and the live Lounge Ax single) are MIA, the set includes all of the truly crucial Palace singles from the first (1993's "Ohio River Boat Song") to the last (1997's "Little Blue Eyes"), along with unreleased material like "Valentine's Day," "Lost Blues," and a more ragged rendition of the debut album's classic, "Riding." The highlights are many, but the true standouts are the anthemic cover of the Mekons' "Horses" and both sides of the "West Palm Beach"/"Gulf Shores" single, a luminously pastoral effort reminiscent of Red House Painters. A stunning recapitulation of a truly unique musical vision, Lost Blues & Other Songs is an essential record from an essential band.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?2rmybqiihgm

[Orcusmars]

Prepare yourself for some quality Black Metal, courtesy of Fen, one of the rising stars of the genre.


Fen - The Malediction Fields

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To describe their sound is to describe the very essence of atmosphere and sorrow, because few bands can conjure these in perfect conjunction within the black metal context. Not only do Fen excel, but they do so with a near mint mix and an onslaught of clean chorus like vocals, some acoustics and beautiful songwriting. "Exile's Journey" is an excellent opening track, conjuring directly to the front the band's heavier side with some beautiful blasted riffs under swelling ambient synthesizers. "A Witness to the Passing of Aeons" begins with a subversive, swampy vibe, some flute like sounds and creepy whispered rasp over a plodding bass line, almost as if a corpse were rising slowly to it from the depths of a peat bog, waterlogged and horrifically preserved by natural forces. "Colossal Voids" is a dreamlike post-rock segue which breaks into melodic shoegazing riffs under snarls. "As Buried Spirits Stir" is another glorious track with several captivating layers of subtle melody. "The Warren" is a delightful, bluesy and folkish piece which finally shifts into the driving black form near its climax. "Lashed by Storm" is the most black metal and 'epic' of its kind on the album, and "Bereft" is another haunting but melodic piece which ends the album much as it opened.

This is the very substance of a job well done, a lovingly crafted piece of atmospheric and sad black metal which should appeal to both the kvlt sects of the depressive, tortured style and the multitude of artsy, romantic black fans who adore bands like Lifelover or Agalloch. I'll go out on a limb and say it will also tickle the bearded and braided chins of the epic Viking/folk metal crowd. It's a phenomenal debut album deserving much time and attention, and there is nothing quite like it haunting the weed choked waterways and shadowed glens of the Isles of late.

Also, @ Tyler -
I think I just clogged up my intertubes trying to get that whole post at once - Loving that "The Continental OP" album

[Metope]

Tyler,

[spoon_of_grimbo]

Commence Giant Post-Hardcore Link Dump:

valley_parade, your mention of Chick Magnet reminded me of the similarly named Bitch Magnet.  They were a post-hardcore band, active during the late 80s and very early nineties, and would appeal to fans of Fugazi, Jawbox, etc.

Bitch Magnet - "Umber/Star Booty" & "Ben Hur" (1989 & 1990)

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Part of the extended Squirrel Bait family tree, Bitch Magnet was one of two bands that guitarist David Grubbs joined in the wake of his departure. Unlike the other one, Bastro, Grubbs wasn't a charter member of Bitch Magnet, nor was he the leader; that duty fell to bassist/vocalist Sooyoung Park. Much like Bastro, however, Bitch Magnet played a blistering and intellectual brand of post-hardcore punk, which often drew comparisons to Steve Albini's Big Black; they were also grouped with a more direct Squirrel Bait descendant, Slint, albeit more relentless and somewhat less nuanced. Sooyoung Park founded Bitch Magnet in 1986 while a student at Oberlin College in Ohio, joining with guitarist Jon Fine and drummer Orestes Delatorre (aka Orestes Morfin); despite their Oberlin roots, the trio was actually based in Chapel Hill, NC. Bitch Magnet signed with the indie label Communion and debuted in 1988 with the Star Booty 12" EP, which was produced by Steve Albini himself and earned the band some notice on the underground rock scene. For the follow-up, 1989's full-length Umber, they added second guitarist David Galt (a later CD issue appended Star Booty as well). Galt's place was taken by David Grubbs later in 1989, and Grubbs toured with the group in between commitments with Bastro. Grubbs appeared on the EP Valmead and on Bitch Magnet's final album, Ben Hur, both issued in 1990. After Bitch Magnet's breakup late that year, all four members went on to other projects: Park formed the acclaimed Seam; Grubbs returned to Bastro, which evolved into the seminal Gastr del Sol; Fine played with Vineland and Don Caballero; and Orestes Morfin resurfaced in Walt Mink.

I found these albums among my uncle's awesome collection of 80s/90s punk/hardcore/etc. CDs.  The guy introduced me to Rocket from the Crypt and The Replacements, among others!  Personally I find "Umber/Star Booty" to be the better of the two albums, and apparently it's out of print now (although "Ben Hur" is still fairly easy to get hold of).


In Pieces - "Lions Write History" (2005)

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These guys play an epic and kinda progressive form of post-hardcore.  Imagine a slightly rawer take on Thrice's "Vheissu," but with a little more variation, and the same brooding atmospheres.  HERE is a pretty spot-on review, that's a little long to be pasting here.  A couple of the ex-members (the band broke up not long after this was released), are now in the post-rock/shoegaze band Have a Nice Life.


Throat - "Knievel Is Evil" (2002)

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?qjoijioz5hf
The first and only album from this Irish band, who sound like a cross between Quicksand (the riffs) and Jimmy Eat World (the melodies).  Also features a cover of The Osmonds' "Crazy Horses" featuring a guest appearance from Neil Fallon of Clutch.


And finally, something a little different...  This is a comedy rap album by 50Sniffs, the chav alter-ego of my mate Jim.  If you're from the UK, you're probably familiar with the whole "chav" thing, if not THIS WIKIPEDIA ARTICLE sums it up pretty well.  It's a bit of a piss-take, but pretty funny if you've ever had hassle from these sort of twats in the street (which, coming from Boston, Lincolnshire, I have had to suffer a LOT).

50Sniffs & The D.K.C. - "Get Laid or Die Tryin'"

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?ygnxgqd1hjf^Jim's link, not mine.

[michaelicious]

I strongly recommend starting with the first Palace records and working forwards.

Tommy you should write a piece about Will Oldham like the one you wrote about Chapel Hill for the music blog. Since the music blog doesn't seem to exist anymore, you can just PM it to me.

Thanks in advance.

[Tyler]

Will, continued.

Will Oldham - Joya

Retiring the Palace moniker for no reason other than a whim, Will Oldham doesn't necessarily explore new territory on his first official solo album, Joya. He sticks to the simple, slow, acoustic country-folk songs that dominated the latter-day Palace albums, and like before, the songs teeter between apparent sincerity and inscrutable irony. The hushed dynamics of the music and his whispered vocals suggest that Oldham means what he's saying, but his appropriation of American folk imagery and impenetrable wordplay suggest otherwise. As always, there are a few songs that have a quiet power (including "Antagonism" and a collaboration with the Silver Jews' Dave Berman), but the overall effect of Joya is a familiar one -- it's a promising, ultimately unfulfilling record that doesn't quite prove whether Oldham is a songwriter of pretense or genuine talent.

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Will Oldham - Western Music

Keeping up to date with Will Oldham's complete output can be an arduous task -- he has always exploited the shorter formats of the 7" and EP, producing a healthy amount of material in between his full-length releases. However, seeking out the 7" and EP formats can be rewarding, as the material often matches -- and occasionally surpasses -- the quality of his albums. The genesis of Western Music (released by the combined forces of two obscure labels for The Affliction Series) is typical, coming from a variety of sessions. Two tracks are solo Oldham, while Mick Turner and Jim White of the Dirty Three and former Gastr del Sol member David Grubbs play anonymous roles elsewhere. On nearly every song, Oldham approaches the level of his best work although, ultimately, each has its shortcomings. "Always Bathing in the Evening" relishes in its simple language. "Wade in/Wade in," he sings, as voices in the distance chime in with "Blowing/Jump in/Waiting/Jump in." While there is little lyrical matter to speak of, it sounds fantastic. Western Music's most complete song is "Jump In Jump In, Come In Come In," though even this, with its plodding tempo, feels more like a rehearsal on disc. Inspiration only seems to strike with the final verse. Only on "Three Photographs" (an oddity in a career full of them) does Oldham manage to throw us yet another curve. It's an intriguing, fragmentary story told through pictures. Over the most rudimentary, lo-fi guitar strum, Oldham's voice is sped up slightly, producing a humorous, Paul Simon effect. Western Music came during a particularly prolific time for Oldham, though Joya, his full-length album from the period, is more consistent.

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Will Oldham - Black/Rich Music

Throughout his career, Will Oldham has returned to the setting of Black/Rich Music. Beginning with his 1994 Palace Brothers album Days in the Wake, some of Oldham's best songs have been recorded solo. Not a great guitar player, Oldham relies on a basic, strummed accompaniment for the acoustic material on Black/Rich Music, and songs seem to have been written and recorded with little editing or refinement. Still, the simply hewn melodies and one-take feel of the performances are all part of what is endearing about Oldham's approach.

The EP is a miniature song cycle commissioned by Estep Nagy for the film The Broken Giant. It consists of four songs (two originals and two covers) linked together by their melodic "themes." Played on guitar and organ, the latter are brief and primitively constructed, so the heart of Black/Rich Music rests in the four songs they revolve around. One "cover" is a lengthy excerpt from D.H. Lawrence's poem The Risen Lord. Attempts to put such weighty material to music are typically unsuccessful and often awkward at best. In this case, it's a rambling narrative set to an unadorned backing of acoustic guitar. For better or worse, the performance is effective, because Oldham's own songs can seem similarly cumbersome. "Black/Rich Tune" passes by, failing to offer much that's musically memorable. The two covers come too close to Oldham on autopilot; thankfully, the best songs here are the two originals. He seems most engaged on "Do What You Will Do," and "Allowance" features the collection's best melody. Stripped of his peculiar vocal inflections in this intimate setting, it's a reminder of why Oldham should continue to record in this manner.

Black/Rich Music definitely has a place in the Oldham fan's collection. For others, he has recorded better material in this vein and the EP should be passed over for his next full-length release.

