- Aqualaygualry in arcade fire - black wave/bad vibrations Today i watching overlay from here. this is wondeful film. Who are watching this?
- cattartiste in arcade fire - black wave/bad vibrations SplitVideo is a freeware virtual video clone and split video nick driver in behalf of connecting disparate applications to a single video...
- Peggus-interruptus in The Temper Trap Lovin’ The Temper Trap!
If you don’t have a ticket to Lollapalooza this weekend and thus have been crying into your pillow because you will miss seeing the Polyphonic Spree perform in their new military uniforms, don’t despair. They will be performing a special show at midnight at the Hard Rock Hotel on Friday night and 312unes has graciously given us a set of VIP tickets to give away. The show will be part of a kickass after-party that starts at 10:00pm and includes DJ Momjeans (Danny Masterson from That 70’s Show), Perez Hilton the gossip dude, a plethora of free food and drink and, most importantly, a dancing and jubilant Joie.
I have no idea how to give these away, so how about this…he or she who pleads most convincingly wins. convincingly and humorously, i should say. you can either email me at joie@superstarcastic.com or comment here. and expect to have your plea posted on superstarcastic, of course. Now enough aimlessly chatting…get pleadin’!
Dear Mr. Butler,
I am writing concerning your management’s commentary on my review of the Psychedelic Furs’ show at Avalon Ballroom in Boston on July 10, 2007. Let me first state that I am a huge fan of your work. I love the way in which the Furs combined post-punk and pop, and I’d been looking forward to your show for weeks.
I’ve said this before on the site, but as you may not have read back that far in our archives (nor may you wish to at this point), I’ll say it again: “We at Superstarcastic believe that the musical is personal.” If you read, for example, DJ’s review of The Wrens’ The Meadowlands, or anything Amber writes about shoegaze, you’ll find that, though our writers make every effort to explain how and why an artist, album, song, or musical genre has an effect on them, they make no pretense that such effects are objective. Rather, our reviews tend to be littered with narratives about personal experience: what someone went through personally that his/her favorite artist mirrored for them musically, what someone was doing when s/he first fell in love with a certain song (I’m reminded of the time that my then-boyfriend cut work so we could drive down the California coast on a warmer-than-average San Francisco summer day; he made me listen to “Heaven”), and so on.
Because to simply be earnest would make us look, well, emo, many of us compensate by being a little tongue-in-cheek. The resultant reviews contain a bit of empathy here and a lot of sarcasm there, but they lay no claims to fair and balanced coverage. Though our website contains some strict reporting (i.e., tour date announcements and the like–it would be pretty dumb of us to embellish those) the bulk of our articles are devoted to our personal opinions about music. Music reviewing is, in short, a subjective business–one to which we bring our critical faculties (such as they are) but also our own experience. Read more »
I’m the first to admit that I’m the type of guy that reads a bit too much into things sometimes, for basically no reason. I still can’t get over the idea that everyone in Riverdale is yelling, at all times. (Speaking of which, have you seen the character redesign they did over at Archie last year? Holy Anne Hathaway, Ron!) But honestly: “Got Me Under Pressure” is really fucked up. Hear me out.
Let’s talk a little about ZZ Top. Approved by everyone from Jimi Hendrix (who once declared Billy Gibbons his favorite guitar player during an appearance on the Tonight Show) to Steve Albini (”Not because I could have done better, but because I’ve never done anything this good: any early ZZ Top…“) to David Lynch (”ZZ Top = the fast track to cool,”) one of the best things to ever come outta Texas.
Their 1983 album Eliminator was utterly unlike anything that had come before it, pulling off the neat trick of combining stiff, metronomic rhythm sequences with authentically greasy blues guitar, and making it work. Nobody’s managed it since, including the Top themselves. But it (along with some semi-clever videos) made them superstars. This was as mainstream as it gets, folks; your Mom would dance to this if it came on the jukebox.
Now, we all know that the lyrical content of many a ZZ Top song regards sex. With ladies. Their catalog is replete with double entendres like “Pearl Necklace” and “I Got the Six” (completed in the chorus with “gimme your nine,”) single entendres like “Tush,” and “Woke Up With Wood,” a song that bends so far back on itself that it might actually be a negative entendre. “Got Me Under Pressure,” by contrast, is so direct that it’s somewhat disconcerting. Things start out innocuous enough: our protagonist is dating someone with expensive tastes (which isn’t very surprising. Once you class up the nerdy gal from the shoe store in the mini-mall across the street, she’s gonna start asking for the finer things.) However, “she won’t let me use my passion unless it’s in a limousine.” Is the titular pressure that Billy’s referring to merely blue balls? No, the situation’s far more sordid.
