Vinnie the Intern's Blog #7: My Favorite Album

Everyone has that one album. An album where everything falls right in line with your specific aesthetics of music. Considering next month will mark a decade since its release, I feel it is important to revisit my favorite album. What is my favorite album, you ask?

Interpol's Turn on the Bright Lights (2002/Matador)

Turn on the Bright Lights, an album that is a rush of reverb, pulsating octave jumps from bassist, Carlos Dengler, and a strong percussive bed built by drummer Sam Fogarino, tells stories of growing old, lost loves, new loves, and depravity all within the hazy backdrop of New York.

The album commences with "Untitled," a lush piece opening with Daniel Kessler's lonely guitar, later dilating into a full arrangement for singer/guitarist, Paul Banks, to break into the song with the opening lyrics "Surprise, sometimes I'll come around." It sets the tone of the album as it diminishes into "Obstacle 1."  

Arguably their most popular song and rightfully so, "Obstacle 1" displays the band at their most musically intriguing. The song is drenched in the syncopation of Daniel Kessler's and Paul Banks' call-response guitar riffs, peppered with the precision of Sam Fogarino's drumming and Carlos Dengler's playful, elastic bassline woven tightly between the guitars. The album is one of the albums for bass guitar. Surely any bass player cannot help be swayed by the basslines that Carlos Dengler has crafted. 

Once this duel attack of guitars halts, the slower-tempo of "NYC," named after where the Brooklyn band is based, enters with the statement of "the subway is a porno and the pavements are a mess" and the powerful conclusion that "it's up to me now, turn on the bright lights," the name sake of the record. This shows one of the more uplifting moments of the albums, which can, at times, seem downright dreary.

The following track, "PDA," is a song that had been in Interpol's repertoire before the turn of the century and featured much similarity to the uptempo style featured on "Obstacle 1" and the proceeding track "Say Hello to the Angels."  The song's true shining moment is the breathtaking back-half which is predominantly a beautifully crafted instrumental. "Say Hello to the Angels" is as smooth as Banks pick up line, "1,2,3. Do me." One of the more rhythmic cuts on the album, it does not stay in one place for long and continues to shift until it is cut off by a chord tinged in feedback.

"Hands Away" greatly slows down the album from the dance-punk a la Interpol that is"Say Hello to the Angels" and sets you up for "the rest of Turn on the Bright Lights which becomes increasingly less formulaic and much more adventurous, extended songs; shying away from verse, chorus, verse song structure. "Hands Away," one of the more sparse tracks on the album, is chilling. Atmospheric and filled with remorse and ponder in the voice of Banks asks he simply questions "what happened?" 

My favorite song on the album, possibly ever, "Obstacle 2," an ode to waiting for love, toasting to the snow and making sure to not waste wine. The chorus "I will stand by all this drinking if it helps me through these days..." is hauntingly backed by the lyrics "Take my love in real small doses."

Emotional center piece, "Stella Was a Diver and She Was Always Down" revolves around the tale of Stella, a woman who has truly "broken away" from her normal life. The climax of Paul Bank's declarative statement "Stella! I love you!" (See Marlon Brando in 1951's A Streetcar Named Desire). 

"Roland" was also an earlier song and punkier by nature featured the incredible run-ons of "my best friend's a butcher, he has sixteen knives. He carries them all over the town, at least he tries. Oh, look it stopped snowing." What? I'm not sure what that means either, but Mr. Banks often ambiguous lyrics make it that much rewarding to decipher, making the album's replay value incredibly high. 

"The New" features an elegant bass line juxtaposed with the droning guitars of Kessler and Banks. One of the more straightforward songs on the album "I can't pretend, I need to defend some part of me from you, I know I've spent some time lying" acts as an honest declaration of love as well as repression. This song can be seen as an inner-monologue of the protagonist's past as well as present while analyzing the new life ahead with his love interest. The lyrics "You're looking alright tonight, I think we should go..." bridge the gap and bring the listener from "The New" to the closer of Turn on the Bright Lights.

The closer, "Leif Erikson" becomes the response to of the protagonist's thoughts in "The New." His love interest "feels that my sentimental side should be held with kids gloves" showing the stark emotional capacities between the two lovers. The ending of the album ends on the captivating line "she says brief things, her love's a pony, my love's subliminal."

So there it is. My favorite album. I hope, if anything, this has inspired you to check it out if you have not already or made you want to revisit the album. Turn on the Bright Lights was the album that changed my life. Keep in mind, some of these comments on songs were just my interpretations so they should not affect any way that you digest this amazing album.

So...go ahead! Listen to it! Right now!

Happy Birthday, Get Bent!

Happy 1st birthday Get Bent! You're one of my favorite psychedelic, garage, punk, power-pop n' roll blogs.

This is one of many reasons I visit you daily....

Review: Slug Guts - Stranglin’ You Too 7” EP

By Jonathan Markley

The Hozac Hookup Klub subscription series is always more than worth the money to sign up, especially with this latest round of stellar underground rock. The cream of the crop has to be the new single from Slug Guts, entitled Stranglin You Too.

