rock nyc

Sure, I have already seen most of these bands, but this is why I know it is a fantastic line-up, with OFF! and its old-school-Black-Flag-revival hardcore sound, Wavves and its distorted-surfing-messy-weedy melodies, Ty Segall and its sunny-garage-punkish-reverbing rock

I have to say that there is nothing spectacular about this. Its a twangy background sound with a cute little chorus. A forgettable song with forgettable lyrics.

The classic early silent movie is given a new soundtrack by the French techno duo Air. Meant to be pplayed simulatenously with a viewing of movie, in context it must be a thing of intence beauty,. Spacey, weighless, It builds efforlessly to the 18 second “Homme Lune” (Moon Man). Without the movie it is like reading Flaubert’s “Madame Bovery” with 10th Grade French. You get the gist but get lost in the nuance. Grade: B

The wittiest named band of all time takes a shot at the Scottish National anthem, which sounds pretty good with bagpipes on the second time round, but the song istself is like a dirge set to a see-saw, with the words changing emphasize every go round. No wonder the English beat em in 1755.

I had lost his track a few years ago, but I remember really liking his song ‘The Rules’ that we were hearing quite a bit on the radio around 2004, with this line ‘I just want to belonnnnnng’ over some raw-youthful rock’ n’ roll which sounded so fresh and inspired

Palmer and her new accompaniment band Grand Theft Orchestra, take this classic song and showcase it in an instigram tinted video. Disturbing yet visually appealing.

The song “Marilyn Monroe” is a pathetic pop drone with weak lyrics, weak music and a weak un credited rapper with too strong a volume. Maybe shes just a great rapper and a horrible singer? That could be it.

‘The thing at the moment is Adele. She is a little too fat, but she has a beautiful face and a divine voice’.

Sarah Fridrich, leader of the duo, sings off-kilter, piano based pop, that aims, or claims to, for a populism, but finds itself in a weird world of its own

Their masterpiece. Starts like the Who, then changes into a books on tape with a great backing back, before Pink Eye ramrods it and at the very end, a high pitched woman joines in. 15 minutes later you go home better for the experience.

The band was never about being cool, never about impressing the masses. I always admired them for this considering they seemed to be the rare few who weren’t singing about a bottle of Jack and getting lucky

Perhaps we are all to buried in BONE EEVAIR (Bon Iver) and the horrible Black Keys to identify worthy music. Step in with the video for “Feel To Follow” an ultra Euro weird jaunt into floating imagery that suits the tune to a T

It’s Iggy and Sid and Hell and swaggering swag and not ghetto swag. The constant drumbeat and repetitive music whipped me right back to the seedy side of town. What a retro sounding single from The Fall.

Epic in intent, and epic in execution, the song goes through moods and sounds, vocalists and guitar parts, pianos and drums and it moves and moves and moves sometimes hash hardcore, sometimes, wall of sound prog rock, sometimes twee pop

Clarkson was crappy at Jingle Ball last December, and ever since then I’ve cooled to her. I liked, not loved, “Stronger” when it was first released. Now it sounds like another chick whining.

If Lana moved a lousy 70,000 units, what did Tim move? Or, more to the point, Cohen? The truth is, the death of the recording business has one up tick, semi-popular artists like Cohen, seem more popular than they actually are

Listening to Fred Hammond the past couple of days got me thinking about the dearth of greats soul songs. The difference between Wonder and even an 80s wonder like Babyface, or a legend like Hammond, isn’t content or sound, it is tune. The tunes aren’t strong enough.

There is not a single redeeming factor about this song. Not a lyric, not one note he hits, not one instrumental beat. I can honestly say I’ve never heard a song that sucked THIS bad.

The last time I saw James Taylor, he was sharing the stage at Madison Square Garden with his namesake Taylor Swift… this time he will have the stage to himself.

This gives new jazz a good name: it seems to circle smooth jazz but with a faster set up and a longer fade out, maybe as if she has been listening to Erykah Badu A lot. Ps That’s a good thing.