The Canals

Good Bad Not Evil

2007-09-15T20:36:00.000-04:00

Like diet coke with lime, The Black Lips

Fellow Canalsman, Jacob, recently complained: “I hate movies with plot. Now, Hitchcock, he just set up a feeling and gave a twist. He gave you diet coke with lime.” I never thought of plot as a bad thing, and what’s more, I thought it was actually integral to a good movie. Crazy notion, I guess. But then when you consider it, some of Hitchcock’s best works were almost retardedly simple: town gets attacked by birds, man in wheelchair witnesses murder, exec runs from spies. It's the Twilight Zone principle: try to make something simple seem extraordinary. Aside from being a fan of diet coke with lime, Jacob is a huge garage rock fan. He's probably the biggest White Stripes fan I know, so I guess his whole simplification and minimalism thing spans both movies and music.

Yesterday I picked up the Black Lips new release, Good Bad Not Evil, an album that pursues a raw and heavy aesthetic with a few notable twists. It might be a stretch to say it, but I'd call it the diet coke with lime of rock & roll. There's no sugar here, all substance. When the album swerves into less conventional territory, the four fellas find themselves out of the garage and out on the range. Songs like "Navajo" and "How Do You Tell A Child That Someone Has Died," show that the Atlanta band has absorbed some seriously countrified influences. And I guess that would be the lime. All bad metaphors aside, Good Bad Not Evil has had constant playtime since yesterday and makes me wish to God I was 21, so that I could see them tomorrow at the Khyber.

The Black Lips -- Navajo
The Black Lips -- Bad Kids
The Black Lips -- How Do You Tell A Child That Someone Has Died

-Benjy

Highest Estimate Yet

2007-09-14T12:35:00.000-04:00

Sometimes we can lose perspective. Especially when trying to get some transparency from total opacity. A disturbing poll from British agency estimates conflict-related civilian deaths in Iraq at 1.2 million. Read the LA Times article here.

Dr. Dog -- Livin A Dream

-Benjy

MTV, the Great Enabler

2007-09-12T12:47:00.000-04:00

Over a decade ago, Beck put to music the precise feeling I get when I think about Sunday night's bizzaro MTV Video Music Awards. As his first official release on Flipside Records, "MTV Makes Me Want To Smoke Crack" tidily encapsulates how most music lovers have come to regard the station. I originally thought the song was a snide response to fears about youth corruption, but the truth is that Beck was just plain pissed off that his peers (especially the flakes that worked with him at the video store) bought into the squeaky clean MTV image. It's almost too perfect that these observations, as featured in "Loser," helped him get a spot in the video lineup a few years later.

I love those videos/ I watch them all day/ And I plug 'em in my eyballs... hey!/
And the colors are nice and the pictures are nice/ And the girls are nice, everything's so nice

I like to think that with the recording of "MTV" he had a vision of a future in which the station-heads attempted to re-invigorate the once lucrative career of Britney Spears by parading her ample figure on stage in a diamond-studded bikini. That’s why MTV makes me want to smoke crack.

Beck -- MTV Makes Me Want To Smoke Crack (unfortunately, this version does not include the goof-ball jazz lounge coda that can be found on a later release)

-Benjy

Chocolate

2007-09-10T21:36:00.000-04:00

"Sittin' on the front porch, ice cream in my hand/
meltin' in the sun, i've got chocolate on my tongue/
and that's good enough reason to live"

A few days ago I read about a new chocolate creation by Lindt. Sold only in select locations, the bar contains 99% cocoa. The article described in detail the experience of eating such a pure variety of such a common treat. Apparently, pure chocolate has a completely different taste than the “chocolate” we’ve grown up loving. The package even comes with a warning label, instructing the eater on how to gradually work his way up the cocoa ladder.

Besides leaving me desperate for a taste of this mysterious confection, reading about pure chocolate got me thinking about what it would be like if everything was so uncorrupted. Fruit juice would be made only from fruit, squeezed straight from the tree to the bottle. Milk would be whole, with no skimming of anything. Music would be 100% unproduced, reality shows 100% unscripted, body odor 100% unmasked.

By isolating the very elements that exist today they would be made stronger, and our perception of the world would change drastically. We would be bombarded with stimuli of concentrations never before experienced, and would be literally bowled over by the sensation. As with the chocolate, we’d have to start off small, and work our way up to the natural state of things. But once we arrive, there would be no looking back. How could there be, with such vivid sights ahead?

The Wood Brothers - Chocolate On My Tongue
The Beta Band - Pure For
Voxtrot - Real Life Version
Nizlopi - Clear (live)
Charles Wright - Doin' What Comes Naturally

-danny

Vampire Weekend

2007-09-08T18:59:00.000-04:00

"Can you stay up to see the dawn/in the colors of Benetton?/
is your bed made? is your sweater off?/do you want to? like you know I do?"

I know what you're thinking: "Is Danny planning on going to a blood bar this weekend?" Unfortunately, as appetizing as it sounds, the answer is no (I'm not 21).

Vampire Weekend, besides being some sort of fetish covered on CSI, is an up-and-coming band from Brooklyn. After attending Ivy League rival Columbia University, Ezra Koenig, Rostam Batmanglij, Christopher Tomson, and Chris Baio formed a group they categorize on myspace as Punk/New Wave/Classical.

I don't know if I actually agree with any of those categorizations, but what I do know is that their music is an impressive collaboration of different styles. It sounds to me part Carribean, part Afro-beat, and, the string arrangements especially, distinctly American. We talked yesterday in my "World Music and Culture" class about the globalization of music, and these guys are the perfect example. They integrate their influences without blurring them, and end up with a sound all their own. The music is exotic but has great, accessible melodies, and the "new" factor never seems forced. They pull off as believable a bittersweet and kind-of-pissed-off as they do a laid-back and beach-party.

Their album, which will officially be released in January, is already one of my favorites. They're playing at the M room in Philly on the 13th and I'm hoping to be there. Buy their EP, visit their myspace, and enjoy these songs.

Vampire Weekend - Mansard Roof
Vampire Weekend - Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa
Vampire Weekend - Walcott

-danny

The Pains of Distance

2007-09-08T16:52:00.000-04:00

"Oh my love, though our bodies may be parted/Though our skin may not touch skin
Look for me with the sun-bright sparrow/I will come on the breath of the wind"

Canal. An artificial waterway for navigation. A long narrow arm of the sea penetrating far inland. A tubular passage or cavity for food.

It wasn't until this final definition for canal did I feel at home here at The Canals. Nothing in my life is artificial, long or narrow. Now, a tubular cavity for food. Nail on the head my friends. Nail on the head.

My biggest hesitation in joining The Canals came from my fear of working without direction. I'm a business student, I need an idea of the final goal, I need teammates that need my direction and I need spreadsheets, dammit. So, in order to allow the blogwatchers out there the opportunity to get to know me, I will talk about what I've been feeling most recently.

As the only Canal in a committed long distance relationship, I deal with the pains and frustrations of feeling lonely on a daily basis. All the cuddling and wrestling with Benjy, Danny and Jacob just can't compare to the comfort of my girlfriend.

If everything went as planned for me in the initiation of a relationship, they would be narrated by The Vision of a Dying World. I mentioned them in my original guest post in early May. These boys do a great job at making college, folk music a little more sophisticated and slightly more appealing to the pop fan. Here's the story of Mary and how she fell in love with a man at his first concert.

The Vision of a Dying World - The Time and Place for Everything

Unfortunately, chance is rarely on my side, and more significantly, I never have the guts to make the first move. In fact, all my attempts at first moves in relationships usually end the same way they do for The Magnetic Fields. I always ended up Tongue-Tied and feeling useless too.

The Magnetic Fields - I'm Tongue-Tied

I'm a pretty emotional, sensitive guy. In fact, I emotionally attach myself to things I care about really quickly. Mario Puzo described Michael Corleone's feelings for his Italian love as being struck by a lightening bolt. I can relate. So, approximately three kisses after the first, I'm in for the long haul. Unfortunately, I cannot help the fact that I am stuck 1200 miles from my "sweetheart left behind." Fortunately, there are bands like the Decemberists, who formulate thoughts into wonderful meledies, keeping me sane for now.

The Decemberists - Yankee Bayonet

-Alex

They Like Me! They Really Like Me!

2007-09-07T19:45:00.000-04:00

"When I was surrounded by the world/
you were the only one who came"

As a new Canal, I really only have two people to thank. They are hardworking individuals who have improved my life and those of countless others through the power of the internet and mind control. They are also dear friends, so I want to dedicate my post to Daniel and Benjamin.

Daniel Boone, of course, brought legitimacy to the West. As a native of Colorado I can assure you it is an honor we are quickly losing. That is why Benjamin Franklin, founder of my school, is so important to me.

As a kind of ice-breaker for you and me, and the filthy people looking in on us, I wanted to pick some of my favorite music. Actually, my favorite music being produced by artists still alive/worth following.

As a child, I looked up to Weird Al as the pinnacle of artistic achievement. He had it all- catchy hooks, sweet rhymes, and a rebel attitude. It was a strange, awkward time in my life.

That was before I listened to The Beatles. I started with older music as it was both easily accessible and unappealing to most of my classmates, the latter being very important to me at the time.

Since Paul first whispered sweet nothings into my ear, I've started listening to many more things. I like to think I am "With it," what the kids call "hep" and "edgy." But in reality, most of the new music I listen to echoes the music I first fell in love with: Bowie, Pink Floyd, The Cars, Zeppelin, The Beatles, and anything else that the kids who beat me up in elementary school didn't like. I hope you had a difficult childhood too.

Cold War Kids - Saint John
Dr. Dog - The Girl
Iron & Wine - Freedom Hangs Like Heaven
The Raconteurs - Blue Veins
The New Pornographers - Myriad Harbor

The last song is from the new New Pornographers album, which I was supposed to review here. That's what Danny and Benjy get for giving me some freedom. I'll review it soon, but listen to Myriad Harbor and you'll know all you need to know about it.

-Jacob

Send The Canals to Space!!

2007-09-06T19:02:00.000-04:00

"We are living in the future, I'll tell you how I know, I read it in the paper fifteen years ago. We're all driving rocket ships and talking with our minds, and wearing turquoise jewelry and standing in soup lines."

-John Prine

Please, send us there

Of all the stellar bodies, the crew at the Canals have always felt the most taunted by the Moon. It sits up there, peering down all night -- sometimes with enough gall to show it's sorry face in the daylight -- just begging for another visitor. But for as close and tempting as it is, we've tried to keep ourselves grounded. I mean, COME ON, we know we ain't goin up there...

...or do we?

Business Week broke the story of the century earlier today: Virgin Galactic, Richard Branson's space tourism enterprise, is opening a spaceport in nearby Upham, New Mexico. For just a $200,000 deposit, you can reserve a space ticket (or, galactic boarding pass) to liftoff from Spaceport America. And that's just what we at the Canals plan to do.

With your help.

We've managed to gather a great group of artists for an online benefit concert. If you just scroll down, you'll find that musicians ranging from Hem to Herbie Hancock have generously donated their megabytes to our cause. If you're feeling the music and feeling generous, feel free to donate to the Moonbloggers foundation and help a couple down-to-earth guys go to the moon.

Spiritualized - Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space
Hem - Lord, Blow The Moon Out Please
Feist - My Moon My Man
Herbie Hancock (feat. Sting) - Sister Moon
Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova - The Moon
Jeremy Fisher - Living On The Moon
Dr. John - Traveling Moon
Belle & Sebastian - Waiting For The Moon To Rise

-Benjy + Danny

Holding the Conch Shel

2007-09-05T13:12:00.000-04:00

So now that the Canals has re-entered the blogosphere (hopefully without causing the “massive blogstinction” that I’ve heard so much about), it’s time to share some material that I think we all can relate to. Over the summer, I discovered an album by the beloved children’s book author and illustrator, Shel Silverstein. A far cry from the stuff of kids he’s known for, Silverstein’s Great Conch Train Robbery is a wild, sickly amusing country album that gives a whole new dimension to his broad catalogue of books, poems, and plays.

It seems that while simultaneously entertaining and molding the youth of the past four decades with his genius brand of dark and heartfelt storytelling, Silverstein produced gobs of written and recorded material for a more mature age set. Perhaps his most famous foray as a songwriter is the raucously funny, Grammy winning, "A Boy Named Sue," made famous by Johnny Cash in 1970. After playing a few songs for some friends, I heard his gruff voice described as a mix of Bob Dylan and Tom Waits (although Waits himself often sounds like a mix between Bob Dylan and Tom Waits). However you choose to describe it, it’s exactly how I’d like to imagine his written word being read. Imagine a bedtime with "Uncle Shelby's" bald head hovering above, reading The Giving Tree in a strained, gravelly voice (note: that may be the most unintentionally perverted thing I have ever written). I think the kid would go into a coma and never wake up.

Shel Silverstein -- Quaaludes Again
Shel Silverstein -- The Great Conch Train Robbery

-Benjy

We're Back!

2007-09-04T22:19:00.001-04:00

"Born on the desert floor you've the deepest thirst/
and you came to my sweet shores to indulge it"

Benjy and I didn’t quite agree on the best way to re-enter the blogosphere. I wanted to come back with a post to shake the very foundation of the internet, making a deep and catastrophic impact that would forever change the blogging landscape. I wanted to take out our competition before they knew what hit them, cause a mass blogstinction, usher in the Canalzoic Era.

Benjy was thinking of something on a slightly smaller scale, more along the lines of a shooting star – worthy of a fleeting glance but no bigger than a grain of sand.

So we compromised, and this is the result. A modest premier, featuring our favorite songs from the summer.

We do have one trick up our sleeve, though. We’d like to take this opportunity to announce that we have officially added two staff writers to the team. You may remember them from our guest week last semester: Jacob “Cobb Salad” Schutz and Alex “Ander²” Anderson. Coincidentally, they also happen to be our roommates this year. With this team in place, you can expect to see a quality post every day of every week. And with our forthcoming overhaul of the website, you won’t want to go a day without checking The Canals (in fact, you might as well join the Facebook group “I check the canals daily”).

Here’s some summer music to kick off the fall:

Danny’s picks:

Sam Prekop – Something
Miracle Fortress – Next Train
Travis – My Eyes
The Shins – Red Rabbits
Hem – The Beautiful Sea

Benjy’s picks:

Sam Cooke – You Send Me
The Shaky Hands – The Sleepless
Cornelius – Chapter 8 – Seashore And Horizon
8 Ball & MJG – 9 Little Millemeta Boys
Os Mutantes – Hey Boy

-danny

Banished!

2007-07-02T16:14:00.001-04:00

Frederick Church's Twighlight in the Wilderness, 1860

Fearless freinds! WEIRD TIMES, so strange. So, I'm stuck up in the desolate hills of... some... God, I don't know... It's been so long since I've talked to anyone. Well, nobody that could talk back to me. The trees and bushes don't make for much conversation. Coniferous bastards! I could be in New Hampshire, Vermont... Maine..... even Canada. It's beautiful, in a terrifyingly lonely sort of way.

Earlier this June I started working for a posh Northeastern summer camp in the hills of.... I... can't.. remember what state. It had the works -- jet skis, motorboats, full spa, jet packs -- and it was perfect. Perfect... yeah, I really screwed up. Damn this solitude!!(!) Well, I lost paradise and began my torment about eight or so days ago, when I set out with my troop on a hike to Bails Pond.

The campers were having a great time, scooting along on their hoverboards, snapping pictures of cybernetic dear and moose (built and set out into the wilderness by the camp director, Dr. Lars Beckins) with their camera-phones/trouser-hemmers, and laughing all the way. I can still here their joyous laughter ringing in my ears like screeching feedback and wind chimes. About four miles out from Bails pond, on as small stretch of bare trail just above the treeline, we rested and snacked on G.O.R.P. and peanut butter sandwiches. That's when I heard the screeching begin. It started faintly, like the squealing of far off tires, and quickly escalated in pitch and fierceness. A sad, horrifying shadow descended on the troop... I looked to the sky to see a giant black shape swooping down on the boys. If it was a bird... a condor, maybe? Or could it have been one of Dr. Beckins' monstrous mechanical creations? I don't know, and I may never know. Whatever it was, I ran from it, sweaty and weird as Hell. I tumbled down the trail, skampering off into a knoll in the side of the hill, all the while listening to the disgusting shreiking of the boys and the bird.

And I continued running... I couldn't go back to the camp, not with this shame. And so I ran and tumbled along the wild paths and forests of the great Northeast. Crying most of the way, I attempted to avoid settlements and trackers. I'm sure there were trackers, as Dr. Beckins had taken samples of each of the counselors' unique scents for his bloodhounds (mecha-hounds, perhaps?) to follow in case of dissertion. And now I write to you, from a computer console of sorts that I've fashioned out of leaves, dung, and various bones... hoping that someone will hear my plea and rescue me from this lonely Hell of my own creation. God speed, and good luck.

