Archive for the ‘music’ Category

I like Marco Scutaro approximately 10% more than I did before

Tuesday, June 8th, 2010

So much better than Lugo. Scu Scu Scutaro

He could jump another few percentage points if the Collins original became his walk-up music.

Scutaro has been more than tolerable on the whole (.285 BA, leads the team in at-bats, second in hits) and on a tear recently (.485 BA in his last ten games). If you don’t agree, then you don’t know the Red Sox unremarkable shortstop history of recent times.

H/T to Jimmy Traina and Hot Clicks for posting today.

(For Pearl Jam nerds mostly) I made a colossal error in timing

Sunday, May 23rd, 2010



This past week, I haven’t exactly been on a live music hot streak.

On Tuesday, the news came down that The Eagles and Phish are headlining Austin City Limits (Here’s a message for the crack geniuses who made that decision). I’ll never buy tickets to a festival when the line-up is site unseen ever again.

On Thursday, I went to see Pearl Jam at Madison Square Garden, and it was just OK. Then – and this is where non-Pearl Jam nerds can just scroll down and watch the video with Ben Bridwell – I saw the set-list for the show at MSG the following night.

Here are the set-lists from the two shows:

Thursday night:

1. Sometimes
2. Breakerfall
3. Last Exit
4. Animal
5. The Fixer
6. Severed Hand
7. Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town
8. I Am Mine
9. Comatose
10. Force of Nature
11. Even Flow
12. Low Light
13. Down
14. I Got Id
15. Army Reserve
16. Insignificance
17. Unthought Known
18. Do The Evolution

Encore:
20. The End
21. Lukin
22. Just Breathe
23. You Are
24. Love, Reign O’er Me (The Who cover)
25. State Of Love And Trust
26. Once
27. Porch

Encore 2:
29. Jeremy
30. Leash
31. Mankind
32. Crazy Mary (Victoria Williams cover)
33. I Believe In Miracles (Ramones cover)
34. Alive
35. Indifference

Friday night:

1. Corduroy
2. Hail Hail
3. Do The Evolution
4. World Wide Suicide
5. Got Some
6. Breath
7. Nothingman
8. I’m Open
9. Unthought Known
10. Grievance
11. Amongst The Waves
12. Present Tense
13. Not For You
14. Push Me, Pull Me
15. Rats
16. Daughter
17. The Fixer
18. Why Go

Encore:
2. The End
3. Just Breathe
4. Lukin
5. Black, Red, Yellow
6. Sweet Lew
7. Given To Fly
8. Spin The Black Circle
9. Rearviewmirror

Encore 2:
2. Wasted Reprise
3. Better Man
4. Black
5. The Real Me (The Who cover)
6. Hunger Strike (Temple of the Dog cover) (with Ben Bridwell)
7. Alive
8. Kick Out The Jams (MC5 cover)
9. Yellow Ledbetter with Star Spangled Banner guitar solo

My girlfriend and I made the decision to go Thursday night for a number of reasons, not the least of which was to see Black Keys over Band of Horses. Eddie mumbled a shout out to Dan Auerbach at one point – pittance compared to this:

Don’t get me wrong, Thursday had some highlights (Reigh O’er Me through Porch), but the set-list as a whole is just pale in comparison. I should’t even be complaining considering that I was at this show in 2008. At $90 a ticket to sit in the 400 level, I reserve the right to sulk a little.

Maybe my timing will be better next tour. I leave you with a quality video of Breath that someone took on Friday:

Red Sox players have discerning musical tastes

Wednesday, May 5th, 2010

H/T to Ryan Hudson (Editor, SB Nation) for finding this deep link on the Red Sox website that lists their walk-up music. He especially likes Dice-K taking the mound to Fabolous. Personally, I don’t think it’s gets any better than Jeremy Hermida coming out to N2Deep’s “Back to the Hotel.”


Four different tracks. Artists and titles unknown.

They actually let him get away with that.

Is this something that’s universally listed on every team’s website? It should be. I did some not-great research, and could only find a listing of the 2008 Detroit Tigers entrance music. However, a coworker of mine who was at the Yankee game last night at least confirms that a certain captain comes out to this song…



And yes, here’s N2Deep with “Back to the Hotel”

Who is Romain Gavras (Director, M.I.A. ‘Born Free’)?

Monday, April 26th, 2010

If you’re like me – meaning you don’t like Justice and don’t pay attention to them, even though they look really cool – you had never heard of French director Romain Gavras until this morning’s agitating M.I.A. video release. Now, if you’re like me, you not going to forget his name for sometime.

To be honest, I’m not sure I can name a single music video director other than Hype Williams. It takes a lot to make a lasting impression in that medium (copious overuse of fisheye lenses, etc.). Today, Gavras proved that blowing off a young ginger’s head is one way to do that – can I use ginger colloquially still or is that offensive? And what do the South Park creators think about this? This clip is a conversation starter.

If you want to avoid asking boorish questions like that, here are some more of Gavras’ videos to help get acquainted with his style – I think they call this verite. Or he might just like shooting close-ups of people looking angry.

In descending order of most violent…

Top Ten SPIN Magazine Covers from the 1990s

Thursday, March 25th, 2010



Whitney Matheson (Pop Candy) picked up on this first earlier. I commend her.

SPIN Magazine did Rock N’ Roll fans a solid, and put every issue from their back catalog – dating back to the first issue in May, 1985 that featured Madonna on the cover – on Google Books.

At some point I’m going to go way down the rabbit hole with this. Chuck Klosterman features, here I come. In the meantime, check out ten covers from what I think we can all agree was the golden age of SPIN – the 1990s.

