Palebear Archives

February, 2006

You may or may not have been familiar with the amazing Splendid Ezine. But if you ever put together your own CD or CD-R as an indie musician, chances are you came across the site when looking for places to send it for review. And now, it’s quietly closed up shop… so quietly that I didn’t even know it was gone until I went to look at the site a little while ago. They ceased releasing new material on Dec 31, 2005.

So why the big fuss over the demise of just another online indie review site? There are still a ton of places to send music for review, and an increasing number of music and mp3 blogs whose opinions are deemed at least as worthy as traditional CD review sites.

Well, since 1996 (nine long years, an eternity online) Splendid had been operating under the policy of reviewing EVERYTHING they received in the mail. I mean everything. Every CD, CD-R, Cassette, 7″, 12″ that came through the doors got the same treatment. I remember on their FAQ page them saying something to the effect that if you sent in 10 CDs of your grandma playing Klezmer music, they would most likely review a few of them. They prided themselves on listening to and reviewing the most obscure music on the planet.

Edited by George Zahora and boasting a huge lineup of writers dedicated to covering true independent music, Splendid was a godsend for indie musicians. This was one of the few places where you had a good shot at getting music honestly reviewed if you weren’t a big indie label player. One of the first reviews that we ever got for a CD at Shmat Records was from Splendid. I remember being surprised and pleased as hell to see it up there. Sure, there was often a bit of a wait… but no more than many other review sites that wouldn’t give you the time of day anyway.

I actually have the screenshot at right of the Splendid Ezine site taken on January of 2005. I have this because of a near paranoiac habit of screenshotting website pages with our actual reviews, for fear that they might one day fold, taking our reviews with them. (I also save the actual text too.) Hmm.. I guess I wasn’t too far off base.

As for the reasons for them shutting down, I have to say that I completely understand why it happened. It’s an example of the better mousetrap gone awry. It hits home particularly hard. Let me get up on the soapbox to explain.

For the reviews at Shmat, we’ve encountered the exact same debilitating problems that they did (albeit on a much smaller scale). Having a true open submission policy eventually leads to more review material than can be handled by just a few writers. The quality and integrity of the writing becomes jeopardized, as the backlog of CDs increases.

Continue reading “A Splendid Demise” …

by Bryan | Comments Off

We are admitted huge fans of Barsuk Records so it was nice to see them release this very cool streaming special up on their site recently. Back in spring of 2005, they hosted a little shindig along for CIMS (The Coalition of Independent Music Stores), which featured live acoustic performances by some of their artists including Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie), Matthew Caws (Nada Surf), John Roderick (The Long Winters), John Vanderslice, and Jesse Sykes.

Now, they’re making the recordings of the event, which were held at the Experience Music Project in Seattle, available online for anyone to listen to. Mucho cool, since these are all indie artists we’re interested in.

You can check out the streams at a special flash interface site they put up at:

http://www.barsuk.com/songwriters/ecard/

They are releasing the songs in 4 batches. The first batch was made available today (well, actually last week) and the rest will come through on February 27, March 13, and March 27. I’ve heard all but one of these songs before on their respective albums, but it’s sorta cool to hear them acoustically live since I’ve seen none of their shows before (something I hope to rectify this year).

Now, while we’re usually not huge fans of Flash interfaces because of its insular technology (and the fact that a lot of the flash sites around are just needless fluff) we’ll have to make an exception in this case because the of the quality of the songs available. But just in case you don’t have Flash, here are the links to Itunes for the songs available starting today. I couldn’t seem to find the Jesse Sykes track; I think it is on a Barsuk split release from another label, so I’ve just included the link to where you can get the album on their site.

