So Portland band Hockey, now signed to Capitol Records, has a new video for their song “Too Fake,” that looks pretty good. Despite being posted over a week ago (February 23), it’s only been viewed, as of this writing, 89 times. I’m frankly shocked and disappointed. Only 89 times? And then I saw it… “Embedding Disabled by Request” paired with “Hockey - Too Fake CAPITOL (P) 2009 The copyright in this audiovisual recording is owned by EMI Records Ltd.”

Ah-hah. It’s all coming together now. Really?! Still?!! Clearly this strategy isn’t too effective one week out. Don’t they know embedding is the cat’s pajama’s for everyone? (Maybe they’ve got a stereogum premiere or something? Maybe they really don’t care if people watch a video they spent many thousands of dollars on?)

In lieu of my normally being able to embed the video, head over to youtube to see Hockey’s “Too Fake.” Maybe you’ll be lucky stream number 100.

Due to ‘Seattle Snowmageddon 2008′ just about every show was canceled or well outside of the reach of Sound on the Sound, who is currently snowbound on Capitol Hill.

So we greatly appreciated this poster on the Jules Maes myspace that told it like it is (even with the spelling error):

Hey Pitchfork, I get it. You’ve established yourselves as the most critical mother fuckers on the internet… so, could you not aim for being the meanest too? As someone who writes about music, I get that there are albums you don’t like, hell I get it that there are albums you downright abhor. But this review is just mean.

And yeah, I like Noah and the Whale and their record, which you describe as “biting its best sensitive-indie forebears and then puking up all the most superficial chunks.” Eventually you proclaim the band should consider murder-suicide. And for someone who seems to get so little joy out of happy little pop songs, but all the joy in the world destroying those songs — we might recommend a similar path. 

An album and a band doesn’t need to be transformative or replete with a thousand obscure influences to be  worthy of a listen. So folks, ignore Pitchfork and take a listen to Noah and the Whale. They may not be the next Neutral Milk Hotel, but the record sure is fun fun fun!

Chromeo ::: photo by Josh

I admit it–I don’t get what the big deal is with Chromeo (or Girl Talk for that matter). But you all were going ape shit at the block party over both acts.

My feelings on Chromeo at least can be summed up by quoting a very very drunk friend of mine who surmised–”This seems like hip hop and dance music for people who feel uncomfortable with black people.” (drunk description wins!)

And looking around the nearly stark white audience (save some bad fake tans)–we had to wonder if it was true.

p.s. if you like the songs these guys are so blatantly ripping off and sampling–go and buy the original.

Are there not enough people in Seattle who would jump at the chance to actually Pearl Jam or Eddie Vedder play in Seattle? Today’s release of an August solo tour schedule for Vedder suggests once again that big bands who actually live in Seattle could care less about actually playing in Seattle. I am giving this phenomena a name: The Seattle Snub.

Here’s the deets on Eddie’s tour with Liam Finn straight from the Ten Club (for those who get to care):

DATE VENUE CITY PRE-SALE

Aug-01 Opera House Boston, MA Jul-07 at 9am PDT
Aug-02 Opera House Boston, MA Jul-07 at 11am PDT
Aug-04 United Palace Th. New York, NY Jul-07 at 1pm PDT
Aug-05 United Palace Th. New York, NY Jul-07 at 2pm PDT
Aug-07 NJ Performing Ctr Newark, NJ Jul-07 at 3pm PDT

Aug-09 Salle Wilfrid Pl. Montreal, QC Jul-08 at 9am PDT
Aug-10 Salle Wilfrid Pl. Montreal, QC Jul-08 at 11am PDT**
Aug-12 Massey Hall Toronto, ON Jul-08 at 1pm
PDT
Aug-13 Massey Hall Toronto, ON Jul-08 at 3pm PDT

Aug-16 Warner Theatre Washington, DC Jul-09 at 9am PDT
Aug-17 Warner Theatre Washington, DC Jul-09 at 11am PDT
Aug-19 Riverside Theatre Milwaukee, WI Jul-09 at 1pm PDT
Aug-21 Auditorium Theatre Chicago, IL Jul-09 at 2pm PDT
Aug-22 Auditorium Theatre Chicago, IL Jul-09 at 3pm PDT

All dates are subject to change.

The rumors were true and New Kids on the Block are indeed touring again. The “boys” (I am not calling them a band… I believe that involves instruments) just announced their first live dates in well over a decade.  The seven dates are all East Coast and one “third-coast” show, sorry West Coast NKOTB fans! If you hope to enjoy the thrilling reunion of Joey, Jonathan, Donnie, Danny, and Jordan - get ready to spend a pretty penny. The starting cost of tickets? $250 a piece! No you did not just hallucinate that. NKOTB is charging $250 a ticket,  and with all the “convenience charges,”  the cost will likely round up to close to $300 a pop. They better play and dance to “Hanging Tough” like their lives depended on it!