-"danny " (Benjy)

p.s. Sorry, no music this time. But a friendly suggestion: I've been listening to quite a bit of Manu Chao and Rocky Votolato recently, so check those guys out. Manu's Clandestino and Votolato's Makers are fantastic.

On Holiday

2007-06-27T16:12:00.000-04:00

To y'all: It seems the Canals has unfortunately hit a slow season in its summer life. With Danny off at summer camp (what a child) and myself roughing it in the Guatemalan wilds, we will not be making nearly as many posts as we would like in the next few weeks. For now, here's our boy Cobb's review of the White Stripes latest, Icky Thump.

Benjy has been asking me whether I reviewed Icky since the day it was released. White Stripes albums do a weird thing to a man. With every album of theirs I’ve heard (excepting the infectiously catchy Get Behind Me Satan) I’ve initially been underwhelmed. Maybe it’s the absence of a bass to line the bottom of their songs, or Meg’s simple drumming, but I never love their albums on first listen.

I am now, however, a believer. Two overreaching comments about it as a whole: 1) Everyone was hyping the album by saying it was “heavy.” Maybe it’s because I only have a mass-less digital copy of the album (legally purchased, for all the Penn Law admissions officers out there), but I never felt the supposed weight of the album. Perhaps since it was their first album recorded in a modern studio, but I would describe the sound as big. Like Led Zeppelin as stadium rock. 2) This is not their pop album, which is strange since it was released under Warner Bros. and has been pimped on MTV. Get Behind Me Satan (and Jack’s other band’s last effort, “Broken Boy Soldiers”) must have exhausted the easy-on-the ear radio jams in Jack’s repertoire. What we have here is a clash between screeching solos and bizarre riffs.

Which, I think, is the only way the Stripes could go. Jack’s simple hooks and Meg’s austere drumming carried them through 5 albums. Now, Jack is adding more riffs and more solos to each song. The track listing shows 13 tracks, but that number should at least be 26. Nearly every song has multiple personality disorder (or Dissociative Identity Disorder if you follow DSM-IV*). Just listen to 300 MPH Torrential Outpour Blues’ tortured oscillations between quiet blues and scorching rock and roll; or perhaps I’m Slowly Turning Into You’s giant organ and rollicking guitar.

My only real complaint of the album is the complete lack of piano. It is, however, made up for by a dueling trumpet-guitar track (“Conquest”), two bagpipe tracks (both of which are great, don’t be fooled by critics), organ, and a synthesizer.

Reading other reviews, no body seems to be able to come to a consensus. This is the Stripe’s worst album — it’s their revitalization. It’s refreshing — it’s juvenile. “Conquest” is a bad joke — “Conquest” is the best track on the album. Perhaps that’s because no critic is listening to the album the proper way: while driving too fast around hairpin mountain turns in a 1987 Honda Accord with very loud and very shitty speakers.They'd realize it's soul revitalizing blues for the flogged spirit of rock and roll.

*I think we all know psychology is a pseudo-science.

-Jacob Schutz, poet laureate

A Southern Perspective

2007-06-18T18:26:00.000-04:00

I recently took a weekend road trip to the eastern-most tip of West Virginia, to the small college town called Shepherdstown. Residing a few miles from the historic Antietam battlefield, Shepherdstown is, naturally, home to a fairly large Confederate cemetery. I’ve been to my fair share of cemeteries, mostly due to my dad’s unhealthy obsession with the dead of history, but until now I had never been to a solely Confederate cemetery. Keeping in mind what a friend’s Virginian relative had told me about the youth of the South (There may be no truth to this: he had said that few southern boys have not imagined themselves dying for the South, despite the historical outcome), my friends and I took some time to survey the area and soak up the vibes of bizarre futility and useless death.

And then I began to think about how most of the great songs that I know that glorify the South’s cause were not written by southerners, but mostly foreigners. For example, there’s the Band’s classic The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down (written by Robbie Robertson, a Canadian), and Elton John’s My Father’s Gun (Taupin/John, Englishmen), both seemingly sympathetic songs for the Confederate cause. To non-American songwriters, an understanding of the southern perspective of the American Civil War should be as foreign as a feud between two rocks on the outer galactic belt. But it seems that many have been able to take the point of view as a compelling and passionate (yet horribly deranged and misguided) voice for a song. A key point, though: both of these songs neglect any mention of racist motives, only nationalistic. For that, there’s always that cantankerous Canuck, Neil Young.

The Band -- The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down
Elton John -- My Father's Gun
Neil Young -- Southern Man

-Benjy

Primary Colors

2007-06-15T01:51:00.001-04:00

Through the magic of e-mail, a couple of fresh new artists have recently come to our attention here at the Canals. To promote their respective new releases, Los Angeles native Frankel and North Carolina's own Bowerbirds have sent us a few tracks that have now found their way onto my regular playlist in the past few days. First, we'll deal with Frankel:

"It's a shame spending days/ In the throws of tooth decay"

Frankel (or, as he is known to his familiars, Michael Orendy), has been described as a fresh mix of the Flaming Lips, Elliott Smith, and Wilco. It's understandable that this is the simplest way of marketing an artist, but is it really necessary to label him so directly? It also seems to explain why we were contacted about him, as our previous posts have included such musicians, but such a cursory and unimaginative description alone shouldn't persuade someone to listen to Frankel. After all, why make brown when you can get the primary colors? Stepping over some pretty hefty piles of bullshit, I put my ear to the phonograph and had a listen to the tracks off his debut album, Lullaby For The Passerby.

The songs are sunny affairs with catchy melodies and pleasing instrumentation, definitely worth a look at the rest of the album. There was one thing that rubbed me a bit awkwardly, though. I couldn't resolve whether I was impressed by Orendy performing all of the instruments, or if it made it seem less organic or full in some way. Despite that little capo on my brain, I really enjoyed the songs, and if I had to make a comparison to anyone it would probably be fellow indie-folk troubadour, Benjy Ferree. The romping drums and up-tempo strumming on Thermostat really reminded me of In the Countryside off of Ferree's Leaving the Nest. So, now that I've added my own two cents, check out Frankel's new release, Lullaby For The Passerby.

Frankel -- Thermostat
Frankel -- Tooth Decay

Buy Lullaby here.

-Benjy

Under The Covers with Traditional

2007-06-13T00:10:00.000-04:00

"Amazing grace how sweet the sound/That saved a wretch like me/
I once was lost but now I'm found/Was blind but now I see"

Second Hand Songs lists The Beatles as the most covered artist in existence, but I have to argue that Traditional is the rightful bearer of the title. Not much is known about the man, but it seems like pretty much every artist out there has been drawn to his music at some point or another. In this post alone we feature artists ranging from Aretha Franklin to Dropkick Murphys, from Willie Nelson to Veggie Tales (I'm gonna go out on a limb and say this is the only time in history the latter two have been mentioned in the same sentence, although I could see Willy being a big fan).

Some highlights: Spirtualized somewhat ironically begins its "Peace On Earth" variation of the song with the Star-Spangled Banner. Paul Simon and Ladysmith Black Mambazo drift into an African language about halfway through. Aretha Franklin manages to drag it out to 11 minutes. Dropkick Murphys' cover fucking rocks, obviously. Jerry Garcia's is my personal favorite. Bela Fleck adds some much-needed banjo to the mix. We saw Braddigan perform the song at World Cafe, although without a segue from "Walk With You." Pete Seeger's is marked "explicit."

On a slightly heavier note, this is a bittersweet post for me. On Friday I'll be leaving for eight weeks to work as a counselor at a camp in NH. Unfortunately, what the mountain air enjoys in crispness it lacks in WiFi. I'm aiming for a post every three days, but Benjy's gonna have to hold down most of the fort for the remainder of the summer. And seeing as he's living in the Midwest, the fort could suffer some serious decay over the coming weeks.

But hope is not lost. Before you know it, The Canals will be at 110% again, swinging for the fences, going for the jugular, busting its ass, taking what the defense gives it, and playing an all around solid game. We have some big surprises in store for the fall (when a Canal says big, he means BIG), so make sure to stick around. And who knows, maybe you won't even notice I'm gone.

Charlie Daniels - Amazing Grace
Jerry Garcia - Amazing Grace
moe. - Amazing Grace
Rod Stewart - Amazing Grace
Willie Nelson - Amazing Grace
Veggie Tales - Amazing Grace
Spirtualized - Amazing Grace
Pete Seeger - Amazing Grace
Aretha Franklin - Amazing Grace
Dropkick Murphys - Amazing Grace
Paul Simon & Ladysmith Black Mambazo - Amazing Grace
Bela Fleck & The Flecktones - Amazing Grace
Braddigan - Walk With You -> Amazing Grace

-danny

I can wait when I'm dead

2007-06-12T19:09:00.000-04:00

A brain aneurysm

Gee wiz, we're an impatient bunch. Remember back when Wilco streamed Sky Blue Sky online weeks before the album hit the shelves? In an age of pirates and pirate movies, how can this be seen as a good idea? Well, anyhoo, the White Stripes highly anticipated Icky Thump can be legally streamed in full at MTV.com. Tune in and listen up, so you don't get a brain aneurysm from the wait.

Is the only way the music industry can save itself from a suicidal implosion of repetitive and uninspired artists by prematurely ejaculating the only decent music around weeks before its due-date? Maybe... but if that's the way it's gotta be, I won't complain.

-Benjy

TGI(T)

2007-06-12T18:21:00.001-04:00

"You might've heard I run with a dangerous crowd/
We ain't too pretty we ain't too proud"

We take full responsibility if yesterday proved to be an especially painful Monday. It was painful for us, too - too painful even to post TGIM. But Tuesday is the new Monday and The Canals have always been ahead of the curve. Here are some very Friday tunes to cheer up your Monday (Tuesday).

Cornershop - Brimful Of Asha
Jamie Lidell - Multiply
Ben Folds Five - Battle Of Who Could Care Less
Creedence Clearwater Revival - Down On The Corner
Billy Joel - Only The Good Die Young

-danny

Unoriginal Sin

2007-06-12T13:28:00.000-04:00

"In my little town/I grew up believing
God keeps his eye on us all/And he used to lean upon me"

Two stories out of Ohio this week:

It turns out that the same actor who plays Adam in a video at the new Creation Museum can also be seen "posing alongside a drag queen on an explicit Web site he owned." The actor hails from Columbus, Ohio.

In related news, the Pentagon recently confirmed that it intended to build a "Gay Bomb." The idea, proposed by the Ohio Air Force Lab in Dayton, was to release hormones that would "cause enemy soliders to become gay, and to have their units break down because all their soldiers became irresistably attractive to one another."

I'm no expert in the field, and I don't want to raise any alarms in the surrounding area, but it seems like a distinct possibility that there was a gay bomb accident in Ohio and that Adam was hit by the shrapnel. Thank goodness the original Adam didn't suffer the same fate, or else humanity never would've caught on (not to mention that Eve would've been one lonely woman). It looks like Benjy will be unaffected - he was on a road trip to West Virginia at the time.

Simon and Garfunkle - My Little Town

-danny

Save The Corn

2007-06-10T00:02:00.000-04:00

"And the river grew higher and wider/
deeper and darker as I was closing in"

I just finished reading a post on The Vegan Dessert (a recent start-up by my friend JT at Amherst that, I can only assume, was inspired by The Canals) about the dangers of bio-fuel. Apparently, rising gas prices are driving up demand for ethanol-based fuel, which is driving up the price of corn, which will eventually kill starving children in Ethiopia.

But the two problems here - filling the gas tanks of SUVs and filling the stomachs of the poor - can be achieved through one simple measure: develop a new bio-fuel that uses hungry humans as the source. This elegant solution increases the supply of fuel while decreasing the demand for food.

This proposal even goes a step further, and provides for the well-being of corn. (Full disclosure: the poet laureate of The Canals is Jacob "Cobb Salad" Schutz, who may in some way be affiliated with corn on the cob.) It seems like these plants are the ones really getting the short end of the stalk at this point - trust me, they'd rather end up cooked on a grill than as sludge in a tank.

Sometimes the best solution is literally the one right under your nose.

I couldn't find any good corn songs, but here's some great music I heard this week that I probably wouldn't have gotten around to writing about:

Miracle Fortress - Next Train
Bill Callahan - From The Rivers To The Oceans
Chris Bell - You And Your Sister
The Alternate Routes - The Black And The White

-danny

Gonna Sell My House, Buy a Trailer

2007-06-08T01:17:00.000-04:00

Julian, Bubbles, and Ricky... any questions?

First of all, screw Danny. He can just cram it, 'cause he doesn't know just how bad I got it. Since I got back from school I've been eating out of a trough with my eight bow-legged brothers and drinking pure antifreeze just to forget my problems. It's a miracle I even know what the interweb is.

Secondly, check this out:

Canada has brought us many incredible sights, sounds, and smells (not to mention textures; we certainly wouldn't want to forget the textures), but all of those pale in comparison to the one thing still unknown to many Americans. And no, it is not my philosophy professor from last semester, although she was most definitely a delight beyond compare. Actually, it's the television show Trailer Park Boys, available on the Canadian version of Showtime, Showcase. Apparently, Trailer Park Boys (TPB) is wildly successful in the northlands, partially due to its unparalleled hilarity and also to its insistence on being as Canadian as possible. Set as a serialized mockumentary, TPB revolves around Sunnyvale Trailer Park residents, Ricky and Julian, two lowlifes and petty criminals, but overall good guys. It also features an incredibly diverse ensemble cast, including the trailer park supervisor, Mr. Jim Lahey, his shirtless, cheeseburger obsessed boyfriend, Randy, and the ever-lovable sideshow, Bubbles. I've become slightly inappropriate in my love of the show, which has altered my psyche to accept small crimes as morally justifiable, as well as loosened my vocab to include significantly more f-bombs, sh-bullets, and the like. Thankfully the show has been popular enough to merit six seasons, with a seventh in the oven, and two full-length feature films. God bless Canada, God bless. If you can't find this gem of a television show on the store shelves, check it out online wherever you can. I'm going to make no suggestions as to where to look, because I hope you will support this wonderful cause by buying as many of the seasons on DVD as you can.

Cowboy Junkies -- Murder, Tonight, In The Trailer Park (Live)
Beck -- Broken Drum (Boards of Canada Remix)

Buy seasons 1 & 2 here.

-Benjy

Nick Drake's Mom

2007-06-07T21:59:00.000-04:00

"Gold and silver/Is the autumn/
Soft and tender/Are the skies"

So, Benjy was gonna make a great post today but his internet's down. It's no surprise - I heard in Ohio they can only use the village computer twice a week. They have to conserve energy to feed the livestock and run the overall factory.

Anyway, I saw it as an opportunity to make another short post about Nick Drake. On June 19 another collection of his rarities will be released, and this one's a 28-track doozie. It features some really cool stuff, like Nick on the clarinet and his family members singing. "Poor Mum" was actually written by his mom, Molly Drake, and you can hear the influence loud and clear. Besides the covers and cameos, it's great to hear Nick in a casual setting. There are no videos of him in existence, so this is about as close as you can get to experiencing his personality.

Molly Drake - Poor Mum
Nick and Gabrielle (sister) Drake - All My Trials
Nick Drake - Kegelstatt Trio (on clarinet)
Nick Drake - Tomorrow Is A Long Time (Dylan cover)
Nick Drake - Milk and Honey (another Jackson Frank cover)

Order the album here
Check out a documentary posted at aquarium drunkard

-danny

Under The Covers with Daniel Johnston

2007-06-06T18:09:00.000-04:00

"I'm walking down that empty road/
But it ain't empty now/Because I'm on it"

Daniel Johnston is the type of artist who needs covers. He has a bizarre, grating, child-like voice that takes a while to warm to and a short time to grow tired of. He can barely play guitar, and his best music was recorded in his garage using tape decks. Despite this, Johnston is unquestionably one of the most talented and influential songwriters to ever live. Ex-girlfriend (sort of) Kathy McCarty explains her reason for covering Johnston's work:

"Daniel was still in the mental hospital, and he'd been there a long time and I rather thought the possibility existed, sad as it was, that he might never produce anything again. And a lot of the music that he had recorded was to the general populous unlistenable and I felt like people would maybe never get him and he would just be like a flower that bloomed in the desert and was forgotten... So I thought that I would do some of his songs... and do them in such a way that they kind of bloomed and became from, say, a notepaper sketch, they kind of came into a full-color painting."

I highly recommmend the documentary "The Devil and Daniel Johnston." The way that Daniel's life played out is almost mythical. The film includes so much real footage of him growing up that the viewer gets a complete picture of the way that his manic depression influenced his music and took over his life. It also does a great job of talking about his artwork.

