Bands That Sound Suspiciously Like Radiohead

Exhibit A: Home Video. Moody piano? Check. Stuttering drums? Check. Ethereal, mysterious, oft-lingering-on-one-word vocals? Check. Yeah, it's missing, like, a 17/8 time signature or two, but whatever.



Exhibit B: Duologue. It's like Radiohead themselves, through a just slightly distorted mirror. All the elements above, plus some extreme falsetto and a bass line that seems more than a tad influenced by "I Might Be Wrong."

Duologue - Cut & Run by Freedom Or Death

Listening to this, I feel like I'm cheating on Radiohead. Quick quick, lads, get that new album out before this develops into a full-blown affair.

Have a Ghoulish Halloween

I seem to have stumbled across a bunch of actually good sort-of Halloweeny music entirely by accident in the past few months. It would be ghoulish of me not to share.

The Dead Weather: Die by the Drop
"A little grave we can fill together."




Cat Power: Werewolf
She did this song a few years ago. I came across it in the context of Almodovar's latest, "Broken Embraces."




Liminanas: I'm Dead
Only the French could make being dead so lively.


The National: Anyone's Ghost
"Walk through the Manhattan valleys of the dead."




Salem: Frost
Well, if the music genre is called witch haus, of course it's going to be Halloween-appropriate. Get it via pitchfork here.


The Black Keys: Howlin' for You.
Because no Halloween playlist is complete without a little blues-heavy howlin' at the moon.

Five Shows In Two Weeks

The National at Prospect Park, July 27

I can't figure out where the voice of The National's lead singer Matt Berninger comes from. He isn't a big guy. Certainly, his body isn't big enough to contain that delicious, warm, large voice. As he sang lyrics like "I was afraid/I'd eat your/brains" and "I'm sorry I missed you/I had a secret meeting in the basement of my brain" (which latter would make an excellent corporate voicemail greeting) at the Prospect Park Bandshell, I came to this conclusion: There are, in fact, more than three dimensions, and in the fourth and fifth dimensions, Berninger is a giant.

This show was perfect in every way: relaxed crowd, pleasant evening, a local band - most of them apparently walked to the show - that knew their crowd. As they introduced their song "The Geese of Beverly Road," there was a dedication to the poor geese formerly of Prospect Park. And I'm still trying to figure out where the Veil of Cashmere is.

Morning Benders/Black Keys at Central Park, July 28

I don't quite get what all the fuss about the Black Keys is about. Yes, they're a good blues band, and I'd like to see them in a tiny, dim, smoky bar while licking BBQ sauce off my fingers and maybe have a conversation with the drummer at the bar later. But the sort of God-like status they've achieved in certain circles is beyond me, and this show did nothing to change this. Perhaps I need to become a boy in my early 20s and grow my hair down to my shoulders and wear a headband to truly understand.

The Morning Benders, on the other hand, were quite precious. "Promises" may be my favorite song of the year.

The Swell Season at Prospect Park, July 30

This free show was incredibly packed, so much so that I wound up outside the fence listening to it after deciding I didn't feel like defending my square patch of land within the fence with my fists. Which was fine: there was a nice picnic, and some annoying dogs, to add atmosphere. This is another band that I don't quite get the popularity of (yeah yeah cute little indie movie whatever yeah), but my night was made when they rocked out with a couple of Frames songs.

Basia Bulat/Tune-Yards/St. Vincent at Central Park, Aug. 1

Basia Bulat was adorable in an all-over-the-place kind of way, and she brought a little bounce to everything she played, including a cover of an incredibly depressing song called, appropriately enough, "I'm So Depressed," by Abner Jay, which was my favorite thing she did (thank you, YouTube taper - awesome video).



St. Vincent was the opposite: technically on point, but chilly to the point of alienating the crowd. There are few things that turn me off to music more than a band that doesn't look like it's having fun, and her band looked like they would rather have been chewing nails.

