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Music Reviews - The Sundaes Issue


  
 
 
     
     




 

ASHER ROTH
The Greenhouse Effect Mixtape
thedailykush.com
I am officially Asher Roth’s biggest cheerleader. This kid’s life is the actualization of my 14-year-old “when I grow up” fantasies. Like one day I’d wake up, realize I can rap my ass off, kick a verse to Steve Rifkind, and BAM, I’d have a record deal. But unlike all the other white rappers, real gangsters would respect me and think it’s cool that I go to college. I would make a couple of albums, sell millions, and move to Miami with Stacy Dash. The only difference between my childhood fantasies and this kid’s present reality is in my fantasy I sounded like a mix of MC Search and Spice 1, not Eminem and RA the Rugged Man.

PRIME MINISTER PETE NICE
 

JIM JONES & BYRDGANG
M.O.B.
Asylum

G-UNIT
Terminate on Sight
Interscope
What’s going on over at G-Unit these days? It seems like only yesterday, Fifty and Game were riding around exchanging verses in the Bentley, Young Buck was killing the South, and, under new ownership, Mobb Deep were about to make Infamous Part Two. These days the Game’s long gone (and better for it), Mobb Deep is on ice while Prodigy does a bid, and Young Buck is the laughing stock of the internet. The only Gs left in the unit are Lloyd Banks and Tony Yayo, aka two guys who obviously didn’t spend their time in jail learning to rap. Terminate On Site can be summed up as a mediocre Polow da Don song and a beat Swizzy should have saved for someone else, bookended by 12 songs I couldn’t listen to past the first eight bars. No need to worry about G-Unit though, Curtis takes care of his boys. If the record biz doesn’t work out, he’ll get the whole team catering jobs on his Val Kilmer movie.

BEANIE SEAGULL
 
I should be Jim Jones’s publicist considering how much I write about the dude. But dang, it’s hard to ignore three summer releases on three different labels, all while changing New York thug fashion almost weekly. In case you’re not up to speed, it’s all about the Cliff Huxtable Coogi with your Louis V scarf now.

SWAGYNESS DEYN

 


 

NOTWIST
The Devil, You + Me
Domino
FUUUUUCK. Can these guys get any better at sucking? It’s almost impressive. They’ve turned aimless jams, flat beats, and monotone melodies into a career spanning over 20 fucking years. They’re like Amon Düül except without the sex, drugs, or balls.

BON SAGE



 

NATALIE PORTMAN’S SHAVED HEAD
Glistening Pleasure
Team Swan

THE SLANTS
Slanted Eyes, Slanted Hearts
Self-released
I know it’s kind of redundant and obvious to make derogatory music-review references to MySpace and Hot Topic in order to make a point about a band. I understand that it’s probably a low blow that can be likened to laughing at a retarded kid for having his shirt on backward. With that in mind, I will say that the Slants are a modern synth-pop band that is, um, stylistically very indicative of and in line with current youth-culture trends, attitudes, and expectations. Their teenage fans can be regularly found visiting specific mall-based retail outlets and social-networking sites. Oh, and the Slants are exclusively Asian (OMG, Slants, get it?), so it’s easier to tell them apart from the 794,856 other modern synth-pop bands that sound exactly the same but with more white people in the mix.

PELHAM PARK PETE
 
Excellent band name, top-notch album title, pleasing CD graphics, and cute kids wearing whimsical outfits. Yes… Yes, I think I’m on board for this. The songs are in the styling of all these new neon-electro bands like CSS, but they’re funnier (shades of Gravy Train!!!!) and the songs are surprisingly catchy. I dunno, man, sometimes you just have to stop being a cynical fuck and let yourself be entertained by a cute song called “Sophisticated Side Ponytail” that namedrops Shamu.

MEG SNEED


 
   
   

ORPHAN
Aborted by Birth
In the Nursery
How many rockers does it take to change a lightbulb? Well, if by “change a lightbulb” you mean “totally rock,” then the answer is two—one to be a tough chick drummer and one to play raw and evil-sounding art-metal entirely on bass. Bands with four or five members are basically just support groups for lonely pussies. Anyway, Orphan is NYC’s new deal and this record is totally cool. Plus the packaging is killer: The cover is by painter David Ratcliff, the back cover is an inverted Daydream Nation cover, the record is on white vinyl, and it’s limited to 666 numbered copies. As they say, Satan is in the details.

MEG SNEED
 

JAMMY DODGERS
Skive Off
Rock-it-Records
These have got to be the cutest punk rockers I have ever heard. They’re from Gainesville, their songs are all fast, short, and full of typical “punk politics” (gentrification and homophobia are bad, etc.) but in a funny way—like the song “Thanks for Nothing!” which is about hating Thanksgiving not just because of the poor Indians and turkeys, but because everything is closed. Also the lead singer sounds like a Powerpuff Girl. And their record label’s motto is “If it ain’t $3, it ain’t punk!” Also they have no webpage! A band and record label without a webpage! Kudos aplenty to these little firecrackers. The only downside is that the CD includes an “audio zine” with 19 tracks of spoken word. It is what the verb “shudder” was born to describe. “Everyone’s voice should be heard,” they say on the back cover. Ah, youth.