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Will Oldham - Ode Music

Will Oldham's Ode Music, the soundtrack to Kelly Reichardt's film of the same name, takes the simplicity of his style to an extreme -- with just a few simple, endlessly repeated acoustic guitar figures and some muted pianos and organs, he creates a subtly captivating suite of film music. The album's hypnotic nature also makes it pleasant background music; the Eastern music-meets-bluegrass feel of "Ode #2" and the brittle sadness of "Ode #4" are particularly affecting. Though this album lacks the sweep and scope of Joya and I See a Darkness -- or any of Oldham's Palace material, for that matter -- it's still an enjoyable album that will please completists.

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Will Oldham - Guarapero: Lost Blues 2

Guarapero/Lost Blues 2 gathers seven years' worth of rarities from Will Oldham, including an unusual reading of D.H. Lawrence's poem The Risen Lord, with a clunky, cheesy drum machine in the background, as well as a radical reworking of Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Every Mother's Son." Several of these songs come from BBC sessions, but the sound quality on tracks like "Gezundheit" and "Let the Wires Ring" suggests they were recorded on wax cylinder and transmitted by a crystal set, which, of course, only amplifies the songs' sparse, timeless feel. "The Spider's Dude Is Often There" and "For the Mekons Et Al" are among the most exuberant Palace songs on Guarapero, while Oldham tracks like "No More Rides" and "Sugarcane Juice Drinker" trace his development as a performer and songwriter. Due to the time span it covers, it's natural that Guarapero/Lost Blues 2 is a bit disjointed; nevertheless, it fills in the gaps for Oldham completists and is an entertaining, if scattered, look at some of his musical sketches over the years.

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Will Oldham - Seafarers Music

One of many non-full-length releases Oldham churned out during his solo career, the four-song, 27-minute EP Seafarers Music is wholly instrumental soundtrack music to a documentary about seafarers in Rotterdam. Each of the four meditative acoustic pieces served as a theme for one of the four sailors profiled in the film. It's the kind of stuff where you can hear the fingers sliding on the strings and the strings hitting the instrument, soothing but not so tranquil that it's devoid of moodiness. It's pleasant, slightly somber ambient music, but not one of Oldham's more notable side projects, the tracks probably working better in the context of the documentary than they do as naked listening.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?lj233vkndvo
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - Black Dissimulation

With his gentle guitar picking and detailed lyrics of heartfelt relationships from yesteryear, Bonnie Prince Billy is actually Will Oldham taking a break from his full-time Palace project. But what makes this alias solo project impossible to separate from the aforementioned band is Oldham's distinctive vocals that never stop cracking. But this "Peter Brady syndrome" is part of his appeal for both Palace and Bonnie Prince Billy -- the later of which also carries a rocking influence of Neil Young. Best listened to alone with all the lights out.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?dyg4ndtdmwm
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy and Marquis de Tren - Blue Lotus Feet



No review I could find. A very short, strange, and beautiful EP

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?wuhxzzkmqyj
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - I am Drinking Again



A quirky and dark 2 track single. Worth the 30 seconds it will take to download.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?ogmnzgy1yan
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - I See a Darkness

Bonnie "Prince" Billy's album I See a Darkness seems to pick up where Will Oldham's 1997 album Joya left off; a more melodic style than the veteran Palace listener might be used to. Oldham definitely hasn't abandoned his foundation of mordant lyrics and minimalist arrangements, but he has built a variety of different layers that make this album an emotional and pleasurable listening experience. In "Nomadic Revery," Oldham draws upon his classic Appalachian sound; it's the kind of song that begs you to join in. Oldham has always given the kind of energy to his character's voices that most people are afraid to relate to. This is all too evident in "Death to Everyone," Oldham punches out his bitter poetry in his most somber voice. The album takes its most surprising turn on "Madeleine-Mary," a Celtic-style folk song set to a Rastafarian guitar sound. "Today I Was an Evil One" introduces a horn section that drives home his morbid words in a strangely elegant manner. The album closes with a short and rare love song called "Raining in Darling"; Oldham stretches his voice to its most impressive limits, and the number is touching and hopeful.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?lggtwqjzird
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - Ease Down the Road

Will Oldham has long confused record buyers with his constantly changing monikers. Though the persona attached has remained fairly consistent, his releases under Bonnie "Prince" Billy brought a subtle but undeniable shift. Following the cracked, wayward style he adopted on 1997s Joya, Oldham settled on the steady understated "Bonnie" voice of I See a Darkness. The lyrics became more direct and the narrator's strange mythology deepened. If that album embraced its subject as a necessary, even beautiful aspect of life, Ease Down the Road finds the singer comfortable with this new-found acceptance. Backing Oldham is a cast of new and old faces who deliver their parts with an unusually soft, smooth touch. The singer eases into this setting, singing of his estranged upbringing, plans to construct his own kingdom (through questionable means), and love. The latter is Oldham's biggest preoccupation, finding its way into nearly every song, like the album's subplot. Though unable to choose between the love of one woman and the ability to be with whomever will suit his needs, the narrator is largely unconcerned with the conflict. Ease Down the Road features some of his most direct dealings with the subject on "May It Always Be" and "After I Made Love to You." As the album develops, this material is balanced with the more characteristic musings of "The Lion Lair," "Sheep," and "Grand Dark Feeling of Emptiness": songs that trace the same fictional histories found on I See a Darkness. The end result is the natural and necessary expansion of a unique songwriting voice. Seeming more confident than ever, Oldham's Ease Down the Road is a wonderful addition to a catalog that should earn him a place among the finest songwriters of his age, or any age.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?jgydnyugnkm
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - Master and Everyone

The fourth Bonnie 'Prince' Billy record in six years finds Will Oldham relaxing into a beautiful groove; similar to 2001's Ease Down the Road, Master and Everyone is quite melodic compared to his Palace or self-titled releases, with less of the dire apocalyptic imagery and more reflections from his literate, anti-romantic backwoodsman. Like most of Oldham's recordings, this one rewards close attention, which reveals recording ambience ranging from creaking wood to a soft patting on the floor (a foot keeping time), and, of course, Oldham's half-resigned, half-plaintive croon. Little gets in the way of these songs. Circular lines from an acoustic guitar demarcate the choruses, a cello adds a bit of emotional warmth to one song, and a few others have the wheezing keys of what sounds like a pump organ. Fortunately, the songs stand up to the examination. "The Way" ("Love me the way I love you") is very nearly sweet, stranded between desperation and hope. Elsewhere Oldham is a true fatalist, resigning himself to the inevitable power of love to ruin his life and using the creepiest of old-timey metaphors to get his point across. On the title song, he explains the situation ("You tell me there are other fish in the sea, and another gathers roses for me/On this we will agree"), then uses the chorus to illustrate his worst fear: "I'm now free, master and everyone/Servant of all and servant to none." "Wolf Among Wolves" is especially eerie, with the merest whisper of feedbacked guitar and a wordless vocal punctuating the puzzled lyrics, "Why can't I be loved as what I am?/A wolf among wolves, and not as a man among men." One of the few guests on Master and Everyone is Marty Slayton, who contributes duet vocals to a pair of songs, a surprisingly close crossover to the folk crowd sparked by the success of O Brother, Where Art Thou? Mostly, though, Oldham concentrates on crafting unremittingly introspective and confessional material in a spare, old-timey format. As sometimes happens on the recordings of his kindred spirit Cat Power, however, such unstinting uniformity can be a curse as well as a blessing.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?2hyzo5l11it
Brightblack and Bonny Billy - Pebbles and Ripples



Will and Brightblack doing amazing covers including the Dead's Brokendown Palace and Donovan's Lullaby

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?cznizgwbde4
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - Ask Forgiveness

As 2007 wound down, Will Oldham, as Bonnie "Prince" Billy, entered the Hexam Head studio in Philadelphia with Greg Weeks and Meg Baird and recorded seven cover tunes and a lone original. Given Oldham's delightfully idiosyncratic method of working, one would expect these tunes (titled only by their writers' names, so it's up to you to figure out what songs he's actually singing) to be radically strange versions of songs both popular and somewhat obscure. While it's true that these are not straight-up readings, they are also far from strange. In fact, what Oldham has done is create a half-hour of relaxed -- if sometimes harrowing and melancholy -- personally interpreted music he enjoys performing. Despite the fine sound and full presence of both Oldham and Baird, there is the distance of reverie, memory, regret, and distance in these songs. There are no stutter steps, loose lyrics, or unexpected interruptions that have made earlier records more marginal, and perhaps -- to some -- more interesting. The bottom line is that only a songwriter could read these songs so subtly and yet inflect them with the kind of immediacy that makes them sound as if they were his own. This is no mean feat when some of the tunes here are considered -- in their respective circles -- as having already been read that way. A case in point is Oldham's version of Gayle Caldwell's "Cycles," which is (and will continue to be) utterly defined by the persona of Frank Sinatra reading it. Nonetheless, as Bonnie "Prince" Billy, he and Baird in duet sing it as if it were some self-reflective back-porch ballad looking on the passage of time and the stages of life. Unless you actually knew this tune well enough, you'd never associate the two versions -- though Weeks does a nice job of injecting some of the original's instrumental and sonic tropes.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?xwmdnzmyzey

[pat101]

The Pains Of Being Pure Of Heart - ST (2009) [V2 VBR]

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?mzouavujyyy


Some new Indie popish stuff, I really enjoy it

bullshit bio from their website

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    Imagine if Stephen Pastel actually threw Aggi off the bridge and married Black Tambourine’s Pam Berry and had three four babies that formed a pop band.

    Meet The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, a New York four-piece who plays sweet & noisy POP with boy/girl vocals, blissful melodies and blistering drums.

[Scandanavian War Machine]

someone tell me where to start with all that Oldham stuff because it's a little overwhelming and i can't decide where to begin.

[Cernunnos]

Tyler i love you

[pat101]

Bon Iver - Bloodbank EP (2009)

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http://www.mediafire.com/?oyk000zoqan


New EP

[VSnaresFreak]

Some eliot lipp sickness. 

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http://www.mediafire.com/?w9yrntkrzgm
No AMG for this one, but this will some of the funkiest, break-beat electronica you'll hear.  His style is so clean, and when this guy puts on a show he destroys the crowd.  Eliot Lipp owns the Moog and every other synthesizer he puts his hands on.  This guy's got talent, and you won't hear anything like him.  Check it out.

