End of the Month Music Bitchfest - June

6.29.11

3:13 pm

 

I was thinking about writing this yesterday, but held out in case someone was waiting until the 29th to drop some crazy news.

Fruitless.

Utterly, utterly fruitless.

 

Nine Inch Nails

Nothing.

That isn't a play on Trent Reznor's now-defunct record label.

There's absolutely no news.

That Girl With The Dragon Tattoo trailer is out there and making folks wet, but, other than that, the NIN/HTDA front has been silent.

I blame his infant.

 

They Might Be Giants

A mere three weeks away from the advent of TMBG's latest album, "Join Us".

The anticipation mounts.

In a recent interview, Linnell (the quiet guy) said: "Now that it’s done, we’ve had our harshest critics weigh in — our closest friends, including our wives – and they are unstinting in their truth."

He didn't actually go on to say what that truth was, but, that's really not for us to know, is it?

Fans will find out, and weigh in ourselves, in less than a month.

AND, if you happen to pick up the digital version of the new album, you will find my name, along with other members of the TMBG Instant Fan Club, hidden in the artwork.

I'll be sure to locate and crow about it next time...

And in exactly a month, I will be at the Williamsburg Waterfront with hundreds of sweaty hipsters, watching TMBG play their new material (as well as a career-spanning selection of old material) for the first time ever.

It will be hot and bothersome, but only until the sun goes down, when it will become slightly less hot and bothersome.

Fingers still crossed for this one, but, as I always say...let go and let God sort them out.

They've also announced more tour dates...nothing in NYC at the moment, so...yeah.

And the day after I see TMBG in Williamsburg...

 

Eels

...I will be seeing Eels in Williamsburg at the Music Hall of Williamsburg, or whatever it's called.

I should move to Williamsburg. right????!!!!

Sorry, don't think I could maintain that level of irony.

Not without acquiring some sort of spastic colon disorder or something.

But, SCD notwithstanding, I checked out a teeny tiny slice of video from this Eels tour and I am ECSTATIC about the band.

It looks to be the same set up from last year (four guitars, one drummer, pure rock)...but with a full horn section.

Fucking yes.

And, of the three or four songs I saw on their set list, it appears to be Souljacker heavy show.

Which is awesome.

Over the weekend, Eels played Glastonbury and kicked some serious ass.

I'm glad of that.

I'd like for more people to dig Eels.

More Scottish people anyway.

 

Cake

Touring.

Snarking.

Whatever.

There was talk a while ago about the band working on a sort of book to go along with their song "Bound Away", but I haven't heard anything about that lately.

It isn't new music though, so no real interest here.

They should have a new music video coming along any day now, most likely for "Moustache Man".

*shrug*

 

Beck

Beck...is beginning to get on my nerves...

After a solid month or so of misconstrued* silence, his site suddenly posts two updates in about as many days...neither of which involve new Beck music.

The first, that he is producing yet another album that isn't his, namely, the new Stephen Malkmus (from...Pavement, I think?) and The Jinks.

I could be less interested in this...but I'm not certain as to how.

And second, that he is the guest editor of this quarter's Zoetrope: All Story, a literary magazine that oh who gives a fuck.

Beck.

Stop producing other people's shit.

Produce some fucking music.

Here's why I'm getting bitchy: the longer an artist takes to produce new music, the better this new music has to be.

As in: if it's taken this long than he/she must have put a lot of time/effort into it, so my expectations are raised.

It's just math.

If the album is amazing, the best thing they've ever done, great, everything is fine, but...if this album doesn't live up to my unreasonably high standards, well, then I start to get antsy.

When's the next new album, the better new album coming out?

And so on.

It's been about three years since Beck put out Modern Guilt, a solid album, but shorter and less layered than Guero and The Information and I'm beginning to get slightly uncomfortable.

I don't doubt that whatever Beck does next is gong to be pure Beck and interesting/fun/etc.; if you'll recall, of my top five I'm most looking forward to Beck's new material because of his inherent ability to consistently make good music, but, well, I'm just getting a little impatient.

A new Record Club isn't going to cut it, and neither is some other artist being produced by Beck with him lending vocals and guitar here and there.

