Interpol

on Vimeo.

Interpol. The National/RVA. Doors at 8p.
First single off the 9.7 new release - a bit f*cked and fantastic.

Interpol // Lights

Matthew And the Atlas

I am a sucker for few things in this world. Could count them all on one hand. And I'm not talking about the hand that has that extra pinkie growing from the second knuckle; the regular ol' boring hand is the one to which I do refer.

Those things include a gentleman buying me a drink (knowing awkward conversation is inevitable), kittens (knowing I have to clean up their poop), Brit accents (knowing they're oft behind less than exceptional teeth) and Ray Lamontagne (knowing that, well, there's no mutual interest).
Disclaimer: There's one more, but I'm not telling you every goddamn thing. Sucker-ing may change on a daily basis. Restrictions apply.

Should any of those be present in combination, exceptional suckerage ensues. Matthew Hegarty, pillar of Matthew and the Atlas, could very well get me there. With a voice soaked in rye whiskey and singed with clove cigarettes. Gritty blues delivery and salt on the heartbreak wound lyrics. A purported shy stage presence till he opens his mouth to bring the crowd to a hush. Hegarty could be Ray TheMountain's Brit brother from another mother.

His April EP, To The North, follows a tour supporting Mumford & Sons and taken part of the Communion Compilation. Now it's more pubs and lochs and grey seas the rest of 2010.

I am certainly sucked in.

Matthew And the Atlas // Within the Rose

Active Child

Well...erm...
Can't really top that behemoth post of a mixed tape. Ever ever. But I do hope all the feudal Lords and Ladies of the Empty Skeleton Kingdom revels in the soundwaves of my birthday tribute as much as I do.

Only feasible followup is to wax poetic over some favorites - cuz I know you want all the smutty slutty deets. I mean, along with the music! Right?
What are you really reading this blog for, anyway?

All right, Active Child = Pat Grossi, former member of the Philadelphia Boys Choir until his father packed up the family and took them cross-country before Grossi cleared the frightening forest of puberty. It was a necessary move - Daddy Grossi worked for Priority Records, a major rap label that required him in the West office. So Grossi grew up with full reign to listen to dirty gangster rap and shake hands with Snoop, Dre and other greats.

For some reason this trips me out when you check out the tracks, which sound like an evangelical rave.
But, as I think about it, raves have more in common with evangelical gatherings than most any other comparative event.

It took some time, some experimentation, but Grossi finally elicited a heady potion to combine electro synth with monastic hallows and his otherworldly tenor. Layers and loops later, you got yourself an EP my friend.

If you didn't catch it earlier.

Active Child // Wilderness

Day Five: A Land Without Monsters

On the fifth day, the Monsters had disappeared for good and the Animal reigned. The Land once of blood and steel was now a peaceful palette of serene green. The black sky turned blue and green and violet before revealing 26 new moons in the North Sky. The Animal labored and the fruits grew plentifully. At night, the Animal was cold and built a fire from the shedding branches of a nearby tree. In the distance, it began to rain the drink of the Land and all were fed. When the storm came closer the wet sky extinguished the fire and there was darkness. The Animal slept as the moons circled the sky and all was the quiet of great quietness. At dawn, the peacefulness was disturbed when the Animal was awakened by a noise in the young trees behind her.

The Do // At Last
Active Child // When Your Love Is Safe
Kaiser Cartel // Dog Stars
Laura Stevenson & The Cans // The Pretty One
Matthew & The Atlas // I Will Remain
Tangarine & Friends // Until The Light Remains
Jamie Lidell // You See My Light

Day Four: The Celebration Of The Animal

In the morning of day four, the battles came to a slow end. The Monsters had lost their energy and began to slowly turn to dust. The arteries and veins of the Animal creatures who had sacrificed their lives grew from their bodies through their skin into the ground and rooted the first of the Land's new infrastructure of nature. Mother begat child and child became mother and the Animal soul grew into something as pure as the fresh light of a beginning. Black covered the sky, but with every breath of new life, the air became cleaner and clearer. The Coral Sea provided sustenance until the plants began to bare fruit and the Cow milk. Toward the evening, as the mass of new life spread through the Land, bits of green and dirt grew over the entangled towers of tar and metal until they became young mountains. At midnight, the Animal creatures congregated around a group of 26 new trees and plants and they danced until sunrise when the sky formed a hole and poured the whitest white of snow on them. They glistened and transformed into one. Once again.

