Atlanta’s Connect crew, holding down the designated spot for deep house Thursdays is joined tonight by Alex Barck of the German collective Jazzanova. Navigating the boundaries between traditional jazz and the more contemporary electronic, chill-out and downtempo genres with a bit of a deep house vibe, Jazzanova has an extensive list of remix credits and a couple of full-length releases, including last year’s Of All the Things.
Joining Barck will be CaZ Atlanta, a new collaboration between local DJs and producers Mike Zarin and Chris Nicholson.
Listen in as Alex Barck sits in with Jamal Ahmed on WCLK 91.9FM today Thursday at 3:45pm EST. Listen live at www.wclk.com.
Alex Barck of Jazzanova w/ CaZ Atlanta and Karl Injex. $5-$10. Thurs. Nov. 19. 10 p.m. Lava Lounge. 57 13th Street. www.cosmolava.com
Yeah, I’m home and I’m sitting here with this huge view of the Appalachian mountains and it’s great and there are church bells singing some Southern hymn. I was born in Memphis and then I lived in Atlanta for 5 or 6 years — Grant Park. My dad was an Appalachian fiddler and he wanted to learn from a teach who lives up here, named Bruce Molsky. We moved here so he could be closer to the fiddle and banjo people.
Does he still play?
Yeah, his name is John Grimm and he’s in a band called the Georgia Potlickers and he has a music store up here called Vintage Music on the Dahlonega square.
Did your interest in music stem from growing up watching your father play?
Definitely, it’s kind of all he does. He’s always worked like 16 hours a day teaching lessons, doing repairs and selling instruments. In the evenings he’s either playing a show himself or working with a recording engineer or sound engineer somewhere. If I was hanging out with my dad it was always at a concert or at his shop. I used to walk home from school and he would give me a nickel to tune all of the guitars in the shop.
He’s really into Eastern music as well — he was a hippie — so he was trying to give me a classical Indian kind of training where you have to spend years tuning an instrument before you can actually play it.
GUCCI MANE: The Atlanta rapper keeps it way too real on the cover of upcoming album, The State vs. Radric Davis.
With Gucci Mane once again headed back to jail, his new song, “My Own Worst Enemy,” feels particularly apropos. Over a melancholy synth beat from Drumma Boy, Gucci touches on his near-deadly beef with Young Jeezy, his conversations with the currently incarcerated T.I., and his own frequent brushes with the law: “Me, Jeezy and T.I. share one thing in common/All are poets/Role models to young people/Though at times man we still ignore it.”
On Nov. 12, Gucci (née Radric Davis) was sentenced to 12 months behind bars for violating his probation and was removed from a Fulton County courtroom in handcuffs. He is expected to serve about half of that time. A judge ruled that he had not completed community service requirements, that he failed drug tests and that he did not secure permission to travel. The case dates back to a 2005 conviction for attacking a club promoter, and this is the second time he has failed to meet the terms of his probation – the first time last year, sent him to jail for seven months.
The setback seems to come at a bad time for him. The Atlanta-bred rapper is more popular than ever, and his highly anticipated new album, The State vs. Radric Davis, is due Dec. 8. But it has already caused chaos with fans and concert promoters around the country. His past incarceration and probation terms have led to the cancellation of about a dozen shows this year. His absences have left promoters squabbling with his manager and booking agent — and threatening to file lawsuits.
But beyond the allegations lies the allegory. If Gucci is the frog prince of Atlanta trap-rap, impatiently waiting as he has for the better half of a decade to take his turn on the throne, he doesn’t need anything else to stunt his growth. Despite collaborating in 2009 with the likes of Mariah Carey, Black Eyed Peas, Mario and Usher – who’s featured in the current single “Spotlight” from his upcoming album – Gucci’s transition from ‘hood star to pop star remains fraught with hiccups. It’s something the industry may have to come to terms with, warts and all.
There’s no doubt in my mind David Guetta wanted the first stop in his US tour to be Atlanta. Last night’s show at Opera had a number of surprises, including a two-song cameo by Atlanta-based singer Chris Willis, who’s worked with the Parisian DJ on a handful of his better known anthems. But the crowd, packed nice and tight into the main room, didn’t quite expect the crunkmaster himself, Lil Jon, to make an appearance. Again. And again. And once more towards the end. And finally, when the lights came on, and the security guard was ushering the Guettablaster from the booth, to chants of “one more song.”
