I haven’t posted a “Video Of The Week” in a minute. Instead, I joined yet another “social networking” site called This Is My Jam. Check it out.
Anyway, my jam for this week is Aesop Rock’s new single “Zero Dark Thirty.” I can’t tell you how excited I am to have a new Aesop Rock album for the summer for the first time in 5 years. Not to mention the fact that El-P and Blockhead both have new albums out as well. This is The Summer Of Def Jux (Redux). It’s an awesome time to be cryptic and kinda-paranoid.
Do you enjoy spending Saturday night with a basset hound, eating canned chili, drinking High Life, watching Fight Club with Ed Norton & Brad Pitt’s commentary on, & incessantly checking NHL scores on your phone?
Hey internets! MinneSarah took a break from cooking us delicious vegan meals to put together this mix!
Need something to listen to as you hop from record store to record store tomorrow? Are you stoned out of your mind because it’s 4/20? Are you just always on the lookout for really fucking good,…
As anybody who knows me, um…, knows, I have an insatiable appetite for British music. I don’t totally understand why, but I can’t get enough of it.
My enabler in this addiction is my oldest friend MinneSarah. She sent me on this road way back in high school when all I wanted to do was listen to NOFX and pretend I was anti-everything.
(Quick aside as to how much I love British music: When I was a high schooler I was all about the Fat Wreck Chords/Epitaph sound, which I have now completely grown out of. Lagwagon, Pennywise, etc… I have dismissed it all as I’ve gotten older because, mainly, that shit’s terrible. Except, I still think Snuff is a great band. I got problems).
Anyway, continuing this decade of enabling, MinneSarah took me out to three concerts this last week:
First up: Kasabian at the Main Room
This was the only Kasabian song I knew before checking out the show, but damn, these dudes killed it. Although, admittedly, they were incredibly punctual, which meant we missed half the set. Quick observations:
1. Kasabian is a festival-headlining band over in Europe. It was cool as hell to watch a band with that kind of stage presence in a venue like the main room. Plus, they brought the fucking stadium light show, which caused us both to develop epilepsy.
2. Their new album is called “Velociraptor!,” but with their accents, it sounds like “Fellosuhraptah.” Awesome.
3. As a young man, their guitarist lived in Eden Prairie for a minute. He dedicated a song to “those folks.” Eden Prairie, your hipster cred is through the roof.
4. Their bass player looks just like Phil Kessel. No, seriously. MinneSarah joked that perhaps the Maple Leafs had traded him to Kasabian for picks.
5. Their singer is like a cross between Robbie Williams & Ian Brown. That is a compliment.
All in all, I give the show a solid 8 of 10. And that’s with only catching half of it.
Two nights later, it was Metronomy at the Entry:
Let me tell you, I wasn’t big on this band before the show, but damn, they made me a believer. Observations:
1. 7th Street was completely packed for this show.
2. If you can’t tell from the above video, this is the hipsterest bunch of hipsters to ever hipster. Seriously. They even wore those fuckin’ lights on their shirts.
3. I took particular glee when I went outside to use the ATM during their set and this terrible scenester girl that I know was standing outside. I asked why she was outside and she said it was because it was, “too hot.” More accurately, she was outside to be seen being outside at this particular show. I’ll be honest, I couldn’t have been more condescending to her if I wanted to.
4. Three terrible bros were inside cutting in line drinking whiskey diets. I joked on Twitter that, “If you have a penis and order a whiskey diet, I can’t help but wonder, what’s the penis for?” Of course, later in the night I called them out for cutting in line and to make it up to us they bought MinneSarah and I whiskey diets. In light of ingesting the same drink I just mocked, but receiving it for free, I was left to ponder the usefulness of my penis for the rest of the night. Conclusion: Still potentially useful, but hard evidence will be needed to support this theory (all puns intended).
Overall rating: 7 of 10
And yet, a couple nights later, it was The Cribs at The Entry.
As I’ve mentioned many times, I’m like a 13 year old Bieber fan when it comes to this band. I just really, really love them. They’re catchy, they kinda sound 90’s-ish, they’re loud, they’re kind of assholes. I dunno. I can’t get enough.
I don’t have a whole lot of observations for this show, as I got way, way, WAY too drunk. According to MinneSarah I started pushing around a little asian dude. I don’t recall doing this, but I do recall disliking him for some reason. Sorry guy. It wasn’t personal. Or maybe it was. Either way, sorry for being a dick.
Plus, I woke up with a hand that looked like this:
No clue. Stupid inability to handle my excitement without copious amounts of alcohol.
Overall: 9 out of 10
Anyway, despite the blood loss and questioning of my own genitals, I would say this was probably the best week ever. Super huge thanks to MinneSarah for funding it & putting up with soooo much of my drunken shit. She’s a saint.
Our old friend TCDroogsma stopped by today to drop off this month’s mix. Unlike last month, he was only a scant 3 days late this time. Baby steps, TCD, baby steps…
So, if you’ve ever perused one of my various blogs you’ve probably seen me make a reference to my Last.fm page. Have a look at it here.
For those who haven’t, Last.fm is a website that keeps track of what you listen to. Theoretically it’s a ‘social network’ site, but I’ve done little to no socializing. Of course, I do almost no socializing on Facebook either and that’s the definition of a ‘social networking’ site.
Anyway, I’ve been on Last.fm since December of ‘07. In those 4+ years, I’ve listened to nearly 100,000 tracks. In addition to this, er… ‘milestone,’ I realized that I just hit 10 different artists who have at least 1,000 plays.
1. Morrissey (2,212 plays)
2. Atmosphere (2,027 plays)
3. Kanye West (1,732 plays)
4. The Smiths (1,611 plays)
5. Doomtree (1,420 plays)
6. The Cribs (1,410)
7. P.O.S. (1,106)
8. Aesop Rock (1,032)
9. The Replacements (1,021)
10. Wilco (1,004)
I was looking at this list and it dawned on me that, despite the fact that I’m able to say whatever (and thus shape my ‘presented-internet-personality’) on sites like Twitter & Facebook, this is the most accurate portrait of who I actually am.
If you’re familiar with these 10 artists (8 if you wanna lump P.O.S./Doomtree & The Smiths/Morrissey), then you know pretty much every different side of me. I’m not totally sure how I feel about this, but its accuracy is indisputable. You couldn’t learn more about me if you called up every one of my Google searches (please, for my dignity’s sake, do not call cup every one of my Google searches).
Anyway, this post doesn’t really have a point. I suppose some grand thesis could be formed regarding the internet/individuality/personal/private/rabble, rabble, rabble… I don’t really feel like doing that right now. I just found this to be very interesting.
