"Could be worse...you could be the lead singer in The Fall."

Have you seen Control, the Ian Curtis biopic yet? You should. It's really very good. We all know what happens in the end and you can figure out the stuff in the middle if there's any familiarity with the band's history and music. The film? Is a looker. A beaut. Surprisingly funny and wonderful to look at. And enjoyable to watch, too. The story moves at the appropriate pace and distance, complementing its subject. One of my faves from the past year. If you've ever seen band photos from the past two or so decades (and who hasn't?), you've probably encountered Anton Corbijn's work. This is such a solid first film for the renowned photographer. LOVE IT. I can write whole essays about this movie but it's late and I have poetry to reread for class tomorrow. Really need to see this movie again. So good!

Ladri di biciclette

Someone stole my bike's back wheel. My bike's back wheel was stolen. Passive voice and all, I prefer the second sentence. Puts the emphasis on the important thing, the back wheel. Never mind the subject. I am all about objects.

C'est moi et ma bicyclette
It's incredible to have my primary mode of transportation fucked with. I found it amusing and disheartening that someone would even consider my bike as something of value, enough to steal--it's rusty and gross and there was an apparent dent in the back wheel where I had kicked it the night before out of sober frustration after deciding that, as a duo, we were over. No more of me and my blue Schwinn. Great timing, Universe. Truly great. A friend told me it looks like there's been a rash of wheel theft the past day or two in the Ukrainian Village/Humboldt Park area. So, if you live in Chicago and had your bikes in those 'hoods, watch out. It's a bummer.

I punched in "bike" and "bicycle" into Itunes and came up with amazing stuff. Here ya go:

Action Patrol - Bike Cop
Deerhoof - Midnight Bicycle Mystery
The Ergs - Bike Shoppe
Lightning Bolt - Bizarro Bike
Oh No! Oh My! - The Bike, Sir
Scholastic Deth - Trust Fund aka No Bike Messengers in Russia

Action Patrol, The Ergs, Lightning Bolt, and Scholastic Deth are bands that few if any of my current friends remotely enjoy. Acquired taste, maybe. They're perennially my favorite shit and I love these tracks a lot.

I also love Deerhoof. One of my Favorites of All Time Ever. I can always listen to Deerhoof.

I'm not big on Oh No! Oh My! but I don't mind this track. It's short, it's cute, it's total kitsch indie pop music and that's nice, too.

So, I'm retiring my bike. What's left of it. RIP Blue Bicycle. <3

Okie Dokie

I dig this image very much. I dig the following song very much. Why would I ever put a song I didn't like on here? Many reasons. But tonight is not one of those nights.

Okay - Natural

It's so simple! So sweet. So plain. A perfect little gem in a lovely album that I have bets on will be HUGE. Maybe just big. With a title like Huggable Dust how could it not do well?

I like the song very much mostly because I am forever compiling hypothetical mixtapes for friends, future folk, past acquaintances, and my little sister. Little Sister is the best kid I know and the most receptive to music. I wish I had an older sibling with inconsistent but vast, sprawling taste in music to guide me in my ways. Heh. I'm such an asshole.

I would put "Natural" on the mixtape for the Love of my Apartment Life.

Say What You Will About Public Radio

I love it! I love Ira Glass, too. And the pretty picture below from Scott Olson Photography.
Did you listen to This American Life this weekend? Well, you should've. Then you should've promptly gone to the website and checked out the winners for the Break-Up Song Contest that stemmed from the brilliant story by Starlee Kine on the aptly-named episode Break-Up.

The original song was fantastic and the remakes/remixes are all lovely and heartbreakingly sweet. I love me some cute music.

The Babelfish Babbled Bubbles

Must I really share my thoughts on the new Jay-Z album that everyone seems to be gushing and gushing and gushing over? I guess I should, as I promised I would.

Look, I didn't like the Kanye West album. I, however, was listening to it out of context. I forgot that Mr. West is in the realm of the Top 40 and not the indie underground that I oh-so-very-much cherish because I am l337. After subjecting myself to both the new 50 Cent and the new Jay-Z, I have learned to appreciate him and his latest release. Sure, he's kind of a pompous dolt but he loved his Mom (what a bummer*) and his music is always catchy. I'm going to take back what I said: dude tries. Really, he does. He takes a stab at art.