Succumbing to the massive peer pressure, the headphones where unpacked, the cables were plugged back, and Guetta’s “Sexy Bitch ” came back on the sounds. Only this time, it’s the remix. The Chuckie Remix, with who else but Atlanta’s own Lil Jon.
Of course, the man jumps in the booth along with DG, except the juice got the best of dude, prompting him to get in the way of the housemaster and his tools, spinning the record back (twice!) for the frenzied crowd.
Too bad it was 3 a.m. and this is Georgia. Security shut it down right as the track was in mid build up!
So now you know, beware of dreads and gold teeth near the DJ booth, ’cause Lil Jon may mess up your encore.
White Denim’s Fits wields a dizzying, ADD aesthetic that brims with rhythmic dexterity. By design, nothing stays in one place for too long. “Radio Milk How Can You Stand It” opens with a wash of noise that bursts into rhythms snaking through funk, psychedelia and art-rock terrain. The music careens wildly, crashing against the noise-damaged, Tex-Mex spaz of “El Hard Attack Dcwyw” and the spaced-out dub of “Sex Prayer.” At the half-way point, the group’s meds seem to kick in as “Mirrored and Reverse” settles into a groove that continues its wild directional changes but tames the atmosphere. The group’s execution of such lurching musical bouts is impressive, but the rapid-fire nature of it makes Fits an exercise in difficult listening. (Downtown Music) 3 out of 5 stars.
Desiree Williams, aka That Retail Chick, is Atlanta’s go-to-girl when it comes to all things retail in urban music. As the manager of Sound Shop in the Mall West End, she makes it her business to break down the business to independent artists desperate to get their grind on.
Tonight, she’s inviting the city to eavesdrop on her conversation with record exec. Rico Brooks. It takes place at 7 p.m. at Desserts by Latrell, 581 Edgewood Ave. 678-705-3409. dessertsbylatrell.com.
One-time Georgia boy and former Archers of Loaf frontman Eric Bachmann has a one-of-a-kind voice. On the best moments of Red Devil Dawn, the second album from Bachmann’s Crooked Fingers, his voice soothes like a sedated Tom Waits; on those few cringe-worthier ones he channels Cookie Monster on an oatmeal raisin binge. Thankfully, those latter moments come few and far between. Red Devil Dawn is one of those records which incongruously pairs music and lyrics to great effect — the instrumentation heard here is upbeat, lavish, even orchestral at times, but Bachmann’s lyrics serve to contrast. The sparse “Bad Man Coming” warns of some sort of impending doom, but manages to sound like a love song; “Big Darkness” prays for change in a dying “town where nothing moves,” where “even the vultures have moved on.”
Of course, Red Devil Dawn contains its fair share of actual love songs, and the better ones are simply outstanding. “You Can Never Leave,” despite its creepy title (what gives, Bachmann?), contains some beautiful lines. “You are no father’s daughter,” Bachmann croons. “No man has this much to offer.” And later, it becomes “You are fire, you are water/ When you dance, it is torture.” Further along in the album, though, that love turns to inevitable bitterness, and on the bouncy, horn-kissed “You Threw a Spark,” all that earlier adoration has become accusation and resentment. “So don’t you go claiming that I did you wrong,” Cookie Mon- er, Bachmann, spits, “When you were the one doing nothing at all.” Continue reading “Revisited: Crooked Fingers, Red Devil Dawn” »
“One of the most influential musicians and composers of the past century, Terry Riley’s impact and influence on contemporary music and art cannot be overstated. In 1964, his revolutionary composition, In C, launched the Minimalist movement in music and his influence is still heard today in the work of Philip Glass, Steve Reich, John Adams and other classical composers. His subsequent early works, A Rainbow in Curved Air and Poppy Nogood, with their kaleidoscopic, psychedelic atmospheres, sent waves across the musical worlds of the 1960s, strongly reflected in the music of the Who, Pink Floyd, and other rock bands of the time. That influence continues today in the music of Radiohead and Animal Collective and even the National and Bon Iver. It’s no surprise that Terry Riley was recently selected by the London Times as one of the ‘1000 Makers of the 20th Century.’”
Jon Spencer of Pussy Galore, Boss Hog and Blues Explosion fame rolls through town fronting a new duo, dubbed Heavy Trash, to play the Earl this Thurs., Nov. 19 at 9 p.m. Tickets are $10 (adv). $12 (door).
… and if that’s past your bedtime, you can catch an early free show at Criminal Records the same day at 6:30 p.m.
