This was done by Jesus Contreras and Hannah Manfredi as a music and video collaboration. The story is about a little girl that wakes up to find herself in Mexico. She meets a young boy named Salvador who is on his way to sell mangos at the market. She doesn’t know whether she is still sleeping or awake. The animation and artwork was done by Hannah Manfredi, who also supplies the voice in the narration. Interesting enough, the music and vocals were completed before the animation was shot. All of the music was realized in Live You may need to go directly to the video on Youtube if you have trouble reading the subtitles. This is the direct link to it: http://youtube.com/watch?v=uVREtfM1AL4

If you like dark gothic country filled with fire and brimstone, you are no doubt familiar with the amazing talent that was 16 Horsepower. The haunting voice of David Eugene Edwards will send shivers down your spine, and at least force you to ponder your existence. They were a notoriously great live band and here is a bit of evidence to support that claim. The video is from the Pinkpop fest in Netherlands in 2000. I could not find any info on the excellent violinist…anyone know who she is?

Sixteenhorsepower- Officially dead website
Woven Hand (Edwards post 16HP)- Official? Website

The author of this amazing piece James Houston claims “It doesn’t sound great, as it’s not supposed to. “, I respectfully disagree…it’s beautiful and I enjoy it more that the original! It’s a little slow to get going but hang in there…it’s pretty damn cool.

The band performing Radiohead’s Nude…

Sinclair ZX Spectrum - Guitars (rhythm & lead)
Epson LX-81 Dot Matrix Printer - Drums
HP Scanjet 3c - Bass Guitar
Hard Drive array - Act as a collection of bad speakers - Vocals & FX

Big Ideas (don’t get any) from James Houston on Vimeo.

It’s really unfortunate that Metallica’s bass player died in that bus crash…as opposed to the rest of the band. It seems like they have just been de-evolving into primordial sludge ever since. During their heyday I’ll admit I was more interested in punk rock, but I still liked what they were doing along with their somewhat more pathetic, yet equally enjoyable to me, little brother Megadeth. In what appears to be their latest media gaffe, they invited a bunch of journalists to a special listening session of songs from their yet to be released album. After these journalists wrote some reviews on their blogs, they were contacted and told to remove the reviews…no non disclosure contracts were signed, and apparently no one was told not to write about it? So without hearing the album I’m going to write a review about it right here, and see if they contact me to take it down…The new Metallica album sucks as much as the one before it, and if they had any dignity left they’d kill each other. This spoiled bunch of sadly self absorbed has beens have milked the life out of whatever formula they undeniably pioneered and perfected 20 years ago. If you need any proof on what a bunch of useless skinbags these guys have become, view the documentary “Some Kind of Monster” in which they douche it out with each other so much their label has to call in a “band coach” to help them finish their record. It’s clearly one of the most comedic films I’ve seen in years. The ability to play music is a gift…somewhere along the line Lars and James may have forgotten that.

Article- “Metallica to bloggers…“

Another post rock outfit with a long strung out name! Much of the soundscape is familiar to post rock fans, guitars, Rhodes keyboard, drums, and not much vocalizing (none). The latest album from these guys simply titled “birds” contains four different “flocks”. The the instrumentation bounces around seeming to morph sounds into some sort of structure, and while it occasionally slips toward the oh so tiresome slow build formula, the organic sounding samples, combined with enough compositional motion seem to help it from becoming too stale or predictable.

Collections of Colonies of Bees

Some musical genres simply don’t need to intersect…it’s ok really, they can survive on their own just fine. One example would be country and rap. I imbibe both of these flavors of music just fine on their own, however I have yet to see any combination of the two that has been anything just short of embarrassing, and often nauseating. I’m always happy to be proven wrong, but here again I think I am right. Willie Nelson is nothing short of a musical hero in my book, and Snoop, well he is one smooth operator, but he just seems completely awkward up there trying to sing along with Willie…perhaps it’s just the mediocre quality of the tune itself, but I’m not buying it fellas. I do completely understand why they might be hanging out and sharing some…smoke.

Here is a nice performance of the soft jazz number Waltz for Debbie from Bill Evans. Check out the chops on bassist Chuck Israels as he matches Bill on some of the runs, and lays down a pretty smooth solo. Good music to wash down some caffeine and get the day started.

Here’s a later version of the trio with Napolean Dynamite on bass…Bill is sort of sporting his Unibomber look…beard and mirror shades.

Love this tune from Brooklyn folksters Phosphorescent, and I was pleased to discover this spirited and somewhat raucous live performance of it.

Phosphorescent performing the song “Wolves” of their album “Pride” at Cake Shop in NYC on November 1oth, 2007…

Phosphorescent- Myspace

So by now you must have discovered Pitchfork TV, if not happy day for you. The online video showcase was launched recently by the same people who bring you Pitchfork obviously, and features exactly what you’d expect, good alternative music videos (great quality for online stuff)…minus everything you hate about MTV. Here is a fun video following the group Man Man around as they work on their new album “Rabbit Habits”. It’s great to see all the freedom and experimentation that the band exploits in the studio, which is exactly what you should do while recording…I agree with Honus Honus, every song should feature the recorded sounds of a dog in a bathtub.

Thanks to one Vance Fink I am feeling a bit like a I grabbed the wrong vitamins while running disheveled out the house this morning. Check out this well edited trippy video…and enjoy some media induced visual hallucinogenics. It’s gonna be hot yo…but fear not, you won’t need a jacket.