Feb/March issue of PSF is now online!
Jason Gross
Along with PSF, some other items that might interest you:
- See videos of Mike Watt's New Year's day tour of San Pedro: <http://
www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=384F9D8926A6F668>
- We have a Last.fm station set up, featuring music from artists
featured in PSF now:
<http://www.last.fm/user/jgrossnas/library/playlists/2gvrr_psf_feb-
march_2009>
- Please see my Twitter page for PSF news, music news, band finds and
other things having to do with... music!:
http://twitter.com/jgrossnas
And of course... in the latest issue of Perfect Sound Forever <http://
www.perfectsoundforever.com>, you'll find (among other things):
LESTER BANGS
- A good role model?
"Lester Bangs, like many deceased luminaries in their respective
fields of criticism, haunts everyone who, against all odds, decided
they want to become a rock critic. I had mildly dabbled in pop music
criticism before I first read Main Lines, Blood Feasts, and Bad Taste
(quickly followed by Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung and a
slew of internet scooping). Like many critics before me, I immediately
tried to follow in Bangs’ lead in my own writing. And like a
playwright who’s just discovered David Mamet, the results could be
disastrous."
THE DONNAS
Still Rock and Roll machines: interview
"The ABC’s of punk rock have been learned and demonstrated by four
women who are not an overnight success in the music industry. The
Donnas are a group of four women (they are older than twenty-one, a
fact that inspired the title for their fourth CD) who have been
playing together for over ten years. Palo Alto, California claims
them as their own--as well they should. Three elements usually appear
in their music: alcohol, boys, and covers."
KENWARD ELMSLIE
- Poet turned theater man
"In the 1950's Kenward Elmslie was the protege of the well-known
lyricist John Latouche, who had worked with Duke Ellington and many
others. Elmslie, at times uncredited, helped Latouche with such chores
as writing a lyric for Leonard Bernstein's theme to the movie On the
Waterfront, and songs for on and off-Broadway revues. Elmslie even had
a jukebox hit (or, per Elmslie, 'hitlet') in 1959: "Love-Wise," sung
by Nat King Cole"
THOMAS HANSEN
- Portrait of concert pianist
"Striding across the stage in a determined and focused manner, Thomas
Hansen seats himself in front of the piano. He's all business. After
adjusting the piano bench, he is ready to perform. Hansen has been
performing for a quarter-century. Born in Massachusetts, near Boston,
in 1956, he started exploring the piano at age four. "
HARD PLACE
- Nerdy-pervy hairy MOR
"Hard Place is a joke: like all good jokes, they contain an ugly truth
and a joyful shell. The joyful shell is their
nerdy-pervy quality- their combination of low-budget videos, costume
and rock and roll scholarship. The specific brand of rock n roll they
work within is the mass culture of the 70's and 80's- 'Labrynth' era
Bowie, hair metal, MOR bands like Journey and Fleetwood Mac and 80's
synthpop. They treat all of these with loving respect and distance"
MAGIC MAGICIANS
- Alt-rock mysteries
"As I began searching for information about The Magic Magicians
online, and I discovered that while their music is widely available
for purchase that it was difficult to find writings on the band
itself. Google searches for 'The Magic Magicians' & 'Review' yielded
less than 95 results—to be exact—most of it comprised of scant
biographies, about a dozen or so album reviews, some with mixed
reactions (some of them with negative reactions, and a lone black-and-
white promotional band photo."
RECORD FAIRS
- Their psycho-geography, by Johan Kugelberg (Ugly Things), intro by
Jon Savage
"Does it matter what time you get in to the record fair? Whether you
get in at four o' clock for an extra 20 bucks, or if you arrive with
the average Joe at six o' clock? Or for that matter, if you chum up to
a dealer and procure a coveted pass in the guise of being his...
helper. What records are found during those first two hours? What
records are found during load-in? Rifling through a half-open boxes as
the dealer subdues his cardiac-arrest in mid-shlep..."
