“I got hair on my chest. I look good without a shirt.” – Tom Waits
I had this ridiculously hot friend in high school who looked like a punk rock, flannel-clad version of Fabio. Big, built, rustic, hairy, unrepentant manbro. He’d come swaggering into 2nd period economics class reeking of Pabst and cigarettes, start an argument with the teacher over the ethics of business regulation or the Coase theorem (did I mention he was brilliant to boot?) and all the weird girls would just swoon.
“Goin’ Out West” – Tom Waits
This guy regularly favored me with bonecrushing hugs that blotted out the sun. As I recall, even freshly showered, he had a musky, vaguely goat-like odor. Being slammed face-first into his armpit should’ve been off-putting, but somehow wasn’t. In fact, I think I must have imprinted on the gent and his scent, because all these years later, there’s still a very special place in my crotch heart for brawny, unshaven, man-stinky lumberjack types with big hands and lantern jaws.
“Lumberjack” – Jackyl
This testosterone-injected morningwood edition of BTC goes out to all of the big, built, rustic, hairy, unrepentant manbros of the world… and the loincloth-sniffing perverts who love them.
Click below for more Beorn porn (and please do add your own in comments)!
Just a quick goodbye air kiss to glamourpuss Eartha Kitt, who passed away today at the age of 81. It’s nice to picture her sitting on some sparkling, inter-dimensional yacht this evening, having scintillating conversation over moon martinis with Harold Pinter. Bye bye, beautiful. You always were my favorite Catwoman.
Here’s Kitt’s decidedly materialistic rendition of “Santa Baby” to send us off to dreamland. Mmrrrrrowl.
The spectacle above was The Pointy Shoe Factory – a Texan ensemble whose turbulent sound I fell in love with 7 years ago, while working a shpooky retail gig. I discovered them behind the shop stereo on a scratched-up, home-made CD. Dramatic and dirty, the album felt almost like a film score. If in his 20s Angelo Badalamenti himself had a doom band that played in smoky Lynchean lounges it would sound like this. I looked for more, but the band had broken up for all the classic reasons: money, women, drugs and backstabbing. Daron Beck – TPSF vocalist and, as it turned out, the one who abandoned that CD at my old job – had apparently lost his mind. He was busying himself with a stint on American Idol, sitting in with various bands and playing strangely affected solo shows under the name “The Passion Of Daron Beck”.
The Great Tyrant 7″ album art by the talented David D’Andrea
This unseemly behavior halted when The Great Tyrant was formed. The band has now been together for three years, with Beck as crooner, wailer and keyboardist, Jon Teague on drums and Tommy Atkins on bass. Both Teague and Atkins are formerly of Yeti – a space-prog band TPSF performed with regularly. The three site a long and erratic list of influences, among them Scott Walker, Il Baletto di Bronzo and Swans. While this configuration is smaller than The Pointy Shoe Factory, the sound is not. Still thoroughly theatrical and doomy, The Great Tyrant drowns the senses in expert noise and takes the brain for a stroll along the edge of pandemonium. Have listen to Candy Canes, the A side of TGT’s 7? while you watch the video, made for the band by Nouvelle Mode Films.
A seemingly sane Daron reports that being part of The Great Tyrant has been a tremendous learning experience, and that playing with Jon and Tommy is everything he could wish for in a band. Feel the love! They have finished their first full length album and are looking for a label to put it out on vinyl – any takers? There is a plan for a West Coast tour in the fall [wheee!] and a split 12? with Human Anomaly [ex-Noothgrush] that should be out by early fall. As we wait for hard copies of an album to become available [or an official website, for that matter], I suggest you keep a close eye on The Great Tyrant myspace page. And if you’re in Dallas, you can see them live on December 28, 9pm at Double Wide.
Julia Frodahl is a dreamy dove, a love, a healer, and dare I say, the most precious of precious snowflakes. When I use the word precious, I don’t mean it in a cloying or derisive manner. Julia is truly precious in the incalculably valuable, rare and astonishing sense of that word, like the Baroda Diamond, like a unicorn found wandering the streets of Greenpoint, Brooklyn.
Music video for Edison Wood’s “Last Night I Dreamt I Would Last Forever” directed by Alicia Reginato, 2008
As an accomplished yoga instructor (according to some, she’s one of the best inversion teachers in New England), her serene approach to the yoga asana practice is paired with a deep working knowledge of human anatomy and alignment. As lead songwriter, singer and keyboardist for the chamber orchestra Edison Woods, she infuses her music with a pensive, wintry grace that makes me think of pure white things: falling snow and eiderdown, powdered sugar, frost, pearls.
Listen for yourself. Here’s Edison Woods’ “Shirts for Pennies”:
Photo by Sebastian Mlynarski.
Click through for more photos of the exquisite Mme Julia, and a rave review of Edison Wood’s album Seven Principles of Leave No Trace from All Music Guide.