Note, these are the album versions of the songs and not the live versions from the performance:

Matthew Caws (Nada Surf) - “What Is Your Secret?”
John Roderick (The Long Winters) - “Ultimatum”
John Vanderslice - “Radiant With Terror”
Jesse Sykes - “Your Side Now”

And here is the full listing of live tracks that will be appearing on the Barsuk site along with their dates of release:

February 27, 2006
Matthew Caws - “Blizzard of ‘77″
John Roderick - “Bride and Bridle”
Ben Gibbard - “Title and Registration”

March 13, 2006
John Vanderslice - “Dead Slate Pacific”
Jesse Sykes - “Doralee”
Matthews Caws - “Always Love”
John Roderick - “It’ll Be a Breeze”

March 27, 2006
John Vanderslice - “Pale Horse”
Jesse Sykes - “Untitled” (unreleased)
Ben Gibbard - “I Will Follow You Into the Dark”

by Palebear | Comments Off

Bishop Allen
Corazon

I’ve been a periodic visitor to the wonderful MP3 blog Said The Gramophone for awhile now… there’s some great finds over there. This band was one of them (though I must admit I’ve seen the name Bishop Allen on another site previous to finally checking out their music).

New York’s Bishop Allen play joyous and honest indiepop. I think I’ve found a nearly worthy successor to the defunct Masters of the Hemisphere. Just maybe. The band has the same sort of spirit though they don’t sound exactly like the Masters.

The track from Bishop Allen’s new EP January is called “Corazon” and is a great mid-tempo pop song, perhaps a bit more mellow than some of their other tunes. It sometimes reminds me of Track Star or American Analog Set with a less mellow singer. Actually, a bit like Dios Malos also. There’s some tasty piano throughout the song. The way that the Justin’s vocals sort of slur uphill in the verses while the chorus resonates simply between just two chords is great. The best indiepop bands seem to be able to do that: take two chords and make two and a half minute epics out of them.

I listened to some of the other tracks from an earlier album and they were just as good, if a bit wordier. “Eve of Destruction”’s verses don’t seem to have any breaths in them at all! “Busted Heart” reminds me of Isaac Brock or Doug Martsch fronting My Morning Jacket.

Not only is their music only available through their website (and on Itunes), but they are currently undergoing an amazingly ambitious project of releasing one EP every month this year! Completely insane, but I welcome the chance to sample more of these little poppity gems. Yes, “teach me your songs” indeedy…

Members:

Jack Delamitraux
Christian Owens
Justin Rice
Christian Rudder

Bishop Allen website

by Palebear | Comments Off

Boy, we’ve been spending wayyy to much time writing up”Blurbin’ Fridays”. It’s like writing 5 mini-reviews on Thursday night. As such, we’re going to shorten up the format and just give the links and “approximate genre”… trust us, you will probably dig at least ONE of the MP3s linked to here. Enjoy!

1. New Estate - Dream Planner (Superchunkian Buttergloried Indie Rock)

2. Hockey Night - For Guys’ Eyes Only (Speedy VU-ish Pavementian Strokesisms)

3. Jesper Fries - Real Enough To Fake (Quirky Swedish Eastriverpiping)

4. Malmo - Jerk Face (Distorted Jamesish Magnetic Fielding from New York)

5. Stars For Sunroofs - How You Fall (Bouncy Jangletwee Bunnygruntisms)

by Palebear | 1 Comment

Arghh.. the weekend has again conspired to creep up upon us. Here is yet another episode of Blurbin’ Fridays… have fun.

1. Shannon Wright - Floor Pile (Tori Amosed Cat Power)

2. Radar Bros. - Shifty Lies (Bill Callahanized Lambchop with a touch ‘o Floyd)

3. Sue - Backwards Forwards (Sonic Youthy side of Sebadoh)

4. The Pit That Became A Tower - Airport Ministry Thief (Israel’s Archers of Loaf and Dino Jr.)

5. Apside - I Have Nothing (Strokesy Italian Interpoling)

by Palebear | 1 Comment

Music, music, music. Here is some for you courtesy of TGI Blurbin’ Fridays on Palebear.

1. Lost On Purpose - Lonely Road (Angsty Tullycraft meets acoustic Mogwai)

2. Calla - It Dawned On Me (Dandy Warhols plus the Smiths?)

3. Dakota Suite - Sand Fools The Shoreline (Red House Painting the Reindeer Section)

4. John Vanderslice - Exodus Damage (A less hurky jerky Colin Meloy )

5. Fiver - Tinywaves (Gerbils meets Built To Spill)

by Palebear | Comments Off

Welcome to Friday. “Blurbin’ Fridays”, that is. This’ll be a quick post because I gotta jet out.

