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I’m not saying that Chicago is the only town making music worth hearing - I am just obsessed with a bunch of local bands right now, is all. And today’s obsession amongst obsessions is the latest offering from Bicycle, Tricycle, Stay Foolish Stay Hungry (B.T. also sports the coolest band name of the scene). The brains of the operation, Bohb Blair, when he’s not saving the world from palindromes, writes about the upside of being the geek in High School, namely you may eventually get to lead a successful band and write songs with names like ‘Drugs R 4 Doin’. Amongst other things, of course.
Yes, just like previous effort Real As You Believe, B.T. is dishing up songs that are so good, memorable and jovial that I can’t believe haven’t existed forever. Borrow or rob? No, just well done like someone’s great idea that you can’t believe you didn’t think of first. They have the air of standards, helped no doubt by leaning heavily (but not too much) on vintage instruments, thick backing vocals, lush strings and enjoyable situational lyrics. It’s more sensitive moments sound like Sonny and Cher as played by the Grass Roots; and before that gets old, Hall and Oates has a love child with T Rex.
Stay Foolish Stay Hungry is a group effort too, beyond Bohb and his band. Members of other Chicago outfits like Poi Dog Pondering, contributed to add to the album’s richness (and my deepening belief that Chicago is the epicenter of everything right now) and tastefully so. It’s not a Chicago-is-the-best rub-off-fest, but it’s a good sign of what mama’s cookin’ ’round here.
Release date: 01-08
Label: None
Sounds like: UFO Tofu
I’ve been meaning to review the ep Senators and Sinners by Chicago band Brave Ulysses for over a month… how can it take so long to form an opinion about four songs? Is my ambivalence to a very likable record the result of careful analysis, or is my critical ear just muddled, nonsensical and utterly confusing? Is there nothing to be said for purblind instinct? I have been listening to Senators and Sinners consistently without much trouble, and I occasionally hum the melody to opener ‘Speakers Push Air’, so obviously I have a fondness for it…
…but this is criticism, by God. Liking it is not enough - it must classified.
Damn it! Jones, the animus-half of my muse, keeps making outrageous demands, and is posing questions that make me uncomfortable. He is also beginning to lose touch with clarity and common sense.
It is too likable – find fault with it.
Nothing wrong with a band (especially a crew of small-time local boys trying to make good) that writes good music and lyrics, even (or especially) if not pushing any kind of envelope. Brave Ulysses is just a regular band, damn it, and Senators and Sinners represents a solid release in the spirit of Built to Spill, Dinosaur Jr. and Spoon.
Do they know where they stand, or do they harbor delusions of singular greatness? Read more »
I like free stuff.
I really don’t know anyone that doesn’t like free stuff, but I figured I’d say it anyway. In my case of free-stuff-reception, I got a free Relapse Records compilation when I bought Mastodon’s Call of the Mastodon a few months ago. Burst held the first two tracks. At first listen, I was in love. There in front of me were two tracks of versatile metal and I couldn’t get enough of it. I decided to buy the album.
At second listen, I was still in love, but thinking about other bands. At third listen, my mind was on other things entirely. I admittedly had a fuckload of things on my mind as it was and had difficulty concentrating on anything for longer than about 5 minutes. I know that at certain points while Linus Jägerskog was screaming into my ears, I was thinking about other matters of life. Yay for break-ups. Because of that, I was missing something that was there all along.
Burst is cool as hell. Their music uses tons of sharp chords, which I cream over on a daily basis. They are Swedish, which, if you’ve read my other reviews, is a dead-giveaway that I’d probably like them even if they recorded themselves defecating and bagging vomit for 45 minutes. Thankfully to all that care to listen, they do not do those things; rather, they record quality music.
I didn’t realize while listening to these guys on the way to work those first couple of times that Burst had been making music since the early 90’s. It sounded more to me like a new band that just had a ridiculous amount of talent. After researching the matter, though (thank you Wikipedia), I found that it’s true. After a few more listens, it became screamingly apparent.
Burst’s music is not for the one-dimensional, Fergie-loving, basic radio-pop-heads out there…no offense… Their music is complex and has underlying melodies and tensions, all of which pour out in the heat of any given song. It is filled with anger, loss, dismissal, questioning, curiosity, and most importantly, soul. No, a track from Origo would not fit well on a Baptist choir recording; I mean to say that this music comes from deep inside of places festering with raw emotion; it’s real. It’s literally a burst of everything that writhes inside of us on a daily basis…and it’s done in a supremely artistic way.
It took me 7 or 8 complete listens to this album to fully appreciate its intricacies. Some of the songs pop out immediately as songs I need to put onto a play-list I plan on playing many, many times. Those are songs like the album’s opener Where the Wave Broke, The Immateria, and Mercy Liberation. This does not mean, however, that they are the album’s best tracks. Honestly, I don’t think the album has a best track. They’re all good.
