This is just too much.
We’re filing for compensation currently. Have it be known that we originally called it “Rent-A-Puppy” but expanded to “Pooch” because we believe old dogs can do new tricks and deserve the chance to help with dating.
Sufjan’s rearrangement of his experimental album Enjoy Your Rabbit (2001) is great listening. Strings do a lot taking the place of electronic instruments. Just thought you should know and plan the next phase of your life accordingly.
That’s meant as the “Gee wiz” or “How interesting” form of the sentence, not asking if people would hypothetically look at something. But while there’s talk of looking, check out our very own Grace Pettygrove’s column in today’s ODE.
It sometimes takes a sparse, whistling overture to wake up out of that late-summer malaise. “Black River Killer,” a standout song from 2008’s Furr, joins six other Blitzen Trapper songs, sold only on CDRs at their live shows, to make the Black River Killer EP, out August 25 on Sub Pop. Short at just above 17 minutes, each song carrying just above two minutes of listening time, the EP keeps the quick songs bound together along an imagistic spine.
The seven songs, stacked seemingly in happy/sad alternation, push forward an agenda of slightly pessimistic exploration into America’s faded pastoral landscapes. It must be the economy, right?
Soft, burbling electronic tones guide the listener from the rural account of spiritual warfare in the opener “Black River Killer” and through the rest of the EP. Similarly, “Going Down” manages a happier note of corroded morals accompanied by an Air-approved, far away synth line.
On “Shoulder Full of You,” the harmonic melody playing over the comparatively restrained acoustic guitar line, causes a break in the low-down tone of the song, like an occasional passing view of rusted grain silos on a desolate highway.
“Preacher’s Sister’s Boy,” the next song on the EP, has the same light-hearted, electronic whistle and a tambourine-laden beat that has all the swaying of the road home with suddenly a lot more to see on the way.
Taking this into consideration, the next song “Black Rock” drops the listener into a chanting melody repetitive like a word association exercise for the entire first minute, which is actually about half the song.
But still, like most good EPs, Black River Killer gets ahead with the help of a strong tailwind at the end. The last song “Big Black Bird” substitutes the requisite electronic sub-tune with a lonesome harmonica and an unprecedented bassy swagger. In a word, or two literally, it’s country music.
Rated: 7 passing glimpses of grazing cows along the highway out of 10 endless, yellowed fields.
The summer isn’t really winding down. It’s just sitting there. Don’t read our progress report. Anyway, with days between now and the beginning of the ‘09/10 school year becoming fewer and fewer in number, it seems like an appropriate time to look in the direction that isn’t backwards.
Our first issue will need reviews, and the fall has some interesting releases:
-9/8- Andrew WK’s 55 Cadillac
-9/11- Jay Z’s Blueprint 3
-9/22- The Pains of Being Pure at Heart’s Higher Than the Stars
-10/13- The Flaming Lips’ Embryonic
-10/13- Thao With the Get Down Stay Down’s Know Better Learn Faster
-10/13- Wolfmother’s Cosmic Egg
-10/27- Weezer’s mysterious seventh
Looks like the late 2000s are a lot like the early 2000s. The question remains, will we be able to review them? Probably. In advance, depending on our yet-to-be-determined printing schedule?
Maybe.
We will have a review for the new Blitzen Trapper EP up ahead of the August 24 release. “In advance” just may be my new favorite phrase.
There’s a naked raccoon on the loose in Toronto. We’re working with the Cultural Forum to book it for a show at Agate Hall next year. It’ll be better than Fleet Foxes.
News fresh from Sub Pop. The new EP will be in stores August 25th. We’ll do our best to get some advanced listenings of it this summer.
According to Stereogum, it’ll pull together many divergent sounds, making a hard rock departure from their usual home-spun melodies. I’m offering a special prize to the person who can figure out the name of the ’80s Libyan pop star. Worth a look.
Blitzen Trapper is playing Pickathon this year with Dr.Dog, Thao with The Get Down Stay Down and square dancing?
Thanks to everyone that submitted. We can hardly keep the print copies around. Congratulations everyone. Issue 3 is on the way.
The Fast and the Furious carved a testosterone-drunk early teen out of a soft-bodied child. It showed me a world of cars, girls, girls that drive cars, and Ja Rule, pretty much the picture I anticipated of my own early adulthood. Things that dramatically cooler than my at the time interests of Dragonball Z and Magic: The Gathering.
And through the years, it stuck. From late night family sedan races to my ambivalent relationship with Tokyo Drift. I was there for all of it, and the franchise had one more gift to give.
On Sunday night at Regal, Vin Diesel was back to influence my choices. I read the news: Biggest opening Car-themed movie ever, biggest opening of a Universal movie ever (take that Jurassic Park: The Lost World), blowing away the ridicule of many critics who just didn’t understand. My roommate and I had to go be a part of the magic.
And then there was Watchmen. At the box office we debated on what to see, Watchmen has its own story of dorm life and personal apocalypse. We weighed our options and went with Vin, middle school, cars, girls.
Hooray for not being scarred for life:
Thanks, Vin.
