I saw TV On The Radio last night in Austin. The band tore through a collection of old and new. “Starring at the Sun” received the biggest reaction throughout the night. It’s good to have the band playing live dates again. I caught their last show pre-hiatus in San Francisco a few years ago. The band’s new album, Nine Types of Light, arrives on April 12th. Listen/download a new track from said record below:
By Jon Stone | @jwstone <– follow me on twitter for updates during the rest of the fest.
Grant Park was really lovely yesterday on the opening day of Chicago’s biggest music festival. The sun was out, but not too hot (most of the day). The crowd seemed a bit more evenly dispersed with the new acreage that the Lolla folks have opened up; the food was tasty (gyros and giganto- truffle fries for me, thank you very much), and I still drank three liters of water. Oh, and the music…
Here’s a quick rundown of my day:
Mavis Staples: I arrived at the north end of the park and into a swarm of dragonflies. They gracefully hovered just above the crowd gathered at the Budweiser stage and Mavis and her band played “The Weight.” Seems a bit weird, huh? But it sounded fantastic. She was joined on stage a bit later by Jeff Tweedy (who, as you likely know, produced her upcoming record) who played acoustic guitar and back-up sang on John Fogerty’s “Wrote a Song For Everyone” and also played back-up on the song he wrote for that new record, both of which are titled “You are Not Alone.” Mavis is such a classy lady and it was fun to see Tweedy in this context — she wished Jeff and his wife Susie a happy 15th anniversary. We all wished Mavis Staples a happy 60 years as a performer. What a career!
Drive-By Truckers: I caught about half of the Truckers’ set and enjoyed what I heard. I still haven’t arrived at fan status of this band — I’m just not familiar enough with their catalog. But seeing the band today and watching them interact with their fans was a large stride in that direction.
The New Pornographers: Carl Newman is a great front-man, but I have a bit of a thing for Neko Case (who doesn’t?), but as much as I like her solo work, I like her work with the NPs even more. They put on really great show yesterday, and Case didn’t disappoint (though she did wear a big sun hat through most of the set that made it difficult to see her face). She and Carl Newman joked back and forth about Gaga, Dan Bejar drank beer after beer, and they played a great mix of New Pornos tunes ranging from opener ”Sing Me Spanish Techno,” to the new album opener “Moves.” Other highlights included 2003′s “Testament to Youth in Verse” and an amazing pair of interpreters for the hearing impaired. They seemed to know every word — fascinating to watch.
Dirty Projectors: This is going to be the one that I remember for the rest of the year, I think. I’ve been a fan of Bitte Orca for a while now, but the record has stuff on it that I figured couldn’t be reproduced live. I was so wrong. “Stillness is the Move” and “Temecula Sunrise” are complicated enough, but then the women in the band started doing this as the intro to “Remade Horizon.” My mouth is still gaping. I read some bad press of this performance on a famous Chicago publication writer’s blog, and I just flat out disagree. Not only did the harmonies during this performance mesh, but the band manages to do it while playing some of the most intricate guitar duets I’ve ever seen. To me, the complicated nature of the music is what makes it so amazing to see rather than just hear on the record. I will never pass up an opportunity to see these guys play again — like I said yesterday via twitter, it was like being at a prog-rock choir concert.
Jamie Lidell: Every once in a while I come across an artist that I I can’t believe I’ve never heard of because their work is such a perfect fit into my interests. Lidell fits that description perfectly. I’ve been jamming his records all week in prep for Lolla with exactly that thought. Lidell and his band take the best of Stevie Wonder’s 70s funk and revitalize it, imbuing it with the modern sampling and laptop shenanigans that Lidell was first famous for. But looking like Jon Hamm with a beard and singing like he could have shared the stage with Mavis earlier, he had me absolutely captivated. A few songs in, and who should turn up? Pat Sansone! He doesn’t get enough of an opportunity to shake that tambourine with Wilco, so did some for Lidell as well. He also played the melodica on a few songs and is credited with production of a few songs on Lidell’s new record Compass. All this was to say that I am now a fan of Jamie Lidell. A big one. (oh, and also to say that I think its funny when Sansone shakes a tambo.)
The Strokes: Lady Gaga was the biggest draw on Friday. Evidence was everywhere. Girls with crazy hats, dudes in head-to-toe neon… it was a sight. It’s estimated that over two thirds of Friday’s attendees were Gaga-ing. I didn’t even make it over to that side of the park. It’s a long walk. The Strokes, regardless of the audience-split, put on a show. It was my first time seeing Julian Casablancas and his crew, and the first time anyone in America has seen the band play in something like four years. When the Strokes first hit it big, I was hesitant to jump on the band wagon — there were too many copy-cat groups and it seemed like it was all happening too fast. It seemed like a fad and I didn’t even listen to Is This It when it came out in 2001. Tragic, huh? A few years later I fixed all that — repented of my rash and judgmental ways (and also by then, the wheat had been separated from the chaff, copy-band-wise). Last night The Strokes proved to me once and for all (the rest of the audience didn’t need any convincing) that they are the real deal: Blistering guitar work; incredible vocal range and sound; perfect pop/rock tunes.
