Provisions

When you're doing some really important or cool shit, like going to the moon, or climbing a really big mountain, the names of lots of things change. "Plans" become "itineraries", "food" becomes "rations", and all the fun things you get to go buy before you leave are called "Provisions". And that is why provisions is a rad word. The fellas over at Stag are definitely on-board the "provisions" bandwagon, they even just added the word to their outdoor signage. Since we have yet to mention them here's a little "debriefing", or history. They've got great taxidermy on their walls. The store is run by five guys with a background in vintage furniture among other things. Everything, including the fixtures and decor in the store is for sale. Which is pretty lucky for us because their store is impeccably decorated and merchandised.... and will soon have some new Stowe Provisions. Just in time for your SXSW "itinerary".

Lumberjack Chic

Meredith gets in on the lumberjack fun with this vintage find from New Bohemia on South Congress. I'm gonna toot my own horn and claim bragging rights for finding it and insisting that she buy it.

HearYa’s SxSW 2010 Day Party! Friday 3/19, Noon – 6pm

HearYa – Indie Music Blog

HearYa and Woods Entertainment are excited to finally announce the lineup for our SxSW 2010 day party! Short of the bar running out of booze, there’s no reason to leave. Show up early, shake off your hangover, meet some of the nicest musicians around and stay ’til it’s over.

If you plan to show up, shoot us a note at rsvp@hearya.com. We’ll do our best to reserve a spot for you, but we recommend getting there early.

Here are the party details:

Beauty Bar (@ the outside stage)
617 East 7th Street
Friday 3/19 | Noon – 6pm
rsvp@hearya.com

Sponsored by: Beer Nuts, Manifest Digital

Here’s the lineup:

The Deep Dark Woods
The Mother Hips
Lissie
Joe Pug
The Low Anthem
Ben Nichols
Murder By Death
Gringo Star
Love Language


+++++ I've already RSVP'ed and you should too! Ben Nichols is the lead singer from Lucero, and Lissie and Love Language were two of my favorite new acts from 2009. This should be a great show. Thanks, hearya.

OMG, Charlie Darwin!

just to be clear this is the song "charlie darwin", not to be confused with the song "OMG,CD" on the same album.



The thematic similarities between The Low Anthem's, "Charlie Darwin", and Shearwater's album, The Golden Archipelago, are just too substantial to leave it alone. Evolution, decay, and the interplay of mankind and the natural world are all center-stage in this disarming stop-motion animated video to "Charlie Darwin".

Neither as sonically epic nor as obtuse lyrically as Meiburg's work, "Charlie Darwin" inverts that approach with equally fantastic results. Ben Knox Miller delivers a pretty direct assessment of our lot in this world of science and history in a sublimely reedy falsetto alongside his usual, painstakingly-crafted, dirge-like compositions. In other words, to tell the same story, Meiburg lets his Shearwater soar, and Miller brings his Anthems in nice and low.

Me And My Barry McGee

Peggy Honeywell – Me And My Barry McGee – Free listening at Last.fm

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In case y'all didn't understand this earlier, i totally heart clare rojas. Not in a creepy way. That's why i posted a link to a nice little cover she did of the Kris Kristofferson/Janis Joplin classic, "Me and Bobby McGee". With practically no effort at all, Honeywell turns it into a charming lo-fi love letter to her real life husband. I can't help but think the painting above could easily be of the two as well. Eyes and ears, start enjoying.

Shearwater ^ The Golden Archipelago

Austin's Jonathon Meiburg and Co. just dropped their latest album, the Golden Archipelago, via Matador at midnight. The album is the third by the group, Shearwater, in its triptych of albums broaching the subjects of environment, decay and the largely negative effects of human activity on the natural world. These subjects are near to the heart of Meiburg, who's formal education was in the realm of orinthology and field research. This third, and final, panel in the triptych focuses specifically on the natural processes specific to the isolation of island environs. Early purchasers of the album even received a full-color, 50-page dossier based on Meiburg's studies on islands at the fringes of our globe. The video above has been streaming on Shearwater's website in promotion of this release for some months and is pretty compelling on its own.

I haven't had a chance to fully process this follow up to the gorgeous Palo Santo and Rook yet, but, a cursory listen reveals the usual drama, lushness, and epic scope of those earlier releases. As usual the instrumentation is dynamic and accomplished and Meiburg's voice absolutely soars. In short this is a band with lofty goals and accomplishments in terms of both intellectual and creative content, as well as emotional solicitation.

Spencer Krug goodness

You may know Spencer Krug as one of the two vocalists from Wolf Parade... or THE vocalist from Sunset Rubdown.... or one of the three vocalists from Canadian supergroup Swan Lake.... Or maybe not at all. Whatever. His newest and possibly least accesible project, Moonface, just dropped their inaugaral release. You're not really looking for wild commercial success when you release a one track, 20-minute EP under your fourth musical moniker and call it Dreamland EP: Marimba and Shit-Drums. Shit-drums? Yes, of course, i played those in high school marching band! And you're really not looking for commercial success when said EP contains one song containing only the sounds of your voice, the marimbas, and some admittedly shitty sounding drums. Then again... his tits do look pretty great on the cover, so maybe.

