Mar 31st, 2009 at 2:42 pm
It’s Blitz
Yesterday, writing about the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ new album It’s Blitz Ta-Nehisi Coates said he “liked each one of the YYY albums better than the last” and idiosyncratic view he attributes to “missing any music created by white people during the mid to late 80s.” I, for one, have been listening to music created by white people for my entire life and completely agree with him about the band’s growing powers. Besides which, Karen O is half-Korean so it’s hardly white people music. Well, okay, that’s exactly what it is. But still.
Here’s “Zero”
At any rate, I’m lamer than ever these days so dismiss my views if you like, but I’m loving this album.
32 Responses to “It’s Blitz”
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March 31st, 2009 at 2:48 pm
hey matt,
here’s a link to a mix i made for a friend of mine (girl, hence the somewhat soft quality of the mix) with very limited knowledge of what’s out there. you might like:
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?lmruzm3jekg
March 31st, 2009 at 2:51 pm
At any rate, I’m lamer than ever these days so dismiss my views if you like
Since you brought it up: in my opinion, Matt, your taste in music isn’t lame per se. It’s that you like to write gushy valentines to records that, whether lame or not-lame, are already the critical darlings-of-the-moment (Feist, Tegan & Sara, Vampire Weekend.) It’s the bandwagoniness that really grates, at least to me.
March 31st, 2009 at 2:51 pm
p.s. here’s an earlier, much more rock-oriented (and equally soft) mix:
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?hjdyygkqnjd
March 31st, 2009 at 2:59 pm
James Gary -
If this were 2003, you could attack Matt for hyping a darling of the moment by posting this video.
At this point he might as well be hyping U2 – which is to say, if it’s good plug it, if it’s not don’t.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Nice to see urban San Francisco being used as a backdrop.
Gotta say I have a soft spot for music that’s basically thirty years young. Long live the Shirts…er, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs!
March 31st, 2009 at 3:02 pm
That was the Warfield theater they’re showed there, here in San Francisco.
Try these:
Tara Blaise – Three Degrees
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXlOrjScU0o&feature=related
Tara Blaise – Breathe (PV)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wF3h41OpPw
March 31st, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Have you checked out the new Decemberists album? It has the best song about murdering all your children that I have ever heard – “The Rake’s Song.”
March 31st, 2009 at 3:13 pm
I know that you’re now @ CAP so they won’t let you actually endorse bands … but I’ve always liked your indie music interludes between the politics stuff. Thanks, sir.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:30 pm
Haven’t heard Blitz yet, but the argument that YYY albums are getting better…maybe.
I had a musician roommate in DC who loved Show Your Bones and claimed it was better than the first two EPs or Fever to Tell. The musicianship was better, the songwriting was tighter, etc.
My response: Yeah, but those other albums are awesome.
I don’t care if Show Your Bones is better. It’s boring.
He conceded the argument.
Still, can’t wait to buy this.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:34 pm
matt,
if you like this, check out the original.
this is ok, but it’s a slavish imitation of missing persons, an ’80’s band that featured dale and terry bozio, a couple of refugees from frank zappa’s mothers of invention.
terry bozio was an excellent drummer, the band was really tight – just what you would expect from zappa alums – and dale was a very fetching blond who sounds suspiciously like karen o. or rather karen o sounds suspiciously – almost exactly – like dale bozio.
the first album was really excellent music and for whatever reason it’s been forgotten and lost. but if you really want to hear where these guys got their sound from, check out missing persons. it’s worth it.
i hate to sound like one of those guys who trashes newer music, and i’m always open to new and really and truly original stuff, but i also hate it when someone basically steals another band’s sound so obviously.
primary source material is always superior.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:39 pm
the audio from “walkin in l.a.” by missing persons.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jR3dgARIr6E&feature=related
March 31st, 2009 at 3:43 pm
Boring… The Yeah Yeah Yeah’s, The Decembrists, Death Cab for Cutie, and all the rest in that ilk are boring as shit to listen to, if you ask me. I’m not sure what the appeal is. They’re *okay* musicians, and *okay* lyricists, but the music goes nowhere for me.
…to each their own though. If you like them, don’t let me ruin it for you.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:46 pm
Agree with Russell, except that, after SYB, I am not really that interested in a new YYY album.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:50 pm
I’m with Jonathan – the world can do without yet another Giorgio Moroder knockoff, really: but if it clicks for you, so be it.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:52 pm
I liked Fever to Tell pretty well, but I loved Show Your Bones. The latter album is more melodic and less harsh, which appeals to a wuss like me.
March 31st, 2009 at 3:53 pm
and i’m always open to new and really and truly original stuff, but i also hate it when someone basically steals another band’s sound so obviously.
OT: Yeah, it bugs me too. I’ve never been able to hear the White Stripes as anything other than a third-rate imitation of the Gun Club.
March 31st, 2009 at 4:14 pm
“Yeah Yeah Yeah’s, The Decembrists, Death Cab for Cutie, and all the rest in that ilk”
What exactly is that ilk? Beyond the increasingly-meaningless “indie” label (the bands are on Universal, EMI, and Warner respectively), they don’t actually sound much alike at all. You’ve named an art-punk group, a thinly-veiled prog band (”not that there’s anything wrong with that”), and a pretty straight-ahead pop group.