Daniel Johnston - Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Your Grievience
Clem Snide - Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Your Grievience

Daniel Johnston - Worried Shoes
Sufjan Stevens & Daniel Smith - Worried Shoes

Daniel Johnston - True Love Will Find You In The End
Beck - True Love Will Find You In The End

Daniel Johnston - Go
Sparklehorse feat. The Flaming Lips - Go

Daniel Johnston - The Sun Shines Down On Me
Guster - The Sun Shines Down On Me

Daniel Johnston - Devil Town
Tony Lucca - Devil Town
Bright Eyes - Devil Town

Check out his art and music at his official website
Read his bio here
Buy the film here

-danny

Rap is Freedom, pt. II

2007-06-06T11:00:00.000-04:00

Here's the second half of my tale fromt the 2007 Hemp Fest rap concert. Check out the first half here to fill in the missing pieces. Part II:

The empty amphitheater

The main thread of Definition's raps revolved around drawing a line between them and mainstream hip-hop, a feat that usually requires some substance to back it up. But instead of substance, we got bombarded with fronts and disses, and strangely enough, references to Napolean Dynomite and U2. I guess they thought they could relate to Central Ohioans at a hippy festival with pop culture name drops. And so these posers continued to hate on the haters as Evan continued to yell about freedom, haircuts, and ice. He quickly and deliberately made his way to the stage and raised his hand as if to ask a question. This got some of the audience interested and some upset, but still there was attention directed toward the ass in the front row.

“He has a question!” Shouted a voice from the audience.
“Yeah, I have a question!” Evan said.
Illogic addressed the mop-haired teen in the undersized Wendy’s shirt by replying, notably confused and annoyed,
“I’m in the middle of my set, man.”
“Well, I’m in the middle of my set,” countered Evan. And it was true, there definitely were two shows going on there that night, one more interesting than the other. All Evan wanted from this rapper was for him to show us that he could in fact put a dirty little punk kid in his place. Nothing was done, and this continued on for some time. Spurts of rap followed by attention to the freedom-obsessed question-punk in the front.

As it turned out, Evan didn’t have a question, but merely wanted to start a rap battle with the defensive Illogic. An avid rap and hip-hop fan, Evan was of the mind that rap should be a discourse in which disagreements can be settled with the mic. Only the best should come out on top, and if to do that it takes a scraggly-haired white kid to be crushed on stage by legitimate freestyle, that’s what it takes. But suspensions of freedom that night only made the situation worse. Before we headed out, during an ultra-hatin’ song about our president, Evan walked onto the stage and started smoking a cigarette. A furious fan slapped it out of his mouth as Illogic stopped to shout obscenities, and the DJ left his cocoon of a record table to deal with the punk on stage. The stage hands gathered as the crowd picked sides. The reluctance by Illogic to face off against his little rival was mirrored by the tameness in the mounting posse, and so it didn’t look like anyone was going to be hurt. To be safe we all escorted our friend out as he shouted back,

“Freedom at Hemp Fest 2007!”

The stage was silent as we walked away.

Visit these to get the whole picture:
Illogic's myspace
Ill Poetic's myspace
The Green Brothers myspace
www.doveink.com

-Benjy

Dry Land

2007-06-05T21:09:00.000-04:00

"I'm only waiting for the proper time to tell you/
That it's impossible to get along with you"

Believe it or not, the interweb is not made up completely of Canals. There's a whole world of dry land out there, waiting to be discovered. Today I ventured out along the shores and was rewarded with some buried treasure.

First, passiveaggressivenotes.com. This is one of a few blogs (Tim Urban's is another) that once I started reading, I couldn't stop until I'd seen every post. Lucky for me this one is only three weeks old, but it's already got a few pages of laugh-out-loud notes. (Mendoza, if you're out there in cyberspace reading this, you should submit the notes your roommate wrote to you. Or maybe submit them here so we can break the story first.) I have a note from a carpenter that I'll be submitting when I retrieve it from storage in the fall.

Second, zillow.com. A much-needed new tool for the amateur stalker, this website approximates the value of any house in the country.

I was going to post music relating to both websites, but I just had way too many great "house" songs. It was hard to narrow it down to these 8:

Hem - Great Houses Of New York
The White Stripes - There's No Home For You Here
Paul Simon - Homeless
Modest Mouse - Sunspots In The House Of The Late
Phish - Farmhouse
"Guitar" George Baker - House Of The Rising Sun
Gorillaz - Rock The House
Jackie Greene - Write A Letter Home

-danny

New Feature: TGIM

2007-06-04T19:39:00.001-04:00

"A little bit of Monica in my life/A little bit of Erica by my side/
A little bit of Rita is all I need/A little bit of Tina is what I see"

First off, I wanted to let you all know that The Canals was recently featured on “Best Week Ever”. We were honored but not surprised. You see, the office of Best Week Ever is located in the same building as Tim Urban’s tutoring company. He was my CIT nine summers ago, was on the 6^th season of The Apprentice, just released his first album, and has an absolutely hilarious blog. So it was really just a matter of time.

Small world? No, big Canal.

In somewhat related news, we’re pleased to announce our third weekly feature: TGIM. I recently noticed that allmusic categorizes songs by theme, and that one is called TGIF. I found that hilarious. According to allmusic, TGIF music is 80s rock and Lou Bega. I realized what a shame it is that we only listen to Mambo #5 at the end of the workweek, instead of at the beginning when we really need it. From now on, every Monday the Canals will post some very Friday songs.

This week the tracks require no commentary – if allmusic says they’re TGIF songs, then by golly they’re TGIF songs. Starting next week, though, we’ll compile the playlist ourselves and make sure to justify exactly why you should be T-ing G after each song.

Sly & The Family Stone – I Want To Take You Higher
Bruce Springsteen – Glory Days
Electric Light Orchestra – Roll Over Beethoven
Dr. John – Let The Good Times Roll
Guns N’ Roses – Paradise City
Fatboy Slim – Going Out Of My Head
The Beach Boys – Good Vibrations
Lou Bega – Mambo #5

-danny

Rap is Freedom, pt. I

2007-06-03T14:06:00.001-04:00

Here's the first half of a story that happened last night. Y'all gonna be hit wit' it in two pieces because I never learned to paraphrase. Part I:

Illogic of Definition

Last night I watched as my friend Evan shut down a rap concert and nearly started a brawl. The show was free, the last in a series at the Ohio State Hemp Fest 2007, an annual event on campus that doesn’t have any more of an excuse to exist other than to sell hip T-shirts and drug paraphernalia. The freeness of the concerts was a condition that lent into two theories. One implies that there is some sort of charity or sponsored act of good will at large, something that would require a degree of respect. Then there is the other side of the coin, which might say that we were not beholden to the folks on stage, and free to act in any manner we see fit. No contract barring any action. And that’s how we thought.

We arrived at the festival, sober as hall monitors, expecting to stay for a max of twenty minutes. The whole idea of throwing a Hemp Fest during the same month as the far more successful and notably more fun Community Fest made me a little uncomfortable, so I certainly didn’t want to stay long. Then Evan began one of his role-playing escapades, a game of sorts where he acts in a particular manner to purposefully misrepresent himself. He started to yell at the top of his lungs to anyone about anything. He shouted about how the ice at the lemonade stand was free, and how we should be more like ice. He harassed the burnt out t-shirt and accessories vendors with nonsensical bursts like,

“This is the biggest variety of sunglasses I’ve ever seen!”
“I’m going to cut my hair ten times tonight!”
“I’m going to get a hair cut and hair extensions at the same time!”

Yelling for the sake of yelling because we were alive and free and young. And on this freedom kick, we showed up to the last concert of the night, the rap group Definition featuring Ill Poetic, The Green Brothers, and the headlining MC, Illogic. A technically sound and proficient group of rappers, Definition was superficially enjoyable to see and hear. Nonetheless, Evan shouted on about freedom, haircuts, and ice, as Definition and Illogic spit rhymes about fakers, players, posers, and haters.

To be continued...

Visit these to get the whole picture:

Illogic's myspace

Ill Poetic's myspace

The Green Brothers myspace

www.doveink.com

Deep Space

2007-05-31T19:22:00.001-04:00

"They were blurry and clean/Outer space in between/
With a depth and a form unclear"

I remember reading a few years ago that scientists had located a black hole that emits a sound 57 octaves below middle C - the lowest note ever observed in the universe, and well outside the audible range for humans. The note has a wavelength millions of miles long, and takes ten million years to complete one modulation. The black hole has been producing this note for over two billion years, providing a sort of cosmic symphony to any entity large and old enough to witness it (the Flying Spaghetti Monster? A polar bear?).

I was happy to hear that the universe had such a powerful bass note, because I've always loved songs that have a steady background a few octaves below the rest of the music. It adds a distinct richness that can't really be achieved any other way. Here are a few songs off the top of my head that fit the bill:

R.E.M. - You Are The Everything (at 2:28)
Phish - Train Song (at 0:38)
Elbow - Grace Under Pressure (at 3:16)
G. Love & Special Sauce - Stone Me (at 0:08)
Radiohead - Exit Music (For A Film) (at 2:50)

And here's a poem by Mikhail Horowitz about the black hole, printed in the New York Times science section on August 3, 2004:

A supermassive ghostly Robeson robed in nothingness,
I serenade the void from the heart of the Perseus Cluster,
underhumming the underpinnings of the galaxies in B flat,
''Smoke Gets in Your Eyes'' at 57 octaves below middle C.
Not even God hears me.

But any one of these icy nights beneath the warbling stars,
those shards of horns long shivered that still take solos,
if you close your eyes you can almost sense my presence,
holding down the cosmic bottom for billions of years,
blowing the antisong of the antispheres.

-danny

Under the Covers with The Band

2007-05-30T12:50:00.000-04:00

"They say ev'ry man needs protection/ They say ev'ry man must fall/

Yet I swear I see my reflection/ Somwhere so high above this wall"

Since grade one, there hasn't been a band that I've obsessed about as irrationally and pervasively as the Band. In the early days of The Canals, as Danny can attest, I had some trouble keeping this from being a 50% Band blog. Shadows of the temptation can be seen in my mention of drummer Levon Helm in a couple of earlier posts along with a few shaky comparisons to contemporary groups. Like a love-sick sea captain writing unstamped letter after unstamped letter, only to mail the lot into the great blue, or an addict trying to kick a bad habit with chewing gum, I would write a few private, unpublished Band posts here and there. That is, only to get them out of my system. But my levees weren't built to last, so I'll hold back the flood no more. Crack open that box of Q-tips in your bathroom closet, clean out those ears, and listen up to the feature that began in a land before time. Here is Under the Covers with The Band!

The Allman Brothers Band – The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down
Listen as Gregg Allman forgets the words and just try not to crack up. He sounds senile as hell.

Wilco – I Shall Be Released (Live)
All I can say is that I wish I had been there.

The Roches – Acadian Driftwood
It’s really refreshing to hear a Band song done by a couple strong, reedy female voices.

Ekoostik Hookah – The Weight (Live)
A very Band-like and soulful rendition done by an excellent Columbus band. I especially like the gruff voice of the singer in the fourth verse.

Flying Dogs -- Katie’s Been Gone
This version by Italian group Flying Dogs is one of the most bizarre songs I’ve heard in a while. The singer sounds almost exactly like the Band’s bassist Rick Danko doing an Italian accent. Auditory gold.

Cowbirds -- Look Out Cleveland
They stick pretty close to the formula and instrumentation set up by the Band, nothing too impressive or mind-blowing here. The inconsistent and overdone southern accent gets a little grating. Should have gone with Italian.

-Benjy

The Forms

2007-05-29T18:37:00.001-04:00

"Talking about music is a game in that you can't talk about music. It's like talking about the human mind. We have no real understanding of how memory works, what purpose dreaming serves, what the function of seemingly unused areas of our brains is. The truth about music is also beyond our comprehension. When you change one note of a great melody, why do the composer and you and I all realize it's ruined? We don't really know why it's ruined, just that it's ruined... Icarus works in a way that is especially hard to talk about."
-The Forms

It was the track names, not the stellar reviews, that made me pick up the new untitled album from The Forms. Track 5 is called "Borges" (Benjy's grandfather) and track 9 is called "Oberlin" (Benjy's brother's alma mater) so I knew the band had some cosmic connection with The Canals.

Turns out this blog is far from the only thing The Forms have connected with. Both of their albums were produced by Steve Albini (Nirvana, Pixies) and the music has received pretty much the best reviews I've ever read. The band has been compared to Sunny Day Real Estate, Nirvana, and Modest Mouse, but they remind me of a less melodic and more rockin' version of The Shins. They literally march to the beat of their own drummer, with almost every track in either 5, 7, or some other bizarre time signature that I couldn't even recognize. It's like they hear music in a completely different meter than other bands.

The music feels a little like an instrumental track to another song. Sometimes it feels like something's missing, but your ears are constantly bombarded with so much sound that it's impossible to put your finger on what it might be. It creates a weird situation where it sounds a little like background music but it requires and holds your complete attention. It's haunting and powerful - the type of music with nothing specific to cling to but that you won't be able to stop thinking about any time soon.

The albums have been described as mysterious, but even more mysterious is the band's lack of presence in the blogosphere. A total of four blogs have written about The Forms, and none have featured tracks from the new (not-yet-released) album. This despite Pitchfork giving their debut album Icarus an 8.5 and naming it the "#1 album of the year." They deserve better, and The Canals is here to provide just that.

From Icarus:

The Forms - Stravinsky
The Forms - Sunday 1

From [Untitled]:

The Forms - Oberlin
The Forms - Transmission

The Forms' Myspace
Buy Icarus here (for $2.34...)

-danny

Searching For Polar Bears: A Multimedia Essay

2007-05-28T20:40:00.000-04:00

"Someone told me/It's all happening at the zoo/
I do believe it/I do believe it's true."

Rather than barbecuing or parading, I spent my Memorial Day weekend on a quest to find the king of the ice. Yesterday my crew and I got on a train and headed due north -- to the heart of the Bronx.

Simon & Garfunkel - At The Zoo

We started out on the African plains. A long way from the North Pole, but interesting in its own right. We were greeted by a zebra.

Elbow - Scattered Black And Whites
Michael Jackson - Black Or White
The White Stripes - Black Math
Nate Allman - Stripes

On our way out of Africa we noticed two monkeys grooming each other, and we took turns doing the same. Under the beating savannah sun it's important to keep your hygiene in mind.

Outkast - So Fresh, So Clean
Chuck Prophet - What Makes The Monkey Dance

We met up with some gorillas. This one was deep in thought.

Ben Folds - Philosophy (live)
Elliott Smith - I Don't Think I'm Ever Gonna Figure It Out
Norah Jones - Thinking About You

And these brothers were enjoying some good-natured roughhousing.

The Hollies - He Ain't Heavy He's My Brother
G. Love & Special Sauce - Love
Golden Earring - Radar Love

Just when we thought we couldn't make it one more step, we spotted a camel in the distance. We all piled on and high-tailed it to Antarctica.

The Beatles - Ticket To Ride
Calexico - The Ride, Pt. II
Alberta Cross - Lucy Rider (acoustic)

Stopped for a bite at the Dancing Crane Cafe.

The Decemberists - The Crane Wife 1 And 2

We spotted something on the side of the road, and we knew we were headed the right way. Personally I think this sign was a bit of an understatement. I'd describe them as something more like "Majestic Creature of the Icy Kingdom" or "Savage Titan of The Milky Way."

Hem - Almost Home

And then the beast appeared before us. I felt such sympathy for my Polar brother. It seemed like I, too, was covered in a dense fur.

"Jump in the water, my friend!" I screamed, but the beast paid no heed. He just sat, absorbing the Sun's rays like the martyr I always knew he was.

All of a sudden, he sprang up on his haunches. He was 25 feet tall if he was 5. He roared at the heavens as if to say, "God - if ye be more mighty than I, strike me down in front of my minions!"

Needless to say, he did not fall.

Wax Fang - Bi-Polar Bear
Modest Mouse - Polar Opposites

What a day.

-danny

A Blazing, Broken, Canyon Arrow

2007-05-26T12:09:00.000-04:00

It seems that arrows have played a major part in my life this past week. Don't worry, my flock, I haven't impaled myself or shot anyone yet, but I have had few runins with the noun called arrow. There was an arrow in the mind-melting season finale of Lost last wednesday. It's not the most personal interaction with an arrow, but it's still there. My good friend Max found out recently that he has good arches (As I write the word "arches" I'm reminded of archery, which also involves arrows. Coincidence? Not while I'm still breathing.), which in turn causes him to have a very straight walk. If you see Max walk, you'd know what I mean when I say he walks straight. It's like he was shot from the bow of God. And that was where I thought of a great pick-up line.

A man walks into a bar, sits down, and orders a drink. He has a brief chat with the bartender about the Marlins game last night. The television fuzzily burns to life, with a news anchor giving tips on how to prepare for the next hurricane season. The man gets bored and looks to his neighbors at the bar. To his left there is a well dressed older man, munching on some mixed nuts and sipping whatever it is that is in his glass. He has a strange look about him, caused cheifly by the distinct difference between the redness of his mustache and his hair. On second thought, it's actually probably a toupee. The mustachioed man continues to drink and eat after the first man looks to his right. A nice looking woman in her early thirties is chatting on her cellphone about apolstery and drycleaning, and despite the tame subject matter, the man watches her intently. When she finishes her conversation and shifts her body to leave, the man opens his mouth to say,

"Hey babe, I'm as straight as an arrow shot from the bow of God."