Slug Guts’ play stomach-wrenching, swampy, gothic noise rock that owes much to fellow Australians the Birthday Party and the Scientists, as well as early Christian Death. Last year’s epic noise-rattled LP Howlin’ Gang on Sacred Bones was an ear-blistering effort that ought to have awoken fans looking for lost Swans albums/demos out of their stupor. Slug Guts’ new single is even better than that.

All four of these tracks crammed onto Stranglin’ You Too continue on in the abrasive, murky, post-apocalyptic rock vibe of their earlier releases. ”Sucking Down” is like a schizophrenic homeless man on the corner howling about the evils of the world and its eminent end. “Coathanger Blue” and “Old Sores, New Boys” show their love of old Touch and Go records and thrashy mid tempo guitar rock. But it’s really the title track that nails the creepy vibe down. Kinda like a slowed-down Murder City Devils mixed with a vitriolic blast of blues-based feedback, the kind that the Chrome Cranks are known for.

Listen to “Stranglin You Too” below.

original post available at getbent.fm

Antietam National Mailing

Antietam the Band, being the self-described "very curious children who can't sit still" that they are, have launched several blogs worth following recently.

You can keep up to date with all the blog updates through the Antietam the Band Facebook page. But here's the in-depth goodies we got from Tara Key that we are very excited to keep up with!

"First- About the antietamtheband.com site. I will definitely be updating it through time, but it is largely a historical (and a mighty one, at that) site. I would encourage anyone who wants to know more in depth about us prior to this year to still poke around. But it is not the place to go for the latest news. The site to keep up to date on our current band exploits is: Antietam Weekly Reader. 

Second- TK has a photo blog up and running. You can follow that at: Antietam Daily Eye.

Third- We are so excited to launch Tim's blog on art, travel, sensory perception of all sorts and, who knows what, this week. The first set of posts will be his book/essay, Antonello's Moment, broken down into 12 parts. TK did most of the photos for the book. The intro and first chapter are up with more to come very shortly. It can be found at: Aesthetic Diary."

While you're at it, don't forget to read the diary entries from the Yo La Tengo Hannukah shows. Nights 5 & 6 written by Antietam's Tim Harris and performed in by Tara Key, and night 8 written by Antietam & Other Music's Josh Maddell.

Special Distance

Today, looking down from the up that I was doing already, I saw on my desk what looked like a dried smearing of spreadable cheese. It was positioned midway between my two typing hands, close (closer than I found comfortable) to a moment of contact. I peered down; nearer, nearer, and full of inspectious desires.

"Hmm...I wonder what this is?" was the thinking. "Do I touch it? Am I to be that bold? It is unlikely that it be dangerous. After all, it may only be processed and modified cheese of the sort that I typically enjoy tasting upon." I considered things some more. "And yet, it looks that perhaps this is not the foodstuff I am expecting it to be. I can see tiny fibrous hairs. They stick out this way and that as though rustled by wind or some other force. Is it possible that it has come to pass already that I have grazed this mysterious substance with the palm or wandering thumb?" This was indeed an unsettling thought. "Yuck, I say. How gross a plight. Yuck to this." And I stood, moving away from my desk.

5-10-15-20

What was your favorite song at age 5? I'm not sure I had one, but I do remember having a plastic toy guitar and singing "Blue Suede Shoes" for anyone who would listen. My musical taste hasn't strayed very far since, but it's always fun to think about what sounds made the biggest impact on you and when. You probably do it all the time at the bar with friends when a song you haven't heard in a long time comes on the jukebox. 

Well, it turns out Pitchfork's been doing it as well. Only instead of your socially lubricated buddy ranting about how much he used to LOVE that Korn record, they ask a heap of notable musicians, producers, etc. to pick their brains about what songs and albums they remember best at 5 year intervals. 5-10-15-20 has featured Kurt Vile, Moby, RZA, Mount Eerie, and Ted Leo most recently, just to name a few.

I'm not a devoted Pitchfork reader, but I think the feature puts an interesting spin on a typical interview query. It also makes me think of Link Wray's "Five and Ten". Win, win.

Week in Preview

So many times we have seen the week through the lenses of someone's "past glasses." And so many times have we been awed at what went before, retiring to our easiest easy chair and getting lost in what was, while the present slips through our fingers. But on this day I bring you better. On this day I bring you a thing that has wowed kings across America, a thing called the Week in Preview. Instead of recapping the events of the past and telling tales of times that can never be lived again, I will tell you the juiciest gossip, the whitest lies, and the full truths about who is and who is not gay; all before it ever happens. That way, you can know which days to look forward to and when to prepare yourself to "live in the now." It is yet another solution to one of the scores of problems that now face us in this world of the future (need I remind you that the future is now?). Buck up, you, all your problems will be solved by the experts as long as you have the patience to just wait for the solution.

So at last, here it is, the Week in Preview:

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