[pebaker2]

Excellent, excellent Will Oldham retrospective. I agree with the other comments that, generally, from the beginning is the best way to dig his music. I personally think that the hight of his career in terms of listening enjoyability is way back in the mid 90s: Palace Brothers: There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You, Days in The Wake, Viva Last Blues, but the absolute best is Master and Everyone.

[Tyler]

So yeah. This is maybe less exciting than Mr. Oldham.

Beck - Mellow Gold

From its kaleidoscopic array of junk-culture musical styles to its assured, surrealistic wordplay, Beck's debut album, Mellow Gold, is a stunner. Throughout the record, Beck plays as if there are no divisions between musical genres, freely blending rock, rap, folk, psychedelia, and country. Although his inspired sense of humor occasionally plays like he's a smirking, irony-addled hipster, his music is never kitschy, and his wordplay is constantly inspired. Since Mellow Gold was pieced together from home-recorded tapes, it lacks a coherent production, functioning more as a stylistic sampler: there are the stoner raps of "Loser" and "Beercan," the urban folk of "Pay No Mind (Snoozer)," the mock-industrial onslaught of "Mutherfuker," the garagey "Fuckin' With My Head (Mountain Dew Rock)," the trancy acoustic "Blackhole," and the gently sardonic folk-rock of "Nitemare Hippy Girl." It's a dizzying demonstration of musical skills, yet it's all tied together by a simple yet clever sense of songcraft and a truly original lyrical viewpoint, one that's basic yet as colorful as free verse. By blending boundaries so thoroughly and intoxicatingly, Mellow Gold established a new vein of alternative rock, one that was fueled by ideas instead of attitude

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?nzidmwtim1y
Beck - Stereopathic Soul Manure

Within months of the release of Mellow Gold, Beck released his second album, Stereopathetic Soul Manure, a schizophrenic collection of lo-fi recordings from between 1988 and 1993. Much of the music on the album draws from the noisy, experimental post-punk of Sonic Youth and the dirty, primitive junk rock of Pussy Galore; his absurdist sense of humor surfaces only rarely, and only in the guise of such sophomoric cuts as "Jagermeister Pie" and "Satan Gave Me a Taco," while his sense of songcraft is inaudible. Essentially, the record was both a palate cleanser, one designed to scare away the "Loser" fans, and a bid for indie credibility, since the music on Stereopathetic is equally as uncompromising and as unlistenable as Sonic Youth or their many imitators at their most extreme.

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Beck - One Foot in the Grave

One Foot in the Grave appeared not long after the noisy freak-out of Stereopathetic Soulmanure, and its quiet, folky textures couldn't be more different than those of its predecessor, or the genre-bending Mellow Gold, for that matter. Recorded before Mellow Gold, the record showcases Beck as a postmodern folkie, and the results are revelatory. Stripped of the intoxicating production that dominated Mellow Gold, Beck's songs prove to be wonderful, vibrant tunes, teeming with emotion, haunting wordplay, and simple, memorable melodies. It's alternately haunting and jubilant, and Calvin Johnson's occasional harmonies lend the record an intimate warmth. It's a gentle record, and its collection of small gems are every bit as impressive as the songs on Mellow Gold or its 1996 follow-up, Odelay.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?oguw2nngzni
Beck - Odelay

Beck's debut, Mellow Gold, was a glorious sampler of different musical styles, careening from lo-fi hip-hop to folk, moving back through garage rock and arty noise. It was an impressive album, but the parts didn't necessarily stick together. The two albums that followed within months of Mellow Gold — Stereopathetic Soul Manure and One Foot in the Grave — were specialist releases that disproved the idea that Beck was simply a one-hit wonder. But Odelay, the much-delayed proper follow-up to Mellow Gold, proves the depth and scope of his talents. Odelay fuses the disparate strands of Beck's music — folk, country, hip-hop, rock & roll, blues, jazz, easy listening, rap, pop — into one dense sonic collage. Songs frequently morph from one genre to another, seemingly unrelated genre — bursts of noise give way to country songs with hip-hop beats, easy listening melodies transform into a weird fusion of pop, jazz, and cinematic strings; it's genre-defying music that refuses to see boundaries. All of the songs on Odelay are rooted in simple forms — whether it's blues ("Devil's Haircut"), country ("Lord Only Knows," "Sissyneck"), soul ("Hotwax"), folk ("Ramshackle"), or rap ("High 5 [Rock the Catskills]," "Where It's At") — but they twist the conventions of the genre. "Where It's At" is peppered with soul, jazz, funk, and rap references, while "Novacane" slams from indie rock to funk and back to white noise. With the aid of the Dust Brothers, Beck has created a dense, endlessly intriguing album overflowing with ideas. Furthermore, it's an album that completely ignores the static, nihilistic trends of the American alternative/independent underground, creating a fluid, creative, and startlingly original work.

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http://www.med!afire.com/?gq353e2vjtw
Beck - Mutations

According to party line, neither Beck nor Geffen ever intended Mutations to be considered as the official follow-up to Odelay, his Grammy-winning breakthrough. It was more like One Foot in the Grave, designed to be an off-kilter, subdued collection of acoustic-based songs pitched halfway between psychedelic country blues and lo-fi folk. The presence of producer Nigel Godrich, the man who helmed Radiohead's acclaimed OK Computer, makes such claims dubious. Godrich is not a slick producer, but he's no Calvin Johnson, either, and Mutations has an appropriately clean, trippy feel. There's little question that with the blues, country, psych, bossa nova, and folk that comprise it, Mutations was never meant to be a commercial endeavor — there's no floor-shaker like "Where It's At," and it doesn't trade in the junk culture that brought Odelay to life. Recording with his touring band — marking the first time he has entered the studio with a live band — does result in a different sound, but it's not so much a departure as it is a side road that is going in the same direction. None of the songs explore new territory, but they're rich, lyrically and musically. There's an off-the-cuff wit to the songwriting, especially on "Canceled Check" and "Bottle of Blues," and the performances are natural, relaxed, and laid-back, without ever sounding complacent. In fact, one of the nifty tricks of Mutations is how it sounds simple upon the first listen, then reveals more psychedelic layers upon each play. Beck is not only a startling songwriter — his best songs are simultaneously modern and timeless — he is a sharp record-maker, crafting albums that sound distinct and original, no matter how much they may borrow. In its own quiet, organic way, Mutations confirms this as much as either Mellow Gold or Odelay.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?zfwj4cqf5jw
Beck - Midnite Vultures

By calling the muted psychedelic folk-rock, blues, and Tropicalia of Mutations a stopgap, Beck set expectations for Midnite Vultures unreasonably high. Ironically, Midnite Vultures doesn't feel like a sequel to Odelay -- it's a genre exercise, like Mutations. This time, Beck delves into soul, funk, and hip-hop, touching on everything from Stax/Volt to No Limit but using Prince as his home base. He's eschewed samples, more or less, but not the aesthetic. Even when a song is reminiscent of a particular style, it's assembled in strange, exciting ways. As it kicks off with "Sexx Laws," it's hard not to get caught up in the rush, and "Nicotine & Gravy" carries on the vibe expertly, as does the party jam "Mixed Bizness" and the full-on electro workout "Get Real Paid," an intoxicating number that sounds like a Black Album reject. So far, so good -- the songs are tight, catchy, and memorable, the production dense. Then comes "Hollywood Freaks." The self-conscious gangsta goof is singularly irritating, not least because of Beck's affected voice. It's the first on Midnite Vultures to feel like a parody, and it's such an awkward, misguided shift in tone that it colors the rest of the album. Tributes now sound like send-ups, allusions that once seemed affectionate feel snide, and the whole thing comes off as a little jive. Musically, Midnite Vultures is filled with wonderful little quirks, but these are undercut by the sneaking suspicion that for all the ingenuity, it's just a hipster joke. Humor has always been a big part of Beck's music, but it was gloriously absurd, never elitist. Here, it's delivered with a smug smirk, undercutting whatever joy the music generates.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?nymmijytzgj
Beck - Stray Blues



A must for any beck fan. Contains "burro", a spanish version of "jackass"; "halo of gold", a Skip Spence cover, along with many other greats

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?v0tymnzydhr
Beck - Sea Change

Beck has always been known for his ever-changing moods — particularly since they often arrived one after another on one album, sometimes within one song — yet the shift between the neon glitz of Midnite Vultures and the lush, somber Sea Change is startling, and not just because it finds him in full-on singer/songwriter mode, abandoning all of the postmodern pranksterism of its predecessor. What's startling about Sea Change is how it brings everything that's run beneath the surface of Beck's music to the forefront, as if he's unafraid to not just reveal emotions, but to elliptically examine them in this wonderfully melancholy song cycle. If, on most albums prior to this, Beck's music was a sonic kaleidoscope — each song shifting familiar and forgotten sounds into colorful, unpredictable combinations — this discards genre-hopping in favor of focus, and the concentration pays off gloriously, resulting in not just his best album, but one of the greatest late-night, brokenhearted albums in pop. This, as many reviews and promotional interviews have noted, is indeed a breakup album, but it's not a bitter listen; it has a wearily beautiful sound, a comforting, consoling sadness. His words are often evocative, but not nearly as evocative as the music itself, which is rooted equally in country-rock (not alt-country), early-'70s singer/songwriterism, and baroque British psychedelia. With producer Nigel Godrich, Beck has created a warm, enveloping sound, with his acoustic guitar supported by grand string arrangements straight out of Paul Buckmaster, eerie harmonies, and gentle keyboards among other subtler touches that give this record a richness that unveils more with each listen. Surely, some may bemoan the absence of the careening, free-form experimentalism of Odelay, but Beck's gifts as a songwriter, singer, and musician have never been as brilliant as they are here. As Sea Change is playing, it feels as if Beck singing to you alone, revealing painful, intimate secrets that mirror your own. It's a genuine masterpiece in an era with too damn few of them.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?ozk1mmizjtz

[Tyler]

