TRMW Archives

* FYI, this stuff is old. The current TRMW is here.

April 8, 2005

Twirling Wussy Shins

Saw the Shins last night and they were great as ever. It’s crazy to see a band go from the Blackbird to the Crystal Ballroom in two years, but these dudes deserve it. They played a few new songs which sounded pretty bare but maybe interesting. I say maybe because these songs sounded like a couple of the more straight-up guitar rock songs off the last album (my least faves), and I’m hoping this is just because they haven’t had time to flesh them out with all the nice little boroque keyboard lines and wussy-wonderful vocal harmonies. If it’s not that, and these songs are actually supposed to sound stripped down and rocky, then I’d say they’re not so promising.

Personal highlight = the Shins covering Magnetic Fields “Strange Powers”. This is one of my fave Mag Fields songs ever, and seeing another one of my fave bands tipping the hat – let’s just say I was yelling to this guy next to me about how awesome it was for five minute before I realized he wasn’t who I thought he was and I was efusing all over a complete and total stranger. I was stoked.

shins skater

Also rad: they had a giant projection screen up, on which Marty (the funny one) promised “Miss Congeniality 2″ would be playing, for those not interested in the music. It wasn’t, but they did screen this totally ridiculous video of the band frolicking with a teeming herd of Monarch butterflies, and another one featuring a totally over the top male figure-skating diva (see ugly cellphone pic). The skater’s twirls and shimmies fit almost-too-perfectly with the song, as if this video, which appeared sans explanation, was actually some kind of half-funny self-comment re: how totally pansy this music is. And god bless them for that. The more people who look like this I see lipping lyrics like this, the better this world will be. Amen.

View Comments • • •

August 21, 2004

This week has been a good one for live music in Portland. I’ve had the privelege to witness both Patti Smith and David Byrne in performance, and both sounded great. These are two performers who completely lay it out live. The both communicate deeply and honestly, but don’t take themselves too serious to break into some fun, straight-ahead hippie-rock (Smith) or lay out the serious disco/funk/house jams, complete with congas (Byrne).

Byrne went so far as to finish his second encore (what a trooper) with “Lazy” the epic dance track he made with British DJ’s Xpress-2, which was a huge hit when I was living in London, and which nobody has even heard of here. I think I was the only person cheering when he introduced it. Interestingly, he opted for a live interpretation of Freeform Five’s remix of the track. Haven’t heard that mix but it sounded great last night. And it gives my white, pseudo-intellectual ass hope to see a die-hard white intellectual like Byrne shake his ass to the funky music with complete and total abandon. Thanks dude.

Byrne is definitely winning in the presentation category: Smith had hilarious cheeseball psychedelic screen-saver projections running during the show, while Smith had and entire string section, all color-coordinated in navy grey Dickies shirts.

View Comments • • •

April 4, 2004

I saw some really nice jazz music tonight. And I wrote about it here. A while ago I went to Austin for SXSW and saw a whole lotta rock music. I wrote about that stuff here. Music = my fetish.

View Comments • • •

January 20, 2003

In keeping with the general internet theme of exposing one’s life to faceless strangers, I thought maybe someone might like to read an email I just sent to my friend Kai, an American expat living in Amsterdam. This does a pretty good job of explaining what I am thinking about music right now, and makes me look somewhat clever. Maybe. Enjoy!

Kai-

Sorry that it has taken me sooooo long to reply to your email. I forgot about it for at least a month, and then I was just downright lazy. Anyway, I enjoyed reading it, (you really are a good writer) and I’m glad you are continuing to adjust to your place. Which implies that you have a choice. Which, hey, you don’t! So good on you!

Uh, I am writing this at 5AM on the first day of the Spring 2003 semester, my final semester at Lewis and Clark College. I just cannot sleep. I think it is from all the rockstar-lifestyle-activity I have partaken in these past couple weeks. I came home from break two weeks early so I would have time to chill, and in that time I have tried to go to as many shows as possibly possible. And, of course, where there are shows, there is alcohol. I have seen a couple shows at the Blackbird, one at Disjecta, and another at Berbati’s all very fun. This really is a fun town for live music. It’s strange to me that London had nothing in the way of a rock scene, and Portland’s is off the heez.

