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December 28, 2007
A (Partial) History of the Blog
This week NPR posted Timeline: The Life of the Blog, a history of the blog as we know it today.
It's a fun trajectory to ponder, from the formation of the Internet's oldest online communities in 1979 to the launch of Cleveland's community network for residents, Freenet, in 1986, to the emergence of homepages and online diaries in 1994—and beyond.
The timeline includes the birth of podcasting, and it also chronicles blogs' effect on political campaigns, but it does not explain how the blogosphere has changed journalism.
I mean, what about bloggers getting paid to link to business' websites but not telling their readers? What about the trend of downsizing newspapers creating blogs to help axed staffers find work elsewhere? Let's not forget the bloggers who cut and paste other people's content and claim it as their own reporting work, or the newspapers that get half of their content from bloggers instead of trained reporters—and pay exponentially less money (or no money) for it.
I'm all for the blog. I've blogged for pay and blogged for free, and had fun both ways. But if we're going to tally the high points of this medium, let's not forget the lows, either.
Ditching the Holiday Cheer With Mahjongg
I love holiday music (Kenny Rogers' Christmas album is a family favorite. Seriously.) as much as the next person, but now that vacation is over, I'm ready to ditch the holiday cheer and get back to music that is rougher around the edges.
Mahjongg, a Chicago-based five-piece, is helping me do just that.
Their latest release, Kontpab, due out at the end of January on Olympia, Washington's K Records, is a bizarre collection of nine songs that sound like a combination of electronic beeps and bloops from 80s Atari games, the percussive bangings of the Blue Man Group, and robotic drum beats from the 80s band Kraftwerk. Lyrics, usually distorted, are sparse.
Mahjongg's fixation on electronic instruments, 80s-inspired beats (think New Order's distant cousin) and difficult-to-understand vocals is as entertaining as it is frustrating. After multiple listens, I'm still confused about what makes this band tick. On their website, band members call the music "tropical, industrial, and minimalist." They also claim that the "brilliant, controlled bombast" of the songs "keeps you elevated, raking across several strata of dance floor enchantment to sustain the listener in a cocoon of measured propulsion." I applaud the satire, assuming that such ridiculous comments were meant to mock pretentious rock criticism.
After Pitchfork's Matt LeMay saw the band open for the Constantines and Pretty Girls Make Graves (great band!) in spring 2005 and then again a year later, he wrote that it was "liberating to let loose and dance like a total stupid asshole without actually feeling like a total stupid asshole," and encouraged people to see the band live— meaning (I think), it was nice to see a hipster band that opted for dance music over shoe-gazer tunes.
As I ease out of vacation mode and back into reality, Mahjongg's CD is on heavy rotation, not because I love their music, but because it's entertaining to hear them taking 80s influences and creating something new and danceable, rather than simply mimicking bands from 20 or 30 years ago.
Rembering Pete Seeger's Rainbow Quest
By now we are all familiar with YouTube's knack for elevating the obscure amateur to star status. But for all you TV addicts bemoaning the writers' strike out there, here's yet another reason to turn to online TV: its ability to resurrect the great, unheralded classic.
Caught in strike-induced withdrawal, I recently discovered via YouTube Pete Seeger's Rainbow Quest—not an album or a song, but a short-lived, self-financed TV show Seeger put on for about 40 episodes in the mid-1960s. The show (whose title is a variation on the lyrics of the folksong "Oh, Had I A Golden Thread") had a casual format, with Seeger chatting up his musician guests, many of whom were his friends, in between songs. Rainbow Quest's setting and tone are quintessential Seeger: He and his guests sit around a rustic living room set, discuss their craft in earnest tones, and, when it's time for a song, Seeger, clad in his proletarian clothes, often joins in on the banjo.
By the mid '60s Seeger, born in 1919, was already a folk patriarch, and the admiration of his younger guests—people like Tom Paxton, Johnny Cash, and Judy Collins—shows through.
Rainbow Quest went off the air when Seeger finally ran out of money. The show doesn't have much of a Web footprint—no Wikipedia page, for example, and just nine mentions on the entire Nexis news database—but thanks to a few committed users there is a wonderful cache of Rainbow Quest clips on YouTube. Here's Seeger, Johnny Cash, and June Carter doing "As Long as the Grass Shall Grow."
