Chicago’s Fancy Fux will be playing a 2:00pm set on the first day of Mamby on the Beach. They play a fun blend of house, hip hop, and dub. Their first big single, “Stripper,” is outstanding, and clips of their live sets look like a good time. They should be a fun start to the festival. Tickets are still available, by the way.
Keep your mind open.
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Nine Inch Nails recently announced they’ll be releasing two EPs in the next seven to nine months. The two EPs follow the December 2016 EP Not the Actual Events, and the band says the three EPs are linked (but they haven’t revealed how they are). The first is scheduled before the start of their summer tour in July, and the next will be released “6 to 8 months” after that.
Keep your mind open.
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One of the best albums of 2017 is a full-length debut by a band that broke up before it was released.
No one seems to know, or is telling, why New York post-punks WALL (Vanessa Gomez – drums, Vince McClelland – guitar, Elizabeth Skadden – bass, Samantha York – lead vocals, guitar) broke up after releasing one critically acclaimed EP (WALL), wowing crowds at the 2016 South by Southwest festival, and recording what appears will be their only full-length record – Untitled. Perhaps they felt they’d said all they wanted to say. Perhaps they found out the music businesses wasn’t what they wanted after all. Perhaps it was the classic “artistic differences.” I’m not sure we’ll ever know, but there are hints on Untitled – a scorching post-punk testament to desperate times and desperate measures.
The first lyrics on Untitled are “Everyone looking ‘round, looking to get high. I was looking ‘round, looking to get high.” on “High Ratings.” The band drills out the jagged punk angles they had mastered so early around a song about people looking for validation in a world in which others are easily obscured by our narcissism.
“Shimmer of Fact” unveils WALL’s love for Joy Division. The reverbed vocals about a relationship gone wrong after moving from the friend zone to the lover zone include “Something went wrong.” and “We crossed those lines.” The song “Save Me” has shared male and female vocals (“You wanna walk away, now that’s it over?” / “Save me from myself.”) and powerful riffs that underline the frantic lyrics about danger and the thrills it can bring.
“(Sacred) Circus” continues the Joy Divison-like bass, but the guitars float into shoegaze glory, and then crash into punk rock, as they sing about love, lust, and jealousy. Part of the chorus is “Nothing in this life is sacred.” That includes, by the way, our expectations of WALL and what they had planned for their musical career. “Wounded at War,” with its guitars that sound like they’re melting in the sun, is both a salute to homeless veterans and a punch in the gut to the institutions that trained them. “Go home, soldier. Back to the war that bred you, soldier,” they sing.
“Everything In Between” sounds like it belongs in a rare 1980’s VHS vampire movie. Trust me, you’ll understand when you hear the heavy bass, racing pulse beat, and distorted guitars. “Charmed Life” (a Half Japanese cover) has a great saxophone riff throughout it. “Watch everything you do and everything you say,” they sing as they mix surf rock, post-punk, no wave, and 50’s love songs. The song ends with an abrupt stop by the band and York saying, “I guess I’m leavin’.”
On “Weekend,” she sings, “The weekend, the weaker I am.” Partying has become too much of a chore. “I can’t live this way,” she sings while the band (who sizzle for the whole track) agrees to go with her and “skip town.” “Turn Around” has York telling an admirer to “pull yourself together” and forget about even trying to chat her up or risk death.
The album ends with “River Mansion,” a gorgeous piece of post-punk shoegaze that has the band wishing for good things ahead but knowing they might end up not getting them. “We built this dream on a hill…A storm is brewing. I’m safe in the house, locked in a dream.” Perhaps WALL realized they’d already achieved the dream of expressing their art (and getting critical success for it) and knew it was time to leave the mansion they’d created before success flooded and drowned them (“I’m laying in the river and the rain is getting thicker,” York sings). Maybe WALL sensed that success wasn’t going to be good for them. Maybe there was infighting (“When our eyes meet, and you’re lying through your teeth. When our eyes meet, and I’m lying through my teeth.”). Maybe they knew going out on top was going to be the best, safest option.
Or maybe it’s all a lark. We won’t know until they or their label decide to tell us, if they ever do. Until then, we have Untitled to give us clues and questions without answers. Sometimes the mystery is more exciting than the solution, and perhaps that was WALL’s message the whole time.
Keep your mind open.
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Riot Fest Chicago has announced its full lineup for 2017. As usual, it’s killer and far better than Lollapalooza.
They’ve added several bands, including At the Drive In, Best Coast, Black Pistol Fire, Cockney Rejects, Skating Polly, the Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black, and many more.
You can still get tickets to this festival, so don’t wait too long. It will sell out.
Keep your mind open.
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“Kids rock” legends Feltworth were kind enough to let me interview them recently about their inevitable foray into serious rock music. I learned a lot about their influences, how they met, and what kind of barbecue Cozy prefers.
