Of Montreal : Live Video and a Contest

April 10, 2009 by · Leave a Comment
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Of Montreal‘s Skeletal Lamping was one of last year’s best records and the live shows to accompany it have been garnering similar raves. Courtesy of Baeblemusic, check out some live video from their recent Portland stop and swing on over to Baeblemusic to enter to win one of three autographed copies of the Skeletal Lamping disc. Cool stuff.

For entry, just follow these steps:

a) Register on baeblemusic.com
b) Let us know what you think about of Montreal’s performance by leaving a comment
c) You must be registered! – Any comments posted anonymously will not be considered a contest entry
d) Voila! You’ve entered the Baeble Hook Up!

Contest ends on Wednesday, April 22. Winners will be selected randomly from the pool of comment entries.


Watch the full concert at baeblemusic.com

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Bag Of Songs Top 25 Albums of 2008 : 1 to 10

January 4, 2009 by · Leave a Comment
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Wrapping up the BOS top 25 albums of 2008 with the top ten. It’s the end of the countdown but stay tuned for some addtional thoughts on 2008 coming in another post real soon, plus lots of great music on deck for 2009.


10 Birds Fled From Me – Deeper Lurking [BUY]
It was just about a year ago when I named Birds Fled From Me the BOS Artist Of The Day and predicted this to be among the year’s best releases. It stood the test of time. Santa Cruz, California’s Rachel Williams is one extremely talented girl who independently recorded and released this record herself. With a voice most closely reminiscient of Fiona Apple or Bjork, this is a stunningly beautiful record that deserves so much more recognition than it received. You
can buy it directly from Rachel via her Myspace page.

Birds Fled From Me – Resisted
Bonus – Bird Fled From Me – I Love You (Live)


9 My Morning Jacket – Evil Urges [BUY]
Take MMJ’s catalog and throw it into a blender with a big batch of those K-Tel hits of the 70’s records and I imagine this is pretty close to where you’ll end up. Not as thematically consistent as some of their earlier records but the success level in the adventurousness pays off more often than not in what ends up sounding like and indie rock version of AM radio gold. Some of the highlights on the buffet include the weird funk experiment Highly Suspicious,the pure sugary rush of Two Halves, and what is one of the best songs of the year in the beautiful, acoustic, Librarian.

My Morning Jacket – Librarian


8 Blitzen Trapper – Furr [BUY]
More refined and focused than their breakthrough Wild Mountain Nation,Blitzen Trapper have taken the Grateful Dead meets Pavement mix to the next level on this one, solidifying their influences into thier distinct sound. The title track with it’s storytelling of a boy raised by wolves grappling with his human emotions is an instant classic.

Blitzen Trapper – Furr


7 She & Him – Volume One [BUY]
Who’d have thought this would work so well, actress decides to be singer is generally the making of a one off disaster(see Scarlett Jo) but this is an addicting listen steeped in a mix of California harmonies and sixties girl group sounds. Zooey Deschanel and M Ward cooked up a winner here for sure here’s hoping there’s a volume 2.

She & Him – This Is Not A Test


6 Black Mountain – In the Future [BUY]
Expecting more of the immediacy of songs like Modern Music  or No Satisfaction I have to admit I was a bit disappointed with the first couple listens to this, thinking it was more Black Sabbath than Black Mountain,not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it’s so much more. Picking up where songs like Druganaut left off and taking them to the next level, capped off by the epic 16 minutes plus, Bright Lights. The show I saw them do back in February with Bon Iver opening was probably the best show I saw in 2008.

Black Mountain – Tyrants


5 Ting Tings – We Started Nothing [BUY]
Sure this is probably more style than substance, but it is hands down the party record of the year, when was the last time you heard a record where every song had enough hooks to be a single. As they used to say on American Bandstand, “It’s got a great beat, and you can dance to it”. Catchy, fun, danceable, and just try not to sing along.