But he doesn't say it. He just sits in his stool, looks back up at the TV, and learns tip number four.

Throughout the week I've thought about the few arrow songs that I know, and I'm surprised to say they all seem to have a similar feel to them. A warm western desert aura of ancient native wisdom. Or something to that effect.

Blackalicious -- Blazing Arrow

Autumn Defense -- Canyon Arrow

Buffalo Springfield -- Broken Arrow

-Benjy

Feed Yourself

2007-05-25T18:58:00.000-04:00

If you haven't heard, yesterday was quite a day for The Canals. Google announced that it will be acquiring Feedburner for $100 million. And Feedburner provides our feed. That's right - this blog was part of a multi-million dollar deal with Google.

We promise not to let our newfound success get to our heads. We're gonna share the wealth the way we always have - by providing you, the heroes, with music that "shanks the inner ear and pumps the pulse of the nation." (For the record, I favored the slogan "from birth to deaf." If you like it, leave a comment and maybe it can change. The power is in your hands.) That being said, here's a quick plug for Feedburner:

"Sweet relief/That's what you come and get from me/
I give it up every time you want it/You got it I'm burning down"

Let me start by saying that if you didn't know this blog used Feedburner, that's because I never configured it. Let me continue by saying that until yesterday, I pretty much didn't know anything about Feedburner or feeds in general. But last night that all changed...

And what a night it was! First, I reconfigured our Feedburner so that you can actually subscribe to it. Next, I read about why I took the time to do that. It turns out that Feedburner is as revolutionary as it looks and sounds. Here's a list of a few great features:

A single link to the feed brings you to a clean, friendly landing page with links to different subscription options
It supports easy email subscriptions
It's compatible with any feed reader application
The feeds are interactive (automatically include links to email, technorati, del.icio.us, digg, and facebook, so you can share The Canals with the world)
The feeds look great and have a simple URL

So, if you've already subscribed to our feed, upgrade to the next big thing! And if you haven't, this is the chance of a lifetime! Click on literally any link in this post, or click them all! This thing is so hot it's single-handedly responsible for global warming! Act quickly before Al Gore sends us a take-down request!

Jeremy Fisher - Cigarette
Ray Lamontagne - Burn
James Hunter - No Smoke Without Fire
Phoenix - On Fire
Voxtrot - Firecracker
Foy Vance - Stoke My Fire

-danny

Week In Random

2007-05-25T18:25:00.000-04:00

"Ninety-five degrees on the blacktop/
I hear its cool on Mars"

It's that time of week again when we go bat-crazy and hit the shuffle button with all our might. here goes nothing.

Third Eye Blind - The Background

Interesting bit of background on 3eb: when they played at Spring Fling, the guitarist tried to make out with a certain McKean girl's 9th grade sister.

Simon and Garfunkel - The Boxer

First of their songs I ever heard.

G. Love & Special Sauce - Don't Drop It

This song has already been posted on here, maybe more than once. One of my favorites. This feature has been eerily un-embarassing to this point.

Barenaked Ladies - Told You So

I'll admit it, I went through a BNL stage. Whever you think about their music, though, it's great that they use Nettwerk as their label and released their newest album on Amie St. And this song isn't bad.

Don McLean - American Pie

Another classic camp song, and a great American tune to get you pumped for the holiday.

Ben Haper - By My Side (acoustic)

Ben Harper is one of my favorite artists. He's great with acoustic songs like this, but even better on the funky tracks off his latest release, Both Sides Of The Gun.

Eddie From Ohio - This Is My Town

Bought this track because I was considering seeing them at World Cafe. I decided against it.

Jack Johnson - Holes To Heaven

Jack Johnson is required listening for any day that hits 80 degrees. I think my iPod might be heat-sensitive.

Dave Matthews - Cry Freedom (Live)

Almost got through one of these posts without a Dave Matthews track. "Cry Freedom" is terrible on the studio album, but I like this version.

Bert Jansch - M'Lady Nancy

With the current Baroque craze I'm surprised this track isn't burning up the charts.

-danny

Minority/Women/Small Appreciation Day

2007-05-24T21:45:00.000-04:00

"They got little baby legs/And they stand so low/
You got to pick 'em up/Just to say hello"

I saw this sign on the subway yesterday:

"Get Prepped For Success!

Minority/Women/Small Business Owners:
Sign up for the MTA and other government agency contracts."

Now I’m no activist, but I know politically incorrect when I see it. I’m not sure who the ad is addressing – Business Owners who are Minority/Women/Small or people who own Minority/Women/Small Business – but one isn’t much better than the other. Whether this is blatant insensitivity or a case of badly-thought-out slashes, The Canals is dedicating this post to the victims.

So here’s to you, Minority/Women/Small – we’re proving once and for all that you don’t need subway ads to help you out. These artists have already realized your worth.

Amos Lee – Arms Of A Woman
Bert Jansch – A Woman Like You
Bob Dylan – Just Like A Woman
Brett Dennen – Because You are A Woman
Billy Joel – She’s Always A Woman To Me
Belle & Sebastian – Women’s Realm
Green Day – Minority
Kelly Joe Phelps – Spanish Hands
Jackson C. Frank – Spanish Moss
Elbow – Mexican Standoff
James Taylor – Mexico
M. Ward – Chinese Translation
The Decemberists – My Mother Was A Chinese Trapese Artist
Sufjan Stevens – Size Too Small
Bruce Springsteen – From Small Things (Big Things One Day Come)
Randy Newman – Short People
Elton John – Tiny Dancer

-danny

Edit: This hilarious exchange took place on sing365.com, in the comments section for the lyrics of “Short People.” (Italics added for emphasis.)

We Don't Need this Song | Reviewer: EGJ
------ About the song Short People performed by Randy Newman

The "Short People" song lyrics are very clever. However, I find the song offensive and "belittling". As a culture we do too many things to people to emphasize our differences. There are numerous obstacles humans face that make one feel less sure, unwanted, ill-equipped, and inferior to others. This song would have been cleverer if it had lauded the advantages and special view point of people who are different. Random acts of kindness are what will save the world - not acts of meanness.

Amazing Song | Reviewer: Vgfh
------ About the song Short People performed by Randy Newman

People, you're taking this song for something it isn't. It is not an attack on anyone. It's like a lot of people have pointed out, satirical. The only people it is taking the piss out of, are the people who have these views for no good reason. Being English, I appreciate satire and can see sarcasm when it is there. However, in my experiance, and I'm sure this isn't the case of all people, other nationalities have trouble seeing sarcasm, and this is probably why a lot of you seem to be taking it the wrong way. Chill out and see it for what it is, an attack on prejudice and not an attack on short people.

Good thing we have heroes like Vgfh to prevent attacks on attacks on prejudice while never, ever, holding any stereotypes of their own.

Icky Thump single Review

2007-05-24T11:06:00.000-04:00

Yo, check it. We got Cobb Salad here, you know, poet laureate crankin' this b, reppin' Icky Thump wit' his take --

"Who's usin' who?/What should we do?/
Well you can't be a pimp/And a prostitute too"

As the resident White Stripes Fanatic, I feel the need to direct your attention to the new White Stripes video. I really am certifiably crazy for the White Stripes; a Hispanic Canals guest blogger once told me I was redirecting sexual frustration into passion for the duo. She hit the nail on the head.

Anyhoo, the release of the video gives me a chance to properly review “Icky Thump.” The Canals previously posted the single, but it was “removed by request.” (In the defense of Warner Brothers, they are strapped for cash. In defense of The Canals, we’re not the morons behind the AOL-Time Warner merger.) So the video gives us a chance to legally link to the song again.

As for the music itself, it is an evolution of early White Stripes music (as opposed to “Get Behind Me Satan’s” revolutionary change.) For hardcore fans, this is ecstasy. Jack brings the raw sound of Detroit and mixes it up with some new instruments, including a deliciously dirty synthesizer. The song plays more like a live track than a single, and the unique sound of the song’s solos will guarantee no two concert renditions will sound alike. Meg’s powerful drumming keeps the cacophony from ripping itself apart, providing the needed momentum to Jack’s rambling guitar.
The song should also be noted for its political message, a direct rebuttal to a certain asinine member of Bloc Party.

As for the video, it plays into the “Get Behind Me Satan” mold. First, create a video with a creepy model and “avante garde” feel. It is well done, but somewhat uninspired— nearly a literal translation of the song. The most interesting aspect of the video is it’s overt sexuality, an unusual move for the band. Plus Meg is sporting red hair... Not entirely sure how to feel about that. But true fans will be waiting for Michel Gondry’s take on the album. Lucky for us, Jack created a song just for him. Wait for the video of “I’m Slowly Turning Into You” to be truly blown away.

-Jacob Schutz, poet laureate

Bonus Track: Forest Sun – What The Poets Know

Under The Covers with Jackson C. Frank

2007-05-23T20:10:00.000-04:00

"Living is a gamble, baby/Loving's much the same/
Wherever I have played/The blues have run the game"

I don’t think any one song has been covered by more of my favorite artists than “Blues Run The Game.” It’s the perfect song to cover – it has a simple, haunting melody, timeless lyrics, and plenty of room for interpretation.

The first 4 tracks are by Frank and 3 of his supposed one-time flat-mates. If these guys actually did live together it would make an incredible movie. All of them ended up as iconic musicians but in such different ways. Watch the video of Paul Simon playing Connie Hawkins in basketball on the 2^nd episode of SNL and tell me you wouldn’t kill to see what it was like for him to share a room with Nick Drake.

Also, the version by The Decemberists was the first time I ever heard them. This fact alone makes me forever indebted to the song.

Jackson C. Frank – Blues Run The Game
Nick Drake – Blues Run The Game
Simon and Garfunkle – Blues Run The Game
Sandy Denny – Blues Run The Game
Bert Jansch – Blues Run The Game
Counting Crows – Blues Run The Game
The Decemberists – Blues Run The Game

If you haven’t heard of Jackson Frank, you’re not alone. Read this short bio to familiarize yourself with his incredibly interesting and tragic life.

-danny

Ambition never hurt nobody

2007-05-23T10:38:00.001-04:00

"I watch your mailbox like Vietnam guerilla warfare/

That's not your real hair, rip credit cards, I don't care"

Ambition is a luxury only the lucky, the fortunate, or extremely talented can afford. Thankfully, the Canals is chock full of all three, making it possible for us to dream 'till our faces turn blue. What, you may ask, could we possibly be ambitious about? After all, we're only a semi-successful music blog with unfocused tastes and a mediocre web-design. Well, scoff if you like, but we have a dream, a dream as clear and pure as the day, to bring the music to the people. We dream to throw the most brain-bustin', ear-poppin', foot stompin' concert this side of the Lebowski Fest. Despite not knowing jack-squat about concert promoting, I think we could make it a reality within the next three years. And with a pretty fly lineup to boot.

Space-obsessed, sex-crazed rapper, Kool Keith goes for a mere $4000 for college shows. Compare that to the exorbitant quarter mil that Dave Matthew's Band demands, and you've got yourself a chance.

Kool Keith -- I'm Seein' Robots

Apparently obliging Philadelphia residents, Dr. Dog (a current favorite of mine), throw the most energetic shows in the galaxy, and I doubt that they can deny a Canals community festival of sound-waves. Plus, their label, Park the Van Records, has some other killer Philadelphia acts too. Perhaps The Teeth, for example.

Dr. Dog -- I've Just Got To Tell You (A great song off Takers and Leavers that I've wanted to post about for a while)

The Teeth -- Ball of the Dead Rat

Throw in a couple more local rappers, rockers, and roustabouts, and you got yourselves a show. You may laugh and pity us for our sad pipe-dreams, but have some faith. Someday in the near future, you might be shakin' it in the front row of a Kool Keith concert, smack dab in the middle of Clarke Park. Let me ask you this, who you gonna pity then?

-Benjy

Artists I Should've Seen, But Didn't

2007-05-22T23:13:00.000-04:00

"I can hear your cornstalks sigh/Underneath your prairie sky/
Southern swamps have footsteps filled/And hound dogs howl at freedom's will"

Believe it or not, even a Canal makes mistakes. I missed my fair share of performances over the past year for various bad reasons. Here’s a short list.

Tea Leaf Green – John Brown
Tea Leaf Green – Taught To Be Proud

I’m hoping this concert will be the only one I ever miss because I was studying. I don’t really understand how it even happened once. These guys played at Penn in March, and Austin told us they and Lotus melted more faces than my room did when I wasn’t in charge of the A/C.

Patrick Park – Past Poisons (live)
Patrick Park – Life’s A Song (live)

I downloaded his album off Amie St. the day after he played a free concert at World Café.

Rocky Votolato – Portland Is Leaving
Rocky Votolato – Red Dragon Wishes
Rocky Votolato – Postcard From Kentucky

I didn’t go because I felt sick, now I feel sick because I didn’t go.

Alexi Murdoch – Blue Mind
Alexi Murdoch – Orange Sky

This one wasn’t really my fault, but I still won’t be able to forgive myself if I never get to see him in a setting like North Star Bar at some point.

-danny

Film Review: "Once"

2007-05-22T20:17:00.000-04:00

"Take this sinking boat and point it home/We've still got time/
Raise your hopeful voice you have a choic/You've made it now"

I’m hardly qualified to write a film review (“The 6^th Man” is securely in my top 10…), but “Once” is hardly a typical film. I’d describe it as an extended music video for an entire album, with hidden-camera-like insight into the lives of the artists.

The main characters are played by Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova – both accomplished musicians with no acting experience. Hansard plays an Irish, guitar-playing vacuum repairman and Irglova plays a Czech, piano-playing house-cleaner. The movie follows the characters as they meet, begin to make music together, and work up the courage to repair past relationships.

And that’s really all there is. The dialogue is so realistic that you almost feel guilty watching them interact. Irglova plays her part so naturally that I spent a good part of the movie trying to figure out which of my East European friends she reminds me of, until I realized that I don’t have any. There are no clichés, no corny lines, no real happy endings to the conflicts – the characters don’t come off as important or genius, just human and talented. And as someone who likes people-watching almost as much as he likes music, this ends up being more than enough.

But the movie is more about the music itself than anything else. Most of the songs come from Hansard and Irglova’s album The Swell Season and many are also featured on releases from Hansard’s band, The Frames. It’s the type of music that brinks on over-the-top drama, but is always mellow at the same time. Hansard and Irglova compliment each other perfectly, and the movie seems to be a pretty good representation of their musical relationship. Here’s how they describe each other:

Glen: "It [The Swell Season] was released around the same time as we started to work on the film. When I met Marketa it was immediately obvious how remarkable she was, and so for me, there was a whole new breath of creative life to be working with someone who could give so much to the music. I am very lucky with my band, they are incredibly creative, but when I met Mar it added a whole new area, a whole new voice, a whole new contrast to what I did. I think John [Carney, ONCE director] caught sight of that."

Marketa: "We have been working together for the past six years. We met in the Czech Republic, where I am from, when The Frames were over to play a few gigs. Glen got me up for a song and I started playing piano and then we started to write songs. It was very slow and very natural process. Then we recorded an album a year ago."

This is the type of movie that I could see myself watching time and time again, much like listening to an album. If you like the music, definitely go see the movie. If you don’t, still go see it, and I promise you’ll at least appreciate it after.

Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova – Falling Slowly
Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova – Sleeping
Glen Hansard – Lies
Glen Hansard – Broken Hearted Hoover Fixer Sucker Guy

The soundtrack will be released tomorrow (5/22), but you can buy The Swell Season now.
“Once” website
The Swell Season myspace
“The Frames” myspace

-danny

Mulching With Townes

2007-05-21T23:40:00.000-04:00

“Townes Van Zandt is the best songwriter in the whole world and I’ll stand on Bob Dylan’s coffee table in my cowboy boots and say that.” – Steve Earle

"All the poets do push-ups/ On carpets of rubber foam/
Loudly they laugh/ At some joke that's been made"

I’m often compelled to return to old musical favorites for utterly inane reasons. Laying mulch in my backyard under the hot Ohio sun, for example, seemed to be the perfect occasion to revisit my boy Townes Van Zandt. As a country singer-songwriter and overall badass, Townes had an enormous impact on modern music with his poetic and melancholy tunes about women, booze, and the hard life. Unfortunately, he never broke into stardom during his stay on earth, and remained a cult figure for much of his life. He’s sadly often remembered for the cover versions of his timeless songs (Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard had a #1 hit with Townes’ “Pancho and Lefty”), but no one else can make your soul bleed and your mind clear like the man himself.

If you decide to go hunting for Townes music, start with the live recording Live At The Old Quarter, Houston, Texas, a chilling two-disc set that doesn’t muddle up his songs with the razzle-dazzle of overproduction. Then pop in the documentary, Be Here To Love Me to get to know the story behind the legend. Once that’s all done, you won’t forget to bring Townes along the next time you go mulching.

