The National – Terrible Love and Bloodbuzz Ohio

Free download of Bloodbuzz Ohio here:

http://highviolet.com/#

A living, breathing thing

Yes, yes, I really do.

I’ve found a new outlet for my passionate sharing of music. Every month before and after Books & Bars, I have a captive theater audience upon which to foist my latest mixtape CD. Feedback is immediate. It reminds me of performing live comedy. You get the reaction right away. No more giving someone a mix and waiting to hear back. A couple weeks I played The Bird and the Bee’s Hall and Oates covers record. Last night a waitress at Bryant Lake Bowl told me that the A/V guy has been playing it before shows all week now. I think he burned a copy of my mix. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. So, if you want to hear my the monthly mixtapes with a live audience, come to Books & Bars between 6-7p and 8:30-10p. Sure the discussion is from 7-8:30p, so you could stick around for that, too.

If you’d like a copy of last night’s mix, request it in the comments section here.

March Mix
Real Life – Tanlines
Crimson and Clover – Joan Jett and The Blackhearts
Don’t Want to Miss a Thing – Pomplamoose
Mother Russia – We Became Actors
In The Street (Alternative Single Mix) – Big Star
Minneapolis – That Dog
Light Love – Free Energy
Hurricane J – The Hold Steady
Baby f. Ludacris – Justin Bieber
piano fire – sparklehorse
I Wanna Life – Goldfrapp
My Life On The Crazy Train Sucks (So What?) (Kelly Clarkson vs. Ozzy Osbourne vs. Pink vs. Daft Punk) – Dan Mei & Marc Johnce
Svaatzi Uutsi – Pomegranates
Digital Love – Daft Punk
Single Ladies – Pomplamoose Covering Beyonce
Animal Arithmetic – Jónsi
All My Friends – Franz Ferdinand
Swim – Surfer Blood
Just Stop Believin’ (Lady Gaga vs. Journey) – DJ Tripp
I Just Want To See Your Face – Serena Maneesh
Saddest Summer – The Drums
Don’t Look Back – She & Him

Hope to see you tapping your toes on April 13th.

A Hard Day’s Knight for Batman

DJ Doodles. He stands up at the kid entertainment center and changes CDs as he sees fit, gauging the mood of his father and brother, setting the tone for the playdates. His identity is not known to most of the kids at the ravedates as he tends to wear a ski-mask or other costume disguise. Rumor has it he is not even 4 years old until tomorrow. DJ Doodles’ fave song of late has been A Hard Day’s Night. I am guessing he thinks it’s about a knight who had a long day fighting dragons. Both Pablo y Doodles like a lot of Beatles tunes, so together we made a compilation representing their favorites. It might surprise you, but here are the 30 songs that fit on our Boys Best Beatles disc.

A Hard Day’s Night
She Loves You
Penny Lane
Help!
Can’t Buy Me Love
Revolution
Paperback Writer
I Saw Her Standing There
I Am The Walrus
Taxman
With A Little Help From My Friends
I Want To Hold Your Hand
Ticket To Ride
Here Comes The Sun
All You Need Is Love
Twist and Shout
We Can Work It Out
And Your Bird Can Sing
Back in the U.S.S.R.
Day Tripper
Drive My Car
Good Day Sunshine
Glass Onion
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da
Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
Yellow Submarine
Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
Her Majesty
Boys
The End

What about you and yours? What are your kids listening to these days?
You want to trade mixtapes or attend the next ravedate? The locations are usually only disclosed hours before they go down.

Mixtapes by requests only (in comments)

I see there were 30 downloads of the Mustache Robots Jan. Mystery Mixtape.
And… zero comments/feedback. Am I back to yelling into my dark cave?
To be fair, a few people did thank me and comment on my Facebook page.

Maybe I’ll try this. Might work better to get songs heard immediately and discussed.
That…
or really talking/writing about music is like dancing about architecture and what’s there to say?
You like or you don’t. You listen and you react. An individual’s experience with music and other art forms is so subjective.
This is why I felt the burnout on music reviewing. But I do still love to share what I love. Here I go again.
Heard Six Different Ways by The Cure used in the film Starter for Ten. Had not heard it for years and it sounded so good. It reminded me some of my first “alternative” music was The Cure, R.E.M., and The Replacements. Do you remember? Is it new to you? What do you think?

Sliding: The Further Adventures of Embracing Winter

We embraced winter again. This time it is actually sliding and not sledding at Lyndale Farmstead Park. Enjoy this video (note: different than my previous Facebook clip)
set to a fresh new tune you’ll hear on Feb’s mixtape:

n (ight) at the museum guy who talks funny

January Mixtape

Mustache Robots January Mixtape

2010 explodes from my speakers with Dessa, Hot Chip, Los Campesinos!, jj, and Corinne Bailey Rae to name a few highlights. These songs represent what I listened to the most in January, at least those I still like enough to share. If you download the mixtape, please leave a comment when you’ve had a chance to listen.

Please support the artists you like. For sampling purposes only. Music: it’s what’s for dinner.

Dessa – free download/new track “Dixon’s Girl”

Darling, isn’t it?

Concert Cal, probably maybes

Whoa, Dessa CD release show on Fri Jan 22 at Fine Line.
That is a highly anticipated record for me.

Love-cars on Jan 30 at Triple Rock
yes, and that one is for sure

these is a good bet:
Sondre Lerche at Varsity Theater on Feb 17 @8:00 PM

this might be a better bet:
The xx at Varsity Theater on Apr 9 @8:00 PM

Music is usually slower to get going again in the New Year. What I mean is it usually takes a while for a few new releases to spark it off. 2009 had a huge leakage of tunes in Spring. Here’s a clip from my first fave of 2010: The Year We Make Contact.

Los Campesinos!

I am such a fan for kinetic motion/energy in videos and film. Music set to running, cars going fast, speed, propelling, flying. I often imagine scenery rushing by as I listen. This lends itself to one of my fave places to listen: the car.

Hark, the Herald Choir is Weird

Pablo sings in choir. He has since he was 3. He seems to like it enough. Enough to put up with it for the reward of root beer and pepperoni pizza. Papa John’s pizza is delivered and sold for a 1.50 a slice in the youth lounge/game room at our church.

Pablo: Dad, this pizza is better than what you make at home.

Jefe: Thanks, yeah, it’s pretty good.

Pablo: Yeah, I like it a lot better than our pizza.

Doodles doesn’t do choir. He tried. We so desperately wanted photos of him in the white robe with big red bow. Doodles would go to choir practice and then report back to me:

Doodles: I don’t like choir.

Jefe: Why not, buddy?

Doodles: It’s weird. All they do is sing all the time.

Well, he’s right. What could I say. That what choir is. So we tried to bribe him with the rewards of pizza and root beer in the youth lounge afterwards. The deliciousness was not enough to conquer the weirdness. We gave up fighting/forcing him.

Pablo sang in a Christmas service. I noticed Doodles doing this during the songs:

He was plugging his ears. Is the music that offensive to him? Were the other kids that out of tune? Perhaps there is a greater problem here. He likes a lot of music as you’ve read here. AC/DC, Queen, Raffi, Metric, The Beatles, John Williams. Lately he has been crooning along with Crosby. Not really singing with Bing, but he likes to hear it. What is it about singing or listening to children’s choir?

Another parent and I talked about the drop-out rate for many boys in choir around the Kindergarten age range. He said he thought more than a few of them come back when it’s time to go up to summer camp with the other kids. They want to renew bonds from nursery school. We’ll see.

For now, I think we’ll try indoor soccer, swim lessons and some ice skating and sledding.