1. Birddog - $100 Wedding
Hushed intensity from Bill Santen. These folk songs off of “Songs from Willipa Bay” may take some getting used to, but very rewarding for those who stick around.

2. [The ] Caseworker - When I Was A Young King
Very similar to the drony goodness from the American Analog Set, this Pehr band is releasing a new CD of the same name as this track this month. Strange brackets around the “The” in their name…

3. Norfolk & Western - A Marriage Proposal From their standout album “Dusk In Cold Parlours”. Adam Seltzer has a tiny but expressive voice. If you like hushed folk with local color instruments in the vein of Sparklehorse (but minus most of the drum machines), you’ll probably like this.

4. Silver Scooter - Pumpkin Eyes
One of the greatest pure-hook indie garage pop outfits from Austin. Nowadays, you can hear lead Silver Scooterer Scott Garred in SuperXX Man, but this track off of “The Other Palm Springs” from 1997 is a soaring reminder of the amazing melodic songs that they put out.

5. Pedro The Lion - Big Trucks
Mope-pop stalwart. I’m not quite sure why I like this particular track off of “It’s Hard To Find A Friend” so much. It’s moody and mellow like the rest, but I guess I sort of remember it whenever I’m driving up the freeway and see sports cars cursing at the big trucks with their oversized lo-oh-oads…

by Palebear | Comments Off

Box_
Hello (Special Glowing) World!

If Elf Power had decided to form an Electronica band instead of an Elephant 6 one, I have a feeling they might have started life like Box_. The music is packed full with a veritable zoo of strange electronic beeps, skronks, whirls, buzzes but happily the underlying song structure and vocals ARE there. Think Postal Service and The Album Leaf fronted by Jason Lytle or Robert Pollard.

By the way, if you can’t seem to find Box_ online, perhaps it’s because you aren’t including that underscore… try Box Underscore.

This duo of Josh and Derek have created a rare thing here: semi-electronica that I actually have a shot of listening to and digging. A lot of it has to do with the fact that it’s not just dumbed down TR808 beats after beats for 25 minutes. Granted the electronics can at times get extremely dense and overbearing and the vocals take an extended hiatus. But there’s actual acoustic guitar amidst the mayhem. There’s melody and singing. These are nice songs, not extended electronic wankings.

Continue reading “Box_ - Hello (Special Glowing) World!” …

by Tyranosaur | Comments Off

One of the most common questions for indie labels and musicians is, “how and where can I get my music onto CD?” There’s a billion options out there for manufacturing from burning your music yourself onto CD-R one by one, to going the full 4/4 color 8 page CD booklet with jewel box route.

For those who are interested in something inbetween, cost is always an issue. For doing basic replication of CDs ONLY with no jewel boxes or inserts, we’ve gone with CDCentric twice in the past with little complaints. Let me tell you this up front: as a CD manufacturer, CDCentric is a bit BORING. But that’s just what we wanted. No flashy ads, no extra doohickeys added on, no hidden fees. Just plain old cheap CD/DVD replication is what we go to them for.

The last CD we manufactured with them was in 2004(?) but the prices haven’t changed much. One thing that is rather nice is that unlike many other CD manufacturers, there’s no need to ask them for a quote. You go their website and all of their prices are laid out on the home page. Couldn’t be easier.

Most people go for the “Value Packages” which range from 1000 CDs in paper sleeves for $626 delivered, to the same number of CDs but with a 4/1 4-panel insert with jewel box for $1099. Note that in all cases, these refer to “replicated” CDs (manufactured using a real glass master, etc.) versus “duplicated” CDs (made using CD-R technology). There are a lot of other companies who seem to have cheaper prices, but that’s often because they are duplicating CDs as opposed to replicating them. Another item that is often left out of the prices are the films and outputs… I have seen a ton of other places that tack this onto the end of the bill, and it can be over 100 dollars just for that!