Other brilliant performances include Tom Paxton's "Ramblin' Boy," Richard and Mimi Farina (née Baez) doing "House Un-American Activities Blues," Mississippi John Hurt's rendition of "Goodnight Irene," and Ramblin' Jack Elliott's "San Francisco Bay Blues."
—Justin Elliott
December 27, 2007
Writers' Strike Could Drive a Quarter of TV Watchers Away for Good
As the writers' strike slogs on, TV pundits look to the past for answers—specifically, the last writers' strike in 1988. A blogger over at YouLicense has talked to a Writers' Guild official who claimed that after the last strike, 10 percent of TV watchers gave up the tube for good. There aren't many hard numbers to back up that claim, but some are saying that the decline in TV devotees will be even steeper this time around—and this time, there's a much more compelling reason—Internet TV:
Whichever way this strike plays out in the near future the real winner is the internet. There are hundreds of well funded online TV platforms like Joost , Babelgum, RayV, Knocka TV and many more ready to make their big move. Millions of viewers are emigrating to these newly launched platforms. Millions of viewers prefer watching 3 minute videos on YouTube and Metacafe over the traditional TV shows. The longer the strike continues, the more accustomed these viewers are to getting their fix online.
Some predict as many as 28 percent of viewers will switch to an Internet-only diet. We can only hope this means online TV will get better.
—Kiera Butler
December 21, 2007
No More Sexy Time?
It's being reported (thanks to a Drudge Report top-line link, natch) that British actor Sacha Baron Cohen is "offing" two of his most beloved characters, Ali G and Borat, but looking at the original quote in the Telegraph, I'm not sure there's a story here. Here's what Cohen actually said:
When I was being Ali G and Borat I was in character sometimes 14 hours a day and I came to love them, so admitting I am never going to play them again is quite a sad thing… It is like saying goodbye to a loved one. It is hard, and the problem with success, although it's fantastic, is that every new person who sees the Borat movie is one less person I 'get' with Borat again, so it's a kind of self-defeating form, really. It's upsetting, but the success has been great and better than anything I could have dreamed of.
Everybody knew that the characters' element of surprise couldn't last forever, but I'm not sure I hear a statement of immediate abandonment of Borat here. Am I just in denial? He doesn't say "it was hard" to say goodbye to them, he says "it is hard." Okay, maybe I'm stretching it, but I still think there's people somewhere who can be fooled by everybody's favorite Kazakh reporter.
If not, there's always Bruno. Oh, sorry: Brüno. If you haven't seen Brüno's interview with one of those pastors who claims to convert gays to straights, it's a masterpiece of political satire and giddy ridiculousness, and you have to stop what you're doing and watch it right now:
Make sure you get to the "nish nish"/"ach ya" part to find out if "eating lots of chocolatey stuff all the time" is gay or not. Anyway, Brüno is supposed to be the next movie from Baron Cohen, and while he's apparently denied that shooting has begun, there have been unconfirmed reports of Brüno sightings in LA. Well, if it's true Ali G and Borat are gone, rest in peace, but I can't wait to see more of my favorite fake Austrian fashion reporter.
All I Want for Christmas, Part 4: New Balance Joy Division
Lately, when I've been jogging, I seem to keep forgetting about, you know, the horror. But if you too need a reminder during your exercise sessions that "a loaded gun won't set you free," why not pick up these special edition New Balance Joy Division tennies? They're snazzy white and gray sneakers with the artwork from the Div's first album Unknown Pleasures on the tongue and the sole. Actually, it's just a prototype, but perhaps if we all lose control we can cause enough disorder so that they'll make these shoes before the, um, new dawn fades... ugh, are they sure a loaded gun won't set me free?