Jon Spencer and Matt Verta-Ray are… Heavy Trash! On stage and in the studio, Jon Spencer has destroyed and rebuilt American roots music with such ferocity and wild abandon it is hard to believe that there is anything left. The trail of musical destruction in the wake of his groovy hate-fuck combo Pussy Galore still smolders with the stench of avant punk trash and nasty garage ooze and grind, while his towering work with the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion remains an indelible totem to his enormous mojo spirit and red-hot power of deliverance. He is Daddy Boss Hog! He is the Blues Exploder and Microphone Destroyer! A Gibson Brother! The man who shared a Chicken Dog with Rufus Thomas, got Soul with R.L. Burnside, and enjoyed a greasy Lap Dance with Andre Williams! He is The Man Who Loved too Much!!! Now, with his pal Matt Verta-Ray, he has become Heavy Trash, and is inviting you to a Midnight Soul Serenade.
Skinny Puppy regroups while its release hangs in limbo.
Even Skinny Puppy, the last great industrial band on the planet, is feeling the bite of the flailing global economy. As the group’s surviving members, frontman Ogre (Kevin Ogilvie) and drummer/programmer cEVIN Key (Kevin Crompton) embark on their In Solvent See Tour, they do so empty-handed. In May, the group’s label, the German-based SPV Records, filed for insolvency – the European version of filing Chapter 11. As a result, the group’s 13th studio album, ironically crafted as commentary on the current state of the U.S. economy, is left in limbo with no word as to when it will be released.
“It’s a clusterfuck,” Ogre huffs. “We worked on another album that was to be a throw-away, just to get us away from SPV, but we had a disagreement internally. So Mark [Walk] and I, who work on ohGr records, took it back. It turned out to be some of the best and most productive recording I’ve done in my whole life, so it’s going to become an ohGr record.”
Though his production work on albums for Aesop Rock and other elite indie rappers gets a lot more attention, Manhattan beatmaker Blockhead has quietly been releasing consistently strong solo albums in the last half-decade. His tracks for other artists tend to be more in the hard-hitting, slicing-and-dicing, traditional hip-hop vein, but albums such as his latest, The Music Scene, give him an opportunity to be more atmospheric and experimental, and at times, to simply space out. The disc is at its best on such creeping, smothering instrumentals as “Attack the Doctor” and “Hell Camp,” which are as compelling as the work of turntablists DJ Shadow and RJD2. One wishes, however, that Blockhead would ditch the canned, vintage-sounding voiceovers he often employs to make things a bit more ironic. On The Music Scene’s title track, it’s a ’50s-style educator chanting, “We call that a joint” – which is pretty silly. (Ninja Tune)4 out of 5 stars.
Much hullabaloo has been made after Arish “King” Khan and the King Khan & BBQ Show’s road manager Kristen Klein were arrested in Christian County, Kentucky last week. The two were picked up on alleged charges of possession of a controlled substance (mushrooms) and driving on a suspended license.
Klein appeared in court yesterday (Mon., Nov. 16), after which the band issued a statement breaking down the situation as it stands now.
“On November 16, 2009 Kristin Klein entered a guilty plea to 2nd degree possession of a controlled substance in Christian County, Kentucky. Ms Klein was driving a rental vehicle that was randomly stopped at a safety checkpoint. Officers located a controlled substance in the cab of the vehicle. Ms Klein was unaware of the contraband and the validity of her license was indeterminable at time of arrest. Under KY law a driver of a vehicle is responsible for its contents. Therefore, Ms Klein entered a guilty plea and is scheduled to appear on April 2, 2010 to provide proof of her valid license.
“King Khan & BBQ Show are driving through the night to make their Los Angeles show at Troubadour tomorrow. Tonight’s show in Phoenix is cancelled, but all further west coast dates and will to be honored. Kristin Klein is safe with the band and continuing her tenure as tour manager.”
Klein explained over the telephone today that despite their best efforts they won’t be able to play the show in Los Angeles scheduled for tonight and are now en route to San Francisco to make it in time to play at the Independent on Wed., Nov. 18.
Klein spoke off the record about the incident, but explained that despite their Canadian citizenship, an international incident was avoided. In other words, no one is being deported and the King Khan and BBQ show can and will go on.
Boston-based composer/clarinetist Karl Henning will make his Atlanta debut tonight (Tues., Nov. 17) at 8 p.m. at Emory Presbyterian Church. Admission is $10/$5 students.
