"this is some straight up thoreau shit"

Picture an urban oasis, a meandering creek crawling cautiously through the heart of the beast, an organic pulse deep in the center of concrete and steel. Add in the usual accoutrements: graffiti, trash, beer cans, scraps of paper and the like, and you've found 'the nature spot'. Such a place was a saving grace for my compatriots and me last week at SXSW. The mind needs an escape from the barrage of people, music, corporate imagery and endless fliers from time to time, and the nature spot was our last frontier, beautiful and mystical in all the right ways. To sit at sunset with a Lonestar in one hand and a spliff in the other and reflect on the day's events, to calmly to prepare oneself for the impending shitshow of the night, to simply sit in one place for a few minutes... this luxury was something I came to appreciate more than the free food, free beer and free music that was diligently sawing away at our sanities throughout the week. And if you listened hard enough, you could almost hear the roar of cannons and the pitterpatter of gunfire, the subtle but tangible war between the elements that lay at our feet. Nature struggling to exist in a place where it was ultimately unwanted, only laid there for some sick sense of self-assuring aesthetic, as if merely a mockery of itself. The urban tentacles of the city had succeeded far into our oasis, unfolding into some awkward fringe space, but the green grass and murky water hadn't given up yet. Who was winning the battle? It was hard to tell, but it's the fight itself that gives us hope. We'll always be presented with a dialectic of this kind; be forced to comprehend a synthesis which seems more like an uncomfortable reality than a resolution. Still, as I sat cross-legged in the company of friends, the savory taste of Lonestar sliding down my throat, try as I might I couldn't suppress a smile. We might not have had found something pure, but at least we had escaped pavement for a few minutes. In a time when dirt is a precious commodity, I think we were honored to even witness a halfassed attempt to take back what once was.

-ds

health!

health!
Originally uploaded by [jono]

be prepared for a flood of photos being posted to the blog.

wyatt at british breakfast

wyatt at british breakfast
Originally uploaded by [jono]

what better way to celebrate our arrival in austin than eating free british food at 10 in the morning? none, if you ask me.

i'm sooooo bored.

summer goth.
Originally uploaded by [jono]

Wavves was by far one of my favorite acts of SXSW. This shot is from the first of three times I saw them at the festival. While there, I was lucky enough to make a brand new friend named Devaki, who happens to be a photographer here in Portland. Also, check out this youtube video of me crowdsurfing at Wavves the last night of SXSW. (Just look for the blonde haired boy in short shorts about one minute into the clip).

-jono

Rock Beards

Rock bands will come and go but the ROCK BEARD is forever. From Jerry Garcia circa 1969 to the kings of rock beardsmanship themselves, ZZ Top, nothing has said ROCK and motherfucking ROLL more than the beard. Ironically, the only un-bearded member of ZZ Top is named Frank Beard. But Frank gets cut some slack because he carries the flag for all mustachioed men of rock. Thick and voluptuous facial hair has long been a rite of passage in rock. Grow a beard and guitar shredding, nighttime sunglass wearing, and PBR bottle smashing all become wicked cool. Before the beard, they were just idiotic acts of drunken stupor. And as the chin hairs grow longer, the music gets better. To prove such a point just take a gander at the shaggy chops of TV on the Radio's Kyp Malone or even The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach. Beards make even Metallica seem rockin. If it weren't for James Hetfield's billy goat goatee, Metallica would be sold in the children's section of Walmart. Recently, the beard has infiltrated the indie and hip-hop scenes. Slowly such artists as Ben Bridwell from Band of Horses, Bon Iver's Jutin Vernon, and the Avett Brothers have crafted their own flavor savors and chinstraps. According to Rolling Stone Mag, even Kanye has gotten in on this action stating, "I took the TV on the Radio pill and ended up with a beard and glasses!" Indeed, the beard is an instant pill to music magic. The beard embodies all that is Rock. The rock beard will live on forever.

KLC TV tonight!!!

Hey hey,

Did you know that KLC TV is actively subverting the hierarchies of modern reality? Come by Miller 105 tonight @ 7pm to discover what they're doing: including an extra special Rockumentary of one of our favorite bands.