(Via HypeBeast)
Thank You, Jesus: Stewart and Colbert Returning to Our TVs
The NY Times is reporting that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert will return to the airwaves on January 7th, the same week their late-night buddies at the major networks are also planning to return. None of the shows will have their writing staffs, since the strike that took the shows off the air is still ongoing, and one wonders how that will affect the content. Without my writers, for instance, I can't even answer the phone. Helloooo? Whaaaat? Darrrrr? Thank you very much. Anyway, the Times says both the hosts will have to improvise basically everything they say, which seems like it might be easier for Stewart, but again, who knows. The hosts said in a statement that they would, of course, prefer to bring their writers with them, and "if we cannot, we would like to express our ambivalence, but without our writers we are unable to express something as nuanced as ambivalence." Cute. Since both hosts are members of the Writers Guild, will we see any protests, officially-sanctioned or otherwise (like what happened to the hapless Carson Daly) against the shows? Tune in in two weeks…
Friday Don't Be a Wise Guy It's Music News Day
M.I.A., Spoon, Swizz Beats Among Shortlist Prize Nominees
Nominees for the Shortlist Prize (America's answer to the UK's Mercury Prize for best album of the year) were announced today, and there's 54 of them, so you might want to get a snack. Shortlist restricts nominees to albums that have sold less than 500,000 copies, which ain't so hard these days, but does eliminate Kanye. The nominating panel included Gary Lightbody from Snow Patrol, the Killers' Ronnie Vannuccii, and KCRW DJ Chris Douridas, and after the jump, the nominees, every last one of them:
A Fine Frenzy - One Cell in the Sea
Against Me! - New Wave
Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam
Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
Bad Religion - New Maps of Hell
Biffy Clyro – Puzzle
The Bird and The Bee - The Bird and The Bee
Bjork - Volta
Blonde Redhead - 23
BrakesBrakesBrakes - The Beatific Visions
Burial - Untrue
Calvin Harris - I Created Disco
Dead Heart Bloom - Cheasea Diaries
Digitalism - Idealism
Dollyrots - Because I'm Awesome
Eddie Vedder - Into the Wild Soundtrack
Feist - The Reminder
Fionn Regan - The End of History
Future of the Left - Curses
Gogol Bordello - Super Taranta
Grinderman - Grinderman
Gui Boratto – Chromaphobia
The Hives - Black and White Album
Iron and Wine - The Shepherd's Dog
Jesca Hoop - Kismet
Josh Ritter - The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter
Juliette and the Licks - Four on the Floor
Justice - Cross
Keren Ann - Keren Ann
Kings of Leon - Because of the Times
Klaxons - Myths of the Near Future
LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
Le Loup - The Throne of the Third Heaven
Les Savy Fav - Let's Stay Friends
M.I.A. - Kala
Maps - We can Create
o'Death - Head Home
Of Montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?
Parts and Labor - Mapmaker
Peter Bjorn and John - Writers Block
PJ Harvey - White Chalk
Puscifer - V is for Vagina
Robert Francis - One by One
Robert Pollard - Standard Gargoyle Decision
Scout Niblett - This Fool Can Die Now
Serj Tankian - Elect the Dead
Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
Stars - In Our Bedroom After the War
Swizz Beatz - One Man Band Man
The Thrills - Teenager
Underworld - Oblivion with Bells
Wheat - Everyday I Said a Prayer
Wilco - Sky Blue Sky
Workin for a Nuclear Free City - Businessmen and Ghosts
Well, there's some good albums on there, but The Hives? Anyway, last year Cat Power won the award for The Greatest in a ceremony in June so we might have to wait a couple months for the winner, I guess.
December 20, 2007
Party Ben's Top Ten Albums of 2007
I know: I have a problem. It's serious, and it's not getting better. I'm obsessed with "Best of" lists. I love them! I collect them, compare them, fold them up into little squares and rub them against my cheeks. Not that last one. But I do read a lot of them, and yes, now mine does look pretty familiar: my Top 3, at least, is a lot like everyone else's. But I swear it: these are the albums that I enjoyed the most, and felt were the most significant, of the year, and just because I kind of agree with Pitchfork, does that make me a bad person? ...Don't answer that.
10. Gui Boratto – Chromophobia (Kompakt)
How to make sense of a Brazilian producing music that fits right in with Cologne, Germany's minimal-house juggernaut Kompakt Records? Don't ask, just relax and let these deceptively simple songs wash over you. This label releases some great stuff, and what unites it (and is most in evidence here) is a realization that "minimal" doesn't have to mean "boring." Track seven, "The Blessing," is based on a rolling, echoey staccato melody, but strange clatters and atmospheric effects flow around the beat, giving you a sensation of both stillness and great speed, like flying through clouds, which by the way is a great place to listen to this album on your iPod, especially if you use your frequent-flier miles to upgrade to business class.
