Local Music Update

Over the past few months I have really tried to jump into the local scene. It took me a while to realize how many GREAT bands are coming out of Chapel Hill and Durham these days. Next year, on B-Cuts, we are going to try to focus on bringing the local scene to WSOE. This year was great with Luego and Bombadil coming into the studio, two amazing bands that I just found out about this year. I'll start with those two, and reveal some other bands that you all might hear on B-Cuts next year.

Luego is an alt-country-ish band featuring acoustic guitar, cello, viola, drums and a vocals that fit seamlessly. Luego is made up of some very nice people who really just love making and playing music. You can find the interview and in-studio podcast on iTunes if you search for WSOE.

Bombadil is a hard band to describe. One of the members, Bryan, actually asked me at a show how I could best describe them and I couldn't. Now that I look back on it, if you combine Beulah with Bob Dylan fronting the Decemberists... that's Bombadil. Even that's a stretch. Bombadil is a fun band to see live because almost everyone plays almost everything. I've never seen some instruments played in a live show before and in certain ways. Daniel played his bass with a drum stick at one point, and it made some cool sounds. They keep it fun and switch it up and they are just one of North Carolina's greatest neo-folk bands.

Bands to look for on future B-Cuts (these will be shorter because we haven't interviewed them yet-sans Old Ceremony and Roman Candle because I saw them live):

Early Morning Swimm is what I can best describe as Joseph Arthur meets Iron & Wine. They are a dark and beautiful folk group. They will be in the studio in early Feb, so listen up!!

American Aquarium takes their name from a Wilco lyric. It fits. American Aquarium is more of a folk version of Wilco, and they do a good job of not being Wilco, which is key in this kind of situation. American Aquarium makes some beautiful music that will bring out your emotions.

Erie Choir is what you get when Elvis Costello makes a pop-indie band or if the Super Furry Animals played folk music. Either way, check them out because they'll grow on you... fast.

The Future Kings of Nowhere is a band that I fell in love with the first time I heard them. They are an anti-folk/acoustic-punk band and their sound is so catchy. Perhaps if you just gave Ted Leo an acoustic guitar and a bit of early Against Me! energy, you'd have Future Kings. The music is very upbeat and fun.

Red Collar or... The Clash of North Carolina. These guys are an interesting punk band in the classic punk sense. They make rock music, and it's great.

The Old Ceremony puts on one hell of a live show. My best way to describe them... is if the Who made Americana music and formed up with Fastball. Again, that's a stretch. If these guys made music in the 60's or 70's, they'd be freaking huge right now.

Roman Candle is what you get if you take Wilco's current "we're just a rock band" mentality and have them re-make A.M. or a more rockin Bob Dylan and the Band. Just like Old Ceremony, if these guys were making music in the 60's or 70's, they'd be huge. Roman Candle is proof that rock is in fact... still alive. For the sake of your life, check out the song "Why Modern Radio is AOK" because it's one of the best songs I've heard all year.


Keep on listening to the B-Cuts next semester to hear these great bands in the studio. Do yourself a favor, go out and support local music at your local venues and you might be surprised at the bands putting on some amazing shows.

Peace, Love and Keep Rock Alive

I'm Very Confused Right Now...

To see my latest rant of confusion about how good bands are finally being supported yet some things never change, go to Before the Culture Dies

Peace, Love and Keep Rock Alive

DJ KRA's Best of the Year

1. Radiohead - In Rainbows
This album flows beautifully and there isn't a bad song on it. The concept behind everything In Rainbows is brilliant, but it doesn't outshine the amazing sounds they make.

2. Soulsavers - It's now how far you fall, it's how you land
Very depressing, very very beautiful album that just makes you break down in emotion. I don't think I've ever felt this way because of an album before. It's so dark and beautiful. Lanegan's voice shines.

3. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
This record is just plain solid. The songs are clever and catchy and the delivery is perfect.

4. The National - Boxer
I'm new to The National. I had no idea who they were until this album. They blew me away. The vocals work perfectly with the lush instrumentation.

5. Porcupine Tree - Fear of a Blank Planet
It's Porcupine Tree, 'nuff said. The album is solid. I feel that it lacks in certain areas, but it's a great album as far as production, instrumentation and lyrically. Breathtaking album competing in a year full of great releases.

Honorable Mentions:

Andrew Bird
Dinosaur Jr.
Winterpills
Three
Autumn Defenses
Devin Townsend
Wilco
Blackfield


Peace, Love and Keep Rock Alive!!!

Wow it's been a while. Now to expose the RIAA!!

Hey all you wonderful people. I recently started a new blog called "Before The Culture Dies." It's dedicated to showing how apathy is growing and our rich American culture is slowly being destroyed.

Anyways, on my recent post I looked at the RIAA and their spinning ways of basically saying they just want to control what we listen to.

Check it out, it's long... but I think it's fairly eyeopening.

Before the Culture Dies

Wait... Radiohead?

So before we thought Radiohead would release their new album in November. Then they say that it won't be out until next year. Now we find out it's going to be released in TEN DAYS!!!!!!!


TEN


DAYS!!!!!

October Tenth!!!


It's called In Rainbows and you can pre-order this epic box set with the album, an extra cd, vinyl of the album w/ extra tracks and art & stuff as well as the download on the 10th (the package goes out December 3rd). Or you can just go for the download.