The only slow point in the album is one that could have been avoided. It lazily sits in the middle of the lone instrumental of the compilation, It Comes Into View. It starts off well-enough, flashing slow melodies and Portishead-like trip-hop-y beats at the ears. That elevates into a haunting strumming of acoustic background chords while a lone electric cries its story up front. That continues for about a minute and a half until all attempt at musical story-telling halts to a standstill. It’s much like what The Mars Volta love to do in the middle of their brilliant and energetic musicianship; stop it for the sake of meaningless and mindless weed-induced guitar drabblings. In Burst’s case, the sounds of a baby crying back up the soundless-ness. Once all of that is done and the band wakes back up, the music starts back up in full force, pulling the ears and mind with it until it almost reaches a melancholic orgasm of thought. Then, it’s over. Now, most of that sounds rather pleasing to listen to, does it not? If not for the black, blah-blah nothingness of sound in the middle of the track, it would make for a great instrumental.
Origo is an interesting name for a metal album. The word “origo” itself has many definitions, all of which are complex. The initial and deepest definition is that it is the linguistic point-of-reference in conversational dialogue. That definition, aside from the fact that both the definition and the music are deep, does not relate much to the overall theme of the so-titled album. The more appropriate definition of the word is its Latin meaning, which is “beginning.” It is also the root word for “origin.” Well, all of that plays into what I gathered just from the music itself. The composition of the music is well done and original. The lyrics are very poetic. The song lengths are spot on. The album art even portrays an inner energy bursting forth from the chest of a bothered man, almost spear-like, its origin somewhere near the heart. That’s exactly what the music is. In my opinion, there are no missing links involved with this work. If this, after 4 albums and countless EP’s, truly is just the beginning of intelligent music from Burst, we all have a lot to look forward to.
I will merely report today’s verdict in the Jeanette Sliwinski case, as reported by the Chicago Tribune. I will point out that being sentenced to 8 years means that she can be released in 4 for good behavior, and with 2.5 years already served, she could be back on the street in one and a half years. This is all i will say about this, because i am a professional and you do not need to hear the rant that is begging to be vomited all over my keyboard.
Jeanette Sliwinski, the former model convicted last month in the deaths of three Chicago musicians who were killed when she rear-ended a car in which they were riding during a failed suicide attempt, was sentenced today to 8 years in prison.
Cook County Circuit Judge Garritt Howard, who found Sliwinski guilty but mentally ill on reckless homicide charges Oct. 26, imposed the sentence during an emotional hearing in the Skokie courtroom where he presided over her bench trial.
Prosecutors had asked that Sliwinski of Morton Grove receive the maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.
Sliwinski, 25, who has been held in the psychiatric ward of Cook County Jail since the July 2005 lunchtime crash at Dempster Street and Niles Center Road in Skokie, apologized to the relatives and friends of the victims who were in the courtroom, before being sentenced. She could be released from prison in a few years if she receives good-time credit.
“There’s not a day that goes by I do not think about the grief and the pain I have caused,” Sliwinski, weeping, told the judge while looking toward the victims’ families. “I never meant to hurt anybody. I’m sorry.”
Mental-health services would be available to Sliwinski in whatever prison she is assigned to, prosecutors said.
Sliwinski’s relatives were on hand for the sentencing as were relatives and friends of the men killed in the crash—Chicagoans Michael Dahlquist, 39, John Glick, 35, and Douglas Meis, 29. At the time of the accident, the men were on their lunch break from work at Shure Inc., a Niles company that makes microphones and other audio electronic products.
Sliwinski pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity in the crash after being charged with first-degree murder. She told authorities she had gotten in a fight with her mother in the family’s Morton Grove home before she got in her car, drove east on Dempster and slammed into Dahlquist’s car at a stop light.
In his ruling, the judge rejected the first-degree murder charges and said he believed that Sliwinski was trying to kill herself.
I once again send the families of the victims all my love, and all the strength i can spare.
I’ve been a fan of Soilwork for a good 2 and a half years now, having started my fandom with Stabbing The Drama, their penultimate release. I got really into their older stuff the more I listened to them. They’ve always had a distinct sound full of strong melody. They’re a band full of good stuff. Unfortunately, they just released a sub-par album. Sworn To A Great Divide is an album they should have left off their repertoire and saved up the potential for a release farther in the future.
If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s bad dialogue. That goes for movies, plays, commercials, and yes, songs. If the lyrics are poorly written, I just can’t concentrate on anything else. Bjorn “Speed” Strid’s very apparent happiness in his life currently reflects in his trying-too-hard-to-be-mad lyrics. I HATE bad grammar. Call me idiotic, but even bad grammar in lyrics annoys me. Now, if some Southern lass is talking up a frenzied storm about the big county dance she’s going to, I expect some poorly situated words. That’s natural. However, songs like Martyr and their horribly dramatic “I don’t want nobody to hurt me, every time I see your face in the night, I know it’s all a voice in my head” moments just murder every attempt I make at actively listening to song craft.