Continue reading “CDCentric” …

by Bryan | 1 Comment

The lineup for this year’s Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival has been finalized at long last. For those who happen to be in SoCal this is the giant semi-hedonistic alternative and indie music fest that takes place every year in Spring out in the desert east of L.A. (Indio’s Empire Polo Field to be exact) The gathering is sort of like a Lollapalooza and this year it’s happening on April 29-30.

We kept seeing supposedly “official” lists of who was playing every so often, but here’s the lineup straight from their site. I often could care less about the headliners… it’s the bands in the smaller print that are often the ones I’d like to see. In that spirit, here is the list in REVERSE order for each day, with links to Itunes for the bands we like in case you should be wondering what they sound like:

Day 1 (Sat April 29)

Infusion, Shy FX & T Power, The Section Quartet, Celebration, Nine Black Alps, The Like, Wolfmother, Living Things, Hybrid, Joey Beltram, Colette, Chris Liberator, White Rose Movement, Platinum Pied Pipers, The Zutons, The New Amsterdams, Matt Costa, Lyrics Born, Eagles of Death Metal, The Duke Spirit, Deerhoof, Lady Sovereign, Audio Bullys, Imogen Heap, The Juan Maclean, The Walkmen, She Wants Revenge, Devendra Banhart, Derrick Carter, HARD-Fi, Animal Collective, Cat Power, Tosca, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Ladytron, TV on the Radio, My Morning Jacket, Carl Cox, Atmosphere, Common, Damian Jr Gong Marley, Sigur Ros, Franz Ferdinand, Daft Punk, Depeche Mode

Day 2 (Sun April 30)

The Octopus Project, Kristina Sky, Giant Drag, Youth Group, Be Your Own Pet, OneRepublic, Minus the Bear, The Subways, Gabriel & Dresden, Infadels, Gilles Peterson, Mates of State, Murs featuring 9th wonder, Michael Mayer, stellastarr, Jazzanova, Los Amigos Invisibles, The Magic Numbers, Jamie Lidell, The Dears, Dungen, Art Brut, Editors, Metric, Kaskade, The Go! Team, Gnarls Barkley, Seu Jorge, Mylo (DJ Set), Little Louie Vega, Amadou & Mariam, Digable Planets, Phoenix, Coldcut, Wolf Parade, Coheed and Cambria, Mogwai, Sleater-Kinney, James Blunt, Matisyahu, Scissor Sisters, Paul Oakenfold, Bloc Party, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Tool

Coachella Valley Music Festival Website

by Palebear | Comments Off

The Devics
Push The Heart

I’ve been gradually becoming assimilated into The Devics‘ mysterious musical world from listening to their CD repeatedly while driving around town. I didn’t know of this L.A. based band until now, though they’ve made a name for themselves over in Italy. The multi-cultural transplants Sara Lov and Dustin O’Halloran are the only members of this slightly quirky dreamrock band but they make up for their lack of numbers with the awesome songs on their new album Push The Heart.

There is a strange ghostly and glowing power running throughout the music, a push and pull of chord pairings which alternates in feeling between whimsical, broken-down cabaret clubs and a classical, almost courtesan setting. That last observation is no doubt validated by the fact that O’Halloran is an accomplished classical musician and composer and has released his own solo piano work to great reviews.

For those who need an overall description of what the music sounds like, imagine Chan Marshall fronting The Delgados. I’m also reminded of another great indie pop duo, Viva Voce, though i think The Devics are a bit more serious. They make really great music that is distinctive, evocative, and compositionally “complete”. A side note: they really seem to like the waltz structure for their songs.

The opener “Lie To Me” is a soft piano arpeggio waltz showcasing Lov’s breathy vocals that does indeed remind me of the Delgados. “Secret Message To You” harnesses a manual typewriter as a beatbox. Sure, it’s been done before but I’m not sure if I ever heard it fit a song so well. Along with tiny bells in the background and a revolving chromatic scale outro, this one was really fun. With “Songs For A Sleeping Girl” comes O’Halloran’s first vocal contribution and it’s certainly significant. All of the sudden, the music gains a more standard folk rock feel but the true treat is the doubling of Lov’s vocals over his. The song reminds me a bit of Mojave 3 or Low at times.

