Just caught the Sleepytime show here in Portland at Dante’s last night…and it was pretty damn impressive. They are a band firing on all cylinders at this point with enough material to pull from to put on a good 2 hours of really strong music. Most impressive moments for me included the new (to me) instrument created by Dan Rathbun, I don’t know which one it was from the list on their site

The Slide-piano Log, the Percussion Guitar, the Electric Pancreas, the Vatican, & the Pedal-action Wiggler; or rare: Autoharp, Glockenspiel, Toy Piano, & Viking Rowboat.

I’m going to harbor a guess it was the Pedal Action Wiggler? It looks like a bow attached to a hi-hat stand and it sounds somewhat like a didgeridoo as he pumps the hi-hat pedal, flooding the world with a monstrous bass tone. There was an entertaining number about the “Last Human Being” which i believe may have replaced the theatrical “Cockroach” number which was a personal favorite from the past. I greatly enjoyed the “Old Grey Heron”, a song written by Dan and introduced in a humorous manner as a song he had written for his father after he passed away, except he hasn’t passed away yet, and he continues to live on at the ripe old age of 88. You still have a few chances to catch this monster of a band as they finish their NW tour down the coast.

Upcoming-

# Eugene, OR WOW Hall W/ Mute Socialite
July 07, 2008
# Brookdale, CA Brookdale Lodge w/ Jason Webley , Edmund Welles
July 08, 2008
# Los Angeles, CA the Troubadour w/ Jason Webley , Edmund Welles
July 09, 2008
(Live Show)
# San Francisco, CA Great American Music Hall w/ Jason Webley , Edmund Welles
July 10, 2008
(Live Show)

Official Website- Sleepytime Gorilla Museum

I heart Devo. McDonalds is being sued for unauthorized use of the trademarked helmet on some stupid toy, designed of course to sell crappy food to children, the McDonalds business model.

“They didn’t ask us anything. Plus, we don’t like McDonald’s, and we don’t like American Idol, so we’re doubly offended.”

Devo- Devo vs. McDonalds

Devo from 1977!

Jack Conte blew a few minds with his Radiohead cover a while ago, and he’s been busy apparently preparing some original material. He proves he can also compose a pretty decent pop song, and of course bust it out in the one man band “video song” format.

Here are a couple other fun “video songs”.
Martin Dosh-

Lasse Gjertsen-

I’ve never been a huge Weezer fan, it’s not that I don’t think they are good at what they do…they obviously are, it’s just not what i am interested in. That said however, they are doing something really awesomely cool right now. Traveling around and getting together with groups of local musicians to play their songs and others. They put out a call for 200 musicians in Portland…where pretty much everyone is a musician, and it seems it went swimmingly. Apparently the idea came from Rivers Cuomo’s mom…in case you were wondering, i might argue he stole it from the Boredoms…but I won’t. Here are a few videos that have surfaced recently.

Weezer and the Portland posse plays Radiohead’s Creep-

Some random Portland footage-

Well I am proud to say that for a short while I played in a band with the great Eric Royer. He is one of the most talented fellas I know, and here is a pretty nice little documentary about him. Eric plays as a one man band, incorporating numerous guitar machines he has constructed himself. He was just starting this when we both lived in Tucson, and it has come a long ways, as you’ll see in the video.

Eric Royer- Guitar Machine
Eric Royer with Caliche Con Carne- The Great Cyclops
Eric Royer- NPR story

My friends Jesus and Susan live in the small beautiful town of Sebastapol California. Sebastapol has a few celebrities, but the most important to us is the enigma that is Tom Waits. Whenever I visit we are of course inclined to play the part of unobtrusive hopeful stalkers. One time in the natural foods store we spotted him, trying to mind his own business and do a little shopping…I won’t continue this story, because it ends in an embarrassing moment for our dear friend. We’re not sure if Mr. Waits even noticed us, but it’s hard to imagine he didn’t as we’re definitely not a subtle bunch. Then there was the time Jesus almost ran him down as he was jaywalking…Well anyway he’s a marked man who is embarking on a new tour. For this monumental event he has created a fun video to promote this event (he’s also a damn fine actor). Tom is a musical icon who has mastered his craft and managed to evolve his twisted style over the years to remain both interesting and relevant in the music world. Bone Machine remains one of my all time favorite albums, I felt he really struck gold there, stripping down his sound to the barest of elements and creating a real raw beast of a record. The recent stuff hasn’t lived up to that one as a whole for me, but I’m sure Tom still has a few tricks up his sleeve for us.

Tom Waits- Official Website

You have to love a band that dresses up in what looks like home made insect superhero costumes (or supervillians it’s hard to tell). San Diego’s synth noise band The Locust also have a pretty fun video filled with creepy bugs and lots of what seems like apocalyptic bug war visions. The music is a mix of metal, punk and aggressive synthesizer mayhem that should appeal to those fans of Ipecac and other metal experimental type stuff.

The Locust “AOTKPTA”

The Locust- Myspace
The Locust- Official Site

Here is a Nico song taken from her 1985 album Camera Obscura, which was produced by one of my all time musical heroes John Cale. The song is cut together with scenes from the great Jodorowsky film Santa Sangre. The union seems to work perfectly, capturing the haunting sadness that made both the song and the film great. If you have not read the book Nico: The End I’d strongly recommend it. It is written from the perspective of one of her band mates on what would be her final tour.

Nico- Konig

It’s good to see the influence of the early Boredoms trickling down into the cracks of the indie rock scene! LA band HEALTH throws down a pretty energetic performance high in the skies of NYC. They are extremely creative and their unrestrained energy is certainly fun to watch. The two drummers add a solid rhythmic foundation to the non traditional song structures.

I haven’t heard much about this site, but it looks poised to do to the music licensing industry what iStock did to the stock photo biz. The site claims to offer a marketplace for musicians to interact directly with music those looking to license music for commercial purposes. They allow the artist and the client to negotiate over the cost, and they take 9%. I’m not sure if this will take off as it depends I think a lot on their marketing abilities…I mean everyone has their music on the internet these days, so if you are looking to license some, you don’t need to look that far. The benefits of this service is it gathers it all together, and categorizes it by mood…that’s what you get for 9%.

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