When the controversy regarding Amanda Palmer’s belly first hit, I was confused. Amanda Palmer’s record label, metal powerhouse Roadrunner, had told her they wanted to cut shots from her new music video that focused on what they deemed to be the singer’s offensively large belly. I watched this video, and I kept waiting for that one shot. I was waiting to see a jiggling closeup, or a spray of sweat flying from a glistening roll of flesh – just something that would make me say, “well, at least I can see where these A&R dudes were coming from, even if I don’t agree with them.” I waited, and waited, and waited, bopping my head to the tune. And then the video was over. There was nothing sinister; just a soft, healthy belly underneath a sexy open shirt that’s mostly obscured by the microphone stand, as can be seen below:
So yeah. Some dude from the label was like, “I’m a guy, Amanda. I understand what people like.” Uh-huh. What’s brilliant about this is the fact that the video and story are now huge, fueling the success of Amanda’s new solo album, which Roadrunner had deemed a commercial failure. The controversy (“Bellygate”) was featured everywhere from Pitchfork to Bitch Magazine to The freakin’ Guardian, and a fan-made Rebellyon rages on.
Mer, left, and Amanda Palmer, right, performing together at “Fuck the Back Row” in Brooklyn
But this post isn’t just about Amanda Palmer and her belly. It’s also to let you guys know that those of you who live in the Bay Area have a unique opportunity to see our dear Mer perform on stage with Amanda Palmer tonight (December 15th) at Bimbo’s. Mer will be playing both violin and theremin, making me want to drop everything and fly to San Francisco right now. For those of you who are going: enjoy the show, you lucky bastards.
Swiss laptop sampler pop duo Larytta call their schizotypal steez “Difficult Fun” and I couldn’t agree more. It’s smart, cheeky, surprisingly radio-ready electronica. You may find yourself simultaneously shaking your booty (with zeal) and your head (in consternation). This video for “Souvenir de Chine”, created by Körner Union with the help of several dozen furry and feathered friends, has certainly left me feeling conflicted (“awww, those poor critters… OOOH, a living kaleidoscope!”) but I can neither stop watching, nor listening:
Nicole Renaud calls herself a “neosoprano” and it’s a fitting description. Her lovely operatic voice is coupled with a graceful, modest manner, fanciful handmade costumes, envy-making globetrotting lifestyle and a sparkling musicality. She sings a mix of original songs and operatic arias, accompanied by accordion or piano.
I first learned of her via Isengart’s Foreign Affairs cabaret party (more on him later) last Spring, where she wowed everyone in the room with her beauty and originality. I went twice. To see her perform is a captivating dream, even if she’s singing in French and you’ve got no clue what she’s saying. Second video after the jump.
Oh… my. Wayne just memed my ass out with the most astonishing OMGWTFBBQ music video of the year. Imagine what might happen if the rennies spiked your mead with DMT at Medieval Times. It is Epic. It is Über.
Meet Chris Dane Owens. He is here to fuck you, amigo. Fuck you earnestly, somberly, savagely, without the courtesy of a reach-around. For he is Legolas on a meth binge. He is Limahl with brass balls. His “Shine on Me” video is the prodigious, tumescent, chain-mail-piercing, pirate-booty-plundering, Adobe After Effects-abusing, alligator-exploiting, stock footage-pillaging D&D Destructo Dildo to the insidious butt plug of Brokencyde’s “Freaxx”.
Keep watching. Don’t click away. Follow that sparkly green Gretsch all the way to the finish line. Take it to the hilt, paladin.
There is a restaurant we three like to go to here in LA that plays current music videos from Russia. It was there, on election night of all nights, where my eye was caught by an odd music video. It stood out from the glittery, overly polished, collagen-peroxide-silicone blur that is Russian music TV. A Google expedition later I’m downloading everything by Dolphin, relieved that Stella Solieil isn’t a regular part of the configuration.
Andrei Lisikov a.k.a. Dolphin on the cover of Russian magazine Afisha
Dolphin has been making noise for over 10 years, has won several high-ranking awards but has yet to hook an international audience. The sound is something like The Streets on the last leg of a bender. Singer and former breakdancer Andrei Lisikov combines rap, soft singing and screaming over organic and electronic music. It’s not at all my usual cup of tea but after a few days’ worth of listening I still like it. The song below is called “Without us” and has some of the most misanthropic lyrics ever. It’s not my favorite but the video is neat.
Maybe Dolphin will become a guilty pleasure, akin to my secret love of George Michael? Only time will tell. While I sort through my conflicting feelings, I want to hear your thoughts on this stuff! There are several more completely different videos from Dolphin, after the jump. Has anyone heard of them before, while I was living under a rock? Does anyone dig it besides me?
Bear with the somewhat sluggish posting schedule, folks. We’re slogging through last-minute corrections to the final proofs of Issue 02 and losing our minds in the process. I do mean that literally. Earlier tonight, poor Nadya sneezed and a big chunk of her frontal lobe fell out. I called her just now to discuss a kerning issue and the conversation went a little something like this. Meanwhile, Zoetica’s delicate alien grey matter has liquefied entirely from overexposure to laptop radiation. As for me, well, I’m having flashbacks of that one time I accidentally took ‘shrooms laced with bathtub LSD and ran out into traffic on the I-580 yelling “FLESH TETRIS, FLESH TETRIS, EVERYTHING FEELS LIKE MATH, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD STOP THE FLESH TETRIS, STOPPIT, HNNNGH” until someone threw a tarp over my head.
It certainly doesn’t help that this 8-Bit version of “Angel of Death” has been lodged in my noggin for several days now.