Beck - Guero

Ever since his thrilling 1994 debut with Mellow Gold, each new Beck album was a genuine pop cultural event, since it was never clear which direction he would follow. Kicking off his career as equal parts noise-prankster, indie folkster, alt-rocker, and ironic rapper, he's gone to extremes, veering between garishly ironic party music to brooding heartbroken Baroque pop, and this unpredictability is a large part of his charm, since each album was distinct from the one before. That remains true with Guero, his eighth album (sixth if you don't count 1994's Stereopathetic Soul Manure and One Foot in the Grave, which some don't), but the surprising thing here is that it sounds for all the world like a good, straight-ahead, garden-variety Beck album, which is something he'd never delivered prior to this 2005 release. In many ways, Guero is deliberately designed as a classicist Beck album, a return to the sound and aesthetic of his 1996 masterwork, Odelay. After all, he's reteamed with the producing team of the Dust Brothers, who are widely credited for the dense, sample-collage sound of Odelay, and the light, bright Guero stands in stark contrast to the lush melancholy of 2002's Sea Change while simultaneously bearing a knowing kinship to the sound that brought him his greatest critical and commercial success in the mid-'90s. This has all the trappings of being a cold, calculating maneuver, but the album never plays as crass. Instead, it sounds as if Beck, now a husband and father in his mid-thirties, is revisiting his older aesthetic and sensibility from a new perspective. The sound has remained essentially the same — it's still a kaleidoscopic jumble of pop, hip-hop, and indie rock, with some Brazilian and electro touches thrown in — but Beck is a hell of a lot calmer, never indulging in the lyrical or musical flights of fancy or the absurdism that made Mellow Gold and Odelay such giddy listens. He now operates with the skill and precision of a craftsman, never dumping too many ideas into one song, paring his words down to their essentials, mixing the record for a wider audience than just his friends. Consequently, Guero never is as surprising or enthralling as Odelay, but Beck is also not trying to be as wild and funny as he was a decade ago. He's shifted away from exaggerated wackiness — which is good, since it wouldn't wear as well on a 34 year old as it would on a man a decade younger — and concentrated on the record-making, winding up with a thoroughly enjoyable LP that sounds warm and familiar upon the first play and gets stronger with each spin. No, it's not a knockout, the way his first few records were, but it's a successful mature variation on Odelay, one that proves that Beck's sensibility will continue to reap rewards for him as he enters his second decade of recording.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?lkjyf5tyghz
Beck - Guerolito

When all is said and done, Beck's Guero might be the quintessential album of 2005. Not the best, nor the one that captured the sound of the year, but the album that illustrates that in 2005, there was no such thing as a finished album — that a set of songs could be packaged and repackaged in so many forms, it never really seems to exist as a finished work. That's because in the course of the year there were roughly five different incarnations of the album. At the beginning of the year, the unfinished album was leaked on the Internet, causing such a commotion that it was reviewed on the front page of Salon. A couple months later, the album was officially released as a 13-track edition, along with a greatly expanded 20-track special edition, containing a few remixes and several songs that didn't appear on the 13-track album but did appear on the leaked bootleg. Then, after a couple of import editions containing various bonus tracks, Guerolito appeared at the end of the year. Guerolito is a remix of the entire album, with each track being remixed by a different act, including Air, Boards of Canada, Octet, and Ad-Rock. Sometimes these songs bear different titles than their source material — "E-Pro" became "Ghost Range," for instance; this practice was in place for the deluxe version of Guero as well — and Guerolito itself had its own alternate edition, which was packaged and sequenced slightly differently from its main edition, plus an import with a bonus track. All this packaging and repackaging, mixing and remixing, titling and retitling has the effect of diluting a good set of songs by Beck — there may be many ways of enjoying these songs, but having them exist in different physical and musical forms makes them harder to grasp, not easier to appreciate. And while the mixes on Guerolito are, by and large, good, they neither illuminate the original songs, nor do they offer much new — they don't expand the songs, they still try to keep the basic structure in place, so it's not a good showcase for the remixers. Instead, they just reconfirm the suspicion that this set of songs was never quite finished or sequenced, it was just released. And while that may be a very 2005 experience, that doesn't mean that each grouping makes for satisfying listen. After all, given all the capabilities you have at home these days, why not make your own mixes and play lists of the Guero material? The deluxe edition of Guero even gives you the ability to remix it on your computer — which means there may be many more versions than five of this album floating out there in the ether.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?wtn0nknmy2r
Beck - The Information

Beck began work on 2006's The Information after Sea Change but before he reunited with the Dust Brothers for 2005's Guero, eventually finishing the album after Guero was generally acclaimed as a return to Odelay form. So, it shouldn't come as a great surprise that The Information falls somewhere between those two records, at least on sonic terms. Musically, it's certainly a kindred spirit to Guero, meaning that it hearkens back to the collage of loose-limbed, quirky white-boy funk-rock and rap that brought Beck fame at the peak of the alt-rock revolution, with hints of the psychedelia of Mutations and the folk-rock that was the basis for Sea Change. Since this is a Nigel Godrich production, it's meticulous and precise even when it wants to give the illusion of spontaneity, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, since it also pulls the album into focus, something that the generally fine Guero could have used. Guero had many strengths, but its biggest weakness was the general sense that it was unfinished, a suspicion fostered by its endless issues in deluxe editions and remixes. Beck embraced these changes, most extravagantly on the cover of Wired, where he was hailing the future of the album, which would now no longer be seen as finished: it would be a project that covered a certain amount of time, the artist would package it one way, then listeners would offer their own spin. That is precisely what Guero turned out to be, so it would have made sense that The Information would run further down that field, particularly because it has a design-your-own-art for its cover and is supplemented by a DVD filled with quick-n-dirty videos for each of its songs. But Beck isn't so easily pigeonholed: as it turns out, The Information is far more of a proper album than Guero, coming fully equipped with recurring themes and motifs, feeling every bit the concept album Sea Change was. Credit might go partially to his collaboration with Godrich -- who is nothing if not a taskmaster, helping to sharpen and focus erratic talents like Paul McCartney and Stephen Malkmus (for good in the former, not as good in the latter) -- but this also feels like the work of a refocused Beck, who shook off the cobwebs by reuniting with the Dust Brothers, thereby getting his "return to Odelay form" notices out of the way, and then getting down to the real work here on The Information, as he tackles the hyper-saturated info-world of the new millennium here...

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?yqxmezdfajy
Beck - Modern Guilt

At first glance, it seems like the teaming of Beck and Danger Mouse is a perfect pairing of postmodern pranksters, as neither musician has shaken the first impression he's made: for most, Beck is still seen as that ironic Loser, trawling through pop culture's junk heap, while Danger Mouse is the maverick of The Grey Album, the mash-up of the Beatles and Jay-Z that reads like a joke but doesn't play like one. Close listening to either man's body of work easily dispels these notions, as Beck has spent as much time mining the murky melancholia of Mutations as he has crafting neon freakouts like Midnite Vultures. He's made a career bouncing from one extreme to the other, occasionally revisiting the cut 'n' paste collage that would have seemed like a natural fit for the sample-centric Danger Mouse, but when he partnered with Danger Mouse in 2008, Beck's pendulum was swinging away from the Odelay aesthetic, as he spent two records on the lighter side, thereby dictating a turn toward the dark. As it happens, this is Danger Mouse's true forte, as his productions have almost uniformly been dark, impressionistic pop-noir, whether he's working with Damon Albarn on the Gorillaz or the Good, the Bad & the Queen, or collaborating with Cee-Lo as Gnarls Barkley (whose fluke hit "Crazy" had nasty rumbling undercurrents) or even blues-rockers the Black Keys. So, he turns out to be a perfect fit for Beck, just perhaps not in the way that many might expect, although the title of their album Modern Guilt should be a big tip-off that these ten tracks are hardly all sunshine and roses...

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?z2wcdazvnyr

[Tyler]

Beck - Loser EP



An EP. Its pretty ok!

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?nznd2nqljfm

[Scandanavian War Machine]

dude Tyler you are the shit.

i just wanted you to know that.

[Tyler]

Just to make it 40 uploads today

Jason Forrest - The Unrelenting Songs of the 1979 Post Disco Crash

Jason Forrest's The Unrelenting Songs of the 1979 Post Disco Crash is a Day-Glo burst of wacked-out samples, clattering percussion, sun-kissed melodies, and general electronic insanity. Unless you are the sourest of electronica purists, you can't help but be knocked out by the sheer amount of wit, skill, and joy on display here. Forrest has a knack for the perfect sample and a predilection for classic rock. So you get bits of Starship's "Jane," the Cars' "Let the Good Times Roll," Elton John's "Bennie and the Jets," and plenty more chopped and manipulated in strange and supercool ways. Which could come off as just cute and silly, but Forrest builds dazzlingly constructed tunes around them that would be swell even without the samples. The most impressive on the album do need their samples, however: "10 Amazing Years" folds, mutilates, and spindles the Who's "Who Are You" into a glittering cube of post-postmodern art that will leave you shaking your head in admiration. You could lump Forrest in with fellow sample-mad groups like the Avalanches, and that would make a lot of sense as they certainly share an everything-but-the-speaker-cables approach. Or with mash-up artists like Soulwax, though Forrest does more than just juxtapose. Whatever you do, make sure you track down The Unrelenting Songs of the 1979 Post Disco Crash because it is the feel-good record of the summer of 2004.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?nuggm33zgwy
Jason Forrest - Shamelessly Exciting

Jason Forrest's brilliant The Unrelenting Songs of the 1979 Post Disco Crash announced Forrest to the electronic masses as the new king of sample-tronica, and while it can't replicate the shock to the system that Unrelenting provided, his follow-up, Shamelessly Exciting, is just as impressive a record and just as full of dazzling technical and musical achievements. In fact, it is a perfect follow-up record, giving plenty of what you loved about the previous record but tweaking it enough to keep things exciting and fresh. As with Unrelenting, it is a blast throughout to play "find the sample" and marvel at the skill and dexterity Forrest uses to fit them together. Check the ease with which he turns his 36 favorite punk songs into "My 36 Favorite Punk Songs," the little riff fragments and occasional shouts blending into a storming electro-punk track. Or check "Dreaming and Remembering," a track that manages to melt '70s soft rock, disco and hardcore techno into a glittering treasure. Forrest is less apt to sample AOR references; he's gone the soft-rock route this time digging into Gary Wright, Gerry Rafferty (with a cool mashed-up "Baker Street" sample on "Skyrocket Saturday" [an awe-inspiring track that also features a cameo by the hook from Starbuck's "Moonlight Feels Right"]) and Seals & Crofts, among others. The whole record is filled with these head-shaking moments of wonder, as on "New Wave Folk Austerity" (which somehow manages to sample both Yes and Blondie and make it work), the thundering "War Photographer" (which features chopped up Blood, Sweat & Tears samples), the foundation-shaking, slide-guitar workout "Storming Blues Rock" and the surprisingly gentle and sweet electro-pop ballad with lyrics penned and sung by one-time fellow WFMU DJ (and alt-country goddess) Laura Cantrell. "Nightclothes and Headphones" is a tribute to the late John Peel that gives the album some soul and depth and captures the feeling of being enraptured by the radio perfectly. "Evil Doesn't Exist Anymore" closes the album on a dramatic, epic-length note with guest vocals by Maja Solveig Kjelstrup Ratkje, who unleashes Björk-on-Red Bull voices over a thumping, clattering beat and a melody that sounds like the funeral march of a Eastern European dictator. It is a bracing and satisfying way to bring Shamelessly Exciting, an album that truly lives up to its billing, to a close. You will find yourself playing this record over and over, hipping your friends to it and generally wishing everyone else with samplers had as much imagination as Forrest.