ROD SNODGRASS
 

DINO FELIPE
No Fun Demo
No Fun
This is the most listenable thing Carlos Giffoni has ever put his name on. Dino is a prodigal son from the noise scene who’s forsaken boring tough-guy music for keyboard-and-guitar jams that sound like they were made by some kid in junior high in his bedroom who just heard Dinosaur Jr. or Royal Trux for the first time and decided he’s going to be in bands for the rest of his life.

TAD PENNANCE
 

CHEAP TIME
s/t
In The Red
These guys kind of sound like a looser American version of early Wire or even the Buzzcocks, but they are way too good-looking for me to get into. Can you see their chiseled little cheeks on the cover there, all puckered up and pouting like it’s the American Eagle catalog or something? One of them’s wearing a fucking choker. How can I admit to liking that?

JARED TENNYSON
 

SAM CHAMPION
Heavenly Bender
North Street
It’s hard to be a band from New York and not be loathsome—it almost takes effort not to have some kind of obnoxious buzz, a blog-boy super-fan, or a spread in some trust-funded quarterly available at your local coffee shop until the “publisher” decides he’d rather be the “CEO” of a graphic tee line. Anyway, a good way to go about it is to dress like normal people, talk like normal people, and play normal rock music really fucking well. Thank God for bands like Sam Champion, who make me feel like this isn’t just a casting stage for douchebags and nut hangers.

JOHN SALLEY
 

NISENNENMONDAI
Neji/Tori
Smalltown Supersound
Oooh, proggy instrumental girl trio from Tokyo with song titles like “Sonic Youth” and “Kyaaaaaaa.” Sold!

CODY NEVERS




PEPPER
Pink Crustaceans and Good Vibrations
Law

ONEIDA
Preteen Weaponry
Jagjaguwar
The sticker on the CD cover tells us that this is “the first piece of Oneida’s ‘Thank Your Parents’ triptych of releases, which will lay bare the band’s colossal vision of a new age in music.” Why now, that’s crazy talk! I’m not saying this ain’t some top-notch instrumental heavy jam-out stuff, but that sort of talk is jinxier than saying, “What could possibly go wrong?” in unison with three other people and a black cat who just broke a mirror in a room where the foot of your bed is facing the door.

GINNY SABORIANA
 

MADE OUT OF BABIES
The Ruiner
The End
I was listening to this the other day and some extreme-metal-type dude chimes in with “I don’t like girl singers.” Which is something you hear occasionally but really makes no sense. It’s like saying, “I don’t like Asian baseball players.” So people will dis MOOB for reasons both valid and stupid, but the music smashes erratically through the bullshit like Steve McQueen high on crack and Cows’ Sexy Pee Story, so who cares about the weird hang-ups of Average Dude, USA? They’re just nervous about someone without a pee-pee making more vicious noises than whatever Viking in mascara is adorning the t-shirt du jour. I know, it’s a scary world.

SHIVA DITKO
 

WIRE
Object 47
Pink Flag
Let’s play a fun game: Close your eyes and think of your favorite rock band that formed within the last three decades. Guess what? Wire’s early records were so seminal, they probably had at least a teeny-weeny influence on the music that artist created! Isn’t that interesting? OK, close your eyes again and think of the same band. Now ask yourself, would I rather listen to them or to a brand new album from Wire? If you answered “the band I thought of before,” you are probably in agreement with 101 percent of the population! And you were also cheating because there’s no way you read that crap with your eyes closed, dickhead.

SHASTA FRESCA
 

MOSS
Sub Templum
Rise Above
Oppressive, plodding misery on an epic scale. Not like, “I’m having a really bad day, there was a really long line at Starbucks, they fucked up my order, and now I have to work late” kind of misery. More along the lines of “I’m going into that Starbucks after work and chaining the doors shut before I set the place on fire with everyone in it, me included.” Point being, Moss is the latest, greatest vehicle for total misanthropy and annihilation in the fine tradition of Winter, Disembowelment, and fucking goddamn it, I said VENTI you pricks.

AIDSY DAISY
 

DR. DOG
Fate
Park the Van
I was in Austin this year and while I was drinking on someone’s company card, this goofy, bearded bastard walks up to me. He tells me that his name is Frank and that he’s in Dr. Dog. I figured he was going to try to fight me since I’d said in the press that his band was “Infant Music,” but he throws me the ultimate curveball and says that he really likes my band (Clockcleaner) and wishes that I liked his band but he understands why I thought they were the musical equivalent of a Meg Ryan movie. He buys me a few drinks and we get to talking. He turns out to be a really good shit and we hit it off like real men. So If you’re looking for a good record to jam on while you’re catching cum in your beard as you discuss mic placement during the recording of Pet Sounds, then this is the soundtrack of your life!

