The Eastern Sea:
An Interview Witth Matt Hines
We Can’t Stop Watching Miley Keepin’ it Local:
Megs Radio:
Album Reviews including
King Krule, Bob Dylan, and The Arctic Monkeys
Table Of Contents 1 2 3 6 7 8 9 11 13
Editor's Note Fall Playlist The Eastern Sea: an Interview Porchfest Megs Radio We Can't Stop Watching Miley Kanye West: From Louis Vuitton Don... to God? Bonaroo Album Reviews
To the reader: Whether you’re a previous reader of our zine, or you’ve never heard of us; on my behalf, welcome to the October ‘14 issue of Cake Zine. We are Ithaca’s music zine. Our issues are filled with musical content; news, interviews, album reviews, playlists, and more. In the past, we’ve interviewed bands such as Wavves, Marco Benevento, Das Rascist, Rapsody, The Avett Bros, and Real Estate. Interested yet? Wait til you see what we’ve got planned for this year. Aside from the amazing interviews, we’ll have some great content. Cake wouldn’t be possible without the help of our E-board. A few dedicated members have been involved for a couple years now, and work extremely hard to produce top-quality work. Aside from the E-board, we have a great staff of writers for this new year. The staff of Cake is still working out some kinks, but I can tell you right now it is going to be a good year.. Oh yes, a good year. We will be doing our best over this year to increase our presence on campus. We’ll be tabling with free cake (the kind you eat), sponsoring open mic nights in the TC Lounge, and bumping our social media precense as well so that you can always be up-to-date. Thank you for picking up this issue; we hope you enjoy. Don’t be afraid to come back for another serving. -Noah Delin President & Layout Manager of Cake
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l P l l a F
t s i l y a
To some, it is the beginning of the end. It is, very possibly, the time when things come to die. Maybe it’s an inevitable, sometimes dark, strangely beautiful decay of nature. Those naked trees and dark clouds, those thunderstorms and harsh winds really can cause the storm within, creating a black maze of fear, doubt, loneliness, and helplessness. On these rainy days, the sun couldn’t be more welcoming, like a smile when one wants—and needs—it most. Yes, the fall is here. Wonderfully, though, there is music to keep us company when we feel down and isolated. While the songs below have a decidedly serious feel, they are friendly in this very way. Like tragic literature or film, these pieces are heavy and sometimes unwanted next to something more joyful. While they may not evoke anything merry within you, these works by some of the world’s greatest musicians can at least allow for some catharsis, for some identification with all of the feelings within them. Are we all alone? Is there a “medicine for loneliness,” as Yasin Bey (formerly known as Mos Def) says? I don’t know. These songs can be your friend, though-- dark, brooding, but a friend, nonetheless.
“Teardrop”- Massive Attack- Mezzanine “Green Arrow”- Yo La Tengo- I Can Hear the Heart Beating As One “Life on Mars”- The Bad Plus- Prog “Sunset Coming On”- Damon Albarn and Malian Musicians- Mali Music “Tonight”- TV On the Radio- Return to Cookie Mountain “Group Dancers”- Charles Mingus- The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady “Help!”- Alejandro Escovedo- The 30th Annual John Lennon Tribute Live from The Beacon Theatre NYC “Among the Sef”- Colin Stetson- New History Warfare, Vol. 3: To See More Light “Memories”- Leonard Cohen- Death of a Ladies’ Man “It’s a Fire”- Portishead- Dummy
Zachary Weg
The Eastern Sea An Interview with Matt Hines Noah Delin
I arrived at The Mercury Lounge in NYC about an hour before the show was supposed to start. As I stood at the bar ordering a drink, a familiar figure walked up next to me. It was Andy Beaudoin, the drummer for The Eastern Sea. After taking control of my nerves, I turned, introduced myself to him, and told him how excited I was for their set. The Eastern Sea was originally a one man recording project by frontman Matt Hines, but eventually morphed into a full band. Throughout the band’s history it has had multiple members. Beaudoin was one of the new additions to the band, joining for the tour and the recording of a new album. The Austin, Texas based Indie rock band has released two full albums and a Christmas album. Hours after meeting Beaudoin, The Eastern Sea began to play. The venue might have been small, but the band’s performance was simply epic. The powerful vocals of singer Matt Hines filled the room and the set was filled was lyrically genius songs, that were both dark and uplifting at the same time. The band played songs from their first album, self titled The Eastern Sea, as well as their most well known album Plague. Hines also dropped a couple new songs on the ever-so-accepting audience from their newest album which is still being recorded. Post-show, I got the chance to talk to Matt Hines about their tour, his music career, and of course his favorite type of cake.