Here’s the setlist:
New York City Cops / The Modern Age / Hard to Explain / What Ever Happened? / You Only Live Once / Soma / This is It / Vision of Division / I Can’t Win / Reptilia / Last Nite /(encore:) Juicebox / Someday / Under Control / Heart in a Cage / Take it or Leave it
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Saturday should be great as well. I’m looking at Stars, Dawes, Grizzly Bear, Deer Tick, Spoon(!) and Phoenix as my must-sees. Let me know if there is anything else I can’t miss.
If your a huge fan of The Strokes like me, then you have probably already heard about drummer Fabrizio Moretti’s side project, Little Joy. But if you haven’t heard this new band yet, please pay attention. You just might like what you’ll hear (or love it!)
The trio, rounded out by Rodrigo Amarante (former singer and guitarist of Brazilian rockers Los Hermanos) and Moretti’s girlfriend, Binki Shapiro, recruited producer Noah Gerogeson (Devendra Banhart, Joanna Newsom, Mason Jennings) and made an 11-song, 30-minute self-titled debut album. Great. But now that you’re aware of the Strokes connection, you probably only care about one thing – does it sound like The Strokes? No…and yes. Confused? Read on.
There are a lot of different little shades that make Little Joy such a wonderful debut album. It has a vintage analog, warm recording quality that sort of makes it sound like it was cut somewhere in California in the late 60′s. From Beach Boys barroque pop to Portuguese troubador, the songs wear many different masks. And from ukulele’s to mellotrons, many different instruments are heard on the tracks.
Opener “The Next Time Around” is a sway-worthy ditty conjuring up images of Hawaii and beaches of yesteryear, with its three-part harmonies and dub bassline. “Brand New Start,” the album’s catchiest tune, sounds like a 60′s AM radio pop hit, with clean electric guitar glimmering with just the right amount of reverb and a big band section tucked away in the back: “There ain’t no lover like the one I got/She and I in a brand new start/There ain’t no lover like the one I got/Love won’t bring me down, oh no.” I wonder if Shapiro blushed when she first heard the song, as it’s pretty obvious Moretti wrote it for her.
“No One’s Better Sake” sounds like a vintage reggae track with great harmonies, vintage organs, and Moretti doing his best “Strokes drummer” impression, all with some extra latin percussion for good measure. “What are we waiting for?” they sing. Good question – this song makes me feel like hitting the beach instead of working for a living.
Shaprio takes the lead vocal on “Unattainable,” a nice sparse song with just a simple guitar strum, subtle bass, light percussion and choral harmonies of “Ohhhh” provided by the men of Little Joy. “I can’t coerce you into this one/Jealousy lay all your spells to bed/I’ll choose unloved instead” she sings with such an easy delivery that it almost seems like it was recorded without her knowing (“Oh, you were rolling tape?).
Amarante carries his croon into “With Strangers,” which sounds like it could easily be just a 4-track cassette demo. With Amarante and his acoustic guitar, he strums along: “I’ll keep holding on to you/See no use for perfecting lives with strangers/If only you, if only now.” There’s also what appears to be a glockenspiel solo, but considering the song basks in Georgeson’s lo-fi approach, it could actually be a piano.
“Keep Me In Mind” is a more upbeat, slightly louder song that sounds like the closest thing to The Strokes you’ll get on Little Joy. With a twin-fuzzy electric guitar attack and added percussion in the chorus, the song simply asks “Even though we had to say goodbye, keep me in mind?” The very next song, the cleverly titled “How to Hang a Warhol,” continues with the garage rock guitars and is rather danceable: “Mama someday you’ll be proud of me/Someday you’ll see me hanging in a New York gallery” Amarante mumbles. Not to spoil it, but the song does have some of the best lyrics on the album.
“Don’t Watch Me Dancing” is another featuring Shapiro on lead vocals. She works well as a storyteller and her words ever so slightly slip from her lips. With mostly a couple of guitars and Amarante and Moretti providing backing vocals, she tells the story of Margarita. Whether she’s real, I don’t know, but she sounds interesting: “In conversation she’d often contend/Costumes build customs out of all dead-ends.” The song unfolds with a quick horn and strings section and chant before nicely dissipating.
Album closer, “Evaporar,” is simply Amarante strumming an acoustic guitar singing in portuguese. Rather peaceful, it’s a great closer to a laid-back album like such. While I don’t know what he’s singing, Amarante’s gentle mumble-of-a-croon is a perfect balance with the sound of the guitar.
If you really want Little Joy sound like a Strokes record, then it does. You can close your eyes and say if Julian Casablancas had a bit more range with his vocals, and was influenced by a lot of Beach Boys and Latin American music, then this is what the Strokes could sound like. But Little Joy deserves better. This album is a great little mellow affair (and I mean that in the best way possible) worthy of much more than just Strokes comparisons. It stands alone quite strongly and Moretti and Amarante can now boast they are (or were, in Amarante’s case) part of two great bands. Now if only Nikolai Fraiture’s side project, Nickel Eye, were any good, then we’d have a real battle royale between he, Moretti, and Album Hammond, Jr. over who doesn’t need the Strokes the most. Until then, go buy Little Joy and sit tight for that fourth Strokes LP.