The Ting Tings – Shut Up And Let Me Go


4 Of Montreal – Skeletal Lamping [BUY]
If you’re like me and only really had a passing interest in Of Montreal, now’s the time to change that. This album is a mix of sexual confusion,funk and dance music, and Sergeant Pepper like psychedelia all blended together in a dizzying mashup that makes Girl Talk‘s Greg Gillis seem like an amateur, yet it somehow all holds together as a whole. As a musician it leaves me amazed just wondering how someone can get that far out there for inspiration and then be able to realize it as a finished work.

Of Montreal – For Our Elegant Caste


3 Cheers Elephant – Here We Are(Demo) [BUY]
One Of Philadelphia’s best bands right now, this record best described is psychedelic folk music with and indie prog rock twist. Shimmers of  sixties and seventies folk and psychedelia are as prevalent as eighties and nineties indie rock. Like all great artists these are just touchstones in a clearly unique and individual sound. This was an early 2008 demo, Cheers Elephant releases their first official CD in a couple weeks watch for it to be turning heads early in 2009.

Cheers Elephant – Here We Are


2 The Dutchess and the Duke – She’s the Dutchess, He’s the Duke [BUY]
Stripped down and folky this album is all about the songs in their purest form. I’m going to quote my own review from July here:
The Dutchess And The Duke’s, debut full length She’s the Dutchess, He’s the Duke careens along in it’s lo-fi immediate glory like a combination of Bob Dylan, The Mamas & The Papas and early Rolling Stones swagger. With the familiar warmth of a lost 60’s classic and the jagged edge of a modern recording, everything old is new again and sounding better than ever. Kimberly Morrison(aka The Dutchess) and Jesse Lortz(aka The Duke) holed up last fall at Magical Basement Studios in West Seattle with Bryan Standridge behind the board of an 8- track and recorded a modern folk classic. It’s chock full of strummy acoustic guitars and percussion with more than enough pure pop melodies and sing along vocal harmonies to have you hooked after just one listen.

The Dutchess and The Duke – Reservoir Park


1 Mono In VCF – Mono In VCF [BUY]
The album I listenedd to more than any other this year, I was hooked on this from the first play back in June of this year and it’s still in the heavy rotation six months later. The name Mono In VCF is a combination of Phil Spector’s Wall Of Sound(Mono) and Moog Synthesizer tones(VCF) and their music has been described as “Drifting in space between psychedelic Beatles and Massive Attack” by Tom Scanlon of The Seattle Times. It is music that is sweeping,cinematic and serenely lush sounding, all woven together by the silky smooth, soaring vocals of Kim Miller. What I previously described as “fearlessly futuristic and reminiscient of the great film soundtrack music of the sixties all at once”. It’s music with the power to take your mind to another place away from all the distrations around you, similar to the the sensation of flying in a dream but converted into sound.

Mono In VCF – Escape City Scrapers

Previous 11 to 15 | 16 to 20 | 21 to 25

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HOT New Music : Of Montreal – Skeletal Lamping

August 31, 2008 by · 2 Comments
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I was never a huge Of Montreal fan, I liked a couple songs here and there, but the new one, Skeletal Lamping has me hooked. It is an amazing blend of 70’s rock,soul and disco and current electronic dance sounds all melded together with an editing style that sounds like a combination of White Album era Beatles and Girl Talk. It’s obvious all those nights of hosting live karaoke shows have seeped into their musical consciousness. Chock full of NSFW lyrics that rival Prince in his lascivious prime, it’s a classic mix of sex and rock and roll which the surreal cover art depicts pretty accurately. Here’s the opening and closing tracks courtesy of Spin & Rolling Stone to give you a small taste, but the best songs lie in between, and I hate to be a tease but unfortunately I need to leave you to your own internet saavy to hear them before the October release date. Some of my favs at the moment are For Our Elegant Caste, the horn infused Eluardian Instance and the smooth soul of Plastis Wafers.

