I'm Matt and this is Music for Hypocrites.
But first.....in the immortal words of Balki Bartokomous, "Here's your maaaaillllll Mr. Appleton".
Reader Mail! Ha! Imagine that! Anyways, some brief snippets and responses from last week's column.
Our first email comes from Steve, who writes:
"I love the Killers, from Mr. Brightside, Under the Gun, to River is Wild, but my favorite is Read my Mind. From the music to the lyrics...I cant wait to see where this band is in 10 years....should be a fun ride...The crazy thing is I was coming out of a horrible break up, when I first heard of The Killers. The cd, the music, keep reminding of my break up, I guess listening to them for 3 months straight will do that to you...However I got over it, and so glad I didnt walk away from them.....have a great New Year...Sams Town album of the year 2006--GREAT CHOICE, and really the only right pick....Steve"
Despite the amazing use of ".", he still gets the point across (ha!). I totally agree with you, Steve. Mind you, I was sans break up, but it took 4 months (until I got the CD from today's artist) before I could find anything to replace this disc in my cd player. There's a huge amount of potential in The Killers and I'm really interested to see where they go with it.
Number Two comes from Marcello, who writes:
"sexyback was produced by timbaland, not the neptunes....why do you think timbaland is plastered all over the song? Beatmakers only do guest appearances on songs if they made the beat."
Sigh. Ok, so I was wrong. Hey, it happens and I fess up to it fairly quickly. I said in my last column I'd bet a Big Boss Man action figure. Where do you want it sent?
I haven't been able to determine if it's my getting older or the music business getting more sleek and angular, but somewhere in the last couple of years I've seen an exponentially growing dichotomy of music I love vs. music I settle for. To be honest, besides NPR and a few talk stations I haven't listened to the radio for more than a few minutes a month in the last year. My work hours are complemented by iTunes blasting at unacceptable volumes in my office, hidden deep within the server room. Out of 3000 songs and 8 days of continuous music available, I can count on one hand the CD's that were released post 2004.
As you get older your tastes refine. Frankly, I need good music, or it isn't worth listening to. Modern rock radio gives you these lame monster ballads with these monotonous baritone singers or switches it up to raging 7-string guitar riffs with a combination of screamo and monotonous baritone. Somewhere around the time of Nirvana releasing Nevermind, people started ignoring tenor voices, save for a few "alternative" acts like Ben Folds Five. One of the bands I really appreciated in the early-mid 90's were the Toadies. Todd Lewis (or Vaden Todd Lewis if you want to be a dick about it) was the frontman and offered a nice blend of great tenor melodies and screaming that involved something I feel is lost on 90% of the rock bands out there today, emotion.
You might remember The Toadies for their hits "Possum Kingdom" or "Away", which for the most part sounded a lot like the same song. After some label troubles that planted the seeds for the future, The Toadies released Hell Below Stars Above, which was met with, well, nothing, given that there was no momentum put into their sophomore release, no promotion and no air play. I highly recommend HBSA, if only for the title track, which completely turns on a dime from a screaming rock song to almost gospel. Shortly after the release of that album they disbanded.
Soon after they broke up a friend and former label mate by the name of Taz Bentley (Reverend Horton Heat) invited Todd up to the Northwest with him to jam with some friends. Those friends happened to be pretty much Guns 'n' Roses, minus Slash and Axl (so I guess those friends happened to be 'n'). Todd and Taz jammed with 'n' for a while but nothing really came of it, save for Taz and Todd forming The Burden Brothers.
The Burden Brothers was a very interesting concept at its inception. Here were two great musicians that were disgusted with and tired of the work and disappointment required to work with the major labels and just wanted to create, be creative and not deal with the downside of the business. They made a deal with a small label by the name of Last Beat. When they had a few songs to record, Last Beat would schedule studio time and they'd run through them, then post them for sale or download from their website. Their intention was to make a compilation of all the tracks at the end of the year and sell that as a cd, then start the process over again. Side note: I've been trying to no avail to find these original releases. If anyone has a copy they'd like to send/sell me, I'm all ears.
Anyways, this idea eventually blossomed into a full fledged band with a full fledged sound and a full fledged album. Full fledged. Full. Fledged. Their first release on Kirtland records, Buried in Your Black Heart, was a loud, raucous affair, full of great tracks ("Beautiful Night", "You're So God Damned Beautiful") and great performances all around. In a world filled with nu-metal and overdone balladry sung in a monotonous baritone, here was a strong tenor voice, backed by a band that found a way to play the cliche riffs and swings in the vein of 70's and 80's rock but with enough new tricks thrown in to not sound like an homage or a classic rock act. This was the sound of Rock and Roll Professionals; Players that have seen the road, wrote the songs that made people sing and knew how to write, record and perform them. They followed BIYBH up with a live disc and then their second studio release in 2006, Mercy. The band took a different approach to this album, forming it into a mix tape of sorts, involving more balladry and moods than straight out rock. Overall it was an effort that shows the band developing their sound further and producing better music with every attempt.
The Burden Brothers are the textbook definition of rock in my eyes, reaching back to the earlier times of bands like AC/DC and Def Leppard in my youth, but modernizing those cliches, so to speak, in such a was that there's no parody (Hello, The Darkness, my name is Matt and yes, I am looking at you) or "retro" (Hello Jack White, my name is Matt and for Christmas next year you get a production budget) sound to deter you from genuinely liking them.
In a world where I need to seek out good music to add to my collection, I tend to follow the paths of artists that have have previously released music I enjoy. Following The Toadies to The Burden Brothers, Crowded House to Neil Finn, Men at Work to Colin Hay, Queens of the Stone Age to Mark Lanegan to Greg Dulli and the Twilight Singers and so forth. The purpose of this column will be to reintroduce you to these characters. Wait, scratch that. This is a column, not a blog entry, so let's add a dramatic flourish, shall we? The purpose of this column is to reintroduce you to these ghosts from the past (ooooooh) and show you that not only are they not dead and buried, but in a lot of cases are creating more dynamic and rewarding music to both the artists and the listener than they ever have before.
In the interest of seeking good music out, I turn the column over to you, the reader. If you have recommendations of great music that's being released, especially if it involves band members going out on their own solo projects, side projects, new bands or entirely new musical directions, please, let me know. I'll give you all the credit in the world if you can find me a few more gems in the mountain of elephant poo that is the current music scene.
That's it for this week. Auf.
The 411
The Band: The Burden Brothers
Threads: The Toadies, Reverend Horton Heat, Doosu, Baboon, GWAR
Band Website: http://www.theburdenbrothers.com
The Top Five :
You're So God Damned Beautiful
Beautiful Night
If You're Going to Heaven
Liberated
Trick of Logic