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Cake: Matt, I know you had a solo recording project for about a year before the band formed. Can you talk about when and how you decided to form a full band? Matt Hines: I decided to form a band when I started feeling frustrated with my attempts to perform live with backing tracks. The music I was making in 2005-06 was kind of a hybrid between folk and electronica, a lot of synthesized rhythms and what not. When I was performing alone as The Eastern Sea I would use tape recorders and laptops and that started to feel really contrived. Ever since, I’ve been kinda obsessed with giving an audience 100percent “performed” music and in order to do that we needed to round up extra hands. I’ve really tried to resist the temptation to use recorded tracks for our shows and that has resulted in our lineup constantly changing as my musical ambitions inflate and deflate. We’ve been a three piece and an eleven piece. Now we have settled on a pretty solid formula of five pieces: guitar, bass, drums, keys, and trumpet. C: Could you tell us a bit about what it was like recording for your 2012 album, Plague? Do the title and/or cover art have any deeper meaning? MH: Plague was our first actual LP to be tracked in a real studio and produced over a scheduled time. Unfortunately we had a lot of trouble getting it done but it ended up getting finished at the end of 2011 and truly lived up to the name I gave it through all of the trials and tribulations it caused me and our team. The title came from an obsession I had at the time with Albert Camus and his book The Plague. A lot of the stories in the album are autobiographical tales of my
travels and experiences during and after the last two years of college at St. Edward’s University in Austin. The cover is a photo that I took of my hotel room that I lived in for two months at Shaanxi Normal University in Xi’an, China. A few of the songs are about that specific trip and that feeling of loneliness that comes with being in a foreign place. A lot of music I write is about that feeling actually. C: On tour this summer in NYC, the band played a couple songs that you’ve been working on. What’s it like to be developing a record both with original members of the band, and new members? MH: Its a trip, I’ll tell you that. Having people there in the room that have been there since the very beginning along with brand new folks who are just kinda learning our methods and habits is an eye opening experience for me especially. I’ve worked with so many different musicians in this band over the years, probably over 30, but this has been some of the smoothest and most enjoyable creating that we’ve ever experienced. Developing new songs is probably the easiest way for a group of musicians to really grow together and I’ve been really privileged to play these new exciting tunes with this band. The newest music that we are putting together is much more physical than our last two records. More movement in the hips if you know what I mean. I’m after a more kinetic live experience for the audience that aids me in slipping in lyrics and imagery that wouldn’t be so easily swallowed without some sugar coating. C: Is the recording process easier for your new album than it was with Plague?