Continue reading “Devics - Push The Heart” …

by Palebear | Comments Off

Headphones
Pink and Brown

If you think this band sounds a little like Pedro the Lion playing keyboards exclusively… well, then you’d be at least 66.6% correct. The Headphones are David Bazan from Pedro the Lion, his bandmate Tim Walsh but with Frank Lenz from dreamrockers Starflyer 59 thrown into the mix. A bit of of a supergroup perhaps… and they play some true coolness without using any guitars. Just synths in the music. There’s no mistaking Bazan’s delivery here though. And the music is similar in its melodic twists and turns to Pedro the Lion.

The track I heard was Pink and Brown. Mellow and drawn out, but with a preponderence of keyboards throughout (the drums are real though… I think), the Headphones sound very much like Pedro the Lion backed by American Analog Set. The keyboards are bit drony like Amanset and the song I heard has a similar mid-speed setting to it. The sound has that same minimal yet beautiful quality to it and Bazan’s vocals definitely shine, though they are less understated than Andrew Kenny’s.

But unlike typical offshoot bands (try Postal Service = electronic DCFC), such collusion is more welcome and the sound seems to gel quite well.

They currrently have one album out on Suicide Squeeze and I believe they toured with Minus the Bear to support it last fall. Hm… I wonder if The Headphones should also try a “Recording Engineer Tour” and then go hit up The Microphones to play with them. Hehe…

Members:

David Bazan
Frank Lenz
Tim Walsh

Albums available on Itunes:

S/T CD

Headphones Webite:

www.headphonesmusic.com

by Palebear | Comments Off

Private Eleanor
No Straight Lines

Off the record, I had already decided I was going to like these tracks from Baltimore’s Private Eleanor before I heard them. Austin Stahl from the band runs OTPrecords who put out the amazing The Seldon Plan record which is still stuck on heavy rotation at our house. I figured anyone who released that album and was also in a band would probably sound pretty good in their own right. How right I was!

Initially a bedroom band project, Private Eleanor has grown to five members and has toured extensively around the country (hey, they played with our faves Dios Malos!) The music itself is an interesting blend of more restrained but nonetheless infectious indie pop and slightly dronier, slower stuff.

I haven’t heard the entire album yet, but on the basis of the 3 or 4 songs I listened to I’m going to have to go with my gut and say that the band that PE reminds me most of is American Analog Set. It has everything to do with Austin’s semi-hushed tones and vocal melodies, as well as the band’s overall tasteful restraint on everything from keyboards and bass to drums and other percussion (xylophone?) This was really apparent on a song like “Richmond” which was my favorite track from their new album “No Straight Lines”. There is a bit of a folksy or woodsy element to some of their songs, but I think that’s more of an accent than a genre that they play.

Other tracks like “Bed Of Nails” simmer along more slowly, and even sound a bit sultry with that bassline oozing all over the place. You know, I want to say that I hear the echoes of The Posies in the way that some of the melodies are put together on this song… but I’m not sure if I’m being influenced from our earlier assessment of The Seldon Plan. “Seventeen” is another great track with a driving beat and pop melody smarts that seems to further back up the Posies similarities. The simple, chiming guitars and tasteful piano were very nice on this one.

Continue reading “Private Eleanor - No Straight Lines” …

by Tyranosaur | 1 Comment

The Dead Science
Drrrty Magneto

I think the one word that may sum up The Dead Science’s music may be: “creepy”. Their name is pretty descriptive of their sound. The songs seem to slither up behind you in a strange way like shambling indie zombies. Lead singer Sam Micken’s voice can be likened to Stuart Staples from the Tindersticks, except that Sam’s voice has been washed bone clean and bare of any low end. At times, he can also sound like Thom Yorke from some of the Radiohead tracks that get into the falsetto range.

