fun. : Aim and Ignite

    Yes, they are called fun. (with a period after fun) and for good reason (they are from NYC? well, maybe). [But actually it's because] their music is pure unadulterated fun.ness! And if you quickly recognize their style, it may be because you knew and loved The Format, which is where Nate Ruess came from after an announced hiatus in 2008--their last release was Dog Problems in July of 2006. Well, they have not lost any of their charm, and I assume any following The Format had has quickly transfered to fun. upon release of Aim and Ignite in August of 2009 (I bet you keep thinking I'm ending my sentences after fun. don't you?). A deluxe album version followed this up, with two excellent RAC remixes, some bonus tracks including a new song, "Stitch Me Up", and some music videos. RAC, for those who do not know them, are Remix Artist Collective, and have remixed quite a few good bands, including handful of songs for Tokyo Police Club, Radiohead's "Nude" two ways (yes, like eggs) and Phoenix's "1901", to name a few. A live album, fun. Live At Fingerprints, was also released in April of 2010. They are on the Fueled by Ramen label.
    One things I love about fun. is that Ruess's vocals (along with a mystery female once in a while; EDIT: mystery vocalist no more: Emily Moore) are always clearly in front of the music, and easily discernible. fun. also has a flair for the dramatic, falling into the category of power pop for that reason, and employ a wide variety of instrumentations to add creative genius to their compositions. The first track, "Be Calm", for example, has an accordion, at least two violins, chimes, trumpet and synthesizers (along with the normal electric guitars and drums). You could almost consider some of fun.'s songs in the Broadway musical genre, an 80's power ballad without the horrible 80's beat (yes, Journey is my least favorite band ever! emphatically!) or reminiscent of Queen's rock operatics from "Bohemian Rhapsody". Perhaps the resulting album is even a little disjointed, with the eclectic use of classical instrumentation: piano, trombone, tenor sax, string quartet, horn (yeah! my instrument), electric organ, and bells and oboe; gospel chorus, punk, glee chorus and barber shop quartet alike style vocal interludes; and sudden changing tempos and loud and soft sections. But, why do I care if every song is just plain fun.?
    I hope that you found this post fun. too and equally as eclectic! And I leave you with "Be Calm" in the MixPod player; as "Walk the Dog" (a worthy choice) is a song you may have heard on the radio, like I did on WBER 90.5 "The Only Station that Matters"; and "All the Pretty Girls" (which I almost chose if not for the fact that it) is on my Facebook playlist and you can listen to it there (if you are privileged enough to by my friend lol). Enjoy!

Just in...Omar Rodriguez-Lopez: Cizaña De Los Amores

    We have ourselves yet another ORL release, and this the second release of October, the first being an album called Tychozorente! Well, maybe with a little less enthusiasm this time...for both releases. Recently, I've been fairly disappointed in OMR's creative impulses, for a few reasons. One, everything lately has been in Spanish. Well I didn't mind that so much for Ciencia de los Inutiles, which is a gorgeous acoustic album released back in February, it has just started getting a little old not being able to discern any of the lyrics. Second, the last few releases were just not the same enjoyable vein as those of Solar Gambling, Xenophanes and Cryptomnesia. Sepulcros De Miel, which I've blogged previously about here, was purely experimental free-rock; Tychozorente was very experimental electronic music; and Cizaña De Los Amores, though it does show more promise as a poor replica of the better former albums is, well for lack of better description, droopy (By the way, all the links, if you haven't noticed yet, are to omardigital where you can listen to each album, respectively, in its entirety for free).
   So, what is Cizaña De Los Amores like? I call it droopy, will explain that now and then try and leave it. Upon listening a few times through I just find each track lacking some sort of spark, it is hard to pinpoint, and the vocals by Ximena Sariñana Rivera--which were so great in Solar Gambling, Xenophanes and Ciencia de los Inutiles--have grown slightly monotonous; they lack the energy that the music wants desperately to emit. I guess the simple explanation of this is that the voice is always low and in her chest voice, while in my opinion needs to be high and screaming to an extent; consequently, it comes out flat by not adding to the electricity of the music. Lisa Papineau also does vocals on the first and seventh track "Nada De Amor", but it is hard to distinguish the difference between both singers if you didn't know better and my complaint remains the same.
    The first track, "Soledad Y Silencio" is, actually, Halloweenish; meaning, it sounds sort of like this creepy background music to a haunted house, with an eerie quality to it produced by the dreamy pulsating synthesizer chords and octave motives in the lo-fi piano. It does in one aspect remind me of, with merely a faint glimmer, of the last track from The Mars Volta 2006 album Amputechture, "El Ciervo Vulnerado" at about 7:55 into the song--at least it kept invoking that comparative image in my mind. There are definitely some nice moments in the next track "No Hay Más Respuestas", about half way through it has that brilliant ORL progressive style going from one lick to the next. I like the intro to the third track "Victamas Del Cielo" and even the down-tempo-ness of it, but in relation to the whole album being slightly so, it loses its impact. It even, if I may suggest, has a slight reggae beat, especially with the rock organ which receives a lengthy solo (I have noticed a trend towards ORL groups becoming more jam-bandish). The ending is sweet too.
    The fourth track, "Corazón" is the droopiest. It has this just under pitch kind of feeling, with a guitar riff throughout that is too repetitive and other moments with guitar chords or melodies that are falling (or failing if you will) pitched sequences. This song continues into the next "De Piedra", where it improves little, except when it eventually fades out. "Infiel Hasta La Muerte" just lacks energy. It has these what would have been cool angular chords, reminiscent of The Mars Volta 2003 album De-Loused in the Crematorium, but they are fragile. The ending portion of the track picks up a bit and if most of the album was this way, I'd have been more satisfied.
    Track seven, "Nada de Amor" imitates the track "Poincaré" from Solar Gambling, with the same piano, but not as clear and fresh sounding. It is hazy and back to the etherealness of track one, while building to the end. The final track, "Carne De Perro" has a clear latino influence, bongo drums and shakers included; and is a big guitar solo that lacks organization and finesse, trying to be somewhat of an 80s face melter I suppose.
    I've uploaded the track, "No Hay Más Respuestas", as I feel it's the best representation of the quality of work ORL can produce and has done so in the past. And don't get me wrong, I do think the whole album is worth a listen and then some, so please do explore!