Townes Van Zandt – She Came And She Touched Me (Live)
Townes Van Zandt – Don’t Let The Sunshine Fool Ya’
Townes Van Zandt – Pancho & Lefty
Townes Van Zandt – Mr. Mudd and Mr. Gold (Live)
Townes Van Zandt – Dead Flowers (featured in The Big Lebowski)

-Benjy

Introducing Newton Faulkner

2007-05-21T21:03:00.001-04:00

"And I'm scared of failure/So scared of success/
Guess it'll all work out"

I heard about Newton Faulkner from Nizlopi’s myspace page and decided right away to buy his two EPs. The problem was that they hadn’t been released in the US yet and the only online store selling them was the UK iTunes. If you’ve yet to experience an international iTunes store, I can tell you it’s one of the most frustrating things in the world. I sat at my computer with his music in front of me, able to preview the songs but unable to buy them. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been in a similar situation with online music, where I honestly want to buy the music from a legit source but end up forced to get it some other way. Good thing we have copyright laws to look out for our musicians…

In the case of Newton Faulkner, there were no “free” online sources either, so I ended up importing the physical CDs. When they finally arrived (after a month and $30) it turned out it was worth the hassle. There’s definitely something about him that reminds me of Nizlopi, but he also has a completely unique sound. He’s a minor key, syncopated, more produced, gravelly-voiced, mature version of my other favorite UK artist. His plays a distinct style of guitar that sounds like the airtap guy, and basically provides its own percussion. His music lacks the uplifting melodies that characterize Nizlopi, but somehow even without real memorable choruses his music is still catchy.

The live and acoustic songs sound as good or better than the more produced tracks, which makes me really want to see him perform. Someone needs to get him and these other British bands over here. They don’t even have to go farther than the east coast. One Nizlopi/Alberta Cross/Newton Faulkner show in Philly is all I’m asking.

Faulkner’s 1^st release, Full Fat, was the #1 single on Amazon last year, but for some reason we’re the first blog on hype or elbo.ws to feature his music. His first full-length album is set to be released on July 23. I’m hoping I’ll be able to get my hands on it before school starts in the fall.

Newton Faulkner – To The Light (Acoustic)
Newton Faulkner – Feels Like Home
Newton Faulkner – Full Fat
Newton Faulkner – Lullaby

Stream some more tracks from his myspace. I especially like “All I Got,” which must be from the upcoming album.

Buy his EPs on Amazon.

-danny

Good Fortune Cookie

2007-05-20T22:34:00.000-04:00

"Summer was gone and the heat died down/
And autumn reached for her golden crown/
I looked behind as I heard a sigh/But this was the time of no reply"

Last night I got a great fortune:

“Time is nature’s way of keeping everything from happening all at once.”

I don’t know if it’s the fact that it actually makes grammatical and contextual sense, that my favorite number (22) was one of the 6 “lucky” ones listed below it, or that it closely resembles one of my favorite quotes of all time (“People are DNA’s way of making more DNA.” – E. O. Wilson), but the Chinese guy who wrote this really hit close to home. Close enough, in fact, that I’m writing a whole post about his idea.

Here are some timeless time-related songs:

Alexi Murdoch – Time (live outro to “Shine”)
Semisonic – Closing Time
Dr. John – Right Place, Wrong Time
Old Crow Medicine Show – Big Time In The Jungle
Donavon Frankenreiter – Every Time
Lee Moses – Time And Place
Jim Croce – Time In A Bottle
Nick Drake – Time Of No Reply
Ollabelle – Before This Time

Edit: I did some research after writing the post and it turns out that I gave China too much credit. The fortune was actually written by none other than Woody Allen, which explains a lot. I have to admit, I’m a little disappointed in the Big Red for selling out – aren’t they supposed to be the wise ones?

-danny

Album Review -- Sky Blue Sky

2007-05-19T13:35:00.000-04:00

"But this is what love is for/ to be out of place/
gorgeous and alone/ face to face"

This past Tuesday marked the release of American rock group Wilco’s sixth studio release, Sky Blue Sky. This time around, Wilco has taken a step back from its signature sound in favor of a more subdued and intimate alt-country style. While it holds much in common with their earlier country-tinged album, Being There, Sky Blue Sky remains distinct with its simplistic friends-in-a-room sound. Nearly everything has been toned down or modified since A Ghost Is Born. The instrumentation is sparser, leaving time for each member to shine while the others wait in the wings. The member that really benefits from this arrangement is guitarist Nels Cline, who tears open almost every track with a solid and memorable riff. Without the sometimes grating guitar noise and general clamor of previous efforts, the guitar work begins to sound more like living, breathing guitar and instead of synthesized whirrs and clanks. Jeff Tweedy’s strained whisper of a voice plays off perfectly against the ephemeral style of the album, sounding naked and live. This nudity is at least partially influenced by the communal processes of the Band, an influence that Tweedy and Co. have been quite vocal about.

Tweedy in a recent Rolling Stone interview: “I always liked the Band as a model -- a bunch of guys sitting around with a typewriter, drinking coffee, writing. That seemed the most fun -- a collective thing. And somehow we ended up being that.”

Somehow indeed. And the results are more than satisfying. Each song, despite its sparseness, maintains a fullness and almost edible tangibility. Building and building and building is the best way to describe the structure behind each song. They often seem to want to explode from the speakers and ooze out onto the floor, but instead deflate back to safety. Every time I listen to the quiet and unassuming Please Be Patient With Me, I half expect the whole band to break into a raucous jam as the finger-picked acoustic guitar morphs into Cline’s electric gold. This building can get frustrating, but always keeps the sound from seeming contrived or conventional. And thankfully there aren’t any streets called Convention on Wilco’s musical roadmap. Immediately after Please Be Patient With Me, everything spills over with Hate it Here. The song seems much like the fragile love song before it until the chorus and Beatles-esque melody crank it up to cosmic proportions.

Last Thursday, two days after the release of Sky Blue Sky, some friends and I went out for a walk around town. As we passed by the house of a classmate attending West Point, we saluted and continued on. That is, until I noticed the pizza delivery guy at his house was blaring Either Way, Sky’s first track, from his car in the street. And so, loved by myself and pizza guys alike, Wilco’s newest is a treat for all.

Wilco – Either Way
Wilco – Please Be Patient With Me
Wilco – Hate it Here

Buy Sky Blue Sky here.

-Benjy

Week In Random

2007-05-18T18:38:00.000-04:00

On the train this morning I was thinking about what a great addition the “shuffle songs” feature was to the iPod. Then I realized that some of our readers might not be up on the latest technology or might not have a big enough library to fully take advantage of it. I knew it was my duty to create our 2^nd weekly feature, “Week In Random.” Every Friday, a Canal will bare his soul for all to see, posting the first 10 tracks that play when he hits Shuffle. We promise not to hold anything back, as long as you promise not to judge. Leave a comment and let us know what you think.

"I detected faint axilla scent/That put me off my appetite/
But mouflon warring where I went/Renewed in me a need to fight"

Ben Harper/Blackalicious – Brain Washers

Benjy gave me this album a few months ago because my library was weak on hip-hop. It still is.

Phish – Axilla I (Live)

It pains me to know I’ll die without seeing these guys in concert.

Sam Prekop – Something

Just picked this up off *Sixeyes the other day. I love mellow songs with driving beats.

Dave Matthews Band – Shotgun (Live)

I have a feeling DMB will be way over-represented in these posts. Nothing to be ashamed of, though – they’re a big part of my musical past. This happens to be my favorite song of theirs.

Richard Wagner – Siegfrieds Rheinfahrt from Gotterdammerung

I wish I could say something sophisticated about this, but unfortunately I’ve never listened to the piece. Looks promising, though.

Edgar Meyer, Bela Fleck, and Mike Marshall – Barnyard Disturbance

Three amazing musicians, one album of bizarre music.

John Martyn – Don’t Want To Know

“I don’t want to know about evil/Only want to know about love.”

Johnny Five – Call Response

I bought this album on a whim and was pretty disappointed after hearing it.

Pearl Jam – Jeremy

Classic song from the days when I used to listen to the radio in the shower. Or at all, for that matter.

Taj Mahal – Cakewalk Into Town

Hand claps + tuba = pure gold.

That’s it for this week. Make sure to keep up with this feature – it’s only a matter of time before I’m forced to post a High School Musical karaoke track, and that’s something you won’t want to miss.

-danny

What’s In a Name?

2007-05-17T19:58:00.000-04:00

"She puts eggs in her orange juice/Coffee in her tea/
Puts olives in her jelly/Says that's the way it's gonna be"

For the past few weeks I’ve been working at a music supervision company in New York. I know what you’re thinking: “Cool.” But it’s actually even cooler than you thought when you were just thinking that a second ago. Not only am I working in The Big Apple, The City That Never Sleeps, and The City So Nice They Named It Twice, but on a very special street in that very special town. Yeah, you guessed it – this Canal has been spending his days in the heart of Chinatown, on none other than Canal Street.

Now, we at The Canals don’t believe in fate, but we do believe in the cosmos – and this connection is cosmic to the extreme. You see, The Canals and Canal St. share more than a name – we share a story. Both had illustrious pasts, but were eventually destroyed by their very creator: Ambition. (To brush up on our history, see our first two posts: 1 and 2.)

Canal St. was not always paved with concrete and saturated with fake luxury goods. No, it was once a real, beautiful canal, a Manhattan oasis, bringing a bit of glory to China and a bit of China to Glory (the US of A). It was brimming with the purest water in any of the five boroughs. Dragons raced gleefully down the banks. The Irish sake bombed with the Italians. Palestinians danced with Israelis on the shores. People came from near and far to witness the spectacle and partake in the constant merriment. Every day was the Chinese New Year, and it was always the year of The Canal.

But such peace could not last. Eventually, people started to exploit beauty for profit. Fights broke out. Darkness set in. Over time, as hope evaporated, so did the canal. Just as Panama Lee was not ready to change the world with the music of his band, the world was not ready to be changed by the magic of Canal St. So what’s in a name? Only the remnants of a glorious past, and a constant reminder of a tragic downfall.

On a happier note, I’m thoroughly enjoying my time here. They have over 20,000 albums in the office, and I’m free to sample them all. Here are a few tracks I’ve discovered since I started working. They’re pretty good, but the best will be featured in a series of detailed posts over the next few weeks.

Andrew Bird – Dora Goes To Town
Emitt Rhodes – Somebody Made For Me
Blue Merle – If I Could
The Concretes – On The Radio
Nouvelle Vague – Just Can’t Get Enough
Pas/Cal – Bem, Please Come Home
Sandy Denny – Solo
Paul Westerberg – We May Be The Ones
Cary Brothers – Honestly

-danny

Under The Covers with Nick Drake

2007-05-16T18:51:00.000-04:00

This is the debut post of our debut weekly feature. Every Wednesday we’ll highlight the music of an artist as interpreted by his peers. So dive under the covers – they’re ready and waiting. Soft, warm, and bed-bug free, we guarantee only sweet dreams and lullabies. That’s right – once a week The Canals will be your personal tooth fairy, delivering glorious sounds straight to your deserving ears. And best of all, we don’t even ask for a tooth in return – just your unwavering loyalty and maybe a comment or two.

"Time has told me/You came with the dawn/
A soul with no footprint/A rose with no thorn"

Day Is Done – Nick Drake
Day Is Done – Norah Jones
Day Is Done – Elton John

Two great covers here, and so different from each other. The up-tempo, driving feel of Elton John’s version highlights the desperation of the song, and Norah Jones’s relaxed, earthy jazz style brings out the melody. I really like the saxophone on hers, and it’s also one of the only tracks here officially released on a studio album (Come Away With Me).

Northern Sky – Nick Drake
Northern Sky – Denison Witmer

Simple acoustic version. It loses the feel of the original, but nice to listen to, I guess.

Pink Moon – Nick Drake
Pink Moon – Beck
Pink Moon – Damien Jurado

Two more simple acoustic covers. I was excited for Beck’s take on it, but I thought it was pretty boring. I liked Damien Jurado’s guitar on his, it sounded like he was tweaking some of the original chords.

River Man – Nick Drake
River Man – Til Bronner

Really liked this cover. Bronner added some nice touches. If there’s one Drake song perfectly suited for this kind of improv style, it’s River Man.

Time Has Told Me – Nick Drake
Time Has Told Me – Kelly Willis
Time Has Told Me – Elton John

Elton John’s cover is great again here. He pretty much just spices up the rhythm and adds some vocal runs, but it’s a fun listen. Kelly Willis offers a somewhat bizarre country-ish version, but is also the only artist here to try adding strings and vocal harmony.

Which Will – Nick Drake
Which Will – Beck
Which Will – Lucinda Williams

I liked this Beck cover more than “Pink Moon,” but I still don’t get why he didn’t “Beckify” the music at all. With the second cover, Lucinda Williams manages to turn the song into a cheesy, boring ballad.

I wasn’t planning on being so critical, but I was pretty disappointed by most of these covers. I was surprised at how sparse they all sounded. Nick Drake’s strength was not his melodies, but his instrumentation and delivery. He wrote sweeping string and wind arrangements that gave his songs a distinct mellow but brimming-with-music quality. He created unique soundscapes for each song, where the vocals and virtuosic guitar just seemed like a final touch or last-minute thought.

I realize that covers are meant to interpret and not imitate, but I feel like most of these stripped so much from the music without adding anything of their own. That being said, a few were really good, and all of them put the originals in a new light. Plus, it’s always good to see the Drakonian influence in action.

Look forward to a more concise, less critical “Under The Covers” next Wednesday…

-danny

New Release!

2007-05-15T23:40:00.000-04:00

On a day like this, you could wave at neighbor or lie in the street. Laugh at joke, don't worry you're broke. Build a canoe, but decide to swim. Jump a fence, but the gates so close. But most of all... buy Wilco's Sky Blue Sky. Here, if you want to.

Watch out for a comprehesive review coming soon.

Wilco -- Shake It Off

-Benjy

Album Review – Leopold and his Fiction

2007-05-12T13:19:00.000-04:00

A few weeks back we neglected to post about a Swedish pop group that had so graciously reached out to us. And then, as if to thank us for not jumping the gun on our first featured group, along came San Francisco rock combo Leopold and His Fiction. Separately known as Daniel Toccalino and Ben Cook, the duo released its self-titled debut album in October of 2006 on their label, Native Fiction Records. Maybe it’s a little too heavy to call it destiny, but the name-link between Daniel and Ben of Leopold and us here at The Canals was enough to draw our attention. After a few listens of the album, the mystical connection began to pale in the light of the delicious mixed fruit smoothie of rock, country, and blues that they have to offer. Well, I guess their debut is less of a smoothie than an oil drum filled with moonshine and gasoline, but who’s to judge? The combination of Detroit guitarist and vocalist, Daniel, and Kentuckian drummer, Ben, allows for simultaneous creative bursts of unrestrained filth blues and subdued sunburned country.

A simple connection can be made between Leopold and his Fiction, The White Stripes, and The Black Keys, if not for anything but the use of a guitar and drum kit combo. The influence of delta blues, Detroit grunge, and twangy southern spit shine drawl spans across the three, but don’t let that muddle the field any. Look deeper and you’ll see that the differences transcend the similar appearances, as Leopold’s debut album shows a versatility and diversity all of their own.

Leopold and his Fiction is a collection of lo-fi jaunts and mesmerizing tunes that make you want to hike up your overalls, drift into warp-speed, and trip down the road in a tin can with your best friend. The first track starts off strong, almost indiscernibly strong. The thick guitar and distorted voice mix together to form some sort of an über-riff, and packs a punch that may turn off the more laid back, countrified listeners. The wail of the chorus of this track, She Ain’t Got Time, pulls itself from the depths of the grunge and pays homage to the love-lost tales of long past blues singers. From that launch pad of grungy Detroit rock, a wellspring of blues and country busts forth, letting the album slowly ramble its way back into the Kentucky half of the duo. The unforgiving guitar riffs and pounding percussion are soon replaced by down-home slides and picks in songs like Gonna Be Your Boy and Miss Manipulation. On the technical side of things, many of the group’s musical choices keep the album from sounding like just a drummer and a guitarist. Daniel’s use of mic distortion and additional instrumentation on some tracks keeps the album from feeling hollow or sparse, a potential pitfall of minimalist groups. Ben’s skillful drumming surpasses the abilities of many other similar duos (i.e. a certain Ms. White), and provides an able backbone for each song on the album. The curious forty-second pause before the unusually fragile final track, Broken Down Blues, allows for close listeners to take a breather and reflect on the album for what it is: an unforgettable boxcar ride of rock with a strong, bold mug of hard cider in your hand.

Leopold and his Fiction – She Ain’t Got Time
Leopold and his Fiction – Gonna Be Your Boy
Leopold and his Fiction – Miss Manipulation

I strongly suggest that you buy Leopold and his Fiction here.