JOHN SHARKEY III
 

THE MELVINS
Nude With Boots
Ipecac
The Melvins, along with rice and beans, comfortable socks, and sleep (the activity, not the overhyped boredom choir), continue to be awesome.

BRAD DAUGHTRY
 
Why bother reviewing a bad CD? I’ll tell you why: Sometimes it’s fun to be a cunt. There. Now you know that when some girl you’re sweating starts acting like a total bitch and makes you feel like everything you’ve ever said was dumb and that you look dumb and in fact your whole life is dumb, that really she’s just in the mood to be mean to you because it’s hilarious. Here’s how bad this CD is: Not only did I not listen to it, I didn’t even open the case. That’s right, you read that. I watched about a minute of the “making of this album” on YouTube—don’t ask me why—and apparently it was made in Redondo Beach. OK, that’s strike one. Slow, crooked-angle pan of a drum kit. “This is where the real playboys hang out,” purrs a double-chinned baseball face. Some guy in a tracksuit picks up a guitar, calls her Olga, and says she’s the best Fender Stratocaster he’s ever played in his life. Dude with the camera asks for one word about Olga. The response? “It is the perfect player.” One word, dude, just one! Goddamn, this CD sucks.

TEEN LAQUIEFA


 		    
   

THE FIERY FURNACES
Remember
Thrill Jockey
Whoa, is this really what this band sounds like? I’d just assumed it was your garden-variety, Pitchfork-approved yogurt music for young-adult t-shirt wearers. But I’m not sure who’d enjoy eating yogurt to a mentally ill woman being strung along by a guy who thinks letting her warble made-up show tunes over pointless bass noodling will make him the new Frank Zappa. Maybe some sort of dude in a cape?

BARRY HIENKIN
 

THE WALKMEN
You & Me
Gigantic
This would be a good album to put on at the end of a date if you wanted the girl you’re with to think you’re an overgrown baby who wears sneakers with suits and is worried about things like “the alienating effect of technology on this upcoming generation.”

FLUB JUNCTIVE
 

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Gigantic: A Tribute to Kim Deal
American Laundromat

QUIET HOOVES
No Mare of Mine
Self-released
See, Fiery Furnaces? THIS is how you do the whole disjointed-genius, Jad-Fair-channeling-Van-Dyke-Parks thing. You get eight or nine buddies to play every instrument in the world and then take yourself about 3 million times less seriously. Then you stamp a skateboarding horse on some used clothes and sell them for “however much you feel like paying” out of a box in front of the Soiled Mattress and the Springs show. Perfection.

BARRY HEINKIN
 

VAN DUREN
Are You Serious?
Water
I’m growing increasingly suspicious that the guys at Water Records are sitting on some sort of time cave or portal to a parallel universe where they can just stick their heads in and ask, “Hey, could you pass us some amazing, completely unheard-of old soul or British folk albums to put out on our side?” then pshhzZWAMP, they pull out a dusty old gem and look like arch wizards of music archiving. In this case the order was probably something along the lines of, “What have you portal guys got in the way of bizzaro Nick Lowe?”

TIMOTHY DALLAS
 
So at first I was like, Who are all these bands? It’s like, Le Testuo? The Modifiers? Am I that out of the loop? But then I was all, OHHHHHHH I’ve never heard of them because they are literally the shittiest musicians in the history of people.

SHAWNEDRIA MCGINTY


 		    
   

LEXIE MOUNTAIN BOYS
Sacred Vacation
Carpark
This is a bunch of crazy ladies in crazy-lady getups who chant and stomp and make grunting noises in unison, generally in front of an audience and preferably in churches. Performance art gives me the heebie-jeebies, but this CD has the benefit of not getting all up in my grill and doing weird shit while I fidget nervously. Instead, I am free to chortle over such hilarious “songs” as “2 Twigs/Big Brown Goat Cheese Twins,” which is basically five girls making rhythmic puking sounds. In fact, I’m going to give this CD a pukey face, not because it sucks, but as an homage.

MEG SNEED
 

HATEWAVE
Sexual Healing 2
Apop
This Weasel-Walter-led mid-90s spoof of “extreme metal” groups is kind of past its prime joke-wise, but it’s still impressive that they managed to make such dark and faux-evil-sounding sonic abrasions without using any bass (not just the instrument—I mean the entire range of sound).

URINE TREBLE
 

 

3 years ago More from this issue Tags: music, reviews, Orphan, Pepper, Quiet Hooves, Hatewave, G-Unit, Asher Roth, JIM JONES & BYRDGANG, NOTWIST, The Slants, NATALIE PORTMAN’S SHAVED HEAD, Oneida, MADE OUT OF BABIES, Jammy Dodgers, DINO FELIPE, Wire, CHEAP TIME, Moss, SAM CHAMPION, Dr. Dog

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