Sack up, Hansen.

It's time to make us dance.

 

Still nothing on the Garbage/Tweaker/Tori Amos/St. Vincent fronts.

But.

Marilyn Manson has debuted a brand new design for his official site and with it, a brand new, rambling, pseudo-intellectual journal entry entitled "Rapeture", naturally.

Here's a taste:

"Christianity
Manufactures
Yesterdays
Killers

 Brave Now World. Don’t ever believe what you read, especially if you are illiterate.  Art will be the burning churches, burning beds, burning witches, burning bridges, burning Cadillacs, burning forests, burning flags, and the burning human remains that are the evidence of the burned books, filled with stories of our razor and rope burns.

But we will not be the ashes. We will not be cremated, we will cauterize our wounds.  We never wanted our wings anyway.

We are more than the flightless creatures, that are always expected to rise from the bonfire. These are barbecues for trembling, idiot arsons who pretend to be America’s Vatican in whatever ‘ism’ is easiest to swallow.  After the horrid blowing jobs, they expect us to fight against each other to obtain the security of willing slaves.

 We do not walk among them.  I am among no one."

 

AND, to go along with his pointless, ineffective babbling, he's also posted "an undisclosed clip from an untitled song"...which, for reasons which will become apparent momentarily, will probably be called "I Am Among No One".

It is thoroughly uninteresting and awful, consisting of effects-heavy black and white footage of Manson zooming in and out of focus while declaring in his toneless, tuneless croak of a voice "I am among no one!" over and over.

It's the longest minute of your life and bodes horribly for any new Manson material that may (or may not, he has been hitting the Absinthe hard these past few...years) be coming.

I know what you're thinking: "How can you judge an entire album based on less than a minute of what might just be a demo of one song?! You fuck!"

Because it's a Marilyn Manson album, folks, because it's a Marilyn Manson album.

Prove me wrong, Mister Superstar...please.

Hey, maybe Beck could produce your new album, get some dusty-ass acoustic guitars and kettle drums on there.

Or maybe you could eat some humble pie and get Reznor to slice you off some talent.

Aside from the "music", Manson just released his first "museum book", a term I've never heard before and he might have made up.

It's called Genealogies of Pain and features pictures of his paintings...the same pictures people have been able to see, for free and in full, high resolution glory for years.

Well, they're now in a book.

Alongside, for some strange reason, screen captures from David Lynch's short films.

He was hawking his wares on this weird ass internet talk show called Fleischer's Universe a few nights ago.

It's rife with teenage sex humor and weird accents and people just off camera yelling things the viewer can't quite make out at both the host and Manson.

It also has a lot of Manson looking confused.

It's worth a view, simply because it's SO disconnecting and alienating for the viewer.

Click for the Mindfreak.

 

I've given SONOIO's Red a few more listens and I remain, for the most part, unimpressed.

Cortini's still doing some interesting things with sound though, so I'm not ready to totally write him off.

Feel free to check his stuff out at www.sonoio.org where you can get the first four tracks of both Blue and Red for free.

That's eight tracks of something you probably won't like...FOR FREE.

Bargain Hunter...your Quest is at an end.

 

Oh, I forgot to mention this last month, the first volume of the Portal 2 soundtrack is up for free download on the Portal 2 web site.

There's some amazing ambient, electronic sound work and should be checked out.

"Hard Sunshine" and "Triple Laser Phase" stand out.

All right, that's all.

If nothing else, July's Bitchfest will include some in-depth TMBG whinery**, I'm sure.

And I knows you likes the Bitchin'...

 

 **UPDATE**

A quick update regarding the new Marilyn Manson opus.

Manson has apparently finished the new album. It has a title and everything, and he's even played it for a few people.

His dad liked it.

It will be out "before the end of the year".

He says that he'll announce the title in a day or so.

We'll see if he remembers and if it isn't laughably offensive.

My money is on "I Am The Christfuckershitmouthniggergovernmentmoneymoneymoneyhate".

Why do I put myself through this...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* Misconstrued by me, yes, but seriously, fuck off.

** Where all the sour grapes go...get it?