Track Review: New TV on the Radio!: "Will Do"

Resident rock music demigods TV on the Radio have decided to unleash a track from their upcoming album, Nine Types of Light upon the world by way of Seattle radio station 107.7 The End's website. In addition, the band's twitter feed is currently sporting a list of stops scheduled for the group's April 8-May 2 tour. An album release date of April 12 was also revealed.

On their first two official records, Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes and Return to Cookie Mountain, TV on the Radio pounded swells of noise and energy into their listeners ears. Usually the tracks would be initially off-putting due to the the amount of musical information they contained. Their 2008 record, Dear Science, was more approachable and less dense but still managed to avoid sacrificing musical complexity. Based on their newest track, "Will Do," the band seems to be building off of the sounds of Dear Science, rather than reverting back to an earlier sound.

List of the Day: Top 10 Songs of 2009

Many people seem to get nostalgic about the music of the past few decades, even people in my age demographic (college-aged) often express their belief that they were born in the wrong musical era. I am not of a similar mindset, I firmly believe that the past ten years of music were the finest ten years of music the world has ever seen. I know that believing that the music you grew up with is the greatest music is about as stereotypical as believing that old music is superior but I'm sticking to my guns. 2009 was a particularly great year for music, which I realized on my college radio show this week, which featured music exclusively 2009. The following ten songs my top choices, with no artist being represented more than once.

Top 10 Songs of 2009

10) Treat Me Like Your Mother (The Dead Weather)
The Dead Weather's first album was notably stronger than their sophomore effort, and was replete with grimy blues-rock standouts. Jack White and Alison Mosshart argument of a song is the strongest track on the record.

9) Woods (Bon Iver)
Off of the Blood Bank EP, Bon Iver's excellent follow up to For Emma, Forever Ago. This song was recently sampled heavily on Kanye West's Lost in the World. The song's copiously layered vocals create a hypnotic gem of a song.

8) Cornerstone (Arctic Monkeys)
Alex Turner's lyrical storytelling gifts have never been more prominent than on this single off of his band's 2009 effort, Humbug. In just over three minutes, Turner recalls his attempts to meet women who resemble his ex-girlfriend, and his eventual and repeated rejection when he asks to call them by his ex's name.


7) That Look You Give That Guy (Eels)
Songs about unrequited love and the heartbreak that results from it, is not an uncommon topic in pop music. And his particular example of that sub-genre of song captures the agony of seeing the woman you love with another man.

Certain Songs: "Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me"

"Certain songs they get so scratched into our souls." -Craig Finn

In this and future posts presented as "Certain Songs," I'll try to express the personal and universal importance of songs that matter to me. I'll try to explain, or at least reflect on the emotional reactions they evoked when I first heard them and when I hear them now.


"Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me"

The first two minutes of this five minute song contains three elements: a simple laboring piano, tortured jeers, and a whale call (seriously). Initially, the brilliance and necessity of this introduction was lost on me, it was nice enough but I wanted to hear something witty and biting from Morrissey (whose lyrics were what finally drew me to The Smiths). The desire to streamline the song was not only mine, as the initial 7" pressing of this single removed the introduction. However, without these two slowly building minutes, Morrissey's initial cry looses the brunt of its impact.

List of the Day: 6 Greatest Bassists

This list is not intended to be an exploration of the most technically skilled bassists in all of rock music history, I'm sure Geddy Lee would probably have no problem playing circles around the below listed individuals. However, as David Berman famously said, "all my favorite singers couldn't sing." This philosophy can and should be applied to many sectors of life, and in this case I have applied it to my favorite bassists. Because if you don't think your favorite things are also the greatest things, there's something wrong with you.

Six Greatest Bassists:

6. Jack Lawrence
"Little Jack," the right-hand man of Jack White in both The Dead Weather and in The Raconteurs, composes dirty bass riffs that compliment the modernized blues-rock crafted by White.

5. Andy Nicholson
The first bassist of the Arctic Monkeys who played bass on their outstanding record, Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not.

4. Andy Rourke
Rourke's weaving baselines complimented Johnny Marr's jangling guitar compositions perfectly in their work together with The Smiths. His finest work can be heard on The Queen Is Dead.

List of the Day: 7 Hip-Hop Acts to Watch in 2011

2010 saw the release of some of the most interesting and boundary-pushing hip-hop that has been seen in years. Curren$y and Ski Beatz released two cohesive and virtuosic Pilot Talk records, OFWGKTA tried to offend everyone (they succeeded in alienating me), Big Boi finally got around to compiling his southern rap opus, and Kanye West was more entertaining, more interesting and and just better, than everyone. A month and a half into 2011, there are a number of things to get excited about all over again.