The highlight of this show, though, was Tune-Yards. Merrill Garbus was a hoot, with her amazing, warbling voice that she loops back on itself infinitely, and her multi-piece brass section that she brought special for the show. Here is a woman who knows how to get the audience involved, forcing us all at one point to do a gleeful shout-out to her Grandpa Lou. And when she bellowed "Grr-ah, grr-ah, we all fall DOOOOOWNN," I had the feeling that here was a star in the making.

The Dead Weather at Prospect Park, Aug. 3

The Dead Weather was so good they were able to overcome the distractions created by an obnoxious crowd that included a man who spilled at least two beers on me and a group of boys who decided to dance a poor version of Hava Nagila while we waited for the encore ("this is what they do in Brooklyn, right?" one of them said, accidentally kicking me). Oh, Jack White and Alison Mosshart, what I endure to experience your rock-star-god auras, completed by blowtorches on stage and stuffed rams heads, or something, mounted on the speakers.

They played all the big, bad, roaring anthems in epic style, but surprisingly, it was the impossibly sexy, sultry, sung-into-one-mike duet, "Will There Be Enough Water," a song I hadn't paid much attention to previously, that left me completely floored. Somebody videotaped it. Bless you, somebody.

You Don't Want To Know. So Now There's A Divide

I am uncertain about how to pronounce Menomena, and I sort of like it that way. I hope it's pronounced such that it almost rhymes with "phenomenon," which is how I like to let it roll off my tongue. If it's not, and it's actually something that sounds like a child's chant about a bully, don't tell me. I don't want to know.

While we're on the topic of my own insecurities, I am also uncertain that I'm actually smart enough to be listening to this group. They're sort of the musical equivalent of what Winston Churchill said the one time about Russia.

One thing I am certain of, however, is that this group will always produce at least one song that I find to be perfect on each and every album they put together. On their last one - you know, the one with the puzzling cover art - it was "Running," which could be about exercising too much, or could be about starving in a post-apocalyptic landscape while being chased by cattle. You just can't be sure.

On the new album, Mines, there are plenty of options to choose from - including the second track, Taos, which I'd swear I just heard a Followill brother running naked through. But my personal favorite is "Intil." (Until? Intel?) It's a little bit the piano; oh, that marching bit that kicks in at 2:30 or so. But only a little bit; the vast, vast majority of my affection for this song is lyrics-driven. Or lyric-driven, if you prefer, since it's really just the one sentiment, repeated over and over until it penetrates passive listening mode, maybe not until the very end of the song, when, just as it concludes, you think, "Wait! What?" And listen to it eight times over again, in a row.

"Sometimes I say too much. I never thought I'd lie."

Mines is streaming at NPR for another few days. Intil is the last track.

B Flat Is Rather Odd

Okay, so I am obsessed with vuvuzelas, and their B-flat-ish-ness.

First of all, why B flat, and not A sharp? Why vuvuzela, and not lepatata?

Nonetheless, B flats make alligators bellow. See?



B flats also continue after you are gone.

Black holes sing in B flat. Apparently, in basso profondo B flat.

Johnny B. Goode is a famous song in B flat. And, as NPR (which seems to be even more obsessed with B flat than I am) tells us, the opening guitar lick in "Welcome to The Jungle" is in B flat.

Thanks to YouTube's new vuvuzela button, which may possibly be one of the top 10 worst best ideas ever, you can now overlay vuvuzelas on top of these tracks. Just click the little soccer icon at the lower right of the video screen. You have to go to the YouTube site, it doesn't work with the embed code.

Johnny B. Goode

Welcome to the Jungle

And, saving the best for last, Vuvuzela Concerto in B Flat.

Welcome To The (Sort Of Creepy) World Cup

BLK JKS' "Zol" should be - probably will be - a sure-fire World Cup hit. It's obviously geared for that: they're from Jo-burg, the lyrics are futbol-y, there's a call-response thing going on, the album drops two days before the World Cup starts, they're playing at the opening ceremonies...and for the first 15 seconds or so, it's, yeah, instant theme song.