Freelance Whales: Weathervanes

    Well it is high time I posted about the Freelance Whales, a group I find myself constantly returning to listen to. I guess you could call them electro-pop, folktronic, or multi-instrumental, because they use a variety of uncommon sound creators, though uncommon is hardly true anymore in the indie scene; like banjo, glockenspiel, xylophone, waterphone, harmonium and synthesizers. They employ solely acoustic guitars, their melodies are light and youthful with an ambient etherealness underlying, while a few of the tracks are specifically fillers of harmonium or synthesizer chords and some banjo. They have been compared to Sufjan Stevens, Death Cab for Cutie--with obviously a lot more bells and whistles--, Arcade Fire, Ben Gibbard (other solo work beyond DCfC) and as Nick and Norah-core (referring to the film Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist). I also think the lead singer sounds like the group fun. (yes it is written as fun.), especially the song "Kilojoules".
    One review, on NPR.org, calls Weathervanes "incredibly infectious, jubilant music", and I wholeheartedly agree with that. In fact, I'd argue that the venues the Freelance Whales are found playing at have led to that type of sound. The Brooklyn group that came together out of an ad on Craigslist often plays on street corners and in subway stations in New York City, which has made them quite a "buzz band" apparently (yes I'm adding to it), receiving a lot of blog notice and anticipation leading up to this their first release in April of 2010.
    The story behind the album is sort of dreamlike, apparently about a boy who has romantic fantasies involving a ghost girl who haunts his family's home. The story is also somehow linked to one of the members, Judah Dadone, and how he almost drowned in the Sea of Galilea and growing up living in Jerusalem. The girl, supposedly is of the typical Manic Pixie Dream Girl archetype. To explain from a film standpoint and quote, Manic Pixie Dream Girl is: "that bubbly, shallow cinematic creature that exists solely in the fevered imaginations of sensitive writer-directors to teach broodingly soulful young men to embrace life and its infinite mysteries and adventures." Some female characters that have been described as fitting that role are: Kirsten Dunst (for whom the term was coined by film critic Nathan Rabin for her role in Elizabethtown), Katherine Hepburn (perhaps the earliest example in Bringing Up Baby), Zooey Deschanel (in many roles) and Natalie Portman (in Garden State). 
    For your listening pleasure, I have uploaded "Broken Horse" to the MixPod player. If that is not enough, though, the entire album put out on Frenchkiss/Mom + Pop Records can actually be heard here: http://www.freelancewhales.com/weathervanes/index.php.

The Flaming Lips: Embryonic

    It is almost the one year anniversary of Oklahoma alternative neo-psychedelic space rock experimental band The Flaming Lips's release of Embryonic (October 13, 2009). That's a lot of genre to swallow, so let me explain a bit. Their sound is very "lush" as some have put it while grungy (hence alternative, think Radiohead OK Computer), while at the same time brash with metallic or bell sounding electronics (hence the space rock) and trippy (hence the neo-psychedelic). I always thought, without really knowing The Flaming Lips, that they were a UK band, because in my own experience, the British groups tend to be more melodic and unique, while American rock is sort of one note; but, the Lips (short name people often refer to them by) have broken through that mold and in doing so put out a pretty interesting album.
    The sound of Embryonic also differs greatly from their other critically acclaimed releases Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots (2002) and At War with the Mystics (2006). I guess their older stuff has been called more polished, which I agree with to a degree. Embryonic is perhaps merely a great collection of ideas akin to a movie soundtrack, not so much complete songs. What I mean is that it seems that as soon as a song gets really cooking, it is over and never really completes its thought. Or, as with many other bands any album contains a few shorter tracks that are meant to fill, a short jam or chordal idea; this is somewhat how many of the tracks could be described. But their older albums seem more popish or neo-60s-70s and do not push the envelop of experimentation as much, so I like Embryonic the most.
    Embryonic is a double album, 18 tracks split between two discs. Some notable featured artists on the album are MGMT on the track "Worm Mountain" and Karen O, lead singer for the Yeah Yeah Yeahs on a few tracks. The Lips have been known to try different things with their releases. One album, Zaireeka (1997) was a true listening experience that few could afford. The music was split between 4 discs, which were meant to be played simultaneously on 4 different stereo systems to create the whole. Discs could even be left out to create a completely different version of the song. Obviously, this idea did not please critics or bring the Lips any real success, and they were almost dropped by their record label. But, their next release, Soft Bulletin (1999) brought them much more into the forefront of the music industry at the time.
    Highlights of Embryonic for me are: "I Can Be a Frog", which has a really cool music video to go along with it. Also, I love "The Impulse" and its electronically mixed vocals. I love the overall anticipation and tension of the slower songs, "Gemeni Syringes", "Sagittarius Silver Announcement" and "Evil" for example are eerie in the sense of leaving the listener expecting something to happen. They draw you into the dreamlike world of The Flaming Lips with their beauty only to bite you with the contrast of the harder songs like "Worm Mountain", "See the Leaves", "Watching the Planets", just to name a few.
    Enjoy the song "The Sparrow Looks Up at the Machine" in the MixPod player!