Also, check these other vids by KLC's one and only Video Czar and get yerself learned:

#1 Cookery's Shepherds Pie


LC Tunnel Crawl


JJ Skateboarding


Soda Review: VITMO


Keep you eyes peeled for more showings and flicks, especially a post Spring Break mixer.

~SocSpecWrite

the world is drowning and i live by the river!

If the apocalypse were upon us, I would want only to hear one thing, London Calling by The Clash. As institutions crumbled to the ground, engulfed in flame and people screamed in rioting masses, I would stand calm amongst the pandemonium, earphones in and i-pod volume up. The ice age is coming, the sun's zooming in Meltdown expected, the wheat is growing thin Engines stop running, but I have no fear Cause London is drowning and I, live by the river.

These politically charged and fearfully foretelling lyrics shook up the UK rock scene and forever earned The Clash their title GODFATHERS OF PUNK. Recorded at Wessex Studios and first released in 1979, London Calling was a testament to world turmoil and an anthem for pissed off punks. During this time, lead singer, Joe Strummer, was a self-proclaimed news junkie whose writing revealed a dark and sinister world. Arguably their most renowned track, London Calling illustrates just this. Strummer wrote of the March 1979 Three Mile Island reactor meltdown and the coming of the third World War. The track name comes from BBC’s radio station identification used during World War II. “This is London calling…” was heard as bombs dropped and civilians died. It is now heard while wicked bass guitar pounds out an SOS beat and angry punks mosh in circle pits.

Although once criticized for being too ambitious, The Clash have stood the test of time and proven to be the most fitting musicians for the end of the world. Their rebellious reggae rockabilly will continue to foretell such an apocalypse. In the meantime, you might want to prepare yourself. Listen to the following tracks: White Riot, Rock the Casbah, Janie Jones, and Spanish Bomb and horde as much vinyl as you can!

-mh

NEW ENGLAND DEATH SQUAD

DOUBLEWALKER is finally here, and it’s wicked heavy. Yes, I’ll grace it with the “wicked” adverb because, like myself, FURNACE hail from New Hampshire, where we frequently use terms like “wicked pissah” and “yep bud” to describe things mildly pleasing to us. And nothing brings this band more to mind then reminiscing about cold, dirty, wood-stove-odor-filled, sweat-stained and beard heavy basement shows at Tyler’s house, where Furnace used to play more shows than I can remember (in more ways than one – “show” was sort of a loose term here). But enough about that. Their first full length has hit the streets and it’s everything I’d expect from such a unique band: spastic, fast, crushing, asymmetrical, crusty, and downright heavy. Basically, so punk.

Doublewalker finds the band experimenting more with their characteristic fast-slow change ups, weaving skull-crushing breakdowns seamlessly into the middle of a d-beat, and often refusing to be in any time signature at all. It’s better not to try to understand exactly what the hell they are doing in a song (band practices must involve a shit ton of memorization), but just to revel in the beauty of some extremely well thought out rhythms that don’t sacrifice a bass-heavy crusty sound for style. Seriously, I am so excited that this is where punk is going.

Lyrically, the band is on the right track, believing that music is medium which must serve to wake people the fuck up from the everyday prisons they put themselves into in the name of normalcy and success, as one of their older tunes explains - “The pressure’s building, we’re in over our heads/Drawing maps and diagrams/Our stories told before we’re born”. The best thing about Doublewalker, however, is the punk rock credibility it gives the band. This album has come out over a year later than when it was supposed to, and there isn’t anything more punk then being bad at being a band.

Furnace is touring Europe now and then is hitting the road around the US when they get back (my how they’ve grown up!). Bring them weed and catch a show if you aren’t too scared.

-ds

Not-So-Skeletal: Kevin Barnes, Decadence, and Decay

“If we’ve got to burn out,” Kevin Barnes of Of Montreal croons in “Suffer for Fashion,” the bombastic introduction to Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer? , “let’s do it together.”