9. Caribou – Andorra (Merge)
Canadian Dan Smith has assembled an unassuming (and at times shambolic) psychedelic masterpiece, which, despite his electronic history, is more Dungen than it is Aphex Twin. Opener "Melody Day," with its flute trills and ecstatic chord changes, sounds both as familiar as The Beach Boys and as left-field as the Beta Band and it gets both stranger and more inspirational as it goes on, even if its tales of archetypal girls ("Irene," "Desiree,") are inspired by the past. Closer "Niobe" seems to take its euphoric uplift directly from trance music, but the drums never kick in: this is a record that's all about melody... whoever she is.
8. Jay-Z – American Gangster (Roc-A-Fella)
Guess who's back? Jay-Z's back! And there's nobody who's better positioned to take full advantage of what seems like the current trend towards hip-hop's rediscovering soul classics like Curtis Mayfield and Marvin Gaye. On top of the affecting samples, Jay-Z is still a master poet, and his lyrics here combine dexterity with a wise maturity. Check out "Fallin'," a dramatic string-led track, with complicated tongue-twisting internal rhymes and a final denouement that's both acquiescence and release: "Fightin', you'll never survive/Runnin', you'll never escape/So just fall from grace."
7. Blonde Redhead – 23 (4AD)
Some reviews called this album "high-gloss," but just because its cover doesn't look like it was laying in a vault for 30 years doesn't mean it's a pop sellout. In fact, the band's reorientation towards, let's say it out loud, "shoegaze," isn't monolithic and seems like a far-from-assured move commercially. The title track, sure, it's hypnotic and mid-tempo, with swirling guitars and Kazu Makino's delicate vocals. But "Spring and By Summer Fall," with its driving rhythms and awe-inspiring central guitar line, combines the swirl factor with something very new.
6. Kanye West - Graduation (Def Jam)
As Technicolor musically as its Murakami cover, and as much of a musical "event" as anything else this year, Graduation is a leap forward, even for the already-running-pretty-fast Kanye. Dude didn't have to look to J Dilla, Daft Punk, Justice, or Japan's freakiest artist for inspiration, but he did. He still mouthed off all year, but somehow, the sheer joy of tracks like "Stronger" and "The Good Life" seemed to reorient the world towards Kanye's viewpoint, and his braggodocio suddenly seemed almost like humility.
5. Of Montreal – Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer? (Polyvinyl)
More than anyone since Franz Ferdinand, these Georgians seem to understand the manic energy of the best new wave, and moreover, that sunny chords and synth lines are best paired with dark, troubled lyrics. With what sounds like a really rough breakup providing the album's force, the lyrics somehow avoid cliché, always surprising with their takes on the emotional roller coaster. For instance, the "chemicals" of "Heimsdalgate" aren't drugs, they're far more dangerous: natural brain chemistry, of which bandleader Kevin Barnes demands, "come on mood shift, shift back to good again!"
4. Lil Wayne –Da Drought 3 / The Carter III (Interwebs)
It's kind of odd, when you think about it: Radiohead get all the attention for releasing a pay-what-you-want album on the internet, but Lil Wayne put out like 27 free mix tapes this year and is anybody lauding him for "changing the music industry?" Well, who cares, because the guy can't seem to make a bad song. I've got another tie here, which I know is a cop-out, but both of these are towering achievements: the former a mix-tape using (and one-upping) current instrumental tracks from MIMS to Gnarls Barkley, the latter a studio album that leaked in an early, Beatles-sampling version all over the internet. Wayne's laid-back style belies what's clearly workaholism.
3. M.I.A. – Kala (XL/Interscope)
I already said lots and lots of stuff about this album, so I'll keep this kind of brief. Four months after its release, these tracks, mashups of familiar samples and avant-garde sensibility, still seem fresh; her lyrics, a devil-may-care collection of agit-prop sloganeering and quick-witted flirtation, still seem urgent. Rolling Stone, calling this their album of the year, says she's a "criminal-minded art freak with a true rock & roller's love of flash and sensation and irresponsible shit-talking;" yes, but you forgot to mention "cute."