MH: Well we havent started recording yet but when we do, I can promise it will be much easier because we are more experienced, more confident, more excited, and more at ease. We will begin tracking some of the first material in the next few weeks with the rest coming sometime this fall. The music on this record has been written with the knowledge I gained in making Plague, which means I know what will be easy and what will be hard. I know what is necessary and what is superfluous. And we will be working with a different production team in some great studio environments so I’m expecting some magic to come from these sessions. C: The Eastern Sea performs in multiple forms- from you performing solo to a full band like your tour this summer. Do you have an ideal size for recording, writing, and performing? MH: Like I said in a previous question, five people is our sweet spot. But when I’m writing songs, I mostly work alone. I tend to bring completed songs to the band and ask them to put their spin on it after most of the groundwork has been laid with structure and tempo, etc. When we are rehearsing, it is most efficient to put songs together in two kinda discrete groups: rhythm section and melody section. Drums are a huge part of the band and so are the big melodies in our songs, and for that reason it often gets hard to focus on both things at the same time in a rehearsal. So we take certain rehearsals to do the separate pieces then come together and put things in their respective places. It takes a little more time but it helps us all think more clearly. C: Once the new album is released, what’ll be next for the Eastern Sea? MH: Well, we will be on the road a ton. Crossing
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the country a lot to bring our music to as many new listeners as possible. We will be travelling and doing press for what will be our biggest release to date. Our business is making songs and records and we plan on doing that while travelling as much as we possibly can. Can’t really ask for more right? C: Do you have a favorite song to perform? MH: I really love getting to perform some of our more instrumental based tunes like “A Lie and Santa Rosa”, partially because it gives me a chance to get outside my head and just feel the rhythm. When I’m singing for an entire song, it starts to become a real selfconscious act and I’m thinking about thinking too much. It gets complicated. so my favorite songs are the one where I lose myself for a bit. “The Match” is another one like that. The second half of that song is pretty cathartic and I can usually feel it in the crowd. C: It seems like the band has a lot of fun, especially when touring. Did you encounter any shenanigans on your recent US tour? MH: One time Kurt was talking to a girl who was trying to make him take a tequila shot that he didnt want. He faked shooting it and tossed it on the ground but accidentally poured it on her shoes. That was pretty classic. As you can tell by that shot, we have fun but we’re pretty tame on the road. Most of our funny stories come from being boring around wild party people. Haha. C: Lastly, what is your favorite type of cake? MH: Funfetti
PORCHFEST 2013 Imagine spending a Sunday afternoon walking through the streets of downtown Ithaca and with every corner you came upon, a new band sat playing music on a porch for the world to hear. Each street would bring you to a different sound, a unique display of raw, local talent. Sounds ideal right? This, ladies and gents, is PorchFest. A surprisingly hidden gem of true Ithaca artistry, PorchFest is the epitome of the beloved local music scene. Each hour brought something new as the melodic sounds lured us from porch to porch leading us to stumble upon the tunes of two insanely talented IC bands. The ever-so-popular Second Dam rocked their yellow, Tibetan-flag-clad porch with their soulful indie style. Lead singer, Casey’s indescribably captivating voice paired with the melodic rythyms of this cohesive band traveled through the speakers, touching the souls of passers-by as they gathered to discover the source of the sound. Another IC original, Samuel B Lupowitz & the Ego Band, had the crowd grooving to the sounds of their funky jazz style as they jammed out on their English professor’s porch. PorchFest wouldn’t be complete without the true display of organic kindness from the community. From kids selling some of the best best brownies we’ve ever tasted to a friendly local barbequing free hotdogs, “and of course, tofu dogs”said the chef himself, we wandered, food in hand, from band to band. By the end of the day we felt like true Ithacans, surrounded by the people that make this town so unique. As one local perfectly put it, “Ithaca is 10 square miles surrounded by reality” and as we listened to the native Ithaca band, Gunpoets, playing on the same porch they grew up in, we realized how special this place is. So next year mark your calendars “Same time, Same Porches.”