-Benjy

My Favorite Artists (Part 3 of 5): The Actual Tigers

2007-05-11T23:18:00.000-04:00

"It's gonna be a waste of your time/
I'm gonna tell you things you already know"

I’ve only been home for a week, but my freshman year musical associations are already set in stone. “The Auld Triangle” by Dropkick Murphys brings back memories of St. Patrick’s Day, when, among other things, we watched Benjy’s dad selling DVDs on a late-night infomercial. Anything by Ella Fitzgerald makes me think of a certain roommate’s idea of seduction, which may or may not be in need of some refining over the summer. The outro to “Wake Up” by Dr. Dog is pretty much just pure joy. The Shins represent the last month of spring semester, and remind me of Yanik’s concluding opinion of my music library (“I guess there are some good songs, but it’s just not the kind of music you want to listen to…”). I can’t play “Grace Kelly” in public, because I’m afraid I might break out into Alex’s dance.

But all of these associations pale in comparison to those I have with The Actual Tigers. Their first and only album, Gravelled and Green, was my freshman year. It was there on St. Patrick’s Day, it was drowning out Ella Fitzgerald, it was on the “study” playlist from the end of both semesters, it was playing in my iPod while the carpenter was breaking shelf. If I had to make a soundtrack for the year, it would be this album from start to finish.

I highly recommend reading this detailed review, but I’m going to do my best to give a brief impression of the band. Gravelled and Green is either the most guilt-free pop music or the catchiest rock music I’ve ever heard. It represents the best of both worlds, but never strays too far to one side. For every simple melody, there’s an unpredictable, unrestrained jam. For every typical major chord, there’s one verging on dissonance. It’s like each song is teetering on the edge of two personalities – at first content with a clean, pleasant sound, but always eventually plunging into “a regular old hootenanny of hedonism.” And the best part is that this tension, this flip-flopping of character, is only magnified with each listen, so that each time you’re even more eager for the breakdown. As the CD progresses it doesn’t disappoint – the last track (“The One That Got Away”) is the absolute perfect ending to an album.

The Actual Tigers also bring with them a certain mystique. The band began as Willis, and released one album under their original name. Gravelled and Green was released in 2001 to much critical acclaim, but for some reason never caught on. They broke up soon after and their music has basically disappeared. There are no pictures, lyrics, or tabs on Google (which makes singing along a challenge). Amazon doesn’t even carry their album. All this just makes them more appealing, despite the frustration of knowing that they’ll never release any new music. We did manage to track down the self-titled album from Willis, and it’s decent. Also, Tim Seely (singer and songwriter of the Tigers) launched a pretty successful solo career, but his music doesn’t resemble the band’s much at all. Listen to tracks below, but know that those not posted here are still more than worthy of Canals airtime.

The Actual Tigers – Bad Day
The Actual Tigers – Testimony
The Actual Tigers – On A Roll
The Actual Tigers – The One That Got Away
Dr. Dog – Wake Up (Outro)

Buy the CD here. There are only six left (one is $155), and knowing The Canals’ popularity and clout they won’t last long, so act fast.

You can stream four more tracks on their myspace.

-danny

Friends of The Canals, part VI: Kleptomaniacs & Co.

2007-05-10T16:08:00.000-04:00

This is, for better or worse, the last official post in the Friends Fortnight. You can count on profiles of friends’ bands in the future, but for now we’re burying this sucka’ six feet under… with the fishes.

My boys, Zach and Seth

Hearken back to the Friends post about Spare Change and you’ll notice that I’m quite jealous of musicians four years younger than myself. Now imagine that same bitter person hanging out with four very talented guys his own age. Yeah, I wanted to be as cool as Kobi, Ben, Zach, and Seth, and yeah, I wanted to be in their band, the Kleptomaniacs. That’s not surprising seeing that they produced some very impressive rock, funk, and goof jams over the past five or six years. Oh, and also that the ladies hung on them like a barrel of monkeys. Within their time together, they warped and molded along with their tastes, forming and reforming various bands (Sack, The Hyponoia Project), and thankfully never stopping the gravy train of tasty music.

Kleptomaniacs – Puffin' on Puffins
Kleptomaniacs – Next Stop… Heaven
Kleptomaniacs – Sorrento (very early Kleptomaniacs fare)
Clarke 2 (Zach at Ithaca) – Erica
Sack – Politics (Live at the UU church, Arlington, MA)

Check out pretty much everything, musical and otherwise, those guys (and a little of yours truly) have done since the beginning of middle school at www.jeopardyfilms.org.

-Benjy

Guest Post #6: Alex Anderson

2007-05-09T19:57:00.000-04:00

Ironically (or, coincidentally), our longest post comes from our shortest contributor. Enjoy this guest post written by the man so nice they named him twice: Ander².

I just finished my freshman year and came home to the less sinful suburbs of Las Vegas. Unfortunately, my father’s supposed sterility delayed my birth until 1987. So, when I look forward to going home, I do not look forward to the lights, bars and strip clubs. Instead, I look forward to what keeps me sane: my friends.

Because I like them so much, I’d like to introduce you to a few of them. One thing binds them together. Music. Well, for everyone but Steve…

Meet Steve Schirripa. Family friend and an all around Goodfella. Steve is best known as Tony Soprano’s brother-in-law Bobby 'Bacala' Baccalieri. For us back home he will always be known as the best Wiseguy Manager the Strip has ever seen. Steve hooked me up with tickets to the NHL All Star Weekend a few years back. The guy who came by to collect the money for the tickets had a thick east coast accent. He scarred an unsuspecting man and his daughter when he asked the man, “Are you ‘ugh?” He was looking for my dad, Hugh. East coasters pronounce Hugh as “you”.

The story reminds me of a love song by Jens Lekman about miscommunication between lovers.

Jens Lekman – Maple Leaves

Please allow me to introduce Christy Coffey. I describe her best with, “she’s my female version.” So, right off the bat, you all know she’s wonderful. Aside from being a great friend, Christy is my go to gal for new music. Christy also knows a lot of people. One of her closet friends is Allex who happens to be the sister of Dustin Abraham. Some say I have a man crush on Dustin for a few reasons. First, he wrote The Runner and How High. Now, he spends most of his time working as a writer on CSI with his boyhood friend, Anthony Zuiker. Recently, Christy was on the set of the filming for the season finale of CSI. She was chosen because she “had the look” to be the Clerk in the opening shot of the episode. Check her out when the episode is on!

Brand New Key by Melanie always reminds me of junior year, driving around the school parking lot with Christy. It’s just fun and light. You might remember it from the earth-shattering scene between Mark Wahlberg and Heather Graham in Boogie Nights.

Melanie – Brand New Key

Now, meet some bands who have members that I know.

Ryan Ross, the guitarist and lyricist of Panic! at the Disco, played hockey with me. He quit our team midseason to pursue his music career. Good career choice. I’m sure you’ve heard of them by now. Check one of my favorite songs by them .

Panic! At The Disco – Time To Dance

Hockey also exposed me to my good friend Michael Catalano – drummer extraordinaire of The Tramlines. I know Chad, Tyler and Cory from school. These guys do great things for the local college scene back home.

The Tramlines – Bottom Of The Sea
The Tramlines – Sail! Sail! Sail!

Robert Ragan and Keith Milgaten played together during high school in The Denver Method. From here they moved into two different paths. Ragan hitched up with The Higher and Keith began playing with The Vision of a Dying World. Two totally different sounds. Both great bands.

The Higher – Insurance
Vision – Barges w/ Banjos

I don’t know what ‘indie’ means, but apparently a lot of bands I listen to fit the genre. If that’s not your style, meet Sunday Afternoon. They have been playing music in Las Vegas and Arizona for many years now. Influenced by Dave Matthews Band and the like, these guys put on a great show and play some sweet songs.

Sunday Afternoon – Brazilian Girl

I’m glad we could meet and you could get to know some of my friends. When you become big and successful, let me know, I’ll ask Danny if I can post again. Until then, I’ll be holding pocket Aces, watching the cards on the river. I’m not sure what that means, I saw something about poker in Casino Royale.

-Alex Anderson

Friends of The Canals, Part V: Ted Rosedale

2007-05-07T18:12:00.000-04:00

My first memory of Ted Rosedale is a musical one. When we were
toddlers our moms took us to see Raffi perform on Broadway. Now it seems Teddy is making music where Raffi left off. With lyrics like "She might fuck you/She's good like that/She offered me a dollar today/And ice cream to go down on her," anyone can hear the influence.

But Teddy is more than just the second coming of Raffi. His debut
album Home features Ted on vocals, guitar, bass, piano, drums, and
ukulele. My first thought was that it represents the next generation
in the Beatles --> Oasis lineage, but I think it actually falls
somewhere in between or to the side. The album's traditional
instrumentation and its lack of real catchy choruses give it a retro
feel, but the music has a touch of Nirvana-esque angst that I just
don't see the British relating to. His songs are full of surprising
key changes that are really satisfying to hear, and the lyrics are
witty and honest. My one criticism is that some of the songs are
similar enough that they blend together, but the album's consistency
is also one of its strengths.

Ted Rosedale – 619
Ted Rosedale – Don’t Be Long
Ted Rosedale – Why Bother Stay

Check out his really well-designed website here (JC was impressed)
Buy the album here

-danny

Guest Post #5 - Katie "Hopalong Cassidy" Poulos

2007-05-03T17:13:00.000-04:00

Since roughly 1/2 of The Canals hails from the beautiful land called the Midwest, we have Katie here to pick up the slack:

Hi, this is Katie Poulos, long-time reader, first-time poster. I'm from the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul in Minnesota. Yes, it snows. Yes, it's cold. Yes, "Minnesota nice" is real. I don't, however, pronounce words with long Os (although I have been known to add a long "A" sound to a phrase here and there). I've spent most of my life trying to get out of the Midwest and on to bigger and better places, but now that I find myself on the East Coast, I'm a little nostalgic for home. One of the great things many may not know about the Twin Cities (besides being able to order "pop" at a restaurant) is the underground hip-hop group Atmosphere. Based in Minneapolis, Atmosphere's brand of Midwestern rap has got more than just the central time zone excited. I saw them play at the Quest in Minneapolis a few years ago, they were awesome. Here's a few of my favorites, check them out.

"And it hit me, Minnesota is dope
If only simply for not what we have but what we don't"

Atmosphere -- Smart Went Crazy
Atmosphere -- God Loves Ugly
Atmosphere -- Guns and Cigarettes
Atmosphere -- Say Shhh

Check out Atmosphere at his Myspace page.
-Katie Poulos

Guest Post #4 - Yanik "Yay-nog" Ruiz-Ramon

2007-05-02T22:42:00.000-04:00

The big Y-man, Danny's roommate, could fill a book with his knowledge of ragtime and classical music. Let's see what he has to say:

Seaboard Stomp -- Blind Arthur Blake

This is from an original recording from the early twentieth century by "The King of Ragtime Guitar." Blind Blake was born around 1893 and died about 1933. I love this song because it is an artifact from the past and fascinating to hear how he improvises with the melody. The crackle is charming and it is great to hear Blind Blake narrate the story as he plays.

Shining Star -- Earth, Wind, and Fire

How can you go wrong with Earth, Wind, and Fire? Imagine fat men dancing to this song (especially the beginning bit) and there is no way that you can be sad. I'm a big fan of funk and this song hits the spot. It was a close call with 'Boogie Wonderland' though. The chorus is pretty uplifting too.

I've Got Rythym -- Phillipe Bas and Olivier Franc

This is a two-man group I came across while walking the streets of Paris. They were amazing live and I bought the CD (something I rarely do from street groups). To perform they had rolled an upright piano in the street. These two struck the perfect combination, allowing each musician to play and improvise equally.The pianist made me jealous with envy and the clarinet player was really funny to watch.

Hard Times Come Again No More -- Yo-Yo Ma, Mark O'Conner, Edgar Meyer, and James Taylor

This is from the phenomenal album 'Appalachian Journey.' It is a collaboration between three amazing musicians, Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, and Mark O'Conner. They take the traditional music from the appalachian region and create an album with the perfect balance of joy, sorrow, and longing. This is the first collection of music that made me believe folk/country music may not be so bad after all.

Hollywood Nocturne -- The Brian Setzer Orchestra

I am a big fan of film noirs and this song is the embodiment of one. The first minute contains a great electric guitar solo that paints a hard-boiled cop walking through the red light district of 1950's LA in the drizzling rain...The singer sounds like he is singing through a tin can, giving the song an eerie tone. In the second minute there is a good sax solo and there is another guitar solo about three minutes in. This song is one of the more subdued of their album "Dirty Boogie," but it is great. The other songs are more typical big band fare but modernized. One other recommendation is their song "You're the Boss." It is corny as hell, but fun to listen to.

-Yanik Ruiz-Ramon

I love Vice

2007-04-30T20:49:00.000-04:00

I saw this on the "DOs and DON'Ts" section of viceland.com and needed to share:

"You know a band’s set is going long when you look down at your watch and realize you’ve become old."

JUST GOLDEN.

-Benjy

X Marks the Knitting Circle

2007-04-30T00:09:00.000-04:00

Good bands may master one style of music. Great bands, on the other hand, have so much ADD flowing out of every orifice in their heads, even those small spaces in the corner of their eyes, that sticking to just one style is painfully impossible. The Beatles did this with a handful of their albums, and often mixed up the styles within some albums. I never get enough of flip-floppers like those guys. My favorite Bob Dylan album is Nashville Skyline, a stark departure from his traditional fare. My boy Beck regularly hops from folk, to rock, to electronica, to hip-hop and back again. The invention of quality music has no stylistic borders, no structure or audience to consider, only the pure intention of a delicious end.

Until recently, I had never heard of the L.A. punk band called X, but I probably should have. Formed in 1977 by songwriter and bassist John Doe, his future wife Exene Cervenka, rockabilly guitarist Billy Zoom, and drummer D.J. Bonebrake (the name I would’ve been given if I had been a girl), this apparently “legendary” rock group was known for crossing musical boundaries. In 1985, the group (minus Zoom) with Dave Alvin and Johnny Ray Bartel, recorded the country-roots album Poor Little Critter on the Road under the moniker The Knitters. The album introduced a fresh mixture of punk rock and country to which the current alt-country scene owes a sincere debt of gratitude. After a twenty year hiatus, the brief flicker that was The Knitters came back in 2005 with The Modern Sounds of…The Knitters. Tonight they’ll be at World Café Live singing songs from Modern Sounds and hopefully selling a few CDs. Swing on by if you get a chance.

X – We’re Having Much More Fun
X – The New World
The Knitters – Walkin’ Cane
The Knitters – Rock Island Line (goofy cover of a classic Leadbelly song)
The Knitters – I’ll Go Down Swinging (off The Modern Sounds of… The Knitters)

-Benjy

Guest Post #3: Alyssa Mendoza

2007-04-29T22:29:00.000-04:00

Here’s some musical insight from the queen of McKean on her birthday.

Since Jacob’s post on The Canals was so popular and in his picture he was wearing my coat, clearly I should be soon to follow. It’s not gonna be good at all, but hey it’s my birthday so they let me become the canals first lady.

I’m a big fan of Maryland. GBURG rep! So I want to spend some time loving what I love. I mean it’s a good state, we got beaches, mountains, big cities, farmlands, annoyingly rich people, DC but we don’t have to live there, I mean we have it all. Three bands that I can think right now have come from Maryland; Good Charlotte, OAR, and Ballyhoo! Since Good Charlotte and OAR have become oh so corporate, let’s focus on Ballyhoo! Ok I really like Maryland and the band a lot. But not that much, they actually have an exclamation point in their name, and their album, Do it for the Money!

I was first introduced to the lovely sounds of Ballyhoo! by my buddy Sam. They are Maryland-grown just like me and so naturally Sam knew Ballyhoo!’s lead singer’s brother’s teacher’s boyfriend’s pledgebrother’s niece’s camp counselor, loosely. Clearly Sam was really excited about this special connection and told us to come see them perform in the sketchy part of our town. At the time I was only 17 and since it was at a bar type place I thought I would have to use my older sisters ID to get in (The second time ever- the first was to get into chucky cheese- more on that later). Sam assured me that it wasn’t 18 and over. So I went to see this crazy exclamation-pointed Ballyhoo! concert and hoped they wouldn’t mind that I wasn’t 18 quite yet. When we got there the extremely scary and extremely tattooed bouncer asked for IDs. I said fuck and went behind my friends; the jerks kept going in without me so me and bouncer could hang out during the concert. They proudly flashed their IDs and got promptly yelled at for trying to get into a 21 and over bar. This is why I like Ballyhoo! – they made my jerk friends feel stupid. And they are really really good. Listen. Do it.

And a little shout out to my boy Benjy with my Maryland boys OAR talking about Benjy’s Columbus, Ohio home.