The next verse starts off gibberish (…the hell is a “mind museum?”) before getting a little more in-depth about Miss Limousine’s sexual tastes: “She don’t like other women/she likes whips and chains.” Okay, sure. BDSM=very yes, threesomes not so much. “She likes cocaine, and flippin’ out with Great Danes.”
“…with Great Danes.”
She fucks dogs.
“…it’s too much for my brain.” No kidding. Whatever is our protagonist to do? “I’m gonna give her a message, here’s what I’m gonna say: ‘It’s all over.’” That’s the smart thing to do, friend. But he’s scared to, because he knows what’s in store for him: “She might get out a nightstick and hurt me real real bad by the roadside in a ditch.” In a ditch? I guess that’s how they do it in Texas, huh? Or…remember that line about how “she don’t like other women?” Maybe “she’s” a transvestite and that “nightstick” is a penis. It’d be par for the course in this seamy little tale. Worst of all, there’s no denouement, no end in sight. Our protagonist remains forever “under pressure.”
Next time: an in-depth analysis of “Unchained” by Van Halen!
since you are a loyal reader of superstarcastic.com and keep dog-eared copies of our writings underneath your pillows just in case of sudden insomnia, you will definitely recall the review of the psychedelic furs show in boston that our beloved editor christine posted a few weeks back. i thought it was a good show recap of some classic acts and i am sure that you found it amusing and witty, as i did.
well, not everyone found it amusing and witty, my friends. and one of the folks who didn’t was the lead singer of the furs, the very talented and not-drug-taking richard butler himself. my business partner commissar dave and i received a call yesterday from the frostily polite manager of the psychedelic furs (a band who doesn’t do drugs), who informed us that richard butler (completely sober man that he is) read the review and appreciated it not so much. in fact, we were told that our drug allegations were slanderous and defamatory. his manager said that butler was surfing the web with his 9 year old daughter, came upon the superstarcastic review and was embarrassed and angered by what they read.
before i go any further with this sordid tale of hurt feelers, may i briefly interrupt myself to make one thing very, very clear - you should never, under any circumstances, ever allow your 9 year old child near superstarcastic. i repeat, SUPERSTARCASTIC IS NOT FOR CHILDREN. sheesh. the mere thought of little munchkins getting their malleable minds twisted and scarred by our rapier snark and communist sensibilities terrifies me.
but now back to my ridiculously awesome story. i really wish i was saying this about a shitty band like panic!%#$ at the disco (who unlike richard butler probably does drugs) and not the psychedelic furs, a band i like a lot. but what can you do…i hope it’s just their management company being dorks. anyway, i asked for the band manager to send me the request for an apology in writing and i told him that i would post it on the site, so here you go:
Hi Joie,
I recently read Christine’s review of the Psychedelic Furs/Fixx/Alarm show in Boston.
Although, we welcome reviewers giving their opinion about the performance, I was deeply troubled by some outrageous (and slanderous) insinuations that were made concerning Richard Butler. No matter how a reviewer may feel about the show, making false personal accusations, as she did, is completely unacceptable and certainly beneath any standard that readers have become accustomed to.
I feel that Christine owes Mr. Butler an apology, and hope that we can keep the reporting at a higher level of integrity and truthfulness in the future.
Best,
Rob Dillman
Arcadia Group Management
Los Angeles, CA
and there you have it, folks. i am pretty amazed on multiple levels by the whole thing. i really don’t see how sentences like “made me start to suspect that he was coked up beyond belief” and “I started to wonder if he was doing lines onstage” can be taken as personal accusations but hey, i guess some folks are sensitive like that. and i fail to see how OPINIONS can be truthful or not. and he’s obviously not familiar with you, the readers of superstarcastic, if he’s talking about you all having some kind of STANDARDS for the love of pete. and also, it’s called libel when it’s in print, not slander.
but whatevs. on the record here - we have never seen richard butler do coke. we have never done coke with richard butler. we have never met anyone who has done coke with richard butler. we are not accusing richard butler of being a cokehead. we think richard butler is a saintly man who loves puppies and rainbows and long walks on the beach. to show how sorry we are, we are having christine immediately killed for disrupting richard butler’s serenity. and if that’s not an apology, dear mr. butler (who is completely sober, by the way), i don’t know what is.
ps just kidding, christine. kisses.