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http://www.med!afire.com/?mxfxy2jmezx

[Tyler]

And just because I cannot stop listening to it and anyone that listens to music should hear it.

Joni Mitchell - Blue

Sad, spare, and beautiful, Blue is the quintessential confessional singer/songwriter album. Forthright and poetic, Joni Mitchell's songs are raw nerves, tales of love and loss (two words with relative meaning here) etched with stunning complexity; even tracks like "All I Want," "My Old Man," and "Carey" -- the brightest, most hopeful moments on the record -- are darkened by bittersweet moments of sorrow and loneliness. At the same time that songs like "Little Green" (about a child given up for adoption) and the title cut (a hymn to salvation supposedly penned for James Taylor) raise the stakes of confessional folk-pop to new levels of honesty and openness, Mitchell's music moves beyond the constraints of acoustic folk into more intricate and diverse territory, setting the stage for the experimentation of her later work. Unrivaled in its intensity and insight, Blue remains a watershed.

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[GnarlsBroccoli]

Awesome posts, Tyler.  And to the Beck list I will add this gem:

Beck - Hell Yes EP aka Gameboy Variations

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cool remixes of a few songs from Guero made with radtastic 8-bit video game beeps and blips

[Clintaga]

So far, this Matthew Dear is rocking out loud. Everyone should continue to throw down the Hawtsauce please. BTW, The Bassnectar Heads Up Remix of Roustabout is way better than the original, IMO.

Good Lord that is a lot of Beck. I never could get into him, but let's say I wanted to, is there a grab bag album that showcases all his different musical directions?

[BlahBlah]

Sonic Youth - 4 Tunna Brix

A four track EP they released in 1990 that consists of a Peel session they did. All of the songs are Fall covers:
Psycho Mafia
My New House
Rowche Rumble
Victora (Kinks song, but The Fall covered it too)

It's alright, enjoyable for a quick fanwank.

They hardly know the songs though, Thurston Moore said that he had never even heard of the Fall before, although he was probably lying. MES hates Sonic Youth now, but I don't think it was just due to this EP.

EDIT: Sorry guys, something's gone wrong. It crapped out during veryifying and now my upload is too slow to do anything. I might get this up tomorrow.

[spoon_of_grimbo]

i'm not personally a sonic youth fan, but for those who are, you might wanna edit in the link 

[imapiratearg]

Oh man, thank you Tyler.  I've been meaning to listen to Joni Mitchell for months.

[Mr. Tool]

Kay Kay And His Weathered Underground

Do you remember the days when psychedelic rock reigned supreme on the radio airwaves with Norman Greenbaum’s tune, “Spirit in the Sky,” and the carnival-tinged atmospherics of The Beatles album, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band was played 24/7? If you are like me, you probably were not even born yet, but you know this music by heart because its played daily on classic rock radio stations around the world. Kay Kay and his Weathered Underground have revived the fuzz rock and flower power child pop of the late ‘60s and early ‘70s on the band’s self-titled debut release. Made of two former members of Gatsby’s American Dream, lead vocalist/guitarist Kirk Huffman and keyboardist Kyle O’Quinn, Kay Kay and his Weathered Underground’s music feels like it was greatly inspired by the soundtrack from the Las Vegas show, “Love” which is based on the music of The Beatles. With the addition of cellist/backup vocalist Phillip Peterson, Kay Kay and his Weathered Underground’s debut release blends rock and orchestral tones like they were made to be paired.

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Howling Bells – Radio Wars



This is an advance so there's no reviews or anything yet.

Genre: Brit-pop with female vocals

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http://www.mediafire.com/?zzmlijftwzw
The Shortwave Set – Replica Sun Machine

Following his work with The Black Keys and Gnarls Barkley, Danger Mouse's production of this effort from The Shortwave Set makes him, this month at least, the hardest-working man in showbiz. And one of its more diversely talented exponents, as he slips smoothly from their respective nu-blues and new-age soul to the Set's psychedelic indie-rock. He's not the only interesting figure involved, the south London trio having also enlisted the services of the omni-talented Van Dyke Parks, whose baroque-pop string arrangements garland tracks such as "Yesterdays To Come", "Replica" and "House of Lies". The result is warm, fuzzy songs that recall recent psych-pop offerings from the likes of Dean & Britta, Viva Voce and Joy Zipper. "We'll make our music always off-key/ It's twisted and wrong, some kind of joke symphony," the Set sing on "I Know", but they protest too much, as for all their armoury of theremin whines, electric harpsichord, mellotron and juddering vibrato guitar, this second album is a tasteful, mellifluous affair.

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http://www.mediafire.com/?xinm5zwz5mn
Magnolia Electric Co. – Sojourner (Box Set)

A four-CD-plus-DVD behemoth packaged in a wooden box, Sojourner was recorded in four different locations by Magnolia singer/songwriter Jason Molina with help from a cast including engineer Steve Albini, Cracker's David Lowery, and singer/violinist Andrew Bird. In small doses these acoustic dirges and country-rock laments -- played at tempos that make Crazy Horse sound like Slayer -- pass by indistinctly, but over time, the slow-blooming guitar solos and age-old folkie melodies of tracks like "Bowery" and "Trouble in Mind" reveal their sturdy, dignified strengths.

Part 1:

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Part 2:

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[Scandanavian War Machine]

re-upped by request

Tobacco - Fucked Up Friends



Part 1

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http://www.mediafire.com/?nk0zyjgyjnhPart 2

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uploaded in two parts because mediafire was being a jerk.


P.S. i want to thank Tyler again for his generous uploading, and also Mr. Tool for that Kay Kay And His Weathered Underground album; it's awesome.

way to go, team!

[Zombietramp]

Would anyone happen to have Johnny Foreigner's "Waited Up 'till It Was Light"?
Thanks in advance.

[ragnarjon]

Interesting elctronica, breakbeat, drum n bas...

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[code]http://www.mediaf!re.com/?1tg5o2qzily[/code]

[onewheelwizzard]

Some awesome stoner/psychedelic rock for you guys.

Causa Sui - Summer Sessions Vol. 1

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This is perfect for fans of Colour Haze and Kyuss, and you know who you are.  If you don't already know that you're a fan of these bands, you should listen to them, and this, anyway.  Causa Sui know their shit.  This 4-track album leads off with a 24-minute epic that I really cannot stop digging on like crazy.

Nebula - Heavy Psych (EP)

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http://www.mediafire.com/?rjz1nzm2a2l
The name says it all.  Nebula are seasoned masters of their trade and this is one of their best efforts.

Poseidotica - La Distancia

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Still heavy, still psychedelic, got a tinge of post-rock in there for good measure.  Really good music.

Thanks for the Elliot Lipp, I haven't gotten too far into it yet but I like what I've heard so far.  I'm excited for the Jason Forrest, too!

[spoon_of_grimbo]

Trap Them - "Seizures in Barren Praise"

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/download.php?nqmyu32ttiz
YOUR FACE  +  A BRICK  x  1000^{Holy Shit!}  =  THIS ALBUM.

[the_pied_piper]

Note to Zombietramp: This thread is no request, please read the rules


That aside, it would be rather callous to deny Johnny Foreigner to an expectant listener so here we are

Johnny Foreigner - Waited Up 'Til It Was Light



Drowned In Sound Review

With lesser songs to call his own *Johnny Foreigner *vocalist Alexei Berrow would struggle to tempt the average listener through even three of the thirteen tracks that make up this debut album proper after last year’s Arcs Across The City EP. His shrill shrieks, at times matched wince for wince by back-up screamer Kelly Southern, a bassist likely to be a fixture on the bedroom walls of indie kids too young to have caught Melissa Auf der Mar or Charlotte Hatherley a few years back, are an acquired taste to say the least; some will flee as he crams syllables too many into a timeframe too short. Those that last the length, though, will be rewarded handsomely.

Like many music lovers unable to keep perfect pace with the ever-shifting landscape of the British underground, I was first alerted to the potential of Johnny Foreigner – affectionately known by fans, and certain DiS staffers, as JoFo, and so they shall be henceforth here – by this site’s review of Arcs Across The City (find it here). Ten out of tens are rightly rare, and while I couldn’t agree wholly with the perfect score after sampling the seven-tracker for myself, there was no denying its positives: once the barrier of that voice is broken down, one swiftly realises the excellent songwriting in action, the masterful combining of avant-indie guitar tendencies with immediate pop hooks the size of battering rams (and possessing all the subtlety). Clearly JoFo have influences that most mainstream radio listeners will never have heard of, but by manipulating these touchstones into manageable portions of frenzied riffing and fret twiddling they’ve successfully made their own material hugely accessible.

A couple of Arcs tracks make the jump from short-play release to fully formed album: ‘The End and Everything After’, essentially the opening to Harvey Danger’s ‘Flagpole Sitta’ given the once over by indie-punks super short of attention spans, is characterised (as so many of these songs are) by Berrow’s breathless diatribes, Southern chipping in to add a little sweetness to shout-along chants of “God knows what you think of us”. Throughout, third member Junior, drummer and keys, provides an essential backbone to proceedings; without this anchor of sorts, chances are the furious guitar lines would run riot entirely out of control. JoFo would display the necessary energy but lack the even more vital pop nuances. The band is, clearly, far more than the simple sum of its parts.