But all the BLK JKS I've listened too (full disclosure: not much, just a handful of songs) has sounded a little minor key, a little discordant, and I'm hearing that here, too, once the lyrics kick in. Is there not something a little off about this song? Is that guitar line not a little too insistent, almost as if it wants to be in a different song? Are the lyrics not intentionally a bit flat at times? Is it an ANTHEM, yes, in all caps, like the band?

It's so subtle, I start to doubt myself. Is it me? Is my hearing and judgment finally starting to go? So I go and listen to something else, something major key, something sunny and Katrina and the Waves-ish...and then I come back to this...and...It's not me. I don't think.

Is it just that this is how the band plays, anthem be damned? Or is it on purpose?

New York, Sometimes It's Killing Me

This song expresses my own mixed emotions towards my adopted home so well it's almost creepy.

You got that nice slow phrasing from Gil Scott-Heron, evocative of the southern transplant making their way (and I'm not from Jackson TN, but it is eerily close to the family homestead).

You got the New York patter from Nas, so fast you can't totally follow it, as fast as the city itself, loving the city, but hating it a little too - a more realistic representation than the Beastie Boys' paean.

Yeah, I too can see why some get up and move where it's slow. New York, have mercy on me.

Go download it here.

Oh The Irony: Sleigh Bells Produces Perfect Summer Album

Most summers, there's an album that makes me wish I had a car, so that I could drive around, windows down, stereo blasting, and share my musical tastes with all those around me. Because I suffer from that same delusion of so many other Brooklynites, namely that everyone wants to know what my musical taste is, particularly as I drive past them, and will be forced to agree that, yes, (insert name of band I hadn't known of previously here) is amazing.

Last summer, there wasn't a summer album like that. Of course, there wasn't really a summer, either, in New York, so perhaps it was fitting.

This spring, I think summer's come early. This spring, I may just rent a car and drive around blasting the new Sleigh Bells album, and in particular this song, for a week or so. Because I'm especially convinced that YOU will thank me for it. Yes, that's me, driving around the block over and over again in my $20 rent-a-wreck.



Welcome back, summer. You were missed.

Thom Yorke Makes Manhole Covers Explode!

Manhole covers exploding! Three-alarm fires! The threat of carbon monoxide poisoning! If it were any other band, I would have had doubts that the actual Atoms for Peace show could top the random events that came before it.

I emerged blinking and mildly disoriented, as one does, from the 7th Ave. B subway stop a little after 6 p.m. Tuesday, hoping to pick up my will call tix for Atoms for Peace from Roseland quickly and grab a bite to eat before the show. The only warning of the chaos awaiting was the comment by a tourist type to her companion as they exited in front of me: "Well, we found the fire."

Sure enough. Some random only-in-New-York transformer-blowing-up-manhole-cover-exploding thing had just happened, right smack dab in front of Roseland. 52nd Street was blocked off, along with several blocks of Broadway. Hordes of firemen were standing around in full gear. Dazed groups of tourists were sitting on their suitcases pondering the likelihood of being able to check into their hotels. The line to get into the Atoms for Peace show was winding along the back of Roseland along 53rd, rather than the front.

After fending off somebody who wanted to know if I was in line for Jersey Boys (later canceled) and hearing that there would be no word on whether or not the show was a go until 7 p.m., I opted not to torment myself by standing in line, and toddled off to dinner. There, I irked my companions by puttering around on my Blackberry trying to figure out what the hey was going on until a kind gent at a nearby table let us know that his friend, in line for the show, had tweeted that it was ON! but delayed half an hour (finally, I see the utility of Twitter...).

Back to Roseland, where the club had shifted their box office to a folding table outside the 53rd Street entrance. Chaos, yes, but organizedly so, with everyone basically filtering in through one small back door.

Inside, perhaps strangest was how normal everything was. Thom Yorke, looking as if he had climbed out of bed and wandered straight onto stage, addressed the day's events in normal understated fashion, declaring, "Well, that was an interesting afternoon." He and Flea and those other guys in the band then proceeded to create a cocoon of sound that blocked out every last New York distraction.