Bjorn himself has let me down on this one too. He’s always been somewhat of a charismatic frontman, someone you enjoy listening to because of his versatility in going
from screams to sings. He’s pretty much a happy person, living life the way he wants to live it. With all of that being said, he sounds weak as hell on this album. Metal is a type of music that produces its own testosterone. A frontman that can manage that testosterone and channel it into angry, entertaining, and intense music has done his job. Bjorn shows a little too much of his lighter side on this album. If that’s what he wants to do, good for him. I have no problem with optimism and happiness and sing-songy vocals…the stuff just doesn’t belong in metal. You’d think that Bjorn Strid knows that, fronting a band that’s been a part of the Swedish Death Metal scene for over a decade. Almost all of Soilwork’s albums feature Strid’s crisp singing vocals, but on a much smaller scale. A majority of the songs get sing-y only in the choruses; choruses, I may mention, that vary in construct and are sometimes hard to pick out. He pisses his vocals away far too often on this album, sometimes hitting falsetto notes in the very apparent hooks.
The music isn’t too bad. It still has that Soilwork feel to it with those highly melodic yet crunching strums on basses and guitars that I faithfully know Soilwork to have. Many of the songs keep me interested based on the music alone. The chord progressions, however sometimes predictable, are good ones. The problem is that the songs no longer have that special songcraft they used to have. Past Soilwork classics like the beautifully synthesized As We Speak, the brutally melancholic and melodic Shadowchild, and the intense The Flameout kick the shit out of you at every turn, mixing Bjorn’s believable screams with occasional crisp singing and occasional guest grunters. The compositions on Sworn… lack that same intensity, that sneaking bite, that underlying layer of brute force and anger that Soilwork has had in the past. This fact, though, along with the poor lyrical construction of the songs, was predictable.
Metal Hammer, one of the best metal magazines in print, did a spread on Soilwork in last December’s issue. Amidst the talks of Bjorn’s happiness in life, the article highlighted the fact that a good part of Soilwork’s lineup has been changed. In 2005, Peter Wichers left the band because he was too damn tired of touring. That was a big one. Wichers was one of the founding members of the band as well as one of the key song-writers. There is one big hint right there. No more Wichers, no more probability of strong songs. That’s not to say that the seasoned professionals that are Bjorn Strid and Ola’s Fink and Frenning, the three strongholds of the band, don’t know what they’re doing. They’ve been a part of a strong metal flow for years out there in Swede-country. Unfortunately for them, a band that consistently puts out good music is a band whose members work in perfect harmony with each other. When a key song writer leaves a band, a noticeable hit is taken, no matter how good the remaining members are. This is the case with today’s Soilwork.
There are still some good songs on the album, though. One of my favorites, Sick Heart River, sounds like it actually comes from somewhere; it has drive behind it and a touch of passion; it doesn’t sound like it was put in the album for filler. The album’s third track, Breeding Thorns, regardless of having that catchy quality complete with hooks, stands out amongst the rest. The songs, even the weak ones, are still Soilwork’s, a band I still like. I’ll still listen to the album, but not as much as I will to their previous albums…not to mention the fact that I’ll probably skip around on this one, too.
Aside from still being somewhat pleasant to listen to, the songs on Sworn To A Great Divide are watered down and border-line radio-friendly. Going from Soilwork’s past credits to their current is like going from Newcastle to Bud Light. It’s all good and goes down smooth, but the prior has more kick than the latter.
A verdict was reached Friday in the case of Jeanette Sliwinski, as Judge Garritt Howard ruled her guilty but mentally ill of the charge of reckless homicide, which was a lesser charge than the three counts of First Degree Murder the prosecution was seeking:
A young woman who rammed her car into another in a bid to commit suicide but instead killed three musicians was found guilty but mentally ill Friday in Cook County’s Skokie courthouse.
The prosecution had charged Jeanette Sliwinski, 25, with three counts of first-degree murder, but the judge convicted her of the lesser charge of reckless homicide. A conviction of guilty but mentally ill means she will receive treatment while serving her sentence.
Sliwinski could be sentenced to a maximum of 10 years. Had she been convicted of first-degree murder, she could have gotten a life sentence.
* * *
After the verdict was announced, Gemskie said prosecutors were disappointed.
“We believe the evidence did support a finding of first-degree murder,” she said. “The families of the victims also … of course, they are disappointed. But nothing is ever going to bring their sons and brothers and friends back.”
Musicians remembered
Dahlquist played drums for Silkworm, a band that had played around the Midwest as well as in England, Italy and Japan. After he died the group stopped playing shows together. Glick played guitar and sang with the Returnables, which also disbanded after the crash. Meis played drums with Glick’s wife in The Dials, a group that continued performing.
Friends and family members have tried to keep the memory of the men alive, posting on Internet message boards and Web sites, recording tribute albums and organizing benefit shows.
“For many of us, the passing of a single day without one of these men was difficult to endure,” read a statement on the Web site for The Dials. “They will be longed for always.”
Sentencing is set for Nov. 26.
Everyone here at Superstarcastic sends their thoughts, prayers, and well-wishes to the family of these three friends.