Ballyhoo! – Cerveza
Ballyhoo! – Cali Girl
OAR – Road Outside Columbus

-Alyssa Mendoza

Guest Post #2: Steve Carmody, friend of the Doctors

2007-04-27T19:54:00.000-04:00

Recently, my old friend Steve sold merchandise at a Dr. Dog show at the Mid East in Boston. I asked him to write a post, and instead he wrote a novel. So here’s a sample of the night:

I walk up to introduce myself, and Toby Leaman (the bassist) is first to extend the welcoming notion. Soon after, Scott McMicken (guitar/vocals) and Frank are meeting me too, with Juston Stens (drums/vocals) and Zach Miller (keyboard/vocals) close behind to say hello. We’re sitting around, and Scott says to me, “I’m thinking of setting up the merch’ table real soon, but I’m gonna smoke a cigarette first. Do you smoke?” I’m not a huge smoker, but of course I accept and we go out to the alleyway behind the building to smoke a butt. We get to talking, about their time on Conan recently (to which Scott and I both share in the excitement of that moment at the end of “Worst Trip” when Conan comes over and says, “That’s how its done!”), about their new publicist in NYC who got them the gig, about staying in strange, welcoming college housing from city to city, about how I got into the band recently much thanks to Benjy Brooke, about Benjy seeing Scott biking by one day (he’s pretty sure that it was him), and I just feel so welcomed to be around these kindly, laid-back guys.

* * * *

Dr. Dog finally takes the stage (now around 11:30), and the crowd goes wild. All the lights go off on the stage, and a rendition of the Star-Spangled Banner, in wonderful a capella harmony, belts out as the now-drunken, excited crowd sings along. Then My Old Ways comes on, and everyone goes absolutely wild for these guys.

* * * *

With the concert over, the crowd swarms to buy more merch, or take some of the free stickers and buttons and posters. I got Scott and Toby (the only band members that I could find) to sign a poster for Benjy. If you get a chance, sometime look for the drunken scrawl of Toby trying to write “Thanks”, or Scott’s goofy “double-vision” rendition of “BENJI”.

Dr. Dog – Wake Up
Dr. Dog – ABCs
Dr. Dog – The Way the Lazy Do

-Steve Carmody

Friends of The Canals, Part IV: Audible Detonation

2007-04-27T17:37:00.000-04:00

A disclaimer: All written below is based on hearsay and rumor.

My friend Ian, a guy noted for marching in a dress during high school band practice, wanted to join his friend Matt’s band. He didn’t play an instrument, so he showed up uninvited to the band practice with a tambourine. The band, Audible Detonation, was Matt’s brainchild and Ian was just secondary percussion. But soon they became “that band with the tambourine guy.” With Ian playing the role as the hype-machine, like the dancing man in The Mighty Mighty Bosstones and Flavor Flav before him, the group began to take off. Then, with a cacophony of sound that must have been something like when you shake sheet metal, the egos started to clash. Although the band couldn’t handle a front man with a tambourine, before they collapsed they produced some high-energy, real heavy rock and roll tunes.

Audible Detonation – Leaving Here
Audible Detonation – Burger Cop
Audible Detonation – Back Up Baby

Don’t forget to check out Audible Detonation’s Myspace page.

-Benjy

Guest Post #1: Jacob "Cobb Salad" Schutz

2007-04-26T17:23:00.000-04:00

If you haven’t noticed yet, we here at The Canals have been spending some time in the past week appreciating friends new and old. To compliment the “Friends of The Canals” series currently underway, a few of our amigos will be making some guest posts to fill up time and space. And this shall be known as the first annual Friends Fortnight! Give a big round of applause for our poet laureate, Jacob Schutz. Welcome back Cobb!

If you’re anything like me, you’re a misaligned youth who gets through daily existential crises thanks to the angry, quasi-angsty music from decades of misfits. You’re also University of Pennsylvania’s most eligible bachelor, but that’s a story for another day. The problem with summer is that sitting in a bedroom—angrily pondering the success of reality TV and railing against the man—becomes a lot less appealing. You just want to go outside, see the world a bit. So you can mock it again when winter comes. Throughout the years I have come up with some songs that fit summer cruising nicely, but still have that sweet soothing feeling that is a balm for the socially awkward. Let me take you through a typical day of summer:

Yellow Sun by The Raconteurs- You wake up on a sunny summer day thinking of the girl you fancy. Will you work up the courage to talk to her? “And if the sun should follow us into your room/Then the courage will be robbed from me to tell you the truth.” Doesn’t look good.

12:51 by The Strokes- So just call her. I recommend a line like, “We could go and get 40s/Fuck goin' to that party/Oh really, your folks are away now?/Alright, let's go, you convinced me.”

I Bet You Look Good on The Dance Floor by the Arctic Monkeys- At the party, dance. I can’t really dance, but I sure as hell can jerk arhythmically. And that’s what girls like. As the music dies down you’ll realize, “Oh there ain't no love/No Montagues or Capulets/We're just banging tunes and DJ sets and/Dirty dance floors and dreams of naughtiness.”

Bike by Pink Floyd- This realization leaves you feeling awkward, and you cease functioning in front of said girl. In a desperate attempt to save the evening, you confess your feelings. Unfortunately, you’re tripping on acid at this point and mess up your metaphors. You make vague sexual references like “I’ve got a bike/You can ride it if you like.”

My Best Friend’s Girl by The Cars- Girl doesn’t respond well. You become withdrawn, distant, unable to stop yourself from seeming sullen. That’s when your friend slides in on you and steals the girl.

The Denial Twist by The White Stripes (removed by request)- I normally deal with situations like these with a heaping plate of denial. Jack White tells me “Take a tip and do yourself a little service/Take a mountain turn it into a mole/Just by playing a different role.” This helps, as does valium.

So anyways, that’s a day in the life of Cobb Salad. If you liked that last song, check out the Stripes’ new single, “Icky Thump.” I’m obsessed with The White Stripes. A lot. And as I know Jack White is a big fan of The Canals, I just want to say: 1) Sorry for being awkward when we met last and 2) Please come to Colorado between May and September.

The White Stripes – Icky Thump (removed by request)

-Jacob Schutz, poet laureate

Friends Of The Canals, Part III: Tim Urban

2007-04-25T17:16:00.000-04:00

Tim Urban is both less and more than a friend of The Canals – less than a friend in the sense that I haven’t seen him in nine years, and more than a friend in that I have a slight man-crush on him.

Tim was my bunk’s CIT in the summer of ’98, and his blog, Underneath the Turban, is absolutely hilarious and inspired me to start The Canals. He was recently a contestant on The Apprentice, and would’ve won if his team hadn’t stabbed him in the back and if Trump wasn’t such a hypocritical, romance-hating thug. As one of his fans so eloquently put it on his website’s guestbook, “i cant believe that you didnt win. that really sux. i thought you were thebest by far!!! well t2yl Terri.”

As much as it must have hurt, hearing “Tim, you're fiahed” was probably a blessing in disguise. Since filming the show, Tim has recorded his original music with Grammy Award winning producer Glen Ballard and recently released his debut album, Turning Home. Benjy and I are pretty sure that the music was featured on The Apprentice, and if it wasn’t it should’ve been. It’s inspirational, movie/TV score type music, and is grandiose enough even for the Donald. Although cheesy at times, it’s an impressive release from a true Canals role model.

Tim Urban – American Fanfare
Tim Urban – Mr. G

Buy the CD here.

-danny

Friends of The Canals, Part II: Spare Change

2007-04-24T23:39:00.000-04:00

Growing up musically inept is tough enough as it is. Compound that with the fact that nearly all of my childhood friends were some kinds of virtuosos, and all that leaves me to be is one half-cracked nut. For folks in my position there’s only one rule: get tough or get out of the kitchen. I like to be near the pudding, so naturally, I picked the former.

Despite the deep resentment I have for people better than me, at The Canals we like to give people, especially friends, the chance to show their skills. For part two of the “Friends of the Canals” series (following Danny’s Carmen Borgia post), meet my young buds of Spare Change.

Based out of my hometown of Arlington, MA, Spare Change is a goofball rock group comprised of four high school freshmen. Briefly described as “Zappa-esque” by poet laureate Cobb Salad, these young minstrels have recorded songs with topics ranging from monster-hunting cowboys to barroom brawls in Hell. Simply classic.

Spare Change – Prehistoric Wranglers
Spare Change – Hey Mama
Spare Change – Lucifer’s Bar and Grill
Spare Change – When I Think

-Benjy

The First Reading Day

2007-04-24T12:11:00.000-04:00

I didn’t get any work done yesterday, but I got a ton of new music. These are my favorite tracks, mostly from artists I read about on the blogs listed to the right:

Alberta Cross – Lucy Rider (acoustic)
Alberta Cross – Old Man Chicago
J. Tillman – Evans and Falls
J. Tillman – A Fine Suit
The Jayhawks – Blue
The Jayhawks – I’d Run Away
Mother Hips – White Headphones
Mother Hips – Time-Sick Son of a Grizzly Bear
Wax Fang – Bi-Polar Bear
Wax Fang – Majestic

You know it’s a successful day when you find two quality “bear” songs.

-danny

My Favorite Artists (Part 2 of 5): Nizlopi

2007-04-22T12:28:00.000-04:00

I was going to follow up Benjy’s post with one about my home state, Connecticut. An island of tranquility between Boston and New York, Connecticut remains neutral by not offering much of anything. It’s a small state with big money, Martha Stewart, Joe Lieberman, and a silent “c.” As a result, Connecticut is the butt of quite a few jokes and the subject of exactly zero songs.

So, Nizlopi. Based in the UK, they seemed an obvious choice for today after seeing Hot Fuzz last night. I discovered Nizlopi in early November, and their music pretty much defined my first semester at college. The band consists only of a singing guitarist (Luke Concannon) and a beatboxing bassist (John Parker), but they achieve an impressively full sound in the studio.

My favorite thing about Nizlopi is that they come up with incredibly catchy melodies while maintaining their musicality, individuality and British humor. They offer guilt-free upbeat music with witty lyrics and distinct personality. I love literally every song off their debut album, Half These Songs Are About You, and the following EP, ExtraOrdinary.

There’s not much else to say about them, except that they’re the only band I know named after a Hungarian girl (Luke’s school crush), and that they’re currently #1 on my “top artists I want to see live” list. I had a hard time choosing which songs to post, since they’re all so different and so good. “JCB” and “Girls” are their two singles, and “Flooded Quarry,” “Helen,” and “Freedom” are my three personal favorites. “Glastonbury” is a little different, but is a good example of the type of music on the EP and is another of my favorites.

Nizlopi – JCB
Nizlopi – Girls
Nizlopi – Flooded Quarry
Nizlopi – Helen
Nizlopi – Freedom
Nizlopi – Glastonbury
Pete Seeger – Yankee Doodle (CT’s state song)

Buy the CDs here. Really, buy them. Not to support the artist, but for your own good.

-danny

Last two weeks of camp

2007-04-22T03:46:00.000-04:00

The year’s gone by like the last weekend of summer. Two weeks from today marks the end of our first year at university level, and the beginning of my trip back to my home in Ohio.

The Canals leaving camp.

So, before we top off the school year with a series of forthcoming guest posts, I’ll let you familiarize yourselves with my peoples. The name Ohio comes from the Seneca word ohi:yo, meaning “beautiful river” or “large creek,” the original name of both the Allegheny and Ohio Rivers. Serving as both the “Mother of Presidents” and the Midwestern Bridge between east and west coasts, this state has served as a pillar of sturdy leadership and a hub of pastoral tranquility for over two hundred years. And so, as a reflection of these values and as an homage to my secondary residence, the state of Ohio, I have compiled this humble yet powerful list of songs.

Damien Jurado – Ohio
Kyle Andrews – Amos in Ohio
Randy Newman – Dayton, Ohio-1903
Sun Kil Moon – Carry Me Ohio (Alternate Version)
RJD2 (A Columbus native) – Ghostwriter

-Benjy

All You Really Need Is A Dollar And A Dream

2007-04-19T15:47:00.000-04:00

If there’s anything I like more than exclamation points in song lyrics, it’s exclamation points after phrases like “tofu penis.” That’s what makes Carmen Borgia so appealing – he takes a good thing and puts his own, usually better, spin on it.

Carmen was my boss when I interned at DuArt Film and Video in NY two summers ago. He used to tell me that he’s been fascinated with sound since he was a little kid in Ohio, and that he’s just never stopped experimenting. He wrote most of the songs on his debut album, North, and plays most of the instruments – steel string guitar, ukulele, musical saw, and accordion, to name a few.

Some of the tracks are a little repetitive, but I’ve been hooked for the last few days. This is one of the only albums I’ve heard that consistently makes me laugh out loud, but not every song is filled with absurd humor. Some are hilarious, some simple and sweet, and others slightly melancholy. He describes the music as “avant-folk” and the album as “an almanac for watchful and upbeat travelers; a documentary roadtrip by Greyhound, Chevy, train and rocket.”

I’d like to think that my days spent organizing DVDs and stuffing envelopes served as inspiration for at least one of these tracks, but I’ll probably never know for sure.

Carmen Borgia – Domenic Rom
Carmen Borgia – All You Really Need
Carmen Borgia – Swan Song
Carmen Borgia – Slim

You can find the lyrics and some more free downloads here, or buy the full album here.

-danny

Dig this ditch: The Switch

2007-04-18T17:30:00.000-04:00

The dry spell is over! After two long, soulless years of waiting, it’s finally here. As a follow-up to his 2005 release, Lost and Found, Will Smith is letting loose his spin-off reality TV show based on the smash hit single, Switch.

Maybe if he read any of my letters it'd be true, but for now...

The Switch, a Los Angeles rock group not affiliated with Will Smith, was recently featured on An Aquarium Drunkard to promote their first release, Hello Today. After enjoying the handful of live tracks there, I popped over to iTunes to snag the whole EP. To be honest, I’m more partial to the live songs than the studio EP, but don’t take my word for it, listen up:

The Switch – Country Song (live at Aquarium Drunkard)
The Switch – Just Smile (live at Aquarium Drunkard)
The Switch – Tongue Tied
The Switch – Living In Another World

-Benjy

The Beginning Of The End Of The RIAA

2007-04-17T17:43:00.000-04:00

The demise of the RIAA has been a long time coming, but a new music service, Amie Street, might speed up the process. Amie Street is the way music should be: DRM-free, market-priced, high quality, and legal. Founded in July, the site allows independent artists to sell and promote their music in an innovative and profitable way. All music on the site starts out free, and the price increases to a max of $0.98 per song based on popularity. About a month ago they signed a deal with Nettwerk Music Group, bringing mainstream artists such as Barenaked Ladies to the site.

If this isn’t the future of music, I don’t know what is. It’s perfect for browsing – they provide 85 seconds of preview for each song, which is important since so many of the artists are completely unknown. They have an effective recommendation model that rewards the customer for promoting quality content. They’re growing fast – just this week albums by State Radio, Hem, Griffin House, and Josh Rouse are being released (and even big names like these start out free). And best of all, the artists pocket 70% of their sales and not a penny goes to the RIAA. The only downside is that I know I’ll be spending a few hours a day this week discovering new music instead of doing something more productive like catching up on Tivo or playing FIFA.

Here are a few songs I heard for the first time and bought today from Amie Street. When you register they give you $1.00 for free, so I basically haven’t even spent any money yet. I also posted a few Griffin House songs, and his CD Upland will be released on the site tomorrow (along with Hem’s Funnel Cloud). Join today and help turn the slow, painful death of the RIAA into a fast (but hopefully still painful) one.

Patrick Park – Your Smile’s A Drug
Jack Zerby – Said
Princeton – The Indifference Curve
Selfish Gene – Daylight Savings (had to get this for the band name, pretty good song though)
Jets Overhead – This Way
Griffin House – Tell Me A Lie
Griffin House – Waterfall

-danny

Spring Fling Flight Test # 1

2007-04-10T18:37:00.000-04:00

Since the legendary Spring Fling concert is coming up in three days we thought it would just prime to take some time to go moonlighting with the three main attractions.

To start off, there’s Eef Barzelay of Clem Snide. I know a number of folks out there aren’t thrilled about this choice to open at the ‘cert, but I happen to think that with a little magic in the air things could rock like a cradle. With lyrics like, “if a Civil War buff can love a diamond in the rough, it’s great,” it couldn’t be anything but golden. Anyway, I saw Eef open for Damien Jurado back in 2006 at the World Café Live, and since then I’ve become a fan of both Clem Snide and Eef’s solo stuff. He’s an energetic and absolutely hilarious performer. Granted, those people I’ve heard spewing garbage like, “he’s going to be too mellow for the Fling show,” do have a point. Eef was (and most likely will be) just his voice and a guitar, singing goofy folk ballads. Hopefully the audience will be able to chill out a little and laugh along with him.

Eef Barzelay – Ballad of Bitter Honey
Eef Barzelay – I Wasn’t Really Drunk
Clem Snide – Action
Clem Snide – Happy Birthday

Buy Clem Snide's most recent album here.

-Benjy

Can You Spot The Difference?