Now, friends, there’s no use in beating around the bush. We are definitely, definitely in the midst of an Apocalypse, albeit a rather slow and sometimes dull one. It is definitely the case that the world is passing into decay, but keeping the decay of society in the forefront of our collective mind is what will allow us to recognize that there is so much newness and absolute, infinite possibility on the other end. So, if you’re like me and my greatest pals, you’ll just start dancing around the rim of the abyss.

That said, this is a radio-affiliated blog, and my spiritual affiliations are definitely of the sonic persuasion as well. Accordingly, you’re right to be shouting at me, as I exist in your computer: “who will be the central musical prophet that will celebrate this decay, as an emergence of new and grander life?” My answer is, of course, Kevin Barnes.

In Skeletal Lamping, Barnes’s recent-ish follow-up to the PoMo rock opera that was Hissing Fauna, we find him thinking Psychoanalytic theory, dealing out some heavy Freudianism in “Plastis Wafers” (“I confess to really being quite charmed by your feminine affects/ You’re the only one with whom I would role-play Oedipus Rex”) while also taking swipes at the intellectual establishment in admittedly heavy-handed tracks like “Women’s Studies Victims” (“Can't you see I've got some text reconstruction?/(What does that mean?)/No clue/It must be an illicit pentagram/(What are you talking about?)/No clue”). There is a beautiful relevance to this kind of philosophizing. It recognizes several things which need to be recognized about society, in order to allow us to understand ourselves as passing away and beyond something. If ole KB is channeling philosophy in a way that oscillates between faithful sincerity and critical scrutiny, he’s picking up on the same wavelength as folks like Derrida, Lacan and Žižek. And the thoughts I’ve had while pondering those kinds of intellectual celebs are: 1) that we’re in constant throes with the attempt to confront the Other and make sense of its otherness, and 2) that our subconscious is one busy bee, particularly in the realm of sexuality – as Barnes himself says, “it’s easily pervertable.”

We’re always grappling with what’s foreign, particularly the way that the foreign can be so darn bound up in us, that it’s hard to know how to see it at all. The darkness confronts the light, melancholy confronts bliss (Thanks John Keats for pointing me to that one!), but it confronts it like a disembodied hand confronts its one-time owner. It is insistent. So, here’s a kick-shuffle-change for the standard idea of the Apocalypse:

Decadence (by which I mean luxury, excess, the space over and above comfort) confronts decay (by which I mean a gradual death, a deterioration, a loss). And it confronts it like an old lover who remembers former intimacies like a forbidden secret. If the Apocalypse is decay (which, all 2012/Mayan/hoodoo/Second Coming of Christ sorts of musings very far aside, is sort of how things seem to be shaping up – just read the news), then we need to meet it with this forbidden secret in mind. We need to get intimate with decay, by embodying decadence – its Other and thus its missing piece.

If there’s anybody who’s lucidly tapped into this idea in music, it’s Kevin Barnes. This explains why his lavish glam rock sound isn’t merely a Bowie throwback, and it definitely explains the over-the-top performance art indulgences of his latest live shows. KB wearing a giant lobster arm? KB getting a foot massage from a nun in fishnets (this is where sexual decadence comes in – the conscious mind finally confronting the oh-so-freaky subconscious!)? KB being crucified? Then, KB being reborn in a sequin jacket, neon-pink briefs, and sporting a ghetto blaster? Yep, this is a man who knows how the apocalypse is best handled. I recall him covering “Smells Like Teen Spirit” as an encore when I caught him on his last tour. I realized clearly that he’s set himself up as the Kurt Cobain of the 21st century. In the ‘90s, a time of utter affluence and comfort in American society, Kurt pointed to the underbelly with angst and an acceptance of futility. It’s just that what we need now is glitter, not grunge, to get where we will need to have been gotten when all of this capsizes and transforms into something new.