March 31st, 2009 at 4:53 pm
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
March 31st, 2009 at 5:08 pm
I’m a bit older than MattY (I’m not in highschool, for one) and I’m not certainly more of a “square” and not as “leading edge” as he is, but… I liked it!
I also enjoyed Coates’ comments, which are not in any way racist.
P.S. This, this, youtube.com/watch?v=n2xODjbfYw8, and youtube.com/watch?v=AJc64xncBt4 are not in any way in their league.
March 31st, 2009 at 5:22 pm
What Julian said. Plus, I don’t care for the Decembrists or Death Cab. But I love me some Yeah Yeah Yeahs.
March 31st, 2009 at 5:48 pm
I picked up the album yesterday and was pretty pleased after my first and second listens. But I’m a sucker for dancable music, and this whole album really appeals to my inner hipster.
I’m with matt, good pick.
March 31st, 2009 at 6:02 pm
“Zero” – Superb danceable song!
March 31st, 2009 at 6:28 pm
Never heard of them before now, but I like them. The song styling is very 1980’s though, which I liked. The sound is like a lot of bands in the 80’s, not just Missing Persons, and the video too harkens back to there too. Cool.
March 31st, 2009 at 6:33 pm
Bah. It has five great songs(Zero, Heads Will Roll, Runaway, Dull Life, and the closer) and the rest bore me. I’ve been disappointed by the new Franz Ferdinand album as well, which has two really catchy songs and then nothing else.
It’s okay. This summer the Arctic Monkeys and the poet laureate of rock Alex Turner are going to drop an album that will kick tail. And then I will be satisfied.
The Arctic Monkeys are the greatest band on the planet. Nobody is anywhere near as consistently good. They are like the Beatles in that just as there is no such thing as a bad Beatles song, likewise there is no such thing as a bad Arctic Monkeys song. They are like crack cocaine in the form of a rock band. You just can’t stop listening to them.
March 31st, 2009 at 7:20 pm
“The Decembrists, Death Cab for Cutie, and all the rest in that ilk are boring as shit to listen to, if you ask me…”
I’m pretty sure they are the same band.
March 31st, 2009 at 8:02 pm
I’m pretty psyched that they found and used the same time space displacement tunnel that Eddie Murphy uses in 48 Hours to get from Chinatown to the Mission in one cut. It’s the best kept secret in SF.
April 1st, 2009 at 12:27 am
a thinly-veiled prog band (”not that there’s anything wrong with that”)
I love The Decemberists and can’t wait to see them do the new album at the Hollywood Palladium, but I’m sorry, as someone who saw ELP, Yes, King Crimson, Gentle Giant and pre-Phil Collins Genesis back in the day, I’m really tired of anything that’s not 4 chords or is a concept album or has songs that are over 4 minutes long getting labeled prog. There’s no focus on individual virtuosity for all the players, the rhythm section doesn’t play like lead instruments, the rhythms are mostly standard 4/4, the chords are the usual A-E-D-G guitar chords, there’s no classical overtones in the song structures and the Decemberists couldn’t play jazz to save their lives.
Sorry, pet peeve.
April 1st, 2009 at 12:57 am
Soft Shock is such a fantastic song. The acoustic version on the special edition versions is excellent.
April 1st, 2009 at 1:07 am
I like the yeahyeahyeah’s. (I’d write ‘YYY’s’, but apparently that’s what people do if they follow things, and I don’t want to give the impression that I ever did anything more than hear the yyy’s (oh, hell) in IHeartVideo in Austin while looking for a movie to rent and asked the available employee who it was. I have one album, from a few years ago. It makes me ache for the unfathomable, and occasionally annoys me with an oddly-turned phrase.)
That Karen O is so hot, and this is only enhanced by the new-to-me knowledge that she is Korean-inflected bodily, or whathaveyou. I now feel incredibly old.
Also, I wish Ta-Nahesi would stop talking about white people/black people, stuff, even facetiously. It just confuses me. I’m white, very white, but I seem to share more, tastewise, with him that with my White People friends of a similar age (which sometimes I think is his point, then I just get annoyed because he next writes a gushy valentine type of post about Velveeta, the non?cheese?!.) I can’t remember then if processed food is for black people or white people and if Disneyland or the black smurf is all whatsit, and then it reminds me of everyone not reading Baudrillard but talking about him while he was writing but maybe not being very fucking serious about goddamn Velveeta.
So Baudrillard is dead and we are not (I hope, fellow travelers). I think it is very relevant that, e.g., missing persons is the real yeahyeahyeah’s, but then, neither rises to the point where we will give a crap about either in 50 years, I hope. Bah, humbug. Gettin’ me vinyl of Brandenburg Concertos out now. I’ll run my finger around the groove and reminisce.
April 1st, 2009 at 8:27 am
doughy captain wins comment of the month.
April 1st, 2009 at 6:04 pm
if you like this, check out the original.
this is ok, but it’s a slavish imitation of missing persons
True, but that’s why I like it! Though this is the first time I’ve ever bothered to listen to this band. I will download some tracks to see what’s what…since I rarely find new music that I like any more (the total Clear-channelization of DC radio being a major cause).
April 1st, 2009 at 7:11 pm
arctic monkeys are terrible- fandom of such is an indicator of poor taste. the yeah yeah yeahs sound a lot like the pretenders. missing persons is a pretty good analogy too, though not as much yelping. mr yglesias’ music taste is obviously not his forte,even though garbage actually might be underrated, a little.