Ah Radiohead, I love when you surprise me.


Peace, Love and Keep Rock Alive

Mark Lanegan: Genius in the Shadows

Many of you are probably somewhat familiar with Lanegan's first project, The Screaming Trees. As grungies on Sub Pop, Lanegan released his signature voice to the public. The Trees were a part of the "main grunge group," meaning they worked with Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam and Mudhoney. Chris Cornell produced the Tree’s album, “Uncle Anesthesia”, and Lanegan was a member of the one time only super group of Mad Season with Layne Staley (Alice in Chains), Mike McCready (Temple of the Dog/Pearl Jam) and others.

What you MIGHT not know is that Lanegan has been making music since that grunge era. Since 1990, he has had 6 solo albums and even more collaborations. Some of his key partners have been Queens of the Stone Age, Hater (a project involving Soundgarden's Ben Shepard & Matt Cameron) and The Twilight Singers. Another very noteworthy collaboration is that of Lanegan and Belle & Sebastian's Isobel Campbell. With out question, "Ballad of the Broken Seas" was one of 2006's best albums.

I'm here to say that Mark Lanegan has done it again. I haven't encountered too much talk about The Soulsaver's new album: "It's not how Far You Fall, It's The Way You Land." The Soulsavers are an English remix/production duo that recruited Lanegan to sing on 8 of 10 songs for their new album. The result is an epic, dark electronica sound with Lanegan's depressingly beautiful lamenting to support it. Both elements make it one of the most depressing albums I have ever heard; yet at the same time it is simply gorgeous.

I'm going to go ahead and call "I.N.H.F.Y.F, I.T.W.Y.L." this year's best album, although... that could change if the Gutter Twin's album is released. The Gutter Twins just signed to Sub Pop and announced their album is finished. Who are the Gutter Twins and how is this relevant? Well, the previously mentioned Twilight Singers' lead singer, Greg Dulli is one of the twins. The other? This millennium’s Man in Black, Mark Lanegan. Dulli and Lanegan have been contributing to each other’s projects for several years, so they decided to record an album together as The Gutter Twins.

The moral of this story is: Mark Lanegan is one of the best, hidden gems of American musicians. I almost feel guilty, because while we talk about the sub-par albums this year, we don't talk about how Mark Lanegan keeps making incredible music that goes relatively unnoticed.

Here's to you Mark Lanegan... Here's to you carrying on the tradition of Johnny Cash and Tom Waits... Here's to the man who walked from the land of grunge into the land of dark blues and rough Americana. Here's to your amazing music...




Peace, Love and Keep Rock Alive!
-DJ KRA

A Great American Holiday

I had to go to classes on Labor Day this year for the second time in a row. I’m not one to despise college or anything like that, and I’m not saying that going to two classes on that Monday morning was the worst thing that I’ve ever had to endure. It wasn’t this year and it wasn’t last year. It did, however, get me to thinking about how the only reason any of us take the second-tier holidays seriously anymore is because we get the day off of work or school, because we walk out to the mailbox, open it up, and slap our foreheads for having forgotten that not even the postmen work on Federal holidays. Who actually spent a moment thinking about the struggles of laborers or appreciating those hard workers who make our product-laden society possible? Heck, I bet some folks think that Labor Day is some sort of sequel to Mother’s Day, a day spent in celebration of mothers giving birth or something like that.

So what’s the point of a holiday if no one really recognizes what the holiday is about? Arbor Day might have more cultural significance than Labor Day, despite the fact that Arbor Day is A: Lame and B: Not associated with days off or gifts. Labor Day isn’t of any importance because of what it’s supposed to be celebrating…it’s important because we get a day off, because for many it signifies that last day of summer before the dreaded school year begins. At least during Arbor Day, elementary school kids are dragged out of the classroom and forced to try and plant trees in the ground and are given a lecture on recycling that will eventually be forgotten when Jimmy Myers or some kid farts in class and the important ecological lesson is lost to the power of immaturity.

So what’s to stop this Sept. 25 from being a holiday? What’s the significance of Sept. 25? Well, any guy reading this will probably know, it’s a date that’s been etched into the 18-25 year old minds of America for about half a year now by relentless tie-ins and advertisements. Countless students, workers, and bums alike will be flocking to their closest retailer and circling around the electronics sections, zombie-like, reaching out and trying to grab the closest employee for a chance to seize that holy grail…a copy of Halo 3. Now, whether or not Halo is the end-all to video games (it’s not) and whether or not Halo 2 was the biggest nerd disappointment since Episode One (it wasn’t…but it was close) doesn’t matter. What matters is that the hype and buildup for Halo 3 is so immense, that millions of people will either be ridiculously preoccupied from their daily routine or just not bother to do anything at all but play Master Chief’s latest zany adventure.

More people will be religiously following Bill Gates’ favorite armor-clad hero than took Labor Day seriously, and Arbor Day doesn’t exactly spur the male youth of America into a buying spree. So why not just give us all the day off? Call it Master Chief Day, call it Halo Day, call it Microsoft’s Xbox Cash Cow Day, whatever the greeting card companies like the most. I’m not sure which is worse, the fact that the imaginary exploits of a space warrior against goofy-looking aliens means more to people than a Federally-supported holiday meant to give respect to our plentiful and deserving workers, or the fact that I’ll be one of those zombies playing Halo 3 as soon as class is over on the 25th.