Special Countdown: 12 Years of Last.Fm (Part 3) (#30-#21)

Rise Against

It's the end of the month, so that must mean that it's time for another installment of 12 Year of Last.fm. It's a great episode with a wide range of music. Enjoy!


12 Years of Last.fm (Part 3)

***Featuring***
Alkaline Trio
Bad Religion
Dar Williams
Elliott Smith
Frightened Rabbit
Pearl Jam
Rise Against
Sublime
Sufjan Stevens
Thrice
Vampire Weekend

Off the Charts #9: Birthday 2014 (Part 2)

WELL, this was quite under the wire, wasn't it? But we got it done and we hopefully learned our lesson for next year.

Enjoy!


Off the Charts #9: Birthday 2014 (Part 2)

**Featuring**
Against Me!
Drop Out Orchestra
Glenn Miller Orchestra
Green Day
Metallica
NOFX
Sufjan Stevens
Sun Culture
'Weird' Al Yankovich
Wild Flag

And here are the posts/blogs that I refer to in this episode:

Panda Head
Pitchfork
Sirens of Decay
Shorpy Historical Photo Archive
I Sing In The Kitchen
Snopes
Page-Turner
Not a Fancier of Cats
Garfield Minus Garfield

One Year, 100 Albums: #21 Sufjan Stevens "Come On Feel the Illinoise!"

Sufjan Stevens Come On Feel the Illinoise, 2005

I tried to tell a friend about this album the other day and was basically unable to describe it accurately while also making it seem like something he should check out. I think that's because this albums SHOULDN'T work as well as it does. It should be a complete pretentious mess! But it's not. It's a beautiful work of art that everyone should hear and enjoy.

I first heard about this album from my wife. One morning, she was checking her email before going off to grad school. I was still in bed, because I had a second-shift job (nowhere to be until 3pm). She started reading me this article (possibly from the Yahoo homepage?! Could it have been??) about this album with super ridiculously long titles and, (I was about to say "for whatever reason", but that's disingenuous. I know the reason) because Sufjan Stevens knows how to title an album in a catchy and memorable way, the album title stuck with me until right before Christmas a number of months later, when I decided to purchase the album for myself (this might not be true. it MIGHT be that I got the songs from my friend Riley and felt really bad about it. but I own the CD...so it could have been that and then guilt made me buy the CD later? Whatever. Not important.) and boy was I surprised at what dulcet tones graced my ears when I listened to the album for the first time. It was unlike anything I'd heard before, and remains unlike anything I've heard since, even from Sufjan himself!

It's half avant-garde indie concept album and half 1950's musical soundtrack. The songs have a way of sneaking under your skin, up your bloodstream and into your heart. Listen to "Casimir Pulaski Day" at your own risk. It's weapons-grade songwriting.

I should say that this album DOES have ridiculously long titles. The longest, and my favorite, is the title for a 2:15 long instrumental track:

"The Black Hawk War, or, How to Demolish an Entire Civilization and Still Feel Good About Yourself in the Morning, or, We Apologize for the Inconvenience but You're Going to Have to Leave Now, or, 'I Have Fought the Big Knives and Will Continue to Fight Them Until They Are Off Our Lands!'"  

Which is certainly one of the songs that that article mentions. 

All of that novelty stuff falls by the wayside when you actually listen to the music. Sufjan purrs the lyrics which are sometimes silly and sometimes bone-chilling. He epitomizes the latter in the 4th track of the album, "John Wayne Gacy, Jr.". The video is below. It's not the official video, but it's one that I think captures the heebie-jeebieness of the song.

If you don't take my word for it, and want a higher authority than me, then I should also point out that this album made #1 on Paste Magazine's "Best Albums of the 2000's" list. High praise, indeed.

Sufjan Stevens - Come On! Feel the Illinoise!: Part 1: The World's Columbian Exposition/Part II: Carl Sandburg Visits Me in a Dream

Sufjan Stevens - The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades is Out to Get Us!

You can buy Come On Feel the Illinoise at Amazon, Amazon MP3, and iTunes

What We Did During the Storm: A Podcast

So, last Monday (not LAST Monday, the LAST last Monday...the Monday when....it was October 29th) Sandy was hitting the east coast and my sister and I were bored. So we decided to make a podcast over the phone. I think it went pretty well. We had a very eclectic mix of songs and had a fun time talking about lots of different things related and unrelated to music!