I think that the problem with Gogol Bordello is that no matter how frenzied or impassioned they get at any given moment, at heart they’re a trick band — it’s hard for me to imagine a world with room for more than one or two gypsy-punk groups. And, like most trick bands, they’ve got less range than either they or you would prefer.
Pretty much each song on Super Taranta!, their most recent full-length, does the same thing. Each one chugs along with a amped-up polka beat (one-TWO! one-TWO!), a violin that sounds like it’s being piped in from your local college theater production of Fiddler on the Roof, and a heaping handful of refugee accordions. The rhythm sometimes changes for the verses, but it almost always moves back into the oompah lockstep during the choruses. Some guitars wander in, of course — again, generally on the verses — but they rarely predominate over the other elements. Lead singer Eugene Hütz’s voice doesn’t help matters — he sounds sort of like how you’d imagine a SNL sketch involving Will Ferrell as a drunk Hungarian would go, especially as he’s invariably backed by a small mob of euro-thugs who punctuate the off-beats with various shouts.
I don’t have a problem with bands that use elements of this kind of neo-traditional instrumentation; I quite liked Khartoum Heroes back in the day, for instance, and I still maintain a great devotion for Zebda. But, at least on Super Taranta!, Gogol Bordello take their chosen formula to such an over-the-top extreme that it’s nearly impossible to take them seriously. One might counter that they aren’t meant to be taken seriously, but the unfortunate fact is that they’re not very funny either. I suppose that the hyperkinetic cartoon frenzy of, say, “Wonderlust King” is something I can easily imagine myself putting on a college mix CD, just so that I could have the pleasure of seeing the recipient’s face take on that classic “What the…?” face when it came on. But I started to get impatient around track two of this album, waiting for something else to happen. In case you were wondering, I wasn’t really rewarded. “Dub The Frequencies Of Love” was kind of fun, I guess — the music reminded me a lot of Zebda circa Essence Ordinaire, actually — and that was probably the high point for me.
I think maybe the issue is that Gogol Bordello are definitely a small-dose band for me — and at 65 minutes, this is definitely not a small-dose album. Yes, there’s lots of energy, and I don’t doubt that their live show is every bit as good as advertised, but all of the frenetic action is devoted to doing the same. freaking. thing. over and over again. The brushstrokes are too broad, the shading too lacking. I guess it’s supposed to be a party album, but it winds up being an album for the party where you get backed into a corner by the loud guy with onions on his breath who won’t stop talking for an hour while your girlfriend leaves with some local lothario.
The album’s getting killer reviews from basically everyone but me, so if you want to consider me an unenlightened killjoy, you’re more than welcome, and you won’t hurt my feelings. But the desperately peppy monotony of this album gave me a worse headache than any Einsturzende Neubauten record I’ve ever heard — not that I want to give Hütz any ideas. I think, as much as I didn’t care for his gypsy punk, I’d like his gypsy industrial less.
Label: Side One Dummy
Release date: July 10, 2007
Rating: 3/10
It’s hard to write a post announcing an impending Turbonegro US tour without slumming it in the title. Seriously, “Are you ready for some darkness?” That song title has probably been used by dozens upon dozens of music bloggers/writers/”journalists” over the years for the same tour date posts year after year. But heck, what else am i gonna go with? “Get it On?” “Good Head/Great Tour?” “Motherfucking Touring Tonight?” Turbonegro Hate the Kids; Love Touring?” All lame.
But who cares? The point is that Norway’s kings (queens?) of hedonism, the glam-punkers that black metal church burners Mayhem referred to as “the most evil band in the world,” TURBOfuckingNEGRO, are BACK. Hank, Happy Tom, and the (euro)boys will be stateside for nearly a month promoting their new album Retox (which will be released in the USA on August 14th). Here’s hoping that Retox isn’t as completely worthless as their last release, Party Animals, because frankly, i was sort of hoping there was no album tied to this tour. I sort of want as little new material as possible. Stick with the classics, guys. Please?