Knowledge of decadence is something that is essential for all of us to attempt. It’s a head start to reaching the beyond: recognize and revel in the end, and thus be best equipped for the new beginning.

fml

I think about the impending apocalypse so much that I honestly don't know where to start right now. Ask any of my friends: at any mention of the environment, politics, disease, religion, innocent and fluffy lap dogs -- all of it inevitably and effortlessly directs me to my topic of choice, the end of the world. How will the world end? With a bang? A whimper? Jesus? Muhammad? Quetzalcoatl and Muhammad teaming up to really fairly judge everyone, maybe with Kali around to act as tiebreaker? Maybe with no one around. Maybe just with a lot of chaos and a lot of Avian bird flu and my lovely brick house in Maine that's so close to the Atlantic -- well, that will be underwater.

I'm alternately drawn to and depressed by optimistic apocalyptic theories. Depressed because I'm more of a pessimist (or at least a very well-disguised optimist), and so I hate to see people pathetically get there hopes up when, yeah, there will be fire and brimstone and shit. No happiness. But, well, just in case a few humans are destined to survive… I am prepared, you know! Not well-prepared, by any means… I smoke too many cigarettes, I can't do a single push-up (yes, not a single push-up), once I almost tried shooting a gun until I chickened out and decided not to, and, even though I go to Lewis & Clark, I'd take a hot shower and comfy bed over a camping trip any day. But I have this friend, see. He is not only a wilderness survival expert in a really non-crazy-person way, but he's also a genius. (Like, really the smartest kid I know.) And I've already let him know that I'm planning on us spending winter break '12 together, and he's down to take me under his wing when we're forced to fight for survival following whatever shit's inevitably going to go down on December 21st. And if it's not winter break '12, well, I'll still be trying to stay within a day's journey by foot from him until we've got reversed global warming (lawls), have miraculously orchestrated a nuclear-free Earth (ditto), have gotten this crazy world population growth under control (…ditto. Goddammit), etc, etc, and… Until they realize what a stupid fucking idea the Large Hadron Collider is and agree to destroy it. (Scientific advancement… What the fuck. Maybe there was supposed to be some mystery in life.)

new in town: Mississippi Studios

Hey kids, get your fake IDs ready because there's a new venue in town! Despite their ridiculous and uncouth 21+ policy, it seems to be worth some investigative effort. Newly renovated with a seating capacity of 150 and a standing capacity of 250 (apparently you can fit in nearly 50% more people if everyone just stands up, a pretty nifty party trick), Mississippi Studios' grand reopening celebration takes place on Wednesday, March 4, at 3939 N Mississippi (7 pm to midnight, free). Bands will include Weinland, Rebecca Gates, Pete Krebs, the Dimes, James Low, Chris Robley, Stephanie Schneiderman, Lewi Longmire, and Portland Cello Project. To find out more visit MississippiStudious and if you're not as broke as I am and can afford a ticket (about $15) visit their BoxOffice.


-mh

Heads Up, Guys: Asher Roth is Fucking Stupid

Unless you live under a carefully coordinated pile of rocks, or respect yourself (or something), chances are you've heard Asher Roth's hot new single, "I Love College." (and if you haven't heard it, you can make a surprisingly accurate estimate of what it's like just from the title) Well, on his personal website, I shit you not, The Daily Kush, Asher goes to describe how his suburban white self was introduced to the funky-but-not-too-fresh world of good old Hip Hop! He details hearing Jay Z's "Hard Knock's Life" in his friend's white Subaru, the Car Where Fresh and Innovative Ideas Go to Die. I think if Jay Z knew his music would inspire Asher Roth to explore the world of hip hop, he would have taken up finger painting, or rhythmic gymnastics instead. But no, dammit, we get to thank Asher's beloved Hova for unleashing the shit-awfulness that is "I Love College."

In his video, produced by the site that has won multiple Pulitzer prizes for being The Least Credible Website Ever, Holy Shit, www.HipHopOfficial.com, he drops an anecdote about how his family presented him with a framed copy of his mixtape and the cover of XXL featuring him for Christmas. Right before hey did their pre-Yule Turkey keg stands, and right after Asher's sister blacked out and accidentally tried to unzip Grandpa Roth's pants. Well, Asher, at least your family fucking likes you.

Mac Pogue

P.S. If you watch this video and don't immediately start crying blood, you have questionable ethics.