2. Radiohead – In Rainbows (Intertubes)
So, Mr. Dumb DJ Name Guy, how can an album that didn't manage to generate any singles good enough for your Top 20 somehow land at #2 on your albums list, huh? Well, helpful internal voice of criticism, you unwittingly point out one of this album's main strengths: it's an album, all of whose songs seem to reference and lift up each other, and while "House of Cards" sounded pretty good on the radio, it just made me flip off the station and start the whole album up, because then I have to hear the Boards of Canada space-hop of "All I Need," the rock ecstasy of "Bodysnatchers," the abject despair of "Reckoner." And I paid like $10.63 for it cause I forgot the pound is worth a million dollars, and I still don't mind.
1. LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver (DFA)
This shouldn't surprise anybody: hey, a dancey album from an aging hipster who really seems to like weird old disco and the Talking Heads, why don't you just put yourself at #1, nerd. Well, that's part of it, since this album feels like a victory for the, ahem, "mature": you don't have to stop breaking ground and being awesome, even if your lyrics reflect the trouble you've seen. From the massive build-to-ecstasy of "Get Innocuous!" to the cheeky "North American Scum" and the majestic, mournful "Someone Great," this is an album that runs the emotional gamut, and all of us, with all of our baggage, are invited to the shindig: "so throw a party til the cops come in and bust it up/oh you were planning it, I didn't mean to interrupt."
The next ten:
11. The Good, The Bad and The Queen – S/T (Virgin)
Surprise: it's not mashups, disco, or hip-hop: just melancholy, dub-inflected ballads.
12. Klaxons – Myths of the Near Future (Geffen)
Nu-Rave? Nah, just forward-looking rock with super sci-fi references.
13. Justice – † (Vice)
French duo turns up the techno until it turns into metal.
14. Feist – The Reminder (Interscope)
A wildly diverse record of home-grown, straightforward tunes, insistently memorable but never cliché.
15. Simian Mobile Disco – Attack Decay Sustain Release (Wichita)
Former rockers turn to dance music, and they don't want to break your eardrums like Justice, they just want you to shake it.
16. Burial – Untrue (Hyperdub)
The dubbed-out sound of South London through a soulful (and despairing) prism.
17. Arcade Fire – Neon Bible (Merge)
Canadian collective works themselves into a religious frenzy until the church falls down.
18. The Field – From Here We Go Sublime (Kompakt)
Chilly sample-based dance music with sources that will freak you out—was that Lionel Richie?
19. Jose Gonzalez – In Our Nature (Mute)
Swedish singer-songwriter laments the state of humanity accompanied by rhythmic, hypnotic acoustic guitar.
20. The National – Boxer (Beggars Banguet)
This album's dark tales are like Raymond Carver short stories: brutal, too familiar.
Red Velvet Goldmine, or, Christmas With Bowie
If you're still singing to yourself, "I hurt myself today pa rum pum pum pum," then you might want to change your interior Muzak track with this gem. Here's what happened when David Bowie dropped by Bing Crosby's place for some Christmas cheer:
(Via The Poop)
All I Want for Christmas, Part 3: Cassette Bag
From the World Wide Fred website: "Time to unwind and rewind with this low-tech cassette tote bag. Full-color printed flexible plastic, complete with handles that look like the tape is unraveling (didn't you just hate it when that happened?). Casual and roomy, our Cassette Tote is the perfect way to pack your important stuff (like your leg warmers, mini skirt, and jelly shoes). What a feelin'!"
There's no price and I can't find anywhere to actually buy it, so maybe it's not real, but it sure does bring me back to the days when home taping was killing the music industry. You know, when it unravels you can fix it with scotch tape (the cassette, not the industry).