Despite the severe dropoff in quality attached to Party Animals (and hey, maybe Retox will be a return to form! Knock on wood!), Turbonegro are quite possibly the greatest live band in the world. Yes, i realize i tend to say that about Melt-Banana and the pAper chAse as well, but i genuinely mean it when referring to any of those bands. A live Turbonegro set featuring the hits from Apocalypse Dudes and Ass Cobra will change your life. But don’t take my word for it:
9/19 - Metro, Chicago, IL
9/20 - Smalls, Detroit, MI
9/21 - The Grog Shop, Cleveland, OH
9/22 - Phoenix Concert Theater, Toronto
9/24 - Paradise, Boston, MA
9/25 - Nokia Theater Times Square, NYC
9/26 - Black Cat, Washington, DC
9/28 - Ziggy’s, Winston-Salem, NC
9/29 - Center Stage, Atlanta, GA
10/01 - Granada Theater, Dallas, TX
10/02 - Emo’s, Austin, TX
10/04 - Brickhouse Theater, Phoenix, AZ
10/05 - HOB, San Diego, CA
10/06 - Downtown LA, Los Angeles, CA
10/07 - Henry Ford Theater, Los Angeles
10/08 - Slims, San Francisco, CA
10/10 - Showbox, Seattle, WA
10/11 - Commodore Ballroom, Vancouver
10/12 - Roseland Ballroom, Portland, OR
Finally, according to the band’s website, they are “looking for Turbojugends in each territory to get to us via Camilla and start working on after shows parties for each city.” Get on it, American Punk Rock Boys and New Wave Hooker Girls. I’ll see you at the Metro (provided the Metro’s website ever gets ticket info posted–hurry up, FIBs!).
Since Smashing Pumpkins‘ Zeitgeist is all the buzz here at Superstarcastic, I figured I would bandwagon this little tidbit. If you open up your music sleeve inside your properly purchased non-pirated copy of Smashing Pumpkins, you have may have come upon an image of America’s most loved to be hated celebutant.
(waits a second for you to check. )
No, your eyes have not betrayed you. That is indeed Paris Hilton inside your Zeitgeist insert. No, you do not have herpes. But Billy Corgan may. NME.com has reported that Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan took the photos of Hilton, who he had met previously.
Billy Corgan said: “The original idea was we were gonna see if Lindsay (Lohan), Britney (Spears) and Paris would all shoot..(but) Paris I knew personally and hung out with her a few times, and so I asked her…and God bless her, she came, she showed up at 10am on a Sunday morning, sat in the chair, got made up and (I) shot her.”
To you negligent personal assistants out there, this is another situation where someone could have replaced a camera with some form of fire arm and made the world a better place for everyone. Shame on you, Billy Corgan’s personal assistant. Shame on you!
(I feel the need to preface this by basically saying that i tried, folks. I really did try. I swear. I tried to listen to this record with an open mind, despite the Smashing Pumpkins occupying a place in my brain neighboring Weezer and Fall Out Boy, two other bands who make my blood pressure rise and my right eye twitch. That objectivity, however, went out the window a few seconds into Zeitgeist–specifically, when Billy Corgan began singing with that trademark “masturbating ostrich” style he’s perfected over the years. So do keep this in mind when you read this. I tried, but i failed. If you want more even-handed reviews from people who aren’t predisposed to pile on the hate, Borch and Christine are here to hook you up. And now…)
People, help me out. Is there anyone out there anymore who takes Billy Corgan seriously as a musician? Is there anyone out there who doesn’t see him as what he truly is–an egomaniacal snake-oil huckster? Let’s examine the timeline of major album releases, and maybe we’ll see what i’m getting at:
-After the phenomenal commercial success of Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (which Corgan apparently described as “The Wall for Generation X”–um, hint #1, people), Corgan and the band begin giving interviews saying that conventional rock music is dying and that electronic music is the future, following these proclamations by releasing the electronica-influenced Adore.
-Adore, of course, tanks, leading Corgan to proclaim “um, just kidding about that whole ‘rock is dead’ thing, heh heh.” The band releases Machina/The Machines of God, which is a guitar rock album that also tanks because (i like to think) people finally started smelling bullshit.
-After Machina tanks, and after a period that saw the band actually do something right by trading up for ex-Hole bassist Melissa Auf der Maur, only to completely screw the pooch by then making her pose with the band for this photo (Jesus Christ), the band breaks up. Corgan and drumming trainwreck Jimmy Chamberlin form “supergroup” Zwan, which lasts a whole, what, two years?