Of Montreal – Nonpareil Of Favor (via Spin)
Of Montreal – ID Engager (via Rolling Stone)
Buy Skeletal Lamping

A huge Fall tour is coming as well see the dates here

Full Track Listing
01 Nonpareil of Favor
02 Wicked Wisdom
03 For Our Elegant Caste
04 Touched Something’s Hollow
05 An Eluardian Instance
06 Gallery Piece
07 Women’s Studies Victims
08 St.Exquisite’s Confessions
09 Triphallus, to Punctuate!
10 And I’ve Seen a Bloody Shadow
11 Plastis Wafers
12 Death Is Not a Parallel Move
13 Beware Our Nubile Miscreants
14 Mingusings
15 Id Engager

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Knocking Down Ten On A Saturday Afternoon

October 20, 2007 by · Leave a Comment
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A mini-mixed bag of ten newish songs I’ve come across lately to soundtrack your Saturday afternoon. No special shoes required. Rock on.

Of Montreal – The Kids Are Alright (The Who Cover)
Nada Surf – See These Bones
The New Whole Ususals – No Name Sally
Foo Fighters – Band On The Run
Josh Ritter – The River (Springsteen Cover)
AA Bondy – There’s A Reason
Drug Rug – Day I Day
PJ Harvey The Piano
Shrinking Islands – The Slow-Moving Aftermath
The Silver Seas – The Country Life

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5 On A Friday : Hopping Into A Holiday Weekend

April 6, 2007 by · 1 Comment
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Spring has sprung, but here in the east wintertime is getting in one more slap as Easter weekend rolls in. Here’s five today related to the mascot of the holiday for you to do the bunny hop to. Hoppity hop hop hop.

1: Magnetic Fields – Lets Pretend We’re Bunny Rabbits
Buy 69 Love Songs
2: Jimmy Haggett – Rabbit Action
Buy The Legendary Sun Records Story
3:Jefferson Airplane – White Rabbit
Buy 2400 Fulton Street
4: The Shins – Red Rabbits
Buy Wincing The Night Away
5: Of Montreal – Bunny Ain’t No Kind Of Rider
Buy Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?

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Grab Bag : Recent Releases

February 28, 2007 by · 2 Comments
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Who Reads The Directions Anyway ?


Just a mix of a bunch of the newer songs that I’ve been into lately, plus a few from last year that had sort of slipped through the cracks.

First up a couple of the songs that were the main inspiration for my Brian Eno History Lesson post a couple weeks back. She’s A Rejector, a guitar laden new wave-ish hip shaker from the new Of Montreal disc, and Strange Lights, a reverb drenched fuzzed out dirgey rocker from Deerhunter. (antichrist television blues) is one of my favorites from Neon Bible, the soon to be released Arcade Fire disc. It’s a blistering rocker of a song thats owes as much to Springsteen as it is does to the Velvet Underground. The reunited Dinosaur Jr returns to form, although unless he’s singing I can’t say I really hear Lou Barlow‘s being back in the fold influencing these new tracks much. The Kaiser Chiefs second disc picks up right where Employment left off, Everything Is Average Nowadays is one of the catchier songs on the new one. The next two will have you up and dancing for sure LCD Soundsytem doing Watch The Tapes from the forthcoming Sound of Silver and the Macromantics new one which uses a formula similar to Lily Allen but cranks it up another notch.

Winding it up with a handful from last year that I just recently picked up, if Fleetwood Mac ever decided to go alternative you’d have Midlake. Roscoe is Rhiannon for Alterna-Rockers. Silversun Pickups shows what can happen if you take all of those 80’s and 90’s influences like Pixies and Sonic Youth and put them to good use. Lazy Eye is one catchy song. And last but not least Sparks show they can still pull it off when they want to, Perfume is a bouncy hypnotic fun little ditty that is classic Sparks.

MP3: Of Montreal – Shes A Rejector
buy Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer ?
MP3: Deerhunter – Strange Lights
buy Cryptograms
MP3: Arcade Fire – (antichrist television blues)
buy Neon Bible
MP3: Dinosaur Jr – Almost Ready
buy Beyond
MP3: Kaiser Chiefs – Everything Is Average Nowadays
buy Yours Truly, Angry Mob
LCD Soundsystem – Watch The Tapes (link removed by request of label)
buy Sound Of Silver
MP3: Macromantics – Scorch
buy Moments in Movement
MP3: Midlake – Roscoe
buy The Trials Of Van Occupanther
MP3: Silversun Pickups – Lazy Eye
buy Carnavas
MP3: Sparks – Perfume
buy Hello Young Lovers

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