The other EP song to progress to this LP is ‘Yes! You Talk To Fast’, again opened by guitar work that’s impressive of pace but controlled by some propulsive drum pummelling. What Berrow is actually on about – pirates are mentioned, and there’s a decent “yo ho ho!” in there – is anyone’s guess (it’s their Blues Brothers song according to our Track-by-Track - Ed) but there’s a naggingly addictive edge to it, ensuring the song’s one of many here that firmly bed themselves into the grey matter after but a week in the album’s company. Of a similarly speedy execution are album-preceding singles ‘Our Bi-Polar Friends’ and ‘Eyes Wide Terrified’, although both also display a tenderness not always evident on JoFo’s wilder arrangements. The latter, in particular, is notable for its softly sung opening 30 seconds – a chance for Berrow to take a breath proper prior to launching into the band’s formulaic – that’s not meant in a disrespectful sense – structure of verse, chorus, verse, scream a lot.

In the album’s middle section sit two of its true standouts, ‘Hennings Favourite’ (should that have an apostrophe? It doesn’t here…) and ‘Salt, Pepa and Spinderella’. The first is in the vein of much that surrounds it – bombast and bluster, squeals and screams – but latches a sizeable motif that recalls Minus The Bear’s experimental pop-rock meanderings to a structure that’s already considerably memorable. The result is a track that’s both weirdly alien and infectious like the finest Girls Aloud offering, a song that knows not its place in the genre scheme of things. ‘Salt…’ might be named after a popular hip-hop group, but it’s sure as hell not a rap number. Rather, it rides a pulsing keys ‘n’ beats intro which Southern and Berrow vocally joust across the top of before tripping into a spoken-word tirade from our frontman. Everything’s weirdly tranquil until two minutes and six seconds in, and then: bang. Everything’s rocked up to eleven, Southern’s repeated “do-do-do”s seeping into the bloodstream. Addiction to JoFo comes easy, then, given just the right amount of exposure.

Which is, by my reckoning, roughly three and a half plays of this debut album, a record that shows other sides to this band’s personality – ‘DJs Get Doubts’ is a sweet paean to the touring life, while many lyrics relate to events unfolding in their hometown of Birmingham; ‘Cranes And Cranes And Cranes And Cranes’ shouts its fuck-yous the way of developers destroying England’s second city’s cultural draws to erect housing blocks – without ever allowing them to stray too far from the source: the yelp-at-home histrionic rock ‘n’ roll that’s already won over legions of admirers. Me, I’m another recruit to the campaign – given touring enough, and a little radio luck, it’s impossible to imagine Johnny Foreigner not becoming a household name.

Not with the parents, you understand; even I’m almost too old for this sort of passionate squall. No, the kids: it’s the kids who are going to make sure Johnny Foreigner matter for the foreseeable future. So long as they’re dancing to songs as near perfect of pop-rock shape and size as these, the world is a better place. Waited Up ‘Til It Was Light is an album of escapism, of sorts: sweat your troubles away, guys, because tomorrow’s another day and we can all deal with that shit then. It’s no 10/10 – to award such a mark for a debut album would be to ask the band to call it quits, as they’re unlikely to ever trump it – but it is a definite contender, alongside Los Campesinos!’s Hold On Now, Youngster, Foals' 'Antidotes' and Wild Beasts’ forthcoming Limbo, Panto, for home-grown debut of the year.

    * Johnny Foreigner 8 / 10

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?mt2ndqj3mo0
And as a bonus, their preceding EP

Johnny Foreigner - Arcs Across The City



Drowned In Sound Review

It’s funny how Birmingham has spawned two bands of such differing quality that one is practically the critical polar opposite of the other. On one side you have The Twang, purveyors of lad-rock dirge and kings of all-things shit-core; on the other, Johnny Foreigner. Surely you don’t need a diagram to clarify which act is just about the best damn band to emerge from the nation’s second city for a long time.

Their first album – a seven-track mini-album, Arcs Across The City – introduces Johnny Foreigner as the excitable kids of new-wave indie music. This is pop music packaged with added E-numbers and dancing feet that never misstep.

The boyx2 girlx1 three-piece make clever, fast, instant guitar music. Throwaway, you say? I can tell you, with conviction, that this record hasn’t left my earphones in weeks, save for a couple of days of obligatory Radiohead listening. Be it the sweet, closely matched male-female vocal interplay that sounds the length of ‘Suicide Pact, Yeah?’, or the ADHD guitar on ‘Champagne Girls I Have Known’, this band leave you reaching for the repeat button. They’re everything good you can say about Sonic Youth, Bloc Party and Los Campesinos!, taking the best parts of said bands and twisting the mixture it into something original.

Brilliance extends way past any collective influences, though, as Johnny Foreigner have enough of their own fuel for nostalgic nuances to be ignored.‘Sofacore’ adopts a hyperactive rapid-fire formula and morphs it into a short two-minute manoeuvre, while slower acoustic number ‘All Moseley Gardens’ is tagged on as a hidden track for necessary respite – a move which should put a hush to naysayer tongues suggesting the band are limited to one cheap trick. Come the release of their debut full length, Johnny Foreigner will be unstoppable, if they’re not already at that stage already.

Arcs Across The City is the counter argument to empty bands with emptier songs, to the indie lyricists solely reliant on quick wit and cool urban references. There’s nobody in this band with a fuckwit ‘rock ‘n’ roll’ moniker, there are no retrospective ska leanings, and nothing to chant along to in drunken karaoke. It’s too fast and too clever for the usual clichés. People will complain that it would be impossible to make a music video for them without shooting it in double-speed a la _something from the television show of famous milkman Benny Hill, and that there are too many _twists and turns and bangs and wooshes for a three-minute slot on daytime radio. But I’ll tell you that the usual methods of criticism cease to matter, because this is_ a ten-out-of-ten record if ever I heard one, and I can’t name one other British band deserving of the highest accolade this year. Johnny Foreigner will have you revert to the excitable teenage fanboy that would go out and buy a band’s single in every format just for the b-sides. Y’know, _just because.

Seven songs, 21 minutes, and some of the most exciting indie-pop sounds committed to record by a British band in a long while. Arcs Across The City is the domestic debut album release of the year, hands down.

    * Johnny Foreigner 10 / 10

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EDIT: Sorry, missed the bonus track for the EP

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http://www.mediafire.com/?wzaddkirjhz

[Spluff]

Yessssss onewheelwizzard is posting again.

[Cire27]

This is what I have been listening to lately:

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Yay, alt-country.

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http://www.mediafire.com/?njhmemetjmi
It actually took me a while to get into The Gaslight Anthem, and I frequent Punknews.

[dinkum]

The Geraldine Fibbers - Butch (1997)

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?9mn9nyopmxw
Awesome album, give it a try!

[minus_the_david]

so i know there's no requests...however; does anyone know if anyone posted any of the beatles albums...i'm in desperate need of them all! aside from the greatest hits of course...

[valley_parade]

It actually took me a while to get into The Gaslight Anthem, and I frequent Punknews.

I'd kinda been avoiding this because it got such critical acclaim..now I see why. That's a fuck of a good album.

[You Are Brahman!]

I waited an hour between downloads for my 3.15 gigs of The Beatles, using Rapidshare.  I did a quick search and didn't see any blogs using MF to share it, and I think I'd go mad uploading it all myself.   Sawwie.
---
Erik Mongrain is an unbelievable lap-tapping guitarist.  Check it out. This album is called Fates.

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/?p9mbtdw90k1


[Caseydog]

My first post here.  Tyler is officially the 2009 Time Man of the Year.  Great stuff!

[ALoveSupreme]

I'd kinda been avoiding this because it got such critical acclaim..now I see why. That's a fuck of a good album.

I listened to it and at first nearly vomited from the blatant Springsteen vocal rip.  I soon got over it for the same reason you sited above.

[Tyler]

so i know there's no requests...however; does anyone know if anyone posted any of the beatles albums...i'm in desperate need of them all! aside from the greatest hits of course...

i'm on it

Let me know if you need any assists in this effort. Once I am done with my uploads for today, I can probably start working on the Beatles tomorrow.

[minus_the_david]

so i know there's no requests...however; does anyone know if anyone posted any of the beatles albums...i'm in desperate need of them all! aside from the greatest hits of course...

i'm on it

Let me know if you need any assists in this effort. Once I am done with my uploads for today, I can probably start working on the Beatles tomorrow.

thank you both...it's greatly appriciated.

[Cire27]

I listened to it and at first nearly vomited from the blatant Springsteen vocal rip.  I soon got over it for the same reason you sited above.

I've heard all the Springsteen comparisons, but I'm not one to notice them.  Mostly because I have never had the chance to listen to him.  I wouldn't know where to start, really.

Oh gawd, Beatletasttic.

[spoon_of_grimbo]

For anyone who liked that Burning Airlines album I uploaded a coupla pages back, here's the first two albums (and EP) by J. Robbins' (guitar/vocals) old band Jawbox.  Kinda like a mix between the more straight ahead Burning Airlines songs and Helmet, but not quite as heavy.  Really good stuff.

Jawbox - "Jawbox E.P.""Grippe" & "Novelty"

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http://www.mediaf!re.com/download.php?n2ydtzzdqdm
imageshack is fucking me around atm, so i'll edit the album covers in later on.  they're in the rar file though.

[StaedlerMars]

although I have what they've supplied already, I just gotta say:

ben792x and Tyler,

[minus_the_david]

thank you guys so much for the beatles stuff...i can't tell you how happy i am! lol

[Tyler]

I realize that a lot of this forum has not really dabbled too much in the absolute wonder that is Joni Mitchell. The argument could be made that she is probably the best female singer/songwriter of the last century. A few of the larger albums I had to split, so youll need to do some copypasta action.