Samantha Cetrulo & Christina Lugo
{KEEPIN’ IT LOCAL}
A Local Radio Station As technology advances, there are so many different ways of listening to music today. Between buying hard copies of music on CD’s or vinyl, downloading music off of iTunes or another company, and listening to your tunes online, the options are virtually endless. Online music has been growing since companies like Pandora and Spotify began to conquer the competition of internet radio and music sharing. However, there’s a new player in the game, and they’re local. MegsRadio.fm is the newest idea on the market for online music, and it’s right in our backyard. Created by Ithaca and Cornell students, MegsRadio is a new way to listen to local bands in Ithaca. We live in a city filled with music, and this is an awesome way to listen to it all in one place, but it gets better. MegsRadio has a vast amount of options to tailor your listening experience. There are pre-made stations with different genres, artists, even different instruments to perfectly edit each experience. Each of these channels, plus channels made by the user, can add or subtract the amount of popular music on the stations, so you can relate more to the local tunes when they come on. The company gets a majority of their music from WICB, Ithaca College’s radio station, because they have a lot of local bands’ music. Artists can also request to add their own music, free of charge. It’s an evergrowing community of local Ithaca jams. The site also tells listeners where and when local shows are, and what venues are hosting events in the Ithaca area. Ithaca College senior Alex Spirgel, the layout designer of MegsRadio, has been working on the project for two years, and is really proud of the outcome. “There are plenty of sites already out there where you can find local music in your area. A site that kind of brings it
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together with artists you probably already know...helps you find the bands you truly like that are local,” says Spirgel. The idea of MegsRadio started as just something for a few friends, and for fun, but it’s become so much more. IC professor Doug Turnbull in the Department of Computer Science, along with IC seniors Alex Spirgel, Kris Stensland, Alex Wolf, Cornell grad student Justin Zupnick, and Park professor Adam Peruta are just a few of the minds behind this creation. The creators hope to expand to other college towns, or to go even further, perhaps New York City, by covering one borough at a time. The combination of both local and mainstream music is new to the online music world, which is why the site is hopeful that both students and residents in Ithaca will be receptive to it. “It brings a lot of different things into one central place”, says Spirgel. A total of about 20 students have worked on MegsRadio, and it’s hoping to eventually expand. Because it’s free for artists to put their music on the site, there aren’t any advertisements, which makes the experience even better. Spirgel also notes, “It brings context to the new songs you’re finding, and honestly, it works! It works for me; I knew nothing about the Ithaca local scene or anything and I spent some time listening to MegsRadio and I was like ‘Okay, now I’m into Jimkata, Gunpoets are pretty cool’, so it definitely works for me at least”. So, why ‘Meg’? The original creator, Professor Doug Turnbull, named the company after his wife, Megan. Doug is also a local Ithacan. Turnbull and the other founders are hoping that everyone in our great city will utilize MegsRadio to attend more local concerts, and to find out about more music. The site also hopes to put out an app, and a mobile version of the site in the near future. Check out all of the talented musicians in Ithaca’s community at MegsRadio.fm.
Jackie Matza
We Can’t Stop Watching Miley As of today, Miley Cyrus is known as a twerking, overly-sexualized and unpredictable starlet by many households. However, not that long ago Miley was known and praised world-wide for very different reasons and with a greatly differing public image. Approximately six years ago, she was a fresh-faced Disney star, who rocketed to fame for both her upbeat, positive music and thriving show Hannah Montana. As Hannah Montana, Miley was the essence of innocence and commended as a wonderful role model for young people everywhere, especially girls. Hannah Montana became an enormous success almost immediately, breaking many of Disney’s ratings along the way and before long it seemed that the show’s reach was boundless. The success lasted for years, but as Miley matured her image changed and before long Hannah Montana’s blond wig and southern charm began to vanish. After multiple seasons, Hannah Montana’s run