(Via AudioPorn Central)
Mashup Roundup: Tasteless Ike Turner Mashup, Tasteful Christmas Mashups, Obvious Jay-Z Mashup Album, Super Zep Mashup
Larry Flynt Doesn't Know Whether Rudolph Giuliani is Gay or Not
Hustler publisher and aspiring political muckraker Larry Flynt has given an extensive interview to Vanity Fair in which he continues to promise the exposure of juicy tidbits about "hypocritical" politicians, although it's his comments about Rudy Giuliani that are raising eyebrows:
"As mayor of New York, would you live in an apartment with three gay guys?" Flynt’s facts aren’t entirely in order, but his train of thought won’t be derailed. "I’m not gay," he continues. "I don’t hate gays. But I don’t want to live in an apartment full of them. They’ll bitch and cry and all. That doesn’t bother Giuliani. It doesn’t bother Giuliani to put a dress on to do Saturday Night Live. I don’t trust him. I don’t think he’s electable. I don’t know whether he’s gay or not… but I’m saying, if you got four friends, all gay, living in the same apartment, how are you going to know which one’s gay? I’m surprised no one’s even asking that question. Why do you break up with your wife and move in with gay guys?"
For the record, Mr. Giuliani lived with Howard Koeppel and Koeppel's boyfriend Mark Hsiao in the spring of 2001. Where Flynt is getting the third (fourth?) gay man, I'm not sure. But I suppose that's just me bitching and crying and all, isn't it? Funny, I thought my bitching and crying was the whole reason people read the Riff...?
Anyway, while the article says Flynt had been talking about exposing some sexual "pecadillos" on the part of three "A-list" Republican names (including a presidential candidate) this past summer, the interviewer says those names are now off the table, although a fourth, another closeted gay Republican senator (whee!), is likely to be exposed soon. Again, probably because of all his damn bitching and crying. It's hard to keep that under control.
For better or for worse, Vanity Fair says that "checkbook journalism" (Flynt usually pays his sources) taints these revelations, although later Flynt insists that Hustler sticks to tough journalistic standards of multiple witnesses before going public with a story, since the mainstream media would "step on me like a bug" if he's wrong. Interestingly, the magazine put a tail on Larry Craig in early 2007 but by May hadn't observed anything "untoward." Say what you want about Flynt, but it's hard not to agree with Frank Rich, whom the article quotes as saying, post-Clinton impeachment: "Larry Flynt is a bull in the china shop of false pieties, empty pretensions, and sexual sermonizing that have brought us to this low moment in American history."
December 19, 2007
Party Ben's Top 10 (Plus!) Songs of 2007
Or "How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Feist." Things have moved around a bit since my half-year list back in July, but the idea is the same: 2007, if anything, was a year of Big Songs. Big triumphant chords, big tragic emotions, big sing-along choruses—this was not the year for quiet ballads. Take "Umbrella," a shoe-in at #1; its genre-crushing intensity and live-remix vocal indulgences made it inescapable, but it was its big-hearted spirit that made it an anthem. Oddly enough, as I look down my list, a lot of these songs have similar emotional landscapes, if not geneses: even LCD Soundsystem seems to be offering up an umbrella for his friends to stand under. There's a theory (maybe?) that pop music gets better as the government gets more right-wing and screwed-up (compare the brilliance of early-80s electro-pop to mid-90s 3rd-tier pseudo-grunge), and maybe you could say these songs all have a fighting spirit, whether the enemies are the boys who "start a war" or the ones who try and make you go to rehab.
Also, three of my Top 11 are in triple-time. Now that's weird.
Here's my Top Ten complete with videos, and then #s 11-20, just cause there were a lot of good runners-up.
10. Dude N Nem – "Watch My Feet"
Usually it takes a while before a new underground musical genre produces a monster single, and while this hasn't exactly topped the Hot 100, it feels like it could, any minute now. Juke music is all about contrast, and here's how it works: this track ambles along, a mellow hip-hop joint, riding one of my favorite James Brown basslines and a Sesame Street-sounding sample, and then suddenly explodes into stompy techno double-time that makes you want to jump up and down, even if you don't have the agility to do some of the shoelace-tangling moves in evidence in the video.
9. Justice – "D.A.N.C.E."
I was so way ahead of everybody on the Justice tip. I swear it!! I was proselytizing about their skronky techno before you were even born, but then this single comes out, and because I didn't recognize its genius at first (no big distorted bassline!) I get no credit. But its funky orchestral stabs and wobbly, goofy vocal lodged themselves in my brain, until I find myself walking down the street, singing "do your dance," and wishing my T-shirt was a cartoon.