I can't say the same about the Jay-Z album. It's like dude rolled out of bed, spat some gibberish and called it a Grammy. The album makes even less sense than I do.

Yes, I concede that "American Gangster" is a concept album but it's a hastily made, incredibly boring one. If you're going to make a concept album, MAKE IT. Make something worthwhile and doesn't sound so poorly cobbled together. It's over-rated and lacks that gut feeling of authenticity. Reeks of marketing ploys. And I'm totally not supporting any of my claims because, come on, just listen to the album. It's about as bad as the new Saul Williams. I have a huge freakin' crush on Saul Williams and his work but I'm honest enough to say that I thought Niggytardust is mediocre so...you get it. Right? Yeah, I'm sure you do.

*I think, however, that the biggest bummer is that Donda West's death out-shined, er, over-shadowed Norman Mailer's. NORMAN FUCKING MAILER DIED. Why is it that only Terry Gross cares?

What happened?

Someone please explain to me what happened to all of the time.

I feel like I am always sitting in front of my computer doing something other than updating this blog: typing up journal entries for my Critical Reading and Writing class, looking up pictures of dead babies for my upcoming speech (in mere hours; I am sooo not ready and will be lucky to pull off a B) in Public Speaking, er, I mean Oral Expression and just SCHOOL SCHOOL (and in between, watching Heroes, Ugly Betty, Pushing Daisies, The Office, and Project Runway) SCHOOL WORK WORK WORK SCHOOL SCHOOL DEATH. Scholastic Deth! I love that band! See, music related stuff in a music blog!

I have even more stuff to write in here about. Once tomorrow (today, technically) is over, I'm going to clean my room really well and I'm going to post a bunch of stuff that I've been meaning to and some new stuff. So, this entry is a filler entry just to keep me on track. Things to expect in the next few days:

- My take on Jay-Z's "American Gangster" and why Kanye West is my fave and my least fave mainstream MC
- Vinyl rips! Yeah. For real. Out of print, C86-ish stuff. You'll love it because I love it.
- More vinyl rips! Remember all of those singles I mentioned I had before? Well, I have some on my 'puter now, and I love to share. Because sharing is caring. Yes. That's it.

Gosh. I really need to get some sleep. I have a ridiculously busy day tomorrow and a weekend of catching up on my internet life as well as my school life (who needs a social life?!). Let's hope I hear my alarm clock and don't sleep through the only conference I have this semester. Urgh.

*Not Well-Written

I thought I had a lot more to say about the show I went to last week, but the cursor's been blinking in this empty field for so long, just blink blink blink and I couldn't come up with anything. There isn't much to say other than I grew up, I stopped listening to Sole, I stopped listening to music that "speaks" to me in a way that I no longer find appealing.

I still love a lot of the things I used to listen to. I used to really love everything associated with Anticon. Why? seems to have progressed in parallel with me by moving from weird whatever to pretty solid but still interesting indie rock territory. If you asked 15-year old me what I'd be listening to as a college senior, I never would've guessed it would largely be the CUTEST POP MUSIC IN THE WORLD--I'm looking at you, Belle and Sebastian. If you also happened to tell 15-year old me that I would go to art school to study writing, I probably would've puked up snot and intestines and laughed and laughed and laughed while wearing my science medals. I digress. What I meant to say is that I still like and listen to a lot of the stuff with the Anticon label slapped on it. Except for, well, Sole. Sole is not something that has aged well with me.



I went to the show partly because I wanted to satiate that younger, idealistic, pimply-er, fatter me who really loved dense music that reaffirmed whatever it was I believed in. Mostly, I went because I said I would as a friend was opening up. The show was good. I had fun. I got bored. I saw things and myself in a different light. However, because that experience touches on things that should be discussed with my BFFs and not a blog not meant for my post-teenage angst*, I think this is where I'll wrap up. At least I saw a cute boy.

