Misplaced Jams

Before there was BLAMMOS… there was The Lazy Songwriter.

When I lived in Burlington VT, back in late fall 2000, I bought a 4-track cassette recorder with my roommate Tyler Bolles. The plan was to start recording some stuff and get some ideas going. I thoroughly monopolized the thing though, and after a few months I bought out his half. For the first time in my life I was able to write songs that, for lack...

Mr. Mojo Risin’?

“Come on! Let’s get some tacos!” With this line, Val Kilmer’s slithery performance in Oliver Stone's The Doors comes to a close. No doubt that Jim Morrison was one of rock's most intriguing front men, yet by the end of his short life, he was a tubby, poor man’s Burroughs with a penchant for whiskey, women and Mexican food. The Doors were...

Synchronicity, Too

I know I give terrestrial commercial radio a lot of shit, and rightly so. But today, my local JACK FM station — aka "soccer mom iPod shuffle" — played some songs that hit me where I live. (That's DC, for those who haven't been following along). I woke up with "Wrapped Around Your Finger" by the Police in my head. I didn't have time to listen...

The Aughts — Whatever Norton Remembers

So what was I listening to in the last decade....? Well, we started out with Fugazi's latest/last (?) album, The Argument. You could look at Fugazi's entire catalog from this album and see in crystalline vision the sum of it's parts. It's as though they explained everything. Even now, each time I hear this record I relive the entire span of my deep...

Underrated Guitarists EXTRA — by Delancey Leathers

My man Delancey Leathers knows from guitar. Which is why I'm throwing his picks into this "supplementary" post. Who is this mysterious Mr. Leathers, you ask? It's best that I don't reveal his true identity, but I can say the man is capable of six-string sorcery that most mortals can only dream of. Anyway, here's his list. --------------------------------------------- I'm...

Stupid Music Ideas I Will Never Get To

Sometimes, when in the shower, I am struck by a barrage of ideas for songs, albums, odd musical projects, etc. Here are a handful that I will likely never find time for: A Latino death metal band called Sotomayor (after the first Latina Supreme Court justice, natch). The set list is ever-evolving, but most of the titles are either legal terms of art or goofy...

Through The Eyes Of A Child

These days we seem to forget it, or gloss over it, or simply flat-out deny it, but the fact remains: childhood is weird. It's not all Harry Potter and birthday parties and 2-dimensional Raffi-style feelings. It's loads more Brothers Grimm and Pan's Labyrinth and Watership Down. Old Yeller dies, Shane doesn't come back, young Christina Ricci wants to play...

Choice Sounds

This spring has seen a consistent flush of new, captivating sounds springing forth on a wallet-taxing level. Here are a few that have me hooked: James Ferraro, (link NSFW), better known as part of skronky noiseniks Skaters, has released LP versions of two limited CDRs, Clear and Discovery on the Holy Mountain label. Holy Mountain is one of the most...

The Singularity Is Lame And Has Lousy Music

Last night I had the honor, along with another thousand people or so, to see technology giant Ray Kurzweil give a sold-out multimedia presentation on his new book The Singularity Is Near at the Coolidge Corner Theater in Brookline, MA. Friends, I was stoked. I've long been a fan of Special K thanks to his invention, the internet. Just kidding — Ray-bones...

Rocketsled Reunion, 1998.

Back in the 1990s, I fronted an ahead-of-its time metal band called Rocketsled (I did not come up with the atrocious moniker, but I've nonetheless been forced to live with it ever since). Members of Rocketsled went on to play with Drowningman, Non Compos, (née Non Compos Mentis), Cancer Conspiracy, The Halogens, The Dakota and Township (I think...

Unreleased Beatles Jam (Potentially) Hits the Web.

For a band that has been a global phenomenon for nearly half a century, and has been so heavily archived to boot, it's impressive how much of a storm The Beatles can still brew up. Yesterday, someone on YouTube leaked what was purported to be an unreleased cut by the Fab Four — specifically a lengthy, doo-wop version of Revolution 1. This...

I Just Listened to “The Necromancer” by Rush.

I did. What? ...