The Bandcamp Guide to Deerhoof

I do enjoy me some Deehoof. It’s not exactly easy listening though and some mornings I need some mellower sounds. But you can’t deny that they are for sure pushing the limits.

“A conversation with Deerhoof founder and percussionist Greg Saunier is as likely to touch on French writer and philosopher Édouard Glissant’s concept of opacity and Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine as it is on Beck’s early album chronology and Melvins’ drummer Dale Crover’s technique. Saunier retains an encyclopedic knowledge of not only Deerhoof’s history but of the social, cultural, and political forces that were at play when the band were composing their albums.

Speaking of encyclopedic, a whole collection of volumes could be written about each of Deerhoof’s albums with lengthy individual entries that delve into the philosophy and creation of each song. Using a consensus approach to song crafting, they strive for a balance of voices between Saunier, bassist and singer Satomi Matsuzaki, and guitarists John Dieterich and Ed Rodriguez on each album.”

Thanks Josh!

RIP: Jeremiah Green

45, yikes.

I first found Modest Mouse during a visit to Portland in 2001, just after 9-11. I was at Music Millennium and picked up probably one of the last CDs I ever bought, “The Moon and Antartica”. Back in LA, they became a soundtrack during skate sessions, backyard pool hunts, surf trips and many nights better left unsaid.

“Jeremiah Green, the longtime Modest Mouse drummer, has died, the band announced. Green’s bandmates had recently disclosed that Green was undergoing treatment for cancer. Jeremiah Green was 45 years old.

Green co-founded Modest Mouse with frontman Isaac Brock and bassist Eric Judy in Washington in the early 1990s.”

More Talking Heads and some new portfolio stuff.

Added some new stuff to the portfolio the other day, some renders and some serious color ups / product swaps. I really do not enjoy making those galleries for some reason, lol!

And for whatever reason, I am really digging early live Talking Heads. It’s so stripped down yet holds up as full songs. Some real artistry going on without just doing anything flashy.

Undetectable very-low frequency sound increases dancing at a live concert

Crank up those Subs people!

“We tested whether non-auditory low-frequency stimulation would increase audience dancing by turning very-low frequency (VLF) speakers on and off during a live electronic music concert and measuring audience members’ movements using motion-capture. Movement increased when VLFs were present, and because the VLFs were below or near auditory thresholds (and a subsequent experiment suggested they were undetectable), we believe this represents an unconscious effect on behaviour, possibly via vestibular and/or tactile processing.

People attending a performance by the electronic music duo Orphx at the LIVELab were recruited for the study. Participants gave informed consent, were fitted with motion-capture marker headbands, and completed pre- and post-concert questionnaires (see Supplemental information). We turned VLF speakers (8–37 Hz) on and off every 2.5 minutes over 55 minutes of the performance (Figure 1D), calculated head movement speed (the three-dimensional path length per sampling unit of time) for each participant in each of the eighteen segments, and compared average normalized movement while VLFs were ON vs. OFF. Our data show that audience participants moved more, on average by 11.8%, while VLFs were ON vs. OFF (t(42) = 5.32, p < 0.0001; d = 0.81; Figure 1E).”

Chicago's Metro club celebrates 40 years of rock, punk and metal

Spent a good amount of time in Chicago and was even lucky enough to play a few shows at the Metro which turns 40! Fun little write up on them from NPR. Imagine how crazy it is to try to keep a venue like that running for 40 years….

“Another memorable act was Iggy Pop, whose Blah-Blah-Blah tour show Ambo calls “one of the wettest, sweatiest, bloodiest shows” he’s ever seen.

“I remember I was just melting in my gym shoes,” Ambo says. “There was so much blood and sweat and beer on the floor.”

Shanahan remembers Iggy Pop trying to rip out the speakers on stage and throw them into the crowd.

“He actually lifts the cabinets off the floor!” Shanahan says. “I mean, he was trying to move something that's not quite movable. Plus it was strapped down, which he didn't know.”