finally came to the end and Miley chose to begin moving away from her squeaky-clean Disney image. She released her album “Can’t be Tamed” in 2010 and began her Gypsy Heart Tour in 2011 to promote it. Her performances for this tour were slightly more provocative then her previous ones, causing it to attract media criticism, but still nothing compared to her displays of today. For the next few years, Miley seemed to lay low, with very few acts deserving of attention. Nevertheless, the spotlight was back on her as she attracted attention in 2012 when she decided to change her style. Up until then, Miley was know for traditionally having long, brown hair, but now she traded that look in for a short, pixie-style cut. Miley’s wardrobe also saw a huge change as she began showing up in outfits that were darker, edgier and more raunchy. The real craziness for Miley Cyrus started in 2013, after the release of her single “We Can’t Stop” preceding her album Bangerz. The song was commercially successful, peaking at number two on the US Billboard Hot 100. The accompanying music video, however, received mixed reviews and featured Miley in a much more sexualized light through more revealing clothing and lewd acts. Despite the shock and awe that the video left on many viewers, it gained 10 million views in 24 hours and later broke Vevo’s record for being the fastest video to acquire 100 million views, accomplishing this task in a mere 37 days. If nothing else, the video is remembered for featuring Miley twerking and sticking out her tongue constantly, which are mannerism that Miley now employs during performances. The 2013 VMAs in late August was another event that help solidify Miley’s new sexualized persona. The most
controversial part of the night is Miley’s performance with Robin Thicke, in which she appeared wearing a tight, skincolored bikini and her hair done up even stranger that normal. During the performance, Miley proceed to rub against and grind with Thicke in combination with her usual twerking and tongue out.. Critics described Miley’s performance at “disgusting” “extreme” and “disappointing”, but the part that really got them was the fact that Miley showed no regret for her acts. Then madness erupted again with the release of her second single from Bangerz, “Wrecking Ball”. The single has a much deeper message than that of “We Can’t Stop”, as Miley attempts to discuss the struggles of relationships and fighting with a person that you will always love. However, she defeats the purpose of the song’s raw emotion by riding around naked on a wrecking ball and licking a sledgehammer for no reason in its music video. Once again despite this, “Wrecking Ball” set another Vevo record for 19.3 million views in the first 24 hours of its release and was Cyrus’s first single to reach number one on the US Billboard Hot 100. It’s hard to say whether all of Miley’s wildness has been necessary or too much at the end of the day. The acts she has done over the last several months have horrified, intrigued and made all of us reconsider who Miley Cyrus is as an artist. On the other hand, its has allowed Miley to once again claim the publics attention and bring her success that even surpasses her brightest days at Hannah Montana. Miley has been able to own the image she has matured and grown into and been able to keep the world at the edge of their seats and that is all that really seems to matters.
Daniel Leap
KANYE WEST
From Louis Vuitton Don to...God?
“Change is the only constant in life.” - Heraclitus
After Yeezus was released, all the media headlines, tabloids, hell even facebook and twitter said things like: “Kanye’s going crazy. I miss the old ‘Ye. Yeezus is the most sacrilegious thing anyone has ever done! Smh, from ‘Jesus Walks’ to ‘I am a God’. 2009 VMAs Kanye definitely won the inner struggle.” To all that I say, “For real though? This is all that shocking to you? Deadass?” Let me take y’all back to the very beginnings of the man we were first introduced to as The Louis Vuitton Don (who remembers when he used to call himself Kanye-to-the?) and see how Kanye done changed. When Kanye made his Debut in 2004, some of the hottest artists in hip-hop were Cam’ron, 50 Cent, and DMX. So what comes to mind when you think back in the early 2000s? Gangstas. Banger music. The scraps of what N.W.A., Wu-Tang, and Snoop Dogg were trying to throw in the dump. Along comes this dude who wasn’t into baggy tees, hollow tips, or spinning rims, but instead was into pink polos by Ralph Lauren, robots… and wait...teddy bears? Ayo he’s one of those edumacated dudes too? Like went to College and sh*t? At a time when hip-hop was about toting gats, pimping hoes, and new shoes on the whip, Kanye came out doing something different.