As far as the music goes, it often floats by in a drugged, skeletonized waltz time. It’s like an indie rock Halloween soundtrack. The Bischoff brothers lay down the slightly schizo rhythm section, with Jherek contributing oozing on his acoustic stand-up bass and Korum tapping out quirky percussion beats, often relegating the timing to speedy snare rolls that are more jazzy than anything else.

Although many of the tracks I listened to were slower, “Drrrty Magneto” has a quicker feel to it, though nevertheless it still mutters along with a sinister feel. There is a sort of carnival darkness to the music that’s a bit like Nick Cave, though not as campy. Their label, Absolutely Kosher, is sort of known for more off-kiltre music like this as far as I can remember… Jim Yoshii Pileup and Xiu Xiu are the two bands on the label that come to mind.

This isn’t music to dance happily to, but more like stuff you might see goth kids swaying to in underground clubs. Still, it’s got a strange dark charm to it.

Members:

Jherek Bischoff - bass, voice
Korum Bischoff - drums
Sam Mickens - guitar, voice

The Dead Science website

by Tyranosaur | Comments Off

Barely a year ago, indie musicians who were looking around to get digital distribution such as Itunes for their music didn’t have too many options. I remember when Apple first started pushing Itunes for the independent labels they even stated in their press release that they were only going to let the “major” indies (Matador, Merge, etc.) participate.

Fast forward to today and you can see the start of a heated battle between companies who are competing to serve as a “middleman” between Itunes and independent musicians whose music otherwise wouldn’t get the time of day on such services. Some of the companies already in the hunt are IODA, CDBaby and The Orchard, all of who claim to have the best distribution channels and the best deals as far as the percentage they take for each Itunes or digital file sold.

I saw a newcomer in the digital distribution fray the other day whose price model is pretty intriguing to say the least. The company, whose service is in beta currently, is called Tunecore. Basically, you get 100% of the amount that you make from the sale of any songs on Itunes or any other of their music partners (Rhapsody is the only other service currently besides Itunes). I’ve been researching digital distribution for a number of indie bands so this was very interesting.

So what’s the catch? Well, the details are that you pay 99 cents per album track to have a song listed on Itunes U.S. This is important because listing on other regional Itunes stores like Itunes Japan, as well as listing on Rhapsody costs an extra 99 cents… but per ALBUM. That’s still not bad. However, there is an annual upkeep fee of $7.98 for each album.

Therein, is my only sticking point so far. In order to keep your album listed in the various music services you need to pay that fee for each album every year. And the problem is that there is nothing saying that fee won’t be increased later. Otherwise, $7.98 seems like a fairly cheap way to keep your album out there digitally. I’d like to see an “all-you-can-eat” fee option for labels who want to have a bunch of albums listed (well, in fact I noticed that they say to contact them for details on bundling 7 or more albums in their service).

Continue reading “Tunecore Beta” …

by Bryan | 1 Comment

Wavering Saints
Collusion

We’ve heard the Strike Date 12″ record from the Wavering Saints before and found it quite pleasant as far as quirky indie rock goes. I’m not even going to mention the “other” famous indie band from Stockton because that might draw too-obvious comparisons.

I will say that there is a bit of a mystery surrounding the band who releases music on Central District Records. There is little info to be had on them through the website… they are certainly letting the music speak for itself. The latest EP they’ve put out is the Collusion CD EP and it continues nicely where Strike Date left off. It’s strange that the songs have a slightly lo-fi and buzzy sound to them, yet sound so much more expansive and spacious than the typical bedroom boombox band. I don’t want to say the songs are “epics” in any sense, but the way are structured just feels bigger or something.

“Subtle Believers” kicks thing off with a great rocker that motors along like a Yo La Tengo song but with vocals by Mike Kinsella. “Strike Date” (interestingly, I don’t think this song was on the actual Strike Date 12″??) mellows out with slower guitar that reminds me of some good old school Freed Weed era Sebadoh. “Homeless Teeth Transportation” turns into delicious noise rock.

Continue reading “Wavering Saints - Collusion” …

by Palebear | Comments Off