Spoon Releases New Album

Spoon Releases New Album

Spoon, photo courtesy from an emo blog

They’re starry eyed, attractively geeky and downright infectious. Let’s forgive them for being featured on the O.C.’s soundtrack in 2004 because I’ve tried my hardest to forget that.

The Texas-based alternative rock group has released their seventh studio album Transference, a follow-up from their acclaimed 2007 album Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. While their trademark sound is typically pared down, simple beats and catchy guitar-heavy riffs, Transference points to something a little more complex — the introjection of a misdirected feeling at someone or something. Maybe the boys are growing up.

Here’s a taste of the new record, released by Merge Records. Enjoi.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHYi-CpzhBU]

Watch Oh No Ono’s “Swim”

Watch Oh No Ono’s “Swim”

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukxu8FgrW10]

An eye-popping delight for the indie-experimental lover.

I don’t think I’ve seen a decent music video since the 1990s. I believe the last “good” one would either be Radiohead’s “Just” (1995) or “Californication” by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers in 1999. A music video that doesn’t detract from the beauty of the song itself is a fine balance most bands and video directors bludgeon with a club.

This time, leave it to the Danish to make something interesting, beautiful and haunting. Oh No Ono is an alternative experimental space-rock band from Copenhagen. Their fourth album Eggs hit the shelves this week. The single “Swim” is delicately layered, with chorus singing and complex instrumental passages reminiscent of the Arcade Fire. Part eerie, part intriguing, the song is unforgettable.

 

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Oh No Ono looking pretty

 

 

The video, directed by fellow Dane Adam Hashemi, is a sweet coming-of-age story about an over-imaginative and aroused child. It’s about the shame of the first sexual experience, from the perspective of a creepy pre-pubescent boy. Like I said, I was surprised to find a music video that I would enjoy again!

Chad Vangaalen lulls Vancouver to sleep

Chad Vangaalen lulls Vancouver to sleep

Rio Theatre

October 15 2009

Polaris-nominated experimental alt-rocker Chad Vangaalen made hundred of hipsters swoon last night at the Rio Theatre on Commercial Drive.

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Playing an intimate set in quasi-candlelight, Vangaalen delivered his usual, hauntingly beautiful vocal talents reminiscent of a younger, more optimistic Neil Young. Clad in a vintage 1970s outfit, complete with flared pants and a moorlock-styled mop of a wig, the singer songwriter played songs mostly from his critically acclaimed album Soft Airplane, which has become somewhat of a modern classic to those who favour poetic contemplations of death, decay and the sweetness of the human condition.

Highlights included an energetic, distorted performance of “Inside the Molecule,” an homage to grungy guitar rock of the 1990s, typified by the image of the lazy teenager rising “early in the afternoon.”

He finished the set with an eerie but sedating performance of “Molten Light,” which has been dubbed creepy and morbid by some, and sentimental and poetic by others. All in all, it was a beautiful show.

Check out his video for “Molten Light,” which Vangaalen animated himself.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLw5b70OJH8]

The Arctic Monkeys at Malkin Bowl, Vancouver

The Arctic Monkeys at Malkin Bowl, Vancouver

Sunday, September 20 2009

Seeing the Arctic Monkeys is like an experiment in trying to understand the classic nonchalance of the British. Is it a cool kind of aloofness, or are they knowingly being arses?

The Arctic Monkeys have reasons to be cocky

The Arctic Monkeys have reasons to be cocky

Coinciding with a beautiful sunset in Stanley Park, the alternative-post-punk quintet came out and started with a slow song. The group’s aesthetic is always a surprising thing, based on opposites. Frontman Alex Turner washed his hair but wore black leather, while lead guitarist Jamie Cook wore a mean plaid shirt that made him look like any other Vancouver hipster.

Despite being a rock band, the show employed an alarming amount of strobe light, which added extra rigour to some of their more popular, catchy tunes like “I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor” and “Crying Lightning.”  They also played “Sketchead,” a bonus track from their latest album Humbug, which Turner admitted to the crowd in his charmismatic Sheffield accent had only been played a couple of times before.

When it came to actual stage presence, AM impressed upon the audience the stereotype of the stiff British upper lip. Albeit the tunes were aggressive, raw — the energy was lacking as the quartet occasionally threw their hair around half-heartedly, lethargically — like they didn’t need any more friends. Or were bored with the ones they already had.