8. Timbaland feat. Nelly Furtado & Justin Timberlake – "Give It To Me"
Okay, Timbo: you need to lay off the roids, and stop trying to hang around with the emo kids, I'm starting to reconsider my utter devotion to your production skills. Here, you managed to combine the slinky harmonies of "Promiscuous" with the swagger and thump of "SexyBack," your two greatest pieces of work in '06, and even though it's been off the radio for a while, it still sounds great. Just don't jump the shark.
7. Amy Winehouse - "Rehab"
You really need a ticker to keep up with the twists and turns in Winehouse's life that add ironic, or not-so-ironic, layers to this song—jeez, she was arrested just today, right? I'll leave it to scholars to sort out whether it's her Jewish guilt over stealing the sounds of classic soul that's causing her self-torture, since the groove here is so perfectly executed, and the vocal seems so sunny and unconcerned (unlike everybody else in the world), it's impossible to resist.
6. UGK feat. Outkast – "Int'l Players Anthem"
A track that's astonishing from the get-go: a 75-second intro that loops its Willie Hutch sample without any additional beats or production, just Andre 3000 delivering a poetic testimony to pre-wedding jitters. But when those drums finally come in, oh my God, and then they step it up a notch for the third verse, getting almost as skittery as drum 'n' bass. Pimp C, who died just two weeks ago, isn't really the star here, but he's vital to the track's success, and the empty space he now leaves in the world of Southern hip-hop feels surprisingly enormous.
5. Kanye West feat T-Pain – "Good Life"
Who knew there was sample magic to be found in "P.Y.T," a kind of embarrassing footnote to Thriller? Kanye, that's who, and like all of his decisions in 2007, it's audacious, arrogant, and completely right on. "I got to shine," read one way, is more Kanye navel-gazing; but read another way, it's a gift, a line for everyone to sing along with. Add to that a video that out-Justiced Justice, a brilliant shout-out-slash-swipe at 50 Cent, and, well, T-Pain: now throw your hands up in the sky.
4. M.I.A. – "Boyz"
Triple-time, man, it's so hot right now. Diplo noticed this, natch, and made a good effort at mashing M.I.A. up with Battles, but the result was kind of like "ack, too much!" "Boyz" is so fully-formed, with what feels like layers and layers of audio: booming drums, cheering crowds, whistle toots, honky horns, and so many cultural references you lose track of where you are. Like everything M.I.A. does, it's both a challenge and a party, and the lyrics switch back and forth accordingly. Boys: you can't live with 'em…
3. Battles – "Atlas"
A song that followed me around all year, creepily, until I just stopped running and danced along. It's not surprising that the drummer here is from Helmet, and his precision allows the track to sustain momentum over its 7-minute length. But straightforward prog-metal this is not: the label, Warp records, should be a clue that there's some electronic wizardry afoot here, most noticeably in the barely-human (and again, kind of creepy) vocal effects. I know I keep saying how scary this track is, but like the monolith in 2001, it's both completely insane and somehow perfect, and how can we be challenged to evolve if we aren't a little freaked out at first?
2. LCD Soundsystem – "All My Friends" / "Someone Great"
A tie is a cheat, I know, but both of these songs switched places in my Top 2 so many times I lost track and finally just gave up. On your left, ladies and gentlemen: a driving, two-chord ode to, well, aging, whose organic imperfection makes it all the more powerful, like New Order circa "Ceremony"; on your right, a machine-driven piece of clockwork electro, mournful and numb, like The Human League's "Don't You Want Me" multiplied by Royksopp's "Remind Me." While there were lots of awesome moments on Sound of Silver (see my album chart tomorrow), these were the two highlights.
1. Rihanna – "Umbrella"
Like I said back in July, Rolling Stone's accusation of a Freudian vaginal-metaphor at work here doesn't hold up—sometimes an umbrella is just an umbrella. Musically, this is a perfectly-executed piece of production, and despite the wall of sound, everything stands out loud and clear, and that open hi-hat on the one keeps everything in check. Is Rihanna a brilliant artist or even that great a singer? Neither, really, but that's probably for the best—there's not a show-offy moment here. It's as straightforward as a promise can be: I'll always be your friend.
