I feel a little bad, because I’ve only posted about summer songs once this season. Oliver Wang at Soul Sides does these big profiles of summer songs, complete with guest bloggers. Here, you get what you get. So, when I think summer music, I think of The Beach Boys. This is a group which filled [...]
Poundin’ the 88
Two more examples of piano rock… The piano goes back to the early 18th century; the electric guitar only goes back to the Thirties. The piano was there from the early days of rock, as it made the transition from jump blues. The piano can be rollicking and happy; it can be orchestral and bombastic; [...]
Round-up: the cool and the crazy
Various and sundry… Hoboken, gateway to America if you’re fresh off the boat, occupies an interesting place in the New York area. A good friend of mine lives there because he spends all of his time in Manhattan, but the rent’s cheap and the trains run late. Hoboken411 is running a few motivational posters for [...]
A well-tempered clavier
I love the sound of piano in pop music. Always have. In rock music, there’s a tension that’s set up. Bass, guitar and drums are very rock. They bash, they shred, they destroy. The piano notes are very delicate, although it is a percussion instrument and you can smash the hell out of a piano. [...]
Old School – with a teeny touch of jazz
A year ago, I discussed the relationship of jazz & hip-hop. As I said then, there is an “uneasy tension” between the two. This issue appeared as early as the Eighties. For example, hip-hop was already smarting under the charge that sampling wasn’t creative (also see this earlier post on the myth that hip-hop was [...]
Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
I am a sucker for Aaron Sorkin‘s work. He’s got a very distinct, unique voice. On the two previous TV shows he worked on (Sports Night and The West Wing), he wrote most of the scripts. He’s famous for his dialogue — both quality and quantity. If you’ve watched his shows you probably had one [...]
Still More Guitar Bands
I love getting mail. It makes a nice change from the incessant stream of comment spam. Bands have started sending me their music. I’m always happy to listen. Can’t promise I’ll do anything. But I might post ‘em. For example, here are two tracks. The first is from Britain’s Archie Bronson Outfit. They name check [...]
He plays that synthesizer
Washington, DC’s Chris Price e-mailed to alert me to his new single, a slice of synth pop entitled “And She Was” (not to be confused with the Talking Heads song). I am a huge sucker for synth pop, so I am happy to post it. On his MySpace page, he lists his influences as “Pet [...]
Immigration Reform: a cultural view
As long as I’m going to go out on a limb and take a position on hot button issues (as in last night’s post on global warming) why not go for broke? When street protests against immigration legislation were staged back in March, I wrote about it in this post entitled Viva La Raza. I [...]
A bunch of hot air
It’s very likely that wherever you are, it’s scary hot. One of our roving correspondents just returned from London, where the heat was horrific. Harry Shearer is doing his Le Show radio program from there, prior to his appearance at the Edinburgh Festival; he compared the situation to that of Los Angeles, where it rains [...]