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" I'm Kan, the Louis Vuitton Don. Bought my momma a purse, now she Louis Vuitton Mom. ” The college dropout brought something new to the table by merging his old school style soul samples, wordplay, tight-ass rhymes and impeccable confidence. I remember my favorite lines by Kanye in the song “All Falls Down” on The College Dropout: “She’s so precious, with the peer pressure//Couldn’t afford a car, so she named her daughter Alexis” and “For that paper look how low we a stoop//even if you in a benz, you still a ni**a in a coupe.” Both of those lines were unlike any other at the time. “I’m Kan, the Louis Vuitton Don. Bought my momma a purse, now she Louis Vuitton Mom.” In 2007 Donda West, Kanye West’s mother, passed away and shortly after Kanye split up with his fiance, Alexis Phifer. Those two events, along with paparazzi frenzy influenced Kanye’s groundbreaking album 808 & Heartbreak, which features minimalist sound that has a heavy reliance on the Auto-Tune processor and the Roland TR-808 drum machine. The album, although sold very well, had critics saying the old school Kanye was done. He no longer sampled and was leaning towards electro and synth sounds. But Kanye shut the haters up with My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, in which he incorporated his old-school style with the sound he used in 808’s. Another new hip-hop sound by ‘Ye. Do I even have to mention the Runaway film? Which brings us to his sixth studio album, Yeezus. The album is even further from the Louis Vuitton Don’s sound than 808 was. A majority of the album is made up of techno beats with incredibly dark themes. ‘Ye done changed again. Again, why should we be surprised? Every album he’s put out so far since Graduation has been a huge jump in his musicality, and for all the haters of Yeezus, the last track of the album shows that Kanye still has the soul in him. Now the album title, along with the track “I Am A God” has been subject to much controversy because it’s offensive-- a complete act of douchebaggery and absolute blasphemy. Still why the shock? I sure remember when Kanye posed as Jesus on the 2006 cover of Rolling Stones Magazine. And when he went off script on the live NBC broadcast Hurricane Katrina fundraiser saying “George Bush doesn’t care about black people.” Oh, and Taylor Swift. So yeah, the overall point is: Kanye has, in fact, changed. In College Dropout we can hear the sensitive side of Kanye: the one who wore pink polo’s, tight jeans and rocked book bags. We could also hear the confidence he had in his work, and over the years many could argue that his confidence remained. Even in Yeezus, his sensitivity is still there...only much more hardcore. Still, he does have a different musical style, different monikers, and even different fashion sense. But he’s fucking Kanye Omari West. He lives to be different. He wears red suits. Entirely red suits. He’s made a trend from plastic frames that resemble window shutters. He’s designed women’s fashion. He has his own sneaker from Nike that’s one of the most priciest resale shoe in the market right now. He has his own Louis Vuitton Collection. He’s combined electro, techno, and even classical music into Hip-Hop. He lives for change. So in a way, he hasn’t changed at all. Perhaps it was us who could not fathom the fact that Kanye is a constant evolution. “Brandy’s little sister lame and he know it now. When a real ni**a hold you down, you sposed to drown. Bound.”
Jackson Li
You might be asking yourself what this crazy word means. It’s the name of a four-day music festival on a 700-acre farm in Manchester, Tennessee. This past June 13-16, Bonnaroo brought an amazing crowd of music and art lovers together for its 12th year running. The headliners, Paul McCartney, Jack Johnson, Bjork, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, and Pretty Lights, were show stoppers. Minor drama ensued when a member of Mumford and Sons had an aneurism (he’s okay now!) and had to cancel, but luckily Jack Johnson saved the day and did an amazing job for only having days to prepare. Smaller bands such as Edwarde Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, The XX, Of Monsters and Men, Alt J, Matt and Kim, The Lumineers, even “Weird Al” Yankovic and Billy Idol blew audiences away with their sound. The rap scene was also represented fully by Wu-Tang Clan, A$AP Rocky, R. Kelly, Kendrick Lamar, Nas, and Macklemore. ‘Superjams’ were a fun add-on this year, letting musicians who were playing at the festival jam together for hours on end. Bonnaroo has been adding other elements over the years, but this summer’s took the cake. The cinema tent, the comedy tent featuring Daniel Tosh and Bob Saget, the ferris wheel, and the Silent Disco were just a few of the extra things to do inside of ‘Centaroo,’ the festival’s center hub. The art is always amazing at ‘Roo’, as it’s nicknamed, and this year was no exception. Walls lined with beautiful, meaningful artwork seemed to never be out of sight. Outside of Centaroo was the campground, where 150,000 people called home for a long weekend.Roo’s slogan this year was “Radiate Positivity”, and it seemed that everyone embraced it entirely. Bonnaroo is an experience to never be forgotten, and it all comes back to the amazing music, awesome people, and good vibes.