1990 – Depeche Mode, July


1991 – Sinead O’Connor, November


1992 – Chris Cornell, September


1993 – Evan Dando & Adrienne Shelly, April

1994 – Kurt Cobain, June


1995 – Pearl Jam, January


1996 – Rage Against The Machine, October

1997 – Ani Difranco, August


1998 – Marilyn Manson, February


1999 – Beck, December

Not-So-Hippies in the City: My first Trey Anastasio Concert

Thursday, February 18th, 2010

Tuesday night, I went to my first Trey Anastasio concert at Terminal 5 in NYC (conveniently located on 11th Ave near all the bad nudie bars. Woohoo!). For those of you who do not know who Trey is, he is the lead singer of Phish. For those of you who do know who he is, below is the set list:

Trey Anastasio & Classic TAB
February 16, 2010
Terminal 5
New York, NY

Set One: Shine, Cayman Review, Push On ‘Til the Day, Alaska, Mozambique, Gotta Jibboo, All That Almost Was, Drifting, Liquid Time, The Birdwatcher, Night Speaks to a Woman, Tuesday, Brian and Robert*, Strange Design*, Sample in a Jar*, Chalkdust Torture*, Wilson*

Set Two: Sand, Alive Again, Last Tube> Show of Life, Sultans of Swing, Ether Sunday, Black Dog

Encore: Magilla, First Tube

* – Trey Solo Acoustic

Now, I am not a huge Trey fan. I like some of his music, he’s a phenomenal guitar player, and it was an excuse to drink beer and hang with my buddies on a Tuesday night (I sincerely hope I have not offended any Phish Heads reading this by saying that). Here is what I learned:

1) I will get the sophomoric, frat-boy comments out of the way first: We saw one woman we deemed attractive. Moving on…

2) Several of the songs Trey and Classic TAB played? They originally wrote ‘em and they were later adopted by Phish, prompting one buddy to say “HA! Phish is like a glorified cover band!” (again, Phish Heads, he is a big Trey fan. He was kidding. Please no hippie voodoo on us).

3) The concert started at 8:30 and lasted (minus a short break in the middle) until midnight. Set two was 70 minutes alone. However, the energy was high the entire time and it’s hard not to get excited when there’s a second-set ending cover of Led Zeppelin’s “Black Dog”:

Get the Led Out…

4) Trey ended the show with “First Tube,” the first song he wrote with Classic TAB. Enjoy this jam-tastic bit from 10/25/08:

Trey with Classic Tab – \”First Tube\”

5) Finally, the concert was a blast (if you get a chance to check the band out, after one concert I suggest you do so) but there was a TINY part of me that was hoping we’d get a surprise guest…like this one:

Phish featuring The Boss

Top Five Renditions of When The Saints Go Marching In

Friday, February 5th, 2010

Super Bowl prediction: I don’t know, Indy by six?

I don’t really have an opinion on who’s going to win the game. However, I am certain, by the end of Sunday night, we will all be sick and tired of hearing the song When The Saints Go Marching In. Even odds that The Who noodle around with it during half time.

If you dislike this song – which, not for nothing, if you dislike this song then you’re a jerk, it’s delightful and timeless – you should probably either watch the game on mute or chew your 7-foot sandwich really loudly.

Here are my Top Five Renditions* of When The Saints Go Marching In.

*So as not to go buck-wild with the Saints favoritism, I didn’t post the original Who Dat?! version, but I did post it over here.

5.) The Seeger Sessions Band


4.) Jerry Lee Lewis


3.) Elvis


2.) Louis Armstrong & Danny Kaye


1.) Fats Domino

New Gorillaz Single “Stylo” Leaks (hear it!)…

Wednesday, January 20th, 2010

Fun factoids about Coachella:

  • Even though the festival site looks like a barren desert, the grounds are somehow dubbed the Empire Polo Club.
  • Goldenvoice, the company organizing the event, also runs All Points West festival.

So you’re saying there’s a chance that Gorillaz could be headlining an East Coast festival too?

Rolling Stone reports, just one day after Gorillaz were named the Saturday night headliner of Coachella, the first single ‘Stylo’ off the band’s upcoming third album leaked on YouTube, here it is:

As the Google search above begs, hit the poll at the bottom and let me know what you think about this track.

Gorillaz new album “Plastic Sun” is out March 9.

Ian Mackaye and D.I.Y. America gone Mainstream?

Tuesday, January 19th, 2010

Trying to figure out his angle here. Because the Ian Mackaye that I know would avoid like the plague anything with even a tinge of corporate sensibility. So, what exactly is he doing in a web series called D.I.Y. America that’s produced by Nike’s ad agency, Wieden+Kennedy?

Along with Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore and some of the old school of skating’s finest, Mackaye is featured in an episode (or part of one) called Skate & Create, which “explores “the skaters’ gaze”— the way a skateboarder looks at the urban environment in a completely different way from others.”

It’s not bad – not nearly as clownish as the phrase skaters’ gaze would suggest – but I thought you were militant about this sort of thing, Mackaye? After all, it’s called D.I.Y. America, yet the video is only available on W+K’s website here?

I’m sure he had his reasons, still, I’d like to think of Ian Mackaye like this: on a budget stage performing a $5 show.



Ian MacKaye Gets DIY For Nike’s Ad Agency
(STEREOGUM)

Photo via Flickr

Baron Davis dribbles his way through NYC…

Thursday, January 14th, 2010

I agree with First Cuts, I like the shirt.

Smooth moves by Common on there too, but who’s cooler than Boom Dizzle? (Certainly not Diz Gibran, the M.C.)

For the love of pete, vote for Baron to be in NBA JAM.