Henning is in Atlanta to perform much of his music for unaccompanied clarinet, and Nicole Randall-Chamberlain will perform his music for unaccompanied flute (and a new work of her own). Together they will play some of Karl’s music for flute and clarinet duo.
You may recall that Karl’s percussion sextet “Journey to the Dayspring” as one of the works on the inaugural concert of the Schwartz Center.
Complete program for this evening performance below …
Of all the superstar DJs that come and go like transient memories of summer breezes, David Guetta has the closest connection to Atlanta. One of his main production partners and collaborators is Atlanta-based singer Chris Willis, who’s laced vocals over some of the bigger tracks this Parisian DJ has put forth (think “Every time we touch,” or ” Just a little more Love”).
Willis returns for Guetta’s fourth studio record, One Love, but his name gets lost among a laundry list of a-list collaborators like Akon, Kelly Rowland, Estelle, Kid Kudi, and Will.i.am. Despite the pop credentials, Guetta’s focus remains on the DJ booth, telling DJ Times Magazine:
Being a DJ is my life! This whole thing right now around me, I see stadium shows, I do concert halls, and my management and my record company people are like, “David, you need to go live and to come with that huge live show!” But I really don’t like that. What makes me happy is to DJ in clubs.
Lest you forget, Guetta is known for putting together quite a party (the name “Fuck me, I’m famous” ought to ring a bell), and having produced big name tracks (Black Eyed Peas’ “I got a feeling”) and remixes (Bob Sinclair’s “World, hold on”), dude’s got an extensive track list to choose from.
Don’t fret if you’re one of the unlucky ones who didn’t act fast enough to get a ticket for the XX show tonight at 529. The group is playing a free in-store show at Criminal Records in L5P tonight (Tues., Nov. 17) at 8 p.m.
With their self-titled debut, Londoners The xx drift through a mire of boy-girl, twentysomething sexual and emotional ruminations via sparse atmospheres and occasionally evolved pop melodies that hide mostly in the shadows. But when it comes to the surface in “VCR,” “Crystalised” and “Basic Space,” their simple, economical songwriting soars far beyond their years.
Atlas Sound has a new virtual 7-inch single posted as a free download over at Deerhunter’s blog. The A-side features a cover of a bounding pop number called “Doctor” by the old school Doo-Wop group, the Five Discs.
The B-Side is a very slow bout of moonlit harmonica doodling and cooing. If you caught Atlas Sound during the most recent tour with the Selmanaires, you most likely caught a glimpse of Bradford Cox’s introduction of the wretched blues harp. It’s tough to bring said instrument into the fold while maintaining even the slightest sense of sincerity, but he seems to be working it in pretty seamlessly. But to wield it for anything more than subtle texture would be the death of the song — as such its presence alone creates beautiful, psychological tension.
The harmonica’s arrival also coincides with an equally unexpected flare for pop narrative, as portrayed on the flipside of this virtual single. But there’s a push toward conflict as well as Cox seems to have also developed an affinity for mashing-up Neil Young-style stridency, longing and melancholy in one fell swoop. Still, it’s a cool couple of songs that show him expanding his repertoire and embracing some changes stylistically while keeping a grasp on his own musical fingerprint.
Duet for Theremin and Lap Steel’s latest offering captures two sprawling masses of improvised drones too harmonious to be called avant-garde and too experimental for stuffy modern classical terms. These sounds are the product of two minds sharing a single headspace and letting the music drive – which is typical of the Atlanta duo. From the onset of the 23:56 minute opener “Live at Eyedrum,” the lines are blurred as each instrument’s respective whines and whirs waver in a dream state. The longer 33:18 minute piece, “Live at Kavarna,” embodies everything the subconscious mind finds appealing when deciphering the beauty in whale songs, haunted house sounds and dog whistles. Here, they collide with the cerebellum in a graceful, slow-motion crash. Put it on and drift away. (Self released) 4 out of 5 stars.
Punk rocker GG Allin immortalized as a bobblehead stocking stuffer
That cat Santa? Yeah, he was a big ol’ pimp.
According to a trusted source (Wikipedia), Saint Nicholas of Myra was the dude who served as “the primary inspiration for the Christian figure of Santa Claus.” Apparently, he earned his cake daddy rep after gifting dowries to a destitute Christian’s three daughters to keep them from resorting to prostitution. Guess that would also explain how he stumbled upon his famed greeting: “Ho. Ho. Ho.”