The next 10:
11. Feist – "1234"
So close, Feist, but considering my first impression of you as a iPod-shilling Lisa Loeb, the fact that I now think you're awesome is nothing short of miraculous.
12. Lil Mama – "Lip Gloss"
I know the song's about lip gloss, but it sounds so confident I still find it hard to believe she's 18.
13. Of Montreal – "Heimsdalgate Like a Promethean Curse"
Bright, new wavey synth-pop with fatalistic lyrics about our unpredictable brain chemisty.
14. Lil Wayne – "I Feel Like Dying"
A devastating ode to addiction built around an unusual, haunting sample.
15. Arcade Fire – "Intervention"
A song that brings you to church only to tear the place down.
16. Duke Dumont – "Lean & Bounce"
Wildly experimental breakbeat techno that approaches industrial intensity.
17. Timbaland – "The Way I Are"
A mutant cross between trance, hip-hop, and freestyle.
18. Caribou – "Melody Day"
Psychedelic dream-pop that still feels contemporary.
19. Kanye West – "Stronger"
The best use of Daft Punk since Busta Rhymes' "Touch It."
20. Bat for Lashes – "What's a Girl to Do?"
A creepy mirror-image of Motown, with lyrics from the opposite side of heartbreak.
A Little Holiday Cheer From... Nine Inch Nails?
Holy stocking stuffers, this is funny: Nine Inch Nails lyrics set to the tunes of classic Christmas carols, AKA Nine Inch Noëls. NSFW, needless to say.
First Look at Lily Allen and Ed Simons' Baby
It's true, she's pregnant, it's in the NME! And Party Ben, using his Photoshop powers for evil, proudly gives you the first "if they mated"-style glimpse at what their offspring will probably look like. Is it the "Chemical Allen" or the "Lily Brother?" You decide, and then decide if it should maybe co-star on that Cavemen show. Prepare yourself, put the kids to bed, and then click the "continues inside" button to witness the carnage.
Breaker of Music Industry Laments Breakage of Music Industry
Today in the Riff's Head-Spinning Irony Department, it's the first part of MTV.com's 3-part series, "The Year the Music Industry Broke." Sure, lots of people have been saying it's been a tough year for record sales or for record company employees, but tell us, MTV, how bad is it?
Make no mistake about it, 2007 was a b-a-a-a-d year for the industry. According to Nielsen SoundScan, album sales were down 15 percent from 2006 (a trend that's continued for eight straight years now); big-name artists jumped ship in increasingly complicated — and messy — ways; and the powers-that-be seemed to get even more heartless and disconnected, thanks to a series of lawsuits, feuds and terrible decisions. In fact, you could probably say that 2007 was Year Zero. Things started to change because they couldn't possibly get any worse.
The article continues by detailing a few truly landmark moments (Paul McCartney leaving EMI for Starbucks, Radiohead doing something or other on the internet) and listing a bunch of random stuff (Stars made their album available for download kind of early!) and adding it all up to "death of industry." It's tough to sort out the conflicting emotions one has reading this stuff: yes, the music industry has screwed up royally over the last few years, and there were some high-profile ship-jumpers, but I'm not sure how the Eagles' Wal-Mart-only LP hitting #1 is a sign of the apocalypse. And of course, not so very long ago, there were those who said MTV's reorientation of popular music towards hot babes was part of the problem, and these days the only music you hear on Music Television is in the background of "The Hills." But the very fact that somebody at MTV is allowed to bite the hand that feeds (to grudgingly reference Nine Inch Nails again) could be as big a sign as any of the end of the industry as we know it.
December 18, 2007
Drudge Quotes The Enquirer on "Edwards Love Child"
Matt Drudge, ladies and gentlemen: he's always had some iffy sources, but have we ever seen him scan The Enquirer and put it "above the fold"? What next, quoting blind items from Ted Casablanca's "Awful Truth" columns? One wonders, who in the Clinton camp is pushing Drudge to go after Edwards, and what sort of Obama-ignoring strategy is that? Okay, that's three questions in a row, and here's another one: why am I still checking this website?