What does preventing a musician from drinking an alcoholic beverage on stage solve? What danger is such a ordinance protecting the fragile rock and roll fan’s soul from? It’s sickly ironic is it that the musicians are the ones bringing people into bars to listen to them, and yet they aren’t allowed to imbibe on the physical stage located within the bar while performing. A drink set down on the stage by anyone in violation of the clearly posted signs on the monitors will be quickly snatched up by security to avoid the appearance of an infraction.

Clearly the fun police have been regulating liquor establishments/entertainment venues more closely and have now required more of the mid-size venues (at least on Capitol Hill recently) to adhere to these draconian rules they’ve been hassling some of the smaller bars with for years now. While I applaud a proactive police presence in regard to regulating and protecting patron’s safety within clubs, what does this rule accomplish?

I really want to know.

Where do I begin?

I suppose first you should read this. (I wasn’t able to find a digital copy yet the other day, so I actually shelled out 7 dollars for a paper magazine. 7 dollars! )

Various people around town have been chatting about the latest issue of PASTE, in which they ask the question “DOES SEATTLE’S MUSIC SCENE STILL MATTER?” So I had to check it out. It was the lead article in their “Scrapbook” section of this month’s issue. The title is completely misleading though, as they don’t actually ask or answer the question in the article, it’s just a litany of reasons why Seattle is a difficult place to be a musician or a club. In the same way that every other major city is a difficult place to be a musician or a club.

What topics do they cover?

- High Cost of Living and Doing Business in Seattle
- Mayor’s Aggressive Nightlife Enforcement Plan
- How a few musicians have moved to Portland (Isaac Brock, Chris Walla)
- How easy/difficult it is/was to be a musician in Seattle

They do reserve a 1/8 page sidebar (not included in the digital version of the article), titled “THREE REASONS TO NOT COUNT SEATTLE OUT YET,” for actually answering the question, but it’s done simply by name dropping without any further context. They offer up a paragraph each on the strength of many local record labels and the burgeoning hip-hop scene led by the Blue Scholars and their five day fest The Program. The final paragraph in the sidebar, titled “Indie thrivers and survivors” mentions many of the other things that they should have been expanding on in the article when answering the question “DOES SEATTLE’S MUSIC SCENE STILL MATTER?” But it’s just names, and does nothing to reveal the depth and character (or supposed lack thereof) of Seattle’s music scene.

I do find it funny (and sad) that a Portland writer would be tasked with writing this article. It does seem like an advertisement for why Portland is better than Seattle. How original. Are there not writers who live in Seattle and are intimately familiar with the “scene” who could actually bring local perspective to the article?

The cost of living in Seattle is skyrocketing, true, but if high rents and traffic were such a big deal for musicians, New York wouldn’t have a music scene. Metropolitan areas are where “art” and “music” find their audiences and hence where artists and musicians make their homes; cities were the gears behind the marketplace of idea’s long before the internet ever came to pass. If the city is where the work is, the city is where the people will be.

When bands want to get noticed, where do they go? Ironically the cities with the highest rents and densest populations, New York and L.A. Yes, living on Capitol Hill (my home) and in the city of Seattle proper is far too expensive, but I’m not seeing musicians who want to live in-town, close to venues and “the scene,” being completely priced out of the neighborhood (no matter what the Stranger may have you believe). That’s not to say it’s easy to pull it off being a musician anywhere, and at the end they do give a nod to that fact. But in no way is there an exodus of talent from the Seattle scene as the article might intimate. For every Chris Walla who has left, I can give you a Ben Gibbard who remains.

So, now to the question. Does the local scene here “matter?” How does one define whether a scene “matters?” I’ll present a few indications one might consider when determining whether the Seattle music scene is alive and well:

Read the rest of this entry »

Paste Magazine has published yet another premature obituary of the Seattle Music Scene. It’s main criticism seems to be that Seattle is not Portland and that folks like Chris Walla and Isaac Brock have chosen to move to our fair neighbor to the South.

Josh will be posting a more complete and incisive opinion on the article, soon. Until then I’ll tell you, Seattle’s music scene is alive and well…. I mean, have you checked out this year’s local releases?! The Hands, Kay Kay and His Weathered Underground, Throw Me the Statue (which is selling out at local record stores), The Lashes, Grand Archives, just to name a few. With countless other exciting local releases on the horizon, from bands as varied as Thee Emergency and Shane Tutmarc and the Traveling Mercies. And while Seattle clubs might be struggling, the DIY scene in Seattle is well organized and puts on some incredible shows outside the confines of the traditional club scene.

From a press email titled, “The Kids Are All Shite!” came a sign off line I completely disagree with: “Drum Machines Will Save Mankind!”