Song to a Seagull

Joni Mitchell's debut release is a concept album. Side one, subtitled "I Came to the City," generally exhibits songs about urban subjects that are often dour or repressed in some way. "Out of the City and Down to the Seaside," by contrast, is a celebration of nature and countryside, mostly containing selections of a charming, positive, or more outgoing nature. What sets this release apart from those of other confession-style singer/songwriters of the time is the craft, subtlety, and evocative power of Mitchell's lyrics and harmonic style. Numbers such as "Marcie," "Michael From Mountains," "The Dawntreader," and "The Pirate of Penance" effectively utilize sophisticated chord progressions rarely found in this genre. Verses are substantive and highly charged, exhibiting careful workmanship. "Song to a Seagull" has graceful and vivid lyrics about the joys of freedom set to a haunting, wide-ranging vocal line. Conversely, "Cactus Tree" explores the downside of a no-strings-attached approach to life, the fear of committing to a relationship (ironically wedding these words to a hopeful melody and pulsating guitar texture). "Marcie" utilizes poignant, twisting music set to desolately lonely lyrics about a jilted woman; the recurrent use of red and green imagery in the verses is especially clever. Character studies such as "I Had a King" and "Nathan la Franeer" are painfully bleak in contrast to the lithe domestic scene of "Sisotowbell Lane" and the winsomely reserved love song "Michael From Mountains." Unusual in her oeuvre are the overlapping dialogue prose manner of "The Pirate of Penance" and the jaunty honky tonk stylings of "Night in the City." Mitchell sings in a light, gossamer, at times diffident manner; vocal harmony is sparingly employed here. David Crosby's production is simple and effective. This excellent debut is well worth hearing.

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Clouds

Clouds is a stark stunner, a great leap forward for Joni Mitchell. Vocals here are more forthright and assured than on her debut and exhibit a remarkable level of subtle expressiveness. Guitar alone is used in accompaniment, and the variety of playing approaches and sounds gotten here is most impressive. "The Fiddle and the Drum," a protest song that imaginatively compares the Vietnam-era warmongering U.S. government to a bitter friend, dispenses with instrumental accompaniment altogether. The sketches presented of lovers by turns depressive ("Tin Angel"), roguish ("That Song About the Midway"), and faithless ("The Gallery") are vividly memorable. Forthright lyrics about the unsureness of new love ("I Don't Know Where I Stand"), misuse of the occult ("Roses Blue"), and mental illness ("I Think I Understand") are very striking. Mitchell's classic singer/songwriter standards "Chelsea Morning" and "Both Sides Now" respectively receive energetically vibrant and warmly thoughtful performances. Imaginatively unusual and subtle harmonies abound here, never more so in her body of work than on the remarkable "Songs to Aging Children Come," which sets floridly impressionistic lyrics to a lovely tune that is supported by perhaps the most remarkably sophisticated chord sequence in all of pop music. Mitchell's riveting self-portrait on the album's cover is a further asset. This essential release is a must-listen.

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Ladies of the Canyon

This wonderfully varied release shows a number of new tendencies in Joni Mitchell's work, some of which would come to fuller fruition on subsequent albums. "The Arrangement," "Rainy Night House," and "Woodstock" contain lengthy instrumental sections, presaging the extensive non-vocal stretches in later selections such as "Down to You" from Court and Spark. Jazz elements are noticeable in the wind solos of "For Free" and "Conversation," exhibiting an important influence that would extend as late as Mingus. The unusually poignant desolation of "The Arrangement" would surface more strongly in Blue. A number of the selections here ("Willy" and "Blue Boy") use piano rather than guitar accompaniment; arrangements here are often more colorful and complex than before, utilizing cello, clarinet, flute, saxophone, and percussion. Mitchell sings more clearly and expressively than on prior albums, most strikingly so on "Woodstock," her celebration of the pivotal 1960s New York rock festival. This number, given a haunting electric piano accompaniment, is sung in a gutsy, raw, soulful manner; the selection proves amply that pop music anthems don't all have to be loud production numbers. Songs here take many moods, ranging from the sunny, easygoing "Morning Morgantown" (a charming small-town portrait) to the nervously energetic "Conversation" (about a love triangle in the making) to the cryptically spooky "The Priest" (presenting the speaker's love for a Spartan man) to the sweetly sentimental classic "The Circle Game" (denoting the passage of time in touching terms) to the bouncy and vibrant single "Big Yellow Taxi" (with humorous lyrics on ecological matters) to the plummy, sumptuous title track (a celebration of creativity in all its manifestations). This album is yet another essential listen in Mitchell's recorded canon.

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Blue

Sad, spare, and beautiful, Blue is the quintessential confessional singer/songwriter album. Forthright and poetic, Joni Mitchell's songs are raw nerves, tales of love and loss (two words with relative meaning here) etched with stunning complexity; even tracks like "All I Want," "My Old Man," and "Carey" — the brightest, most hopeful moments on the record — are darkened by bittersweet moments of sorrow and loneliness. At the same time that songs like "Little Green" (about a child given up for adoption) and the title cut (a hymn to salvation supposedly penned for James Taylor) raise the stakes of confessional folk-pop to new levels of honesty and openness, Mitchell's music moves beyond the constraints of acoustic folk into more intricate and diverse territory, setting the stage for the experimentation of her later work. Unrivaled in its intensity and insight, Blue remains a watershed.

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For the Roses

On For the Roses, Joni Mitchell began to explore jazz and other influences in earnest. As one might expect from a transitional album, there is a lot of stylistic ground explored, including straight folk selections using guitar ("For the Roses") and piano ("Banquet," "See You Sometime," "Lesson in Survival") overtly jazzy numbers ("Barangrill," "Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire," and hybrids that cross the two Let the Wind Carry Me," "Electricity," "Woman of Heart and Mind," "Judgment of the Moon and Stars"). "Blonde in the Bleachers" grafts a rock & roll band coda onto a piano-based singer/songwriter main body. The hit single "You Turn Me on I'm a Radio" is an unusual essay into country-tinged pop, sporting a Dylanesque harmonica solo played by Graham Nash and lush backing vocals. Arrangements here build solidly upon the tentative expansion of scoring first seen in Ladies of the Canyon. "Judgment of the Moon and Stars" and "Let the Wind Carry Me" present lengthy instrumental interludes. The lyrics here are among Mitchell's best, continuing in the vein of gripping honesty and heartfelt depth exhibited on Blue. As always, there are selections about relationship problems, such as "Lesson in Survival," "See You Sometime," and perhaps the best of all her songs in this genre, "Woman of Heart and Mind." "Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire" presents a gritty inner-city survival scene, while "Barangrill" winsomely extols the uncomplicated virtues of a roadside truck stop. More than a bridge between great albums, this excellent disc is a top-notch listen in its own right.

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Court and Spark

Joni Mitchell reached her commercial high point with Court and Spark, a remarkably deft fusion of folk, pop, and jazz which stands as her best-selling work to date. While as unified and insightful as Blue, the album -- a concept record exploring the roles of honesty and trust in relationships, romantic and otherwise -- moves away from confessional songwriting into evocative character studies: the hit "Free Man in Paris," written about David Geffen, is a not-so-subtle dig at the machinations of the music industry, while "Raised on Robbery" offers an acutely funny look at the predatory environment of the singles bar scene. Much of Court and Spark is devoted to wary love songs: both the title cut and "Help Me," the record's most successful single, carefully measure the risks of romance, while "People's Parties" and "The Same Situation" are fraught with worry and self-doubt (standing in direct opposition to the music, which is smart, smooth, and assured from the first note to the last).

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Miles of Aisles (live album)

Like most live albums, this two-record set was a profit-taking release on which the artist re-presented many of her old songs for a new acceptance now that she had a larger pop audience. Backed by the pop-jazz ensemble the L.A. Express Mitchell reprised the best from her first five albums, pointedly ignoring Court and Spark, and including two new cuts, "Love or Money" and "Jericho."

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The Hissing of the Summer Lawns

Joni Mitchell evolved from the smooth jazz-pop of Court and Spark to the radical Hissing of Summer Lawns, an adventurous work that remains among her most difficult records. After opening with the graceful "In France They Kiss on Main Street," the album veers sharply into "The Jungle Line," an odd, Moog-driven piece backed by the rhythms of the warrior drums of Burundi -- a move into multiculturalism that beat the likes of Paul Simon, Peter Gabriel, and Sting to the punch by a decade. While not as prescient, songs like "Edith and the Kingpin" and "Harry's House -- Centerpiece" are no less complex or idiosyncratic, employing minor-key melodies and richly detailed lyrics to arrive at a strange and beautiful fusion of jazz and shimmering avant pop.

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Hejira

Joni Mitchell's Hejira is the last in an astonishingly long run of top-notch studio albums dating back to her debut. Some vestiges of her old style remain here; "Song for Sharon" utilizes the static, pithy vocal harmonies from Ladies of the Canyon's "Woodstock," "Refuge of the Roads" features woodwind touches reminiscent of those in "Barangrill" from For the Roses, and "Coyote" is a fast guitar-strummed number that has precedents as far back as Clouds' "Chelsea Morning." But by and large, this release is the most overtly jazz-oriented of her career up to this point — hip and cool, but never smug or icy. "Blue Motel Room" in particular is a prototypic slow jazz-club combo number, appropriately smooth, smoky, and languorous. "Coyote," "Black Crow," and the title track are by contrast energetically restless fast-tempo selections. The rest of the songs here cleverly explore variants on mid- to slow-tempo approaches. None of these cuts are traditionally tuneful in the manner of Mitchell's older folk efforts; the effect here is one of subtle rolls and ridges on a green meadow rather than the outgoing beauty of a flower garden. Mitchell's verses, many concerned with character portraits, are among the most polished of her career; the most striking of these studies are that of the decrepit Delta crooner of "Furry Sings the Blues" and the ambivalent speaker of "Song to Sharon," who has difficulty choosing between commitment and freedom. Arrangements are sparse, yet surprisingly varied, the most striking of which is the kaleidoscopically pointillistic one used on "Amelia." Performances are excellent, with special kudos reserved for Jaco Pastorius' melodic bass playing on "Refuge of the Roads" and the title cut. This excellent album is a rewarding listen.

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Don Juan's Reckless Daughter

A big chunk of the pop audience Joni Mitchell had earned with Court and Spark in 1974 deserted her in 1975 and 1976 when the follow-ups, The Hissing of Summer Lawns and Hejira, proved more difficult works. With the pretentious double album Don Juan's Reckless Daughter, Mitchell lost many of the loyal fans who'd stuck with her from the beginning, but who, upon hearing her here as she spread her obscure poetic observations and thin melodies across whole sides of the album, found her disengaged from the close, personal observations that filled her best songs. This was Mitchell's last album to go gold.