COZY: Bring it back? Bring it back??? Have you not heard of The Saxpocalypse©? Every song in the 50’s: sax solo. Every song in the 80’s: sax solo. If you follow my math you’ll realize that the Saxpocalypse© is nigh! Every thirty years the sax takes over for 10 years. All artists/all genres. This is no different for Feltworth. I’d be shocked and disappointed if the band erased all of the major sax I blew all over our next LP.
MANNY: Ctrl-Alt-Delete-Sax. Ok, actually I don’t mind a little sax…Little Richard, Springsteen’s Born To Run album, “Let’s Dance” by Bowie. Dezi says sax makes all music sound like the Saturday Night Live band. What was Steve Albini’s quote? “New York’s alright if you like saxophones?”
COZY: It’s weird. The moms still come backstage after the shows to meet (and greet!) us it’s just this time around they get a little more dolled up – no more worries about baby barf!
COZY: Quite frankly I’m hoping to take over for Gregg Allman in the Allman Brothers Band. Rest easy, MidnightRider.
MANNY: Hmmm…I’m not big on jamming. I guess it’s fun though. Animal Eyes are a half-decent KISS cover band. Not alot of room for jamming with those guys. The only brothers I’m interested in are the Hudson Brothers…kids music to rock cross-over geniuses.
COZY: Who?
MANNY: When I was a kid, my friends were all going to see Poltergeist, but I was nervous to see such a scary film so I tried instead to convince them to see Raiders of the Lost Ark… for the third time. No luck. But yes, the first is the best.
COZY: We plan on getting our manager Skip to drop the hammer on ’em. See you in court guys, may the best lawyer win!
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Thanks to all who listened to my first WSND show of the 2017 summer. Here’s my set list from June 01, 2017.
I’m back on air June 08, 2017 at midnight until 2am Friday morning. I hope you’ll give me a listen. Keep your mind open.
Spawned by the folks in Fat White Family, the Eccentronic Research Council, and the Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger, the Moonlandingz’s debut album, Interplanetary Class Classics, is, according to a quote on the band’s website “…a derogatory slap in the face of good taste and decency, an album synthesized out of pure irresponsibility and sheer self-adoration.”
In other words, it’s one of the most fun records of the year. That shouldn’t be a surprise when it’s something cooked up as a goofy music project by GOASTT’s Sean Lennon and members of Fat White Family. The Moonlandingz were a fictional band in this project, and now that band has come to life.
Opener “Vessels” is a song about sex, possession, and / or addiction. The heavy back beat and 1980’s no wave synths give the whole song a dark, smarmy feel. Lead singer Lias Saoudi’s vocals get louder and more frantic as the song progresses, and the Waitresses-like saxophone cacophony only helps. “Sweet Saturn Mine” was the first single released by the band when they kind of, sort of existed. It has a wicked drum beat and synths Gary Numan would love. Saoudi sings about strange happenings in strange places and, I’m pretty sure, orgasms that don’t necessarily bring relief. The Eccentronic Research Council’s synthesizer work and drumbeats on this are sharp as a knife.
“Black Hanz” is great psychedelia, and one of those songs that is apparently bonkers live (judging from YouTube videos I’ve seen). It’s something you’d hear in a weird curio shop in San Francisco that has a secret disco in the basement. “I.D.S.” begins with spooky female vocals from Charlotte Kemp before Saoudi starts a chant and then a Sigue Sigue Sputnik-like beat rushes at you. “The Strangle of Anna” could be a long lost Raveonettes track with its fuzzed-out guitar, Phil Spector rhythm, and heavy reverbed vocals.
After the brief, creepy circus music instrumental of “Theme from Valhalla Dale,” the Moonlandingz deliver “The Rabies Are Back,” which is just as wild as you hope it will be. “I turned my back on Paris, when I heard their dogs do bite,” Saoudi sings at the beginning before he goes into a bit of a frenzy singing about werewolves. “Neuf Du Pape” is just as weird and funky, combining new wave with industrial.
You can guess the subject of “Glory Hole.” You might not guess that it seems to involve sex across the galaxy or that it has such a wicked beat. “Lufthansa Man” is cool space / lounge / synth rock. It deserves to be on your next playlist (or mixtape if you’re still old school) named “Damn Funky Tunes.”
The album ends with the apocalyptic, epic, and crazy “This Cities Undone.” I’m sure it slays live and inspires crowd chants and spastic dancing as the band sings about the end of the world and puts down killer beats and cuts. If the world is going to end, you might as well party to something like this.
You might as well crank this whole damn record. It’s one of the best, funkiest, and weirdest albums of the year. I hope this fictional band doesn’t disappear into the ether. I hope they stay outside the fourth wall for a while. Break your own fourth wall by letting this album into your head. It will do the rest for you.
Keep your mind open.
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