Jacqueline Matza
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REVIEWS [ALBUMS] Arctic Monkeys AM
Domino Records Released: September 10th. 2013
B
The typical Arctic Monkeys album consists of light, layered, bass-driven tunes that are easy to digest, shouting for your attention with their carefully crafted poetic lyrics. On the other hand, AM, the band’s fifth studio album, takes those eloquent words and nightmarish bass beats and hurls them at you with a force that’s impossible to ignore. The album rocks a sound that’s a bit more polished and rounded than their previous works, making you want to put on a leather jacket and some dark aviators, and take your motorcycle out for a spin or just subtly bob your head and snap along like you’re tantalizingly cool. Turner’s vocals encase the bass-heavy tunes like a thick fog unifying the bass, guitar, and drums. “Do I Wanna Know,” “Are You Mine?,” and “Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re High?” best display the album’s theme of pleasantly dizzying melody accented by annoying Bee-Gees-style falsetto backing vocals which are isolated by the general dark tone of the rest of the songs’ components. “I Want It All” is easily the worst song on the album. Here, a couple vocal tracks are layered over each other at different pitches in an attempted harmony to create an almost Doppler-like effect and hypnotic sound, but instead Turner’s usual sultry vocals are simply buried beneath a pile of squeaky voices that bleed into buzzing pungent guitar riffs (which wouldn’t be so bad otherwise). “No. 1 Party Anthem” will leave you swaying longingly with its lovely use of piano, which melts right into the slowly wandering bass line and heavy drumbeat. The classic Arctic Monkey nostalgic sound flows from “Party Anthem” right into “Mad Sounds” which is the perfect soundtrack for sleepy sunrises and lazy Sundays. The pace is picked back up with “Fireside” which is fueled by a tribal beat vibe. The trance vibe makes it perfect for shuffling in with some Tame Impala or The Horrors. Overall, the album is far from disappointing and bound to get at least one song stuck in your head for the rest of the day.
Lisa Laffend
B Bob Dylan Another Self Portrait (1969-1971): The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10 Warner Bros. Records Inc. Released: Feb. 19th, 2013
Bob Dylan’s Another Self Portrait (1969-1971): The Bootleg Series, Vol. 10 is exactly what the title suggests. Released on August 23, 2013 by Columbia Records, this extensive collection includes demos and alternate versions of songs from “Self Portrait” and “New Morning,” as well as the full “1969 Isle of Wight” performance with The Band. In short, this album is a must-have for any super fan. Unfinished songs take you even deeper into an artist’s vulnerable and private world. It’s very easy for artists to adopt the mentality of only wanting their audience to hear it the way they ultimately envisioned it and not as a work-in-progress. Another Self Portrait showcases Bob Dylan’s artistry and poetry with a raw twist. The album features simple acoustic guitar without instrumental overdubs, which gives the songs an airy and sometimes haunting quality. “Days of ’49” has so much space for Dylan’s voice to linger in contrast to the studio version that is jammed with instrumentals. “Alberta #3” is a snappier, more upbeat version of Self Portrait’s “Alberta #1” and “Alberta #2” (#1 being the slowest and most soulful of the three). The studio version of “Copper Kettle” is much softer than the alternate version without overdubs. The latter definitely has more spunk, and begins with Dylan proclaiming the song as “one of our old favorites.” The deluxe version of Another Self Portrait includes Bob Dylan and The Band’s full 1969 Isle of Wight performance. Some of the highlights include “Like a Rolling Stone,” “Mr. Tambourine Man,” and a band introduction that makes you feel like you were really there. You get a stellar combination of high quality live songs and the audience’s cheers and applause, which is great because sometimes a live audience can distort the overall sound of a song. The live version of “Like a Rolling Stone” from Isle of Wight on Another Self Portrait sounds even crisper than the one that was released on Self Portrait. I’d give Another Self Portrait a B+. It brings a fresh perspective to an album that isn’t highly regarded.