Oh, did i mention this record is fucking great? Cause it is. Krug brings these three elements together with his usual aplomb, despite they're unusual co-existence. He obviously beefed up on his marimba skills before the recording and manages an organic sound that evokes Kieran Hebden's Four Tet compositions. And the usual drama of Krug's voice and vocal delivery is as compelling as ever in this constrained format. You can find out more about the project and download the EP for a suggested donation over at their Jagjaguwar/Secretly Canadian site, but, please, someone give that man a million dollars, for god's sake, he showed us his tits.

Breaking Bad Season 3!!!

Of course, normally i think that knowing when a program is going to be on TV places a person somewhere between boring and mouth-breather, but that was before Bryan Cranston started cooking this shit. In case the Penthouse reading dentist, Dr. Whatley, or speed-walking enthusiast, Hal, had somehow failed to convince you of this man's brilliance and you haven't been watching the first two seasons you have until March 21st to freebase those seasons on netflix and get good and strung out on season 3. This is literally the show that made my technologically-challenged ass learn how my DVR worked.

iamamiwhoami

Music nerds are all up in a tizzy over this viral ad campaign on youtube. I know i'm intrigued. The short videos are really pretty fantastic in both production value and aesthetics, and the minimal electronic compositions and distorted vocals are working for me too. Visually, I'm actually reminded of Lars Von Trier's film Antichrist. But, ya know, without the whole smashing-my-dvd-player-then-crying-in-a-fetal-position-in-the-shower-and-washing-my-eyeballs-with-bleach part. Shame on you Lars. What was i talking about? Oh yeah, iamamiwhoami? I'm gonna feel really weird if this turns out to be christina aguilera like so many nuts out there are guessing. I'm not gonna put any money on a specific guess, or spend all day trying to decipher the clues they've left, but i don't think these folks are american. probably of some northern european heritage.



as of now there are three more videos in this campaign at youtube.

Peggy Honeywell aka Clare Rojas

One of my favorite banjo-plucking female folkies (honeywell), and probably my current favorite visual artist (rojas) just published her second childrens book and completed an installation at Ikon Gallery in the UK. That last bit of info is of importance because that's who you can buy the book from. The book's called Pidgy (as in pigeon), and someone buy me one already because the copy I buy will certainly end up in my handsome nephew's hands. It's vintage Clare Rojas, heavily influenced by textiles and folk-art as well as the whimsy of her husband, Barry McGee.




Pidgy even looks a little Charley Harper influenced if you ask me, and that's not a bad thing.

Better still Miss Rojas has a show stateside this spring in Savannah, a mere seven hour drive from Knoxville and it's Big Ears Music Festival.

April 1
Performance by Peggy Honeywell (Clare Rojas)
ACA Gallery of SCAD, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St., Atlanta, Ga.
SCAD exhibitions department presents "Through the Woods," (Feb 12 - April 2) a solo exhibition by California-based artist Clare Rojas traversing five years of the artists productionfrom painting and printmaking, to installation and sculpture. A careful blend of comedy and tragedy, past and present, Rojas imaginative landscapes are peopled with stylized human and animal characters playing out poignant and witty allegorical narratives. "Through the Woods" showcases Rojas distinct iconography, inspired by folk art, street art, quilting and cartoons, that evocatively connects themes of history, community, feminism and ecology in an unforgettable folklore entirely contemporary and unique. The performance is free and open to the public.

Roadtrip anyone?

Evening Hymns, Port Hope

A perfectly dreamy video that was coincidentally directed by Taylor Kirk (aka Timber Timbre). This guy pops up even when i'm not looking for him. Strange

the Low Anthem

Geez. That voice. This is more of that music that climbs out of cracks in drying soil. Dusky, mournful and gorgeous. It should come as no surprise that they're touring this spring with Timber Timbre. I can't wait to catch them during SXSW.

The video is from their Hearya session in Chicago. They've got a pretty great website over there, and the Low Anthem's isn't too shabby either.

Draumalandio

Valgeir Sigurosson's upcoming release on Bedroom Community is the score to a documentary of the same name, Draumalandio (or Dreamland in english). The film examines the devastation of Iceland's breath-taking landscape through the exploitation of its natural resources. The selection of Valgeir and his label-mates seems a wise choice, as fluent as they are in the language of atmospheric sounds and aural landscapes, and as capable they are of representing conflict in subtle hues.

You can hear the input and coalescence of all of bedroom community's big 5 in the track Grýlukvæði, a children's folktune sung in icelandic by sam amidon. Immediately apparent are sam's banjo, and BC newcomer Daniel Bjarnason's prepared piano tinklings. There's Ben Frost's industrial distortions and fuzz, and Nico Muhly's arrhythmic compositions, and, finally Valgeir tying it all together with his trademark hushes and swells. I haven't seen the film and don't understand a bit of Icelandic, but its easy to see how all these pieces fit together sonically in their own right, and as an accompaniment to the documentary. Sam's appalachian folk delivery with Valgeir's swirling composition behind him provides a sense of provincialism and vast, raw, natural beauty. Ben and Nico's challenging and dissonant contributions could certainly represent an affront to that beauty and Daniel's off-timbre piano articulates the inevitability of the impending destruction. I'm looking forward to the album, as well as the film.

Folk Graffiti

More vintage fabric, stencils, and spray paint.