It’s been music to our ears ever since. Each year around this time, we get our bells in a jingle trying to beat jolly ol’ St. Nick at his own game. To lend a helping hand, we’ve rounded up a few music-themed gifts for you to freak the music fetishist in your life.
The reissue of Pylon’s second album, Chomp, arrived like a thief in the night in October. Like the DFA-sanctioned reissue of its predecessor, Pylon’s debut full-length Gyrate, the sound qualities have been greatly improved and some strange odds and ends have been tacked on as well.
Dubbed Chomp More, the reissued album benefits a good deal from the remaster treatment it received for this first-time CD appearance. The brighter cadences and darker nuances of opening number “K,” along with “Yo-Yo,” “Italian Movie,” “Buzz” and the album’s undisputed classic “Crazy” unfurl with the bounce, hazy disco, punk and funk angles that defined alternative rock when Chomp was initially released in 1983.
It’s a natural instinct to blather on about the group’s Athenian cohorts R.E.M. and the B-52’s when trying to qualify what made Pylon such a revered part of Athens’ musical heritage. But Pylon wielded a darker sexual, emotional and cerebral edge. The only thing they had in common with those other bands was time and place. It’s more fitting to drop names like PiL, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Gang of Four and Wire if you’re attempting to peg the group’s post-punk and raw new wave aesthetics. But even those comparisons don’t quite add up either. “No Clocks” and “Reptile” are rigid songs by design, underscoring the group’s signature styles — mechanical rhythms, sparse and chattering guitar lines and Vanessa Briscoe-Hay’s growling mantras that all compliment each other with balanced precision. But there’s a looseness to it all that swells within these songs, and an element of simplicity that taps into the higher functions of musical cognition.
Atlanta’s Connect crew, holding down the designated spot for deep house Thursdays is joined tonight by Alex Barck of the German collective Jazzanova. Navigating the boundaries between traditional jazz and the more contemporary electronic, chill-out and downtempo genres with a bit of a deep house vibe, Jazzanova has an extensive list of remix credits and a couple of full-length releases, including last year’s Of All the Things.
White Denim’s Fits wields a dizzying, ADD aesthetic that brims with rhythmic dexterity. By design, nothing stays in one place for too long. “Radio Milk How Can You Stand It” opens with a wash of noise that bursts into rhythms snaking through funk, psychedelia and art-rock terrain. The music careens wildly, crashing against the noise-damaged, Tex-Mex spaz of “El Hard Attack Dcwyw” and the spaced-out dub of “Sex Prayer.” At the half-way point, the group’s meds seem to kick in as “Mirrored and Reverse” settles into a groove that continues its wild directional changes but tames the atmosphere. The group’s execution of such lurching musical bouts is impressive, but the rapid-fire nature of it makes Fits an exercise in difficult listening. (Downtown Music) 3 out of 5 stars.
Though his production work on albums for Aesop Rock and other elite indie rappers gets a lot more attention, Manhattan beatmaker Blockhead has quietly been releasing consistently strong solo albums in the last half-decade. His tracks for other artists tend to be more in the hard-hitting, slicing-and-dicing, traditional hip-hop vein, but albums such as his latest, The Music Scene, give him an opportunity to be more atmospheric and experimental, and at times, to simply space out. The disc is at its best on such creeping, smothering instrumentals as “Attack the Doctor” and “Hell Camp,” which are as compelling as the work of turntablists DJ Shadow and RJD2. One wishes, however, that Blockhead would ditch the canned, vintage-sounding voiceovers he often employs to make things a bit more ironic. On The Music Scene’s title track, it’s a ’50s-style educator chanting, “We call that a joint” – which is pretty silly. (Ninja Tune) 4 out of 5 stars.
Who are you?
Duet for Theremin and Lap Steel’s latest offering captures two sprawling masses of improvised drones too harmonious to be called avant-garde and too experimental for stuffy modern classical terms. These sounds are the product of two minds sharing a single headspace and letting the music drive – which is typical of the Atlanta duo. From the onset of the 23:56 minute opener “Live at Eyedrum,” the lines are blurred as each instrument’s respective whines and whirs waver in a dream state. The longer 33:18 minute piece, “Live at Kavarna,” embodies everything the subconscious mind finds appealing when deciphering the beauty in whale songs, haunted house sounds and dog whistles. Here, they collide with the cerebellum in a graceful, slow-motion crash. Put it on and drift away. (Self released) 4 out of 5 stars.