7 Hip-Hop Acts to Watch in 2011

7. Mos Def
In 2009's when The Ecstatic was released, expectations were not very high for the Brooklyn MC's fourth solo album. After the overrated Black on Both Sides, which was followed up by two more mediocre records, any excitement lingering from the outstanding Black Star record with Talib Kweli had been almost entirely smothered. But creatively global production and previously absent level of excitement from the rapper let to a return to popularity and relevance. Now that he has allied himself with Kanye West, it will be exciting to see what he does in the coming year. It is also interesting to note that Mos Def has been seen supporting the young Odd Future collective on multiple occasions.

6. Pusha T
In his two verses on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, and in his five other GOOD Friday appearances, the younger half of Clipse asserted himself as Kanye's second in-command. While no album release dates are set, it seems doubtful that Pusha T will stay silent for all of 2011.

5. Wiz Khalifa
With the unsurprisingly named Rolling Papers due out on March 29, it will be interesting to see if Wiz can keep up with the sudden popularity Black and Yellow has brought him.

List of the Day: 9 TV on the Radio Related Wishes in Light of Their New Album

I would like to begin by apologizing for the pun in the headline for this post. Brooklyn's excellent quintet, TV on the Radio have shattered their hiatus in dramatic fashion with the announcement of a new album, Nine Types of Light, due out sometime this spring. The group will play their first live show in well over at year at the Radio City Music Hall on April 13. To celebrate this news, I have compiled a list of nine things that I hope the band kept/keeps in mind regarding the recording/release of this record.

1. Release delays are limited (or nonexistent).
Anytime an artist claims their newest project will be released "early next year," or "sometime in the Spring," I tend to get a little weary. Even though I have a little more faith in the honesty of this announcement than I do for say, a rumored Curren$y mixtape release date, I won't be totally worry-free until a more definitive date is put on the project.

2. Wolf Like Me redux.
I love TV on the Radio. I love every intricate and gentle and layered and complex piece of music they've ever made, but their biggest hit to date; Wolf Like Me, proved that this group could also make passionate and comparatively straight-forward rock music. While an entire album pursuing this sound would be a bit much, a couple of songs that explore similar sounds would not be unwelcome.

List of the Day: Top 5 Lyrics on Stay Positive

My favorite band is The Hold Steady, in fact the name of this blog is pilfered from a Craig Finn lyric. Craig Finn, for the uninitiated, is the brilliant and lyrically gifted frontman of The Hold Steady. On the band's fourth record Stay Positive, Finn decides to "tell it like a murder mystery," as he portrays the emotional and physical toll a violent crime takes on the victims, the perpetrators, and the witnesses. This record took me a long time to get into, and in fact, I barely even enjoyed it that much until I finally took note of the complex narrative Finn was presenting. In light of my own lyrical conversion, here are the top five lyrics Finn penned for the album.

Top Five Lyrics on Stay Positive (The Hold Steady)

5. "Her friends all seemed nice. She was getting good grades. But when she came home for Christmas. She just seemed distant and different." -One for the Cutters

(The record's female protagonist begins her spiral into despair after witnessing the killings.)

4. "Sapphire, if St. Paul don't call we've always got Aberdeen. Because dreams they seem to cost money but money costs some dreams." -Yeah Sapphire

(A clever bit of Craig Finn philosophizing.)

Track Review: Shaolin vs. Wu-Tang

The recent resurgence of Raekwon as a relevant force in hip-hop has led many to point to the Wu-Tang Clan as a whole as an improved and reinvigorated collective. I disagree. From where I'm sitting, Only Built 4 Cuban Linx...Pt. II single-handedly managed to raise the profile of the group with little help from any of the other group members solo efforts.

List of the Day: Top 5 Songs on Alien Lanes/Blog Introduction

One of my favorite books, if not my favorite book, is Perfect From Now On by John Sellers. It's not a life changing novel, or a collection of sage advice from someone who understands life a lot better than I do, and because of this it's not the most impressive book to list as one's favorite. However, it is a book written by a person who loves music, and it allows him to share with the reader his intense love for that subject. It reads like a great conversation with a fellow music fanatic, and that's pretty much my goal for this blog. About 70 pages in, Sellers accurately states that, "Lists are the backbone of present-day music writing." So here's my first post in the form of a list.

Top Five Songs on Alien Lanes (Guided By Voices)

1. Game of Pricks
A near-perfect example of lyricist Robert Pollard's ability to produce simultaneously original and evocative melodies. (Bonus points for being featured in the brilliant British sitcom The IT Crowd)

2. Motor Away
Alien Lanes along with Bee Thousand are considered to be Guided By Voices two masterpieces because of songs like this which compact hook after chorus after riff into a two minute rock song and somehow multiply the band's energy.