Danielle Zickl
King Krule 6 Feet Beneath The Moon True Panther Released: August 24th, 2013
A
Just by looking at Archy Marshall, you would not expect the powerful voice that comes out of this pale, red haired boy. Previously releasing music under the name Zoo Kid, 6 Feet Beneath the Moon was released under his new moniker, King Krule. This album is a terrific work of music, and considered even greater by the fact that he is barely 19 years old. An obvious comparison could be made between King Krule and the late lead singer of The Clash, Joe Strummer. Their British accents come out strong and neither try to hide them. On songs such as “Easy Easy” Krule bellows out the words with such strong emotion that you can’t help but get chills up your spine. He also varies his songs up greatly in style, as “A Lizard State” moves quickly with punchy brass undertones while “Baby Blue” saunters along slowly accompanied by Krule’s melancholy lyrics echoing over twangy guitar lines. The album feels like a combination of both old and new as the songs are so intricately layered yet they sound as though they were made effortlessly by maintaining a simplicity about them. “Neptune Estate” is a standout track on the album with Krule’s vocals having a lullaby quality surrounding them as he sings about a love lost which is hauntingly beautiful. The album as a whole maintains a dark tone but Krule works it well and all of the songs sound well put together. One of my only complaints is that there is a challenge in trying to understand what Krule is saying on some of the songs because of his thick accent. However, I believe that adds to the atmosphere of the album in some cases because his emotion comes out so strongly.
Chris Stoddard
MGMT MGMT
Colombia Released: September 16th, 2013
C
MGMT is treading in similar territory as Vampire Weekend. After receiving commercial and critical acclaim for their first album, their sophomore effort had a much more subdued and artistic sound; favoring atmospheric and introspective melodies over catchy synth riffs. “Congratulations” was beautiful, but in a different way. It was clear this time around no songs would be subject to iphone commercials or dubstep remixes. Just like VW’s ‘Modern Vampires of the City,’ Indie stars MGMT have produced a third album that is hugely ambitious. The opening track, ‘Alien Days’ sounds like some strange animated musical number out of a Tim Burton film. But suddenly a warm acoustic guitar drops into the melody and it all somehow seems to work in a weird MGMT sort of way. The weirdness sometimes shines through with spinechilling beauty; like the shimmering melodies of the, dare I say it, ‘radio-friendly’ “Introspection.” On the other hand, many tracks suffer. Take “Mystery Disease” or “An Orphan of Fortune.” The effects and the mixing are so crazy that it becomes difficult to distinguish the vocals from the synthesizers, the synth from the guitars, the basses from the drum kits, etc. It all just mixes together into a sort of muddy droning. On first listen many tracks seem like an audio-engineering professor’s crazy experiment, rather than a song. Maybe the shoe-gazers can dig it but I can’t. On MGMT’s third album we hear brief glimpses of genius from a once beautifully innovative indie-pop band. They sound like the same artist but muffled by a curtain of their own art-house tendencies. I suppose with “Optimizer” the die-hard MGMT fans have already put on their headphones and lost themselves in cascade of psychedelic noise rock. But I will always remember that feeling I got the first time I heard Andrew VanWyngarden passionately crying out about the spiritual qualities of parachuting heroin. That electric feeling is nowhere to be found on this album. Shawn Roberts
*Albums are graded on a letter grade scale. Kind of like your homework.