I was most curious at this show to see how Flea's hard-driving vibe would fit in with Thom's subtler one. While there were a few moments of "This Is Flea. Playing Bass. Watch, And Learn," it worked well for the most part. In fact, some of those bass licks on the Eraser seem made for him. The two men even dance sorta the same weird half-crazed way, making for an odd stage spectacle.

But the highlights of the show for me lay elsewhere. One came on "Skip Divided," where Flea used a blow-organ to lay down the harmony that Thom hums on the recorded version, leaving Thom to half-rap the lyrics and try to figure out what to do with his arms. Reminiscent of Amnesiac-era Radiohead, I came away with a new "so THAT's what that can sound like live" appreciation of the song.

The other was the solo version of "Everything In Its Right Place" that Thom did during the encore. Radiohead tends to swing through New York towards the middle or end of tours, as I recall, when the band is a little grumpy and Thom's voice is wearing down. But with this particular show on night two of the tour, Thom's voice was the purest I have heard it (I'm not sure I'd want to hear him attempt the opening notes on "Hollow Earth," for instance, even a few more shows into the tour), making everything, but "Everything In Its Right Place" in particular, sound like it was being beamed straight from heaven.

Was it Radiohead? No. But definitely the next best thing.

Videos from someone awesome named AllBearsRule's YouTube channel, embedded below.

And One. Mobile. Phone.

I'm still dubious that Wall Street II: Money Never Sleeps is going to be able to meet the high bar set by its predecessor, but this rather clever preview does give me hope. It seems like it's not going to take itself too seriously, from the shot of the mobile phone (I REMEMBER that phone!) to Gordon Gekko getting outclassed by a random drug lord.

I also like the ominous driving music in the background. The wonders of Google quickly told me it's a song called Ricochet, by Shiny Toy Guns, whom I know nothing about since I ain't no club kid no mo'. It works better without lyrics in the preview, but the opening line's pretty appropriate for the movie, too: "Welcome back to where I'm gonna have you..."

You Found Another Way To Tell The Truth

When did this win me totally over? When the (dreamy) lead singer sings, "We'll still be best friends when all turns to dust," and hits that unexpected note at "all," that's when.

Yours Truly Presents: The Morning Benders "Excuses" from Yours Truly on Vimeo.

The Spaces. Between. Words.

It is good to see there's still a place for something like this in an A.D.D. world.



Then there's the top song here, which is possibly even better, in a sort of opposite way.

PolarBear on myspace

25 Songs That Befriended Me In 2009

Warning: You will not find Animal Collective, Dirty Projectors, or Grizzly Bear on this list.

(Loses 99/100 of potential audience...)

Now then. Here are 25 songs that I adored in 2009, in no particular order.

Mexican Chili Taco Fiesta - Tamales Oaxaquenos (via KEXP). If you had told me that I would include a mostly instrumental song about Oaxacan tamales, where the only lyrics I can understand are the title words of the song, on my year-end mix, well, I might not have laughed at you, but I would have been skeptical. But then again, yum, tamales oaxaquenos.

The Dead Weather - Hang You from the Heavens. Take Jack White and his affinity for dirrrrrty blues and side projects that obliterate other people's main bands. Add Alison Mosshart, the lead singer of the Kills, whose albums I could (and have!) listen(ed) to on repeat infinitely. Insert a simple guitar riff and some bass drum. Rinse. Lather. Result: this, my favorite song on my favorite album this year. Repeat.


K-Naan - America. He says it better than I can: that shit was cool in English (especially the Chali 2na bit, all you people pining for Jurassic 5), but give me that Somali verse.


Spinnerette - Ghetto Love. The hip online reviewers, they did not like this album. Me, I can't stop rocking out to this song.


Tuneyards - Sunlight (via Pitchfork). It's pretty rare, when you get to my doddering age, to stumble across music that is unlike anything heard before. So, Tuneyards - also, incidentally, unlike anything capitalized before. So much so that I'm not even going to try it.