So you can tell that I have been digging the rock lately. I just got tired of how canned and static so much electronic music sounds. I started listening to the Pixies in London and I realized that I was craving the manic energy that comes with having real live performers banging away at their instruments.

I also realized, in London, that the electronic music scene is a little too Wallpaper*(tm) magazine when you get right up in front of it; All style and no substance (which is a little unfair to Wallpaper, but only a little). Of course, the same can be said of rock music, but at least it’s fun to see live! No offense to Brede but I can not sit still through laptop shows. This is why I cannot be a laptopologist, as per your suggestion.

So I have been digging the really manic spastic rock shit coming around right now. Bands like Deerhoof, Oneida, Point Line Plane, Old Time Relijun, etc are blowing me away. I really enjoy the physicality of this music, and the insane experimentalism. These bands get fuckin nuts, and what’s cool is that it seems to come out of an intense lust for life and a desire to just do something wild and loud, instead of coming from mopey downerism like, um, Radiohead, and a billion other indie rock bands. This is more where I am at in my life. I wanna get crazy and have a good time.

To that effect, I have started a quasi-band with my friend Steve Walsh. We are really just fucking around, but it’s cool to get out of my head and have another person to bounce ideas around with. Keeps things lighter and more fun. I am buying the old Pro-Tools 888 interface that Joe Waters used to use in his classes at LC for $300, and we will start tracking some songs into my computer. This way I can do my composition in realtime on real instruments (which I think lends itself to creativity better than writing on a computer), and still have my fun going crazy with the effects and digital sound editing. I’ll send you a CD when one exists.

London, eh? Good call. It’s a rad town, with lotsa lotsa shit going on (but no live scene, see above). As far as how to get a job in media, check out the BBC. They have loads of oportunities and they make very high quality content. I almost got an internship working for BBC Radio, but it ended up starting after I left.

Will you ever be returning to the Northwest of the USA? I’d like to kick “it” with you again. Alas, mayhaps tis not in the stars?

Oh yah, thanks a lot for the Christmas Card, that was really nice.

By the way, do you know if it would be really hard to get a job writing for the Mercury? That’d be way fun. I’d basically really like to write about music for someone, and I think the Mercury is a good place to do that. I’d also like to continue getting into shows for free after I graduate. Thoughts?

Anyway, if I don’t stop now, I may never stop so I’m gonna have to make a dive for the margins now. Take care, have fun, and GET SOME! SPRING BREAK 2003 WOOO HOO!

XOX

Matt

View Comments • • • •

October 27, 2002

Another weekend comes to a close, and all I got was this lousy hangover. It’s a life. Went to the Electroclash(tm) tour on Friday, featuring Peaches, Chicks on Speed, and the northwest’s own Tracy and the Plastics. The whole thing was entertaining, if a little overblown. I would not have paid $18 to see what was essentially very stylish kareoke. But, hey, I got a free ticket and I had fun.

Tonight I will attend one of my favorite Portland institutions. “Hello Video” is a monthly screening of local independent film. But it’s not (too) pretentious or snotty. In fact many of the films are really funny, while maintaining a high level of creativity. And it’s in a bar, like everything should be! Stir all this together, and you’ve got yourself something special. Should be great.

…now to fill the belly.

View Comments • • • •

September 5, 2002

Couple nights ago I went to a rad show at the Blackbird. The bands playing were Quix*o*tic, some singer-songwriter girl, and Beachwood Sparks. The first of these (Quix*o*tic) really blew my socks off, which is saying something considering the amount of hype I had heard about them. They are this wierd hybrid of 60′s-gothic-r&b-surf type stuff, and they end up sounding something like Portishead if they were into guitar riffs. I love it. Check their rad album Mortal Mirror. They even cover a Black Sabbath song! Beachwood Sparks are pretty rad too. So now you know, cuz I told you so.

View Comments • • • •

Blast from the present!