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Mingus

In the months prior to the passing of legendary jazz bassist Charles Mingus, Joni Mitchell had been personally summoned by the bop pioneer to collaborate on a musical version of T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets. The project would entail Mitchell to condense the text for Mingus to score instrumentally. He planned on utilizing a full orchestra, as well as the more traditional guitar and bass. They would accompany Mitchell's vocals and the narration of selected portions of the text. After a few weeks of consideration, Mitchell's reaction was that "[she]'d rather condense the bible." Mingus then bestowed Mitchell with six melodies -- "Joni I" through "Joni VI" -- penned specifically for her. Mitchell spent a few weeks with Mingus -- who was totally immobilized from amyotropic lateral sclerosis (aka Lou Gehrig's Disease) -- during the spring of 1978. Their partnership advanced the half-dozen tunes. More importantly, it shook Mitchell from a three-month long writer's block/drought -- yielding two of her best late-'70s compositions: "God Must Be a Boogie Man" and the revisitation and completion of a track she'd been wood-shedding, now titled "The Wolf That Lives in Lindsey." Incidentally, the former piece was inspired by the opening chapters of Mingus' autobiography, Beneath the Underdog. Initial recordings during Mitchell's stay with Mingus in New York City produced several interesting experimental sessions with the likes of Stanley Clarke (bass), Jan Hammer (keyboards), John McLaughlin (guitar), Gerry Mulligan (baritone sax), and Tony Williams (drums). A few of these recordings -- while rumored to have been lost, destroyed, or made otherwise unavailable -- were leaked into the trading community in the late '90s. Arguably, Mitchell could not have chosen any finer musicians than the sextet she ultimately incorporated into this work. The luminaries include Herbie Hancock (electric piano), Wayne Shorter (soprano sax), Jaco Pastorious (bass/horn arrangements), Peter Erskine (drums), Don Alias (congas), and Emil Richards (percussion). Sprinkled amongst these soulfully jazzy pieces are five "raps," or aural snapshots of the time Mitchell and Mingus spent together. Sadly, Charles Mingus passed before he was able to listen to this timeless and ageless paean to his remarkable contributions to bop and free jazz.

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[Tyler]

Joni, continued

Shadows and Light

Shadows and Light is Joni Mitchell's second live album, and it serves as a good retrospective of her jazzy period from 1975-1979. As expected, she assembles a group of all-star musicians including Pat Metheny (guitar), Jaco Pastorius (bass), Lyle Mays (keyboards), and Michael Brecker (saxophone) who give these compositions more energy than on the studio recordings. The musicians are given room to jam, and they sound terrific on uptempo songs such as "Coyote" and "In France They Kiss on Main Street." If there is a general theme of these songs, it's about growing older and maturing after the failed idealism of the late '60s (the album opens with audio clips from the movie Rebel Without a Cause). Although this album is pleasing, the live arrangements are not different enough from the studio versions to warrant higher marks. In fact, Mitchell has always been an album artist who recorded studio albums that had a sound and feel all their own. While Shadows and Light provides a nice summary of her experimental period for casual fans, interested listeners should start with Hejira or The Hissing of Summer Lawns.

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Wild Things Run Fast

On her first new studio album of original material in five years and her debut for Geffen Records, Joni Mitchell achieved more of a balance between her pop abilities and her jazz aspirations, meanwhile rediscovering a more direct, emotional lyric approach. The result was her best album since the mid-'70s.

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Dog Eat Dog

Joni Mitchell here turned to guests like Michael McDonald, Thomas Dolby, Don Henley, James Taylor, and Wayne Shorter, continuing to straddle the worlds of California folk/pop and jazz fusion. Musically, it worked, although as a lyricist, Mitchell again took off after abstractions (one song railed against "The three great stimulants of the exhausted ones/Artifice, brutality and innocence"), such that, even when you could figure out what she was talking about, you didn't care.

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Chalk Mark in a Rain Storm

Long before Frank Sinatra made his Duets album, Joni Mitchell cast a variety of name singers in prominent roles for the songs on Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm. Peter Gabriel sings with her on the leadoff track, "My Secret Place," and Don Henley is heard on "Lakota" and "Snakes and Ladders," Billy Idol and Tom Petty have roles in "Dancin' Clown," and Willie Nelson brings his dry phrasing to "Cool Water," while ex-Cars singer Benjamin Orr and ex-Prince associates Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman also have backup parts. Mitchell uses the vocal firepower over spare tracks heavy on percussion (by Manu Katche) and programming to tell stories and comment on social issues. "Lakota" deals with Native American and environmental matters, "Cool Water" (a Mitchell rewrite of the Bob Nolan original) discusses water pollution, "The Tea Leaf Prophecy (Lay Down Your Arms)" and "The Beat of Black Wings" tell war-related tales. But Mitchell's main theme, which encompasses those topics, concerns the evils of contemporary culture in which one struggles to be "Number One," rises and falls like a game of "Snakes and Ladders," and suffers "The Reoccurring Dream" brought on by advertising. Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm rarely makes these points personally enough to stir the listener, and the trendy percussion sound (popular with artists like Gabriel and Kate Bush in the '80s) is already beginning to sound dated. But the songwriting and Mitchell's voice remain impressive, especially when she recalls her past with a revised version of "Corrina, Corrina" at the end.

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Night Ride Home

Cutting back on the guest musicians of her previous effort and paring down to a basic small group of musicians helps add immediacy to Night Ride Home. While this release features several of Joni Mitchell's favorites, nothing here would become a hit, as Joni tended to buck trends and follow her own beat. Very involved and a rather tough listen, but well worth the attention, this would be her last for Geffen, where she languished unnoticed while the label went heavy metal crazy.

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Turbulent Indigo

Joni Mitchell returned to the relatively spare style of albums like Hejira and her early folk collections on Turbulent Indigo, emphasizing her acoustic guitar strumming and singing on a series of songs that detail the political and social discontent she had previously explored on Dog Eat Dog and Chalk Mark in a Rain Storm. In the brief opener, "Sunny Sunday," a woman tries to shoot out a streetlight with a pistol and misses every night, a metaphor for the individual's futile struggle against civilization, and Mitchell repeats much the same message in songs like "Sex Kills," a generalized criticism of everything from lawyers to the hole in the ozone layer; "Turbulent Indigo," which describes the inability of people to understand artists; "Last Chance Lost," which treats romantic disappointment; and "Not to Blame," about spousal abuse. The low-key music and restrained vocals stand in contrast to the lyrics — over and over, Mitchell's imagery refers to guns and violence. Turbulent Indigo provides a disturbing view of modern life made all the more compelling by its calm presentation.

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Taming the Tiger

This 1998 disc from Joni Mitchell harks back to the days when she heard the hissing of summer lawns and the jazzier essays of her Hejira days. The only difference between then and now is her use of a guitar synthesizer for her aural textures and melody templates. Always employing the best of musicians to help her out, Mitchell takes off on a trip through "Harlem in Havana" and ending up with "Tiger Bones" to show for it. Along the way, she puts forth "No Apologies" and rocks things up with "Lead Balloon" (which will remind one of "Big Yellow Taxi"), and contains one of her best opening one-liners ever. With "Taming the Tiger" dedicated to her newfound daughter and grandson, "Stay in Touch" could be about them, or almost anyone Mitchell's been close to. Either way, it's a great tune. Taming the Tiger is her most pleasing and consistent disc since the mid-'70s; even after all these years, Joni Mitchell continues to expand her music while keeping her integrity intact. This is definitely one of her best.

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Both Sides Now

Ex-husband Larry Klein, who serves as co-producer and musical director, explains in his liner notes that Joni Mitchell intended to tell the story of a "modern" romantic relationship in the songs, most of which come from the '30s and '40s. If so, her concept of a modern relationship is very troubled -- most of the selections are unhappy love songs. Vince Mendoza's arrangements -- a third of them played by a gigantic 71-piece orchestra, a third by a regular-size orchestra, and a third by a swing-style big band -- often suggest the oceanic sweep and serious, melancholy tone of film noir movie music. They also do a lot of Mitchell's work for her. As a singer, she has never had much projection or power, but she is a master of phrasing and tone. Mitchell often sounds like an alternate Billie Holiday, with the breathiness and note decay characteristic of later Holiday, if none of her delayed timing. Both Sides Now is not revelatory in a musical sense, but it does achieve its intention of reconceiving Joni Mitchell as an interpretive singer.

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Travelogue

According to Joni Mitchell, Travelogue is her final recorded work, and if that is so, it's a detailed exploration of moments in a career that is as dazzling as it is literally uncompromising. Over 22 tracks and two CDs (and as stunning package featuring a plethora of photographs of Mitchell's paintings), Travelogue is a textured and poetic reminiscence, not a reappraisal, of her work -- most of it from the 1970s through the 1990s. A 70-piece orchestra, as well as jazz legends Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, and Kenny Wheeler, drummer Brian Blade, bassist Chuck Berghofer, producer Larry Klein, and organist Billy Preston, among others, accompanies her. It's true that Mitchell dabbled in this territory in 2000 on Both Sides Now, but that recording only remotely resembles this one. Cast in this way it is true that this is no easy cruise, but given the nearly 40 years of her sojourn in popular music, Mitchell's work, particularly from the mid-'70s on, has been difficult for many to grasp on first listen and always gives up its considerable rewards, slowly making her records age well over time; they are not disposable as much of the music from her peers is. These completely recast songs cover the entirety of her career, from her debut, Song From a Seagull, to Turbulent Indigo (with certain albums not being represented at all). It's true there aren't high-profile cuts here except for "Woodstock," which is radically reshaped, but it hardly matters. When you hear the ultrahip, be-bopping "God Must Be a Boogie Man," there is an elation without sentimentality; in the scathing and venomous "For the Roses" and "Just Like This Train," the bitterness and aggression in their delivery offers the listener an empathy with Mitchell's anger at the recording industry -- and anyone else who's crossed her. But while there is plenty of swirling darkness amid the strings here, there is also the fulfillment of prophecy; just give a listen to this version of "Sex Kills" that bears its weight in full measure of responsibility and vision. Her voice, aged by years of smoking, is huskier and is, if anything, more lovely, mature, deep in its own element of strength. The restatement of W.B. Yeats, "Slouching Toward Bethlehem," is more stunning now than ever before as is "Hejira." In "The Circle Game" and "Slouching Toward Bethlehem," you hear the ambition in Mitchell's musical direct as she has moved ever closer to the tone poem as a song form. Though it may not be as easy on first listen as Court and Spark, Travelogue will continue to unfold over time and offer, like her best work, decades of mystery and pleasure.

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