Justin Adams & Juldeh Camara - Fulani Coochi Man. For the first 15 seconds, this is just a typical blues song, which, you know, yawn, just give me some Muddy Waters instead. But at 0:15 exactly, something extraordinary happens, and all of a sudden this is something new and fresh, and at the same time, so, so old.


Beyonce Ft. Lady Gaga - Video Phone. Oh Beyonce. I try, how I try, to keep your songs off my year-end lists, to retain some minimal sort of indy cred. But always, always, you end up making something amazing that I cannot ignore. The fact that it is a duet with Lady Gaga? Doubly insulting and even more ignominious. Curse you!


Muse - Uprising. This is an excellent anti-whatever-is-keeping-you-down anthem (You hear me, Beyonce???). They will not control us. We will be victorious. Handclap. Hey.


King Midas Sound - Darlin'. This song whispers of seduction like twilight in the tropics.

Mos Def - Quiet Dog. Making the best old-school hip-hop hands down year after year in and out without even thinking about it is Mos Def. Which I like to think is what the title of the song is all about.

Whitley - Poison in Our Pocket. And the winner of the Grammy for best depressing song expressed optimisticly is...Whitley! Wait a second, wait a second...What do you mean there's no such category? Well, invent one.

Petracovich - Heaven Help the Day. I already wrote this once, but I can't say it any better. I like this. I like the tinkling way it starts, the dissonance of the lonely lyrics and the warm music, the unexpectedness of the guitar strumming when it kicks in, the way she turns the tables, the acceleration into a torrent of fierceness, the emphatic full stop.


Ramona Falls - Russia (via Pitchfork). When this song, from the lead singer of Menomena, comes on, it sweeps me up and sends me soaring over the world, with cherry blossoms blowing in my face.

Here We Go Magic - Only Pieces. The jittery guitars sound exactly like my mind feels, skimming the surface of the questions this song asks.

Blakroc - Coochie. Why yes, yes, this is the second song on the list with Coochie in the title. No, no, it wasn't planned. Yes, yes, I do see some sort of rhythm and rhyme to it.


Das Racist - Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell (via Pitchfork). This song is completely, utterly ridiculous. It reminds me of every pointless summer job I ever had, of every pointless quest I ever went on just to kill time, of time wasted, junk food eaten, of cruising the strip.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Heads Will Roll. This album didn't grab me as instantly as the Yeah to the third's previous efforts have. But ultimately I installed a disco ball in my brain and embraced the glam.


Florence & the Machine - Cosmic Love. Because the music and lyrics match so perfectly.

Chris Brown - I Can Transform Ya. I feel vaguely queasy about including a Chris Brown song on my list, at least without some kind of balancing "I will survive" anthem from Rihanna, but I HAVE TO. I sing along, I shimmy, I am transformed from a human to a Carter, without any reluctance at all.


Fresh Espresso - Big or Small (via KEXP). If they did a remake of Saturday Night Fever, whoever tried to fill Travolta's shoes would dance to this, and not just because of the Stayin Alive sample.

The XX - Crystallised. Have you ever heard something so simultaneously simple and complicated?


Bat for Lashes - Daniel. A friend says this reminds him of Imogen Heap's "Glittering Clouds," which I had not heard before. So in some ways, this was like finding two great, gloomy, ominous songs in one.


Frankel - Anonymity is the New Fame. You had me at minor chord modulation number one. The lyrics are just the rose tied to the satellite.

Kurt Vile - Inside Looking Out. This song reminds me of trains. But not of actually being on a train. Instead, more like sitting at a railroad crossing somewhere that still qualifies as the wide open spaces, with the bars down and the red lights flashing and the train moseying by, not in any hurry, and neither are you, and neither is this song, and when the song is over maybe the train will be too, or maybe you'll listen to the song again.

Richard Hawley - Don't Get Hung up in Your Soul. Good advice for a new year.