-After Zwan goes down in flames, Corgan decides that maybe he should try banking on his own name instead of some random “supergroup,” releasing a solo album. Perhaps predicting that it would sell about as many copies as Warrant’s third record, he announces on the day of the release that he’s getting the old band back together. How does he do this? By taking out a full-page ad in the goddamn Chicago Tribune. Because obviously the news that the Pumpkins are “reuniting” is Very Important and the people of Chicago are sure to give at least one shit, maybe two.
And of course, how was this “reunion” executed? By Corgan and Chamberlin essentially collaborating together on another Billy Corgan solo album, only making sure to call it “Smashing Pumpkins.” Look, you can move the Cleveland Browns to Baltimore, rename them the Ravens, and set up an expansion team called “The Browns” to replace them, but guess what? The team Jim Brown played for is wearing purple and black these days. You can hire a blonde chick bass player and sort of dress her like D’Arcy (seriously, Billy…really?), but all we’re gonna do is laugh at you. And her. Read more »
“Hi, my name is Billy and I’ll be your server. The special of the day - and the only thing available tonight - are apocalypse cutlets sautéed in a succulent arena-rock reduction, and served on a plate so hot that you may burst into flames should you touch it.”
“We call it Zeitgeist,” he adds.
Of course, Billy recommends it. He whets our appetites by informing us that not only is it his favorite item on the menu, but comes directly, in fact, from his heart and soul. The three of us submit to his suggestion because he’s already told us so much about it, and we’re too curious to go somewhere else and leave w/o having a taste, for good or ill.
The dish eventually comes out on warm (but hardly combustible) plates, and an unusual odor fills the room. Some are pleased and have a look of familiarity in their eyes; they lick their lips as they think about the first time they inhaled this comforting fragrance. The others look bored if not repulsed, remembering all too well the first time their faces were stuffed with Flair de Corgan, and had thought they’d never have to go back there. Their stories follow:
* * *
Billy Corgan and the ‘Smashing Pumpkins’ are back sans D’arcy and James Iha (which, following that formula, would have constituted a Beatles reunion on almost every one of Ringo’s solo albums), and are out to prove relevancy after years of wishful reunion speculation and full-page apologies in the Chicago Reader and Tribune. This Zeitgeist… Corgan has plenty to say about the state of the world, and very little of it exceeds the level of conversation with someone who saw the headlines and got pissed, but skipped to SuDoku without reading the story. Like talking to a dim but driven activist, we can assume that “they” represent either the government or fat, dumb Americans (the two of which are interchangeable, mind you), and he invokes “them” quite a bit. Read more »
Having accompanied Patrick through the rollercoaster ride that was our high school choral program, I always knew he had the ability to reach notes that are well above the average singer’s stratosphere. However, I was not aware that the now seasoned singer accompanies his voice with silky smooth guitar rifts.What strikes a chord about Patrick is the passion and conviction he conveys through his original music. While displaying the capability of covering critically acclaimed artists such as Ray Lamontagne and Jeff Buckley, the original songs Patrick played were what really captivated the audience at the show I recently attended at The Globe in the Lakeview neighborhood of Chicago. Armed with little else but his guitar, a microphone and a beer, he had the entire well attended venue enthralled and on the edge of their seats.
“19 Year Old Junkie” is a song that I dare you to get out of your head after listening to it a few times (much like the theme from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. I’ll send you a cookie if you can get that out of your head). The tune tells the true story of Patrick’s trials and tribulations as an aspiring musician in the harsh, unforgiving entertainment business and how he coped with his struggles while living in Califorinia trying to become a star. The upbeat rhythm of the song does well in keeping the audience captivated to hear Patrick sing his story and it was a perfect song to start his set with.
“Waiting” is what i would consider Patrick’s go-to song, a perfect example of his vocal and musical ability shining through his song writing. Once again, I was very impressed with the ease in which his voice was able to hit the upper reaches of his range, something that cannot be ignored when listenig to him perform.
My only complaint is that I would have liked to see Patrick complimented with a complete band to see what he is fully capable of. His musically inclined brother did take the stage with him creating a mixed voice and guitar duet for the second portion of his set. But that was just a taste of how adding parts around Patrick has the potential for a special sound. Check out Patrick’s Myspace Page to listen to a few of his tracks and to find out when and where he’ll be gracing the stage with his presence next.
Patrick’s answers to the 5 questions after the jump: Read more »