Stutter and Stammer Around A Cherry Tree

My friend Jamie has a super good blog that you should read: Oh! How Lovely!. A day or two ago, she asked her readers what their theme songs would be. It took a while but I finally decided on one for myself:

Beat Happening - Youth

I wanted to find a song with pizazz, with pop!, with jazz hands, with flashing lights and zing, but that's just not me. Give me fuzz. Give me simple. Give me skinned knees and Tokyo and songs that clock in under two minutes. Songs that I can play, that anyone can. I love this band. I didn't start listening to them until I first got to college all of those years ago (though not that many but a lot for my short life so far). An aside: I can't believe I can measure the time I've spent in college, in Chicago, in years. Actual years. When I was young, I couldn't pronounce Chicago. My tongue wouldn't bend the right way. Then it happened, suddenly, and here I am.

swiftly sweeping away swift from my titling vocabulary

if you don't see me in the next few days, I've moved to Sweden and bought a horse and a cat. Blame NPR. Seriously. You can also blame the truly wonderful Bob Boilen's/NPR's All Songs Considered for my taste in music. Sometimes Pitchfork (yeah, I said it) but mostly ASC--go to their redesigned site and, most importantly, the new blog. It's great and where I came across the video.

Failing Swiftly

I failed at NaBloPoMo in just a three-day period. Wow. That's okay, because I failed at NaNoWriMo in even less time than that. How embarassing. Oh well. Such is the life of a "busy" person. I JUST HAVEN'T BEEN ON THE INTERNET! Blasphemy, I know. And I broke my favorite pen but that's a different story for a different place if I ever get around to it. AND I've been sick. Look, I have a lot of excuses with varying degrees of legitimacy. Really, though, I have a sinus infection that feels like a squirrel living in my upper left jaw. I didn't know that was possible until it happened! No really. My jaw hurts and I have a sinus infection. Sick or not, I did do a lot of music related stuff since I went missing. I'll parcel those out in appropriate doses in the next few days.

Last Saturday, on the day that I did not post in this here blog, I went to the Sole headlining show at Abbey Pub. There's a lot to write and it deserves its own post. But I will leave you with the following--a Missed Connection for Mostly Certain:

sole (not the fish*) show @ abbey pub

You were by yourself, dark hair, scruffy-faced, glasses, a hoodie/vest? combo thing and a collared shirt? I can't remember. You grabbed a beer at the bar early on in the night and I almost approached you because I thought you were a friend of a friend; a friend of a friend I have yet to formally meet but have an e-crush on because I'm an idiot internet stalker fiend but this whole last bit is not relevant, is it? Anyway, I just wish you weren't into such didactic music. You were totally into it. How endearing.

*Fish pictures? You need fish pictures? You should go here.

A Swift Kick From 1995

Sonic Youth - Little Trouble Girl (m4a, not mp3)

Seriously. Watch the video. Listen to the song. It is delicious. It's like the first time I watched Ghost World. A couple of us gals spent the night in a friend's attic bedroom in a drafty house. We curled into bed and watched the movie and I was completely floored. This is what being a girl is, neigh this is what being a teenage girl is (and even now I'd contend that this is how it is, though I'm not all that far-removed from teenage-hood). This is the isolation I feel. This is how my life and my perceptions are deflating. None of that is wrong, really, but it's just how it is. Recently, I tried to explain to someone why Ghost World is one of my favorite movies (and then one of my favorite comics) and I couldn't without resorting to, "You have to be a girl to understand. It perfectly portrays what growing up as a girl feels like." I really hated myself for saying that because it was inadequate.



But that's the way I would attempt to describe "Little Trouble Girl", too. I can't succinctly write about why this song encompasses and opens up everything ever about my gender as I've experienced it any better than how I attempted to explain why Ghost World is just so good. "Little Trouble Girl" may be a little bit more on the surface but it's the sing-songy repetition, the general malaise (fancy word alert) that really does it. Plus, Kim Deal! Kim Gordon! Perfection, those two.

The Decade-And-Some of Repetitious Band Names

Gang Gang Dance like Die! Die! Die! and whatever, sixty-four more Something Something bands that are no where near being as good as those two and all of the stellar bands I know I'm not thinking of.



Dance Party Earthquake Riot Volcano. WHY HAVEN'T I BEEN LISTENING TO THIS BAND THE MOMENT I HEARD ABOUT THEM? Why must I dismiss everything because of a dumb band name and because it is "cool" when it actually is cool? Or hot. Hot like things that which are so cool that it defies all logic and simultaneously exists in both ends of the spectrum thus being HOT and COOL. Not smoking hot because I am asthmatic and that would be a bad scene, man. Really bad. Why must I be this way?