Love Is All // Take Your Time
Laura Stevenson & The Cans // The Source and the Sound
Correatown // Play
Jason Collett // Little Tiger
Wild Beasts // We Still Got The Taste Dancin' On Our Tongues
Oh Ruin // Just Like Kat's Guitar
Republic Tigers // The Impossible Dream

Day Three: The Revolt Of The Animal

On the third day, the Monsters had demolished their accomplishments and uprooted any hope of new creation. They walked barefoot on the hardened tar and smoldered steel below them, walls of grey smoke and bullet rain filling their pores and lungs. There was nothing left to kill or eat or experiment with, no blocks to build upon, no entity on which to declare war. They grew tired and weak and they began to wonder what they had done to deserve this.

At the bottom of the Great Depths, the Animal sat wrapped in a blanket of liquid soot lifeless in the still around her. Under the thick sea floor was a blue coral reef 90 miles wide, a trap door in the darkest place of the Great Depths. It shook and cracked and sucked the blackness into it until there was no black at all and the Animal fell in causing the reef to cry tears of gold blood. It seeped thick and boiled and turned to shapes that turned to limbs and eyes that became an army of angry Animal creatures racing to the surface of the Sea like arrows from a swift bow. There was a great roar heard from the Land and the Monsters turned to see, struggling to stand. Without warning, the blood began to pour from the necks and scalps and chests of the Monsters who watched their beating hearts brutally retracted from their bodies. Their bones were skinned and sharpened to use as weapons and their teeth were kept as trophies. Though the Monsters fought back striking blood of their own, the Animal creatures had no mercy or forgiveness to show upon them.

How To Destroy Angels // The Space In Between
Massive Attack // Girl I Love You
Crystal Castles // Celestica
Holy Fuck // Stay Lit
Dom // Living In America
Future Islands // Walking Through That Door
Late Of The Pier // Blueberry

Day Two: The Black Storm

On the second day, even the Monsters were surprised by the evil and damage they had created. They had turned the Land that welcomed them into a black plume, eyes of red and teeth of pearl and peril. All they had created now stood singularly as a wall of chaotic noise and destruction. Yet instead of admission and submission, they raged on, deeper and faster. They spit rain that fell like hardened bullets and hail like atom bombs into the mountains and sea. The Animal spilled and lost her breath and her arms and legs were ripped and her eyes blued and broken, her blood mixed with the toxic sea that burned and battered her skin. She screamed and pleaded, but the Monsters would not, could not listen and pulled her deeper under the once blue surface, stabbing and biting as they dragged. The base of the sea enveloped her and the air inside her turned to black and her eyes blinked and closed one final time.

Avi Buffalo // Truth Sets In
Saintseneca // Kill All Animals
Typhoon // Happy People
Horse Feathers // The Drought
Liars // No Barrier Fun
How To Destroy Angels // A Drowning
Clogs // Last Song (with Matt Berninger)

Day One: The Arrogant Kiss

On day one, the Monsters took advantage of the Animal with their greed and arrogant ignorance and undisciplined hand. The experimentation, the lies, the power. They swept the rug out of the feet of all that moved before them. When the Animal spoke and said "Why must I endure your plight when you misunderstand my existence and worth and significance," the Monster would smile and laugh and pat the Animal on the head, his muscle and punch cocked behind his complex electrical configuration. He would say nothing because he would not need to. The testing gazes and the wasteful waste clouded the sky as the night fell upon the Animal, her eyes opening for the first time. While the Monsters appeared to be blind, the Animal could see the lightning and the blackness in the distance and she knew in her heart that a storm was upon her. 

Jamie Lidell // Compass 
Damien Jurado // Rachel & Cali 
Phospherescent // Los Angeles 
Sarah Jaffe // Vulnerable 
Sebastien Schuller // Battle 
Midlake // Acts Of Man 
Valgeir Sigurdsson // Dreamland