THE RUTS
- Early UK punk gone dub: interview
"Out of the four albums that were released while the band was still a
going concern, it's the last of these, a dub album called Rhythm
Collision, which I've gone back to the most. Released in 1982 on the
band's own label, it was the result of a band set free from major
label shackles, laying back, letting go and enjoying themselves. It
came at the tail end of a long period of turmoil including heroin
addiction and the subsequent death of lead singer Malcolm Owen in
1980, and a failed third rock album for Virgin without him in 1981, by
which time the band had appended their name with DC."
SOUNDSCAPE
- Lost NYC music venues (part 3)
"A sparsely appointed West Side loft dedicated to the presentation of
improvisational and global music, Soundscape was the spiritual
predecessor to such contemporary NYC venues as the Knitting Factory
and The Stone. Soundscape was founded by Verna Gillis, a City College
graduate who earned her PH.D in ethnomusicology from Union Graduate
School in 1975. Verna did extensive field recording in Haiti, the
Dominican Republic, Surinam, Peru, and Ghana; 25 albums of her
material were released on the Lyrichord and Smithsonian Folkways
labels."
TELEVISION
- Their early years
"... Television walked on, four tall skinny lads with military-erect
postures. Drummer Billy Ficca dressed simply in T-shirt and jeans, but
his bandmates' clothes flashed despite their thrift-shop shabbiness.
Positioned center-stage: guitarist Tom Verlaine, a hollow-eyed blonde
scarecrow, sported a delinquent's black Banlon-knit shirt. Bassist
Richard Hell grinned behind a baggy wrinkled suit and a tab-collar
shirt, his rectangular sunglasses and teased-out hair completing a
sardonic 1965 Bob Dylan look. Soupbowl-blonde guitarist Richard Lloyd
wore a brazen black T-shirt that bore the crimson legend 'PLEASE KILL
ME.'"
TRUE TEMPERAMENT
- Guitars in different, 'strange' scales
"True Temperament's guitar necks look as if they have been haphazardly
constructed. But the construction of the seemingly warped frets gives
them a sound very much in tune. Anders Thidell, the man behind the
company, tells his story about the invention and demonstrates how they
are produced."
TRANCE MUSIC
- Its dizzying history- from Africa to techno
"Trance music staged a takeover of the world's clubs sometime in the
early 1990's; its steady, pulsating beat dominating the drug-addled
dance floors that had once been the domain of Disco and Synth-Pop. It
stripped away the flashy adornments of earlier dance musics and placed
it emphasis squarely on dance's 'trance inducing' qualities."
VAN HALEN
- The misunderstood Hagar years
"The Cinderella tale begins in the sterile year of 1986 - before Guns
n' Roses rebooted history - and the choice of Sammy Hagar, perennial
minor-leaguer, adopted favorite son of St. Louis' KSHE-95 for
chrissakes, was obdurate, at best. Following 1984's close scrape with
#1, millions of dollars rode on the risk. That's a lot of lines. Of
course, Eddie Van Halen wanted his hereditary spotlight back from the
perpetually usurping David Lee Roth, but, what the f---, puppy-faced
"I Can't Drive 55" Hagar was, huh, Ted Nugent without charisma."
VINYL ANACHRONIST
- Turntable alternatives
"Why do we talk about Rega and Technics as if they are the only game
in town? If you read these forums regularly, you'll know that many
analog fans also own 'tables from Music Hall and Pro-Ject, two
companies that are also very competitive in the sub-$1000 turntable
market. Yet the debate always becomes heated when you compare the
virtues and sins of a particular Japanese mass-market direct-drive
'table with that of a particular English belt-drive turntable."
PLUS rememberences of Ron Asheton (Stooges) and Mark Price (from his
Tin Huey band mates) and a list of the staff's favorite music of 2008.
We're always looking for good writers and/or ideas so let us know if
you have anything to share.
See you online,
Jason