Off the Charts #6: Sister/Rain

***Featuring***
Beach House
The Beatles
Gogol Bordello
No Use For a Name
P.O.S
Panda Bear
Smashing Pumpkins
Sufjan Stevens
Wu Tang Clan

Round 1b

Hi,

Just a really quick post to put up the next round in what's looking to be a year-long Battle of the Bands, if I don't get my act together.

1. Sufjan Stevens vs. MxPx

Sufjan Stevens - John Wayne Gacy, Jr. from Come On Feel the Illinoise!
MxPx - Kings of Hollywood from Before Everything and After

2. NOFX vs. Strung Out

NOFX - The Marxist Brothers from Wolves in Wolves' Clothing
Strung Out - Party in the Hills from Blackhawks Over Los Angeles

So where have I been? Well, work's been really busy and also...um...WE BOUGHT A HOUSE! It's about 5 minutes closer to my work, so it shouldn't be that bad of a move and it's basically our dream house. We really lucked out here, folks. I'll post pictures as soon as we can figure out how to get them out of K's camera.

Brackets

Ok. So NCAA Basketball March Madness is pretty much over now, but I decided I wanted to try something related to tournament brackets. The classic rock station that we occasionally listen to at work is having a battle of the bands with this tournament bracket and everything. So that's what I'd like to do too.

I'm a part of this website called Last.fm that keeps track of music that I listen to on my iPod or computer. And so, using the chart that it has for the Artists I've listened to most, I have made up a bracket of my own. It's really neat, but I don't think you get to see it yet. First, I'm going to gauge the interest in this endeavour with something of a pre-tournament set of match-ups. There are some positions on the bracket that are ties (basically, I've listened to two or more artists the same number of times) and so we're going to pick who gets those positions right now.


RULES FOR SAMPLE SONGS (Pre-tournament and Round 1):

For the first two contests, I will be posting songs from the contestants' most recent LP (not including greatest hits, live, or B-sides collections) that I own. Round 2 will have a different set of rules.


Oh, and the winner of the whole thing will have an entire post devoted to them including a playlist created by yours truly that you can download and burn to a CD in memory of the time we've spent together! Awww.

OK. So here are the pre-tournament match-ups and their sample songs:

1. Fall Out Boy vs. Sufjan Stevens
Fall Out Boy - You're Crashing, But You're No Wave from Infinity on High
Sufjan Stevens - Decatur, or, Round of Applause For Your Stepmother! from Come On Feel the Illinoise

2. Outkast vs. Blink-182
Outkast - Idlewild Blue (Don't Chu Worry 'Bout Me) from Idlewild
Blink-182 - Easy Target from Blink-182

3. Coheed and Cambria vs. Catch-22 vs. Taking Back Sunday
Coheed and Cambria - Feathers from Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV: Volume 2: No World For Tomorrow
Catch-22 - So Cold from Dinosaur Sounds
Taking Back Sunday - My Blue Heaven from Louder Now

4. Jack Johnson vs. Sublime
Jack Johnson - Sleep Through the Static from Sleep Through the Static
Sublime - Jailhouse from Sublime

5. Alanis Morissette vs. MxPx
Alanis Morissette - Everything from So-Called Chaos
MxPx - Well Adjusted from Before Everything and After

6. Ben Folds vs. The Get Up Kids vs. Foo Fighters (Now, that's Ben Folds (solo) not Ben Folds Five)
Ben Folds - You to Thank from Songs For Silverman
The Get Up Kids - Martyr Me from Guilt Show
Foo Fighters - Let It Die from Echoes, Silence, Patience, and Grace

7. Descendents vs. Linkin Park vs. No Use For a Name
Descendents - I Won't Let Me from Everything Sucks
Linkin Park - Given Up from Minutes to Midnight
No Use For a Name - Bullets from Keep Them Confused


So, take a listen if you don't know the artist, leave a comment with your votes and I guess the voting will close at like 11 pm EST on Monday. Thanks in advance for participating!