2007-04-10T01:14:00.000-04:00

-danny

The Best Team In The World

2007-04-09T03:56:00.000-04:00

Kurtis Blow – Basketball

One of the bookshelves in my bedroom is dedicated to the New Jersey Nets. It’s a remnant of my middle school years, when I was proud to be the only Nets fan in Westport to enjoy the team's rise from perennial loser to king of the tri-state area. Six years later, being the best NBA team in New York/New Jersey/CT is about as exciting a distinction as being the best Rec Intramural team in Fisher/Ware/Riepe (a title the Delicious Corn came within 2 mercy rule losses of securing).

Since I haven’t added to my memorabilia collection in almost a decade, I tend not to pay much attention to it. Over spring break, though, this magazine caught my eye:

There is so much to say about this image that I really don’t know where to begin. I guess I’ll start with the simple fact that Todd McCullough is featured on the cover of SLAM (that’s his big, white, Canadian mug right on the “L”). Keep in mind that this is a publication that bills itself as “The ‘In Your Face’ Basketball Monthly Magazine” and includes segments with names such as “Sla – of – the – month.”

Not only is Todd prominently displayed, but the headline “The Best Team In The World” is referring to his team. SLAM is claiming that Todd McCullough is a starter on the best basketball team on Earth, while featuring the likes of AI, KG, Kobe, MJ, Stockton, the other TMac, and Lebron James ON THE SAME COVER. It looks like one of those pictures you’d take home from Bar Mitzvahs where they’d crop your face into a movie poster or the cover of TIME magazine’s “Man of the Year” issue. I honestly think the juxtaposition would be no more striking if Benjy were photoshopped in to replace Todd.

Anyway, I felt like the best team in the world deserved a post on The Canals, and I’ve created a playlist with songs for each player (excluding Keith Van Horn – I only remember him for his high socks and couldn’t think of any musical representation for that, but I’m open to suggestions) and for the Nets as a unit of basketball domination. Once you’ve finished listening to Kurtis Blow’s greatest hit, try these out. They actually happen to be some really good songs.

Rocky Votolato – White Daisy Passing (Todd McCullough)
moe. – Captain America (Jason Kidd)
DJ Danger Mouse – Justify My Thug (Kenyon Martin)
Elbow – Grace Under Pressure (Kerry Kittles)

Josh Rouse – Jersey Clowns
Khia – The Nets, Are Back

-danny

Jacob Schutz, poet laureate of The Canals

2007-04-08T23:19:00.000-04:00

Aside from being the musical institution that it is, I feel that The Canals is also both a cultural and literary experience by definition. Thusly, I publish this photo with accompanying piece of prose:

From left: Jacob, Alex
Jacob: This is after I won my appeal and was released from prison.
Benjy: You must have really liked prison.
Jacob: No. See, what I'm thinking is, "Boy I am glad to be out, but who will take care of little Jerome in cell 3B, who will only have his coffee if it has two sugars. And what about Lamar, who cries himself to sleep everynight." I won the freedom of my soul, but lost the soul of my freedom.

From now on I will keep a look out for other tidbits worthy of our recognition. Who knows, maybe someone will someday dethrown Mr. Schutz as the poet laureate of The Canals. Anyone could be next. Yeah, even you... Panama Lee.

P.S. Here are two slightly relevant songs that are also just plain great:

Yo La Tengo -- Mr. Tough
Little Feat -- Trouble

-Benjy

BEAM TO KILL ARMY AT 200 MILES, TESLA'S CLAIM ON 78TH BIRTHDAY

2007-04-06T23:34:00.000-04:00

A recent episode of Future Weapons with Richard "Mack" Machowicz showcased the awesome power of a new riot control device called the "Silent Guardian." This massive ray gun fixed atop a military vehicle induces the sensation of fire on the skin, making the dispersion of crowds a piece of cake. In my mind it's the sissified descendant of Nikola Tesla's "peace ray," otherwise known as the "death ray." Unfortunately, after an unsuccessful attempt to market the weapon to the US War Department, Tesla's plans were seized and locked away by the FBI for fear of public safety.

In the 2006 film "The Prestige," (my hero) David Bowie plays (my other hero) Nikola Tesla convincingly enough to make me wish that the "Silent Guardian" was both silent and deadly.

David Bowie -- Heroes

-Benjy

Undaunted Something

2007-04-03T02:11:00.000-04:00

Last Sunday, JC and I had to give thanks. Thanks to World Café Live, WXPN, and YRock for hosting a free members-only concert featuring Dr. Dog and, unexpectedly, the folk duo Jeffrey and Jack Lewis. The main event, Dog MD, rocked as usual, so I won’t go into detail about them. The Lewis brothers, however, were an entirely different breed of musicians. Cut from a more indie-folk cloth than the Dog, the brothers led by singer-songwriter Jeffrey, played sped up Subterranean Homesick Blues-ish poems put to music. They played mostly songs of sob stories lamenting a failed career in comic book illustration and the fickle and unappreciative ways of the music industry. A little to heavy-handed for the likes of me and JC, the brothers laid it on pretty thick with lyrics like, “maybe the world would be better off if we were all uncreative drones.”

I don’t want to judge too much, but it seemed that Jeffrey sang the songs as fast as he did because he knew the lyrics sucked. What we did appreciate, however, were the low budget “short films” with accompanying performed soundtracks. Less films than slideshows featuring Jeffrey’s Daniel Johnston-esque illustrations, these performances had lighthearted stories about multi-handed monsters, nuns, invincible heroes, and villains named Celery Sam. Was it enough to redeem them? Ask JC. Anyway, I’ll let you judge for yourselves.

P.S. It’s two in the morning, and I think I’m starting to like these tracks. In a way.

Jeffrey Lewis – Don’t Let the Record Label Take You Out to Lunch
Jeffrey Lewis – The Last Time I Did Acid I Went Insane

Buy the Lewis brothers' newest album here.

-Benjy

Mind Your Manners

2007-04-01T23:27:00.000-04:00

A few weeks ago I put in an order to have my windows fixed. Friday afternoon I found this note on my desk:

“Carpenter was here to fix windows. I have to order new windows for repair. To access window had to stand on shelf. Sorry I broke shelf. If it’s a problem call 573-3822.

-Rob"

My first reaction was anger. I use that shelf to hold my alarm clock, lamp, cell phone, hand sanitizer, magazines, and books. My second reaction was disbelief. I couldn’t believe that he thought the shelf could have supported him, and I couldn’t believe that he thought it potentially wouldn’t be a problem that he broke it.

But I didn’t stay mad for long. The carpenter was sorry that he broke shelf. That one, simple word softened the blow of the whole incident, much like my bed must have softened the blow of his fall from the windowsill.

Never underestimate the power of good manners—the carpenter and these artists clearly don’t.

Jim Bianco – Sorry
Sufjan Stevens – The Dress Looks Nice On You
Sly and the Family Stone – Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)
Wilco – Please Be Patient With Me
Dispatch – Walk With You
The White Stripes – I’m Finding It Harder To Be A Gentleman

Few notes about the music. Jim Bianco is a great new artist with a unique voice. You can buy his CDs here. The Sufjan song is my favorite of the past week and the first I learned on guitar. The Wilco song is off their new album Sky Blue Sky, to be released on May 17. I'm pretty sure that we're literally the first blog to post this song, so maybe that will help our average of 3.5 unique hits per day.

-danny

Vastergotland Spotlight: Dungen

2007-03-29T01:19:00.000-04:00

There’s just something inherently musical about Spanish, French, Portuguese, and Italian. Romance languages, they’re called. The same shouldn’t and couldn't be said of Swedish (or, for that matter, English), and I think that’s why Dungen is just so damned appealing. If you like these tracks off of Dungen’s Ta Det Lugnt (Take It Easy), watch out for Tio Bitar coming up in May.

Dungen – Festival
Dungen – Du E För Fin För Mig

Buy Ta Det Lugt here.

-Benjy

Summer

2007-03-27T18:14:00.000-04:00

Today is a different kind of summer than last week. Today's summer is the kind where every time you move, you sweat, so you end up sitting still for hours at a time. It's the kind where your brain melts and putting together sentences becomes next to impossible. It's the kind where your friends are somehow having fun outside playing frisbee and are about to go see Peyton Manning speak, but if you leave your fan for a second you think you'll die, or worse. It's the kind of day way too miserable for lyrics, so here's some good (mostly) instrumental music.

Soko – In November Sunlight
Taj Mahal – Ain’t Gwine To Whistle Dixie (Any Mo’) (Live)
Don Ross – Michael, Michael, Michael
Hem – Eveningland
Béla Fleck and the Flecktones – Big Country
Nick Drake – Sunday
William Galison & Madeleine Peyroux – Jealous Guy
Rebirth Brass Band – Cassanova
Spiritualized – Cool Waves
Sigur Rós – Untitled 4
Dave Matthews Band – One Sweet World Intro

-danny

FYI

2007-03-24T14:48:00.000-04:00

I just want to call attention to the fact that conservapedia.com has updated their look to include a new logo.

Neil Young -- America the Beautiful

-Benjy

Philadelphia Spotlight: Dr. Dog

2007-03-24T14:24:00.000-04:00

I was a little late catching the Dr. Dog train. Formed in 1999 as a temporary departure from the Philadelphia based indie-rock group Raccoon, Dr. Dog began as drummer Scott McMicken (now guitarist/vocals) and guitarist Toby Leaman (now bass/vocals) and their lo-fi, 35 track album The Psychedelic Swamp. They started to blast off when they were chosen to tour with My Morning Jacket and, later, when Kelefa Sanneh of The New York Times praised their terrific 2004 release, Easy Beat. Since then they’ve released three full albums and one EP.

On a promotional tour last month to hype the release of their most recent album, We All Belong, Dr. Dog watched the Canals watch them in concert in the back of AKA Music. I think we were two of six people there not wearing flannel. We felt a little out of place, yet there was something magical about the whole event. Amidst the clamor and jingle-jangle of the riffs and beats, I spotted a long-lost amigo from my Arlington, Massachusetts days, now attending school at LaSalle. The whole crowd exploded with the reunion; all except one be-flannelled female fan, who complained, “Um… you’re kinda taking my space.” She just couldn’t appreciate the moment. Despite their tendency to attract disgruntled little women and alienate their non-flannel-wearing fan base, Dr. Dog pops your eardrum with a repertoire of colorful throwback rock & roll.

Dr. Dog – Alaska (My original favorite track on We All Belong)
Dr. Dog – California
Dr. Dog – Wake Up
Dr. Dog – Die Die Die (Might be surpassing Alaska now)

-Benjy

Buy We All Belong here.

God Help Me

2007-03-23T02:31:00.000-04:00

Campus Crusade for Christ is currently in 3^rd place among the top corporate networks on Facebook in the overall NCAA tournament bracket standings. I was surprised at first, but it makes perfect sense. Every player and coach publicly thanks God immediately after winning a big game. Clearly, He has something to do with the outcome. And clearly, if any corporation is going to get its hands on the scoop before the official results are in, it's the CC for C. It’s probably a perk to compensate them for all the late nights they’ve spent crusading. It’s the least He could do.

Anyway, I figured that it couldn’t hurt to get in touch with the big guy up there, if only to help me through the rest of the tournament. I went 4/4 tonight and all 4 of my other elite eight picks are playing tomorrow, but I still need all the help I can get. Here’s my playlist for the rest of the tourney, or at least as long as C³keeps it up.

Wilco – Jesus, etc.
Everlast – Black Jesus
Beck – Lord Only Knows
Guster – All the Way Up to Heaven
Vusi Mahlasehla – Heaven in my Heart
Grace Potter and the Nocturnals – Nothing But The Water (II)
Dave Matthews Band – Christmas Song
Mike Doughty – Thank You, Lord, For Sending Me the F Train

-danny

music in ads (part 2)

2007-03-21T15:17:00.000-04:00

Benjy has gone on record saying that if he could go back in time and do one thing, he would be in the ensemble for this ad. I'm not sure what the official title of the song is, but I'm gonna go with "Big Beefy McD," which is in my opinion the most poignant lyric.

Jason Alexander – Big Beefy McD

-danny

I can talk to God too

2007-03-20T13:21:00.000-04:00

As Stephen, the crazy Irishman from Braveheart, taught us, the Scottish and the Irish can get along just fine. Having a bit of Scot in me, I feel that it won’t be overly insulting to have a four day late St. Patrick’s Day post.

Anyhoo… we all found this song to be an integral part of the festivities this year:

Dropkick Murphys – The Auld Triangle

-Benjy

Shoot me now, I can die happy

2007-03-19T18:27:00.000-04:00

The most recent movie featured in a long string of pre-release screenings here at school, Shooter, with Mark Wahlburg, is not only a fantastic political action thriller, but also a personal musical pleasure. As the opening credits passed over a burning Ethiopian village, my heart skipped a beat as the words “Levon” and “Helm” appeared on screen. I had heard of Levon’s acting career (including The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada), but had never actually seen him act. I completely flipped a wig when I saw his craggy old mug on screen. He was hilarious: a zonked out oracle, singing mystical artillery wisdom in his iconic gravel-tongued voice… and reading palms. Nothing gets better.

Listen up and pay respects:

The Band – Caves of Jericho
The Band – Key to the Highway

- Benjy

My Favorite Artists (part 1 of 5): Braddigan

2007-03-19T03:58:00.000-04:00

Yesterday morning I woke up to the following Facebook message:

From: Bonnie Eisner
To: Danny
Subject: Braddigan in Philly
Message: www.worldcafelive.com (click on april 19)
www.xpn.org/moc/phl
www.braddigan.com (click on Tours and April 19)

There were a few remarkable things about the message. First of all, I was notified of it by email. It always annoyed me that Facebook didn’t send out emails about private messages, and I was happy to see the apparently new feature in action. Second of all, I have no idea who Bonnie Eisner is. The only information on her profile is that she is “UPenn Staff” and that her birthday is February 17, 1953. Third and most importantly, it let me know that Braddigan is coming back to Philly to headline a benefit concert in April. I’d place this information at around #7 on the “best things to wake up to” list, right behind having breakfast in bed served by Hayden Panettiere, and a few spots ahead of being serenaded by Yanik. Needless to say, I immediately bought tickets.

Braddigan is the solo effort of former Dispatch lead singer Brad Corrigan. You can definitely hear some Dispatch influence in his music, but it has a much more laid-back, acoustic vibe. His songs are impressively diverse, especially considering he’s only released one studio album. In his live stuff the bongos are some of the best I’ve heard, and are a constant reminder of what Panama and the Canals could have been.

“Whirlwind” is a Dispatch cover and the other four tracks are his, posted in the order that they were my favorite songs.

Braddigan – Whirlwind
Braddigan – Sailin’
Braddigan – City on a Hill
Braddigan – Pura Vida
Braddigan – Fare Thee Well (live)

Buy his album here. Almost everything Braddigan sells and does is for a good cause.

-danny

Ide like to hear some music

2007-03-15T23:36:00.000-04:00

It’s the Ides… officially. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. On account of the fact that March is the official month of betrayal, here are a couple songs to commemorate the occasion. (They're both live tracks for no particular reason... don't look too far into it.)

Townes Van Zandt – Pancho & Lefty

Clem Snide – Jews for Jesus Blues (Look out for some more Clem Snide coming up for a Spring Fling post)

-Benjy

SUMMER

2007-03-14T18:07:00.000-04:00

It’s official: today is the first day of summer. I know it might seem like I’m jumping the gun a little, but I have to call it like I see it. Today for the first time since September I wasn’t the only person in Dunkin’ Donuts ordering an iced coffee, bikinis reappeared in the Quad courtyards, and I’ve been miserable in my dorm without air conditioning.

The arrival of summer means that summer music is close behind. Summer music is great because guilty pleasures lose their guilt. It’s like it evaporates in the heat and just leaves the pleasure behind. Music like this makes me miss my car.

Smashmouth – All Star

Jurassic 5 – Concrete Schoolyard

Mungo Jerry – In The Summertime

Slightly Stoopid – Mellow Mood

Fatboy Slim – That Old Pair of Jeans

G. Love and the Special Sauce – Don’t Drop It

Wilco – Jesus, etc.

Secondhand Jive – Lemonade (acoustic)

Dave Matthews Band – Best of What’s Around

-Danny

So Seu Me

2007-03-14T15:16:00.000-04:00

Over spring break I watched City of God in two sittings. I guess it was just too good to watch all the way through without taking a break. Well, anyway, in my off time I tried to figure out why the character “Knockout Ned” looked so familiar. Then it hit me. He was played by the Brazilian singer-songwriter, Seu Jorge, also featured in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. Check him out:

Seu Jorge – Team Zissou

And for a sample of what I hear is really popular in Rio today, check out this baile funk track that I heard in the Vice Guide to Travel.

Bonde do Role – Marina Gasolina

Buy Jorge’s new album, Cru, here, and Bonde Do Role’s EP here.

-Benjy

Ollabelle and then some

2007-03-14T01:53:00.000-04:00

As noted by D-Roc below, we saw Hem perform at the World Café Live in October, and it just so happens that another terrific band, Ollabelle, opened for them with a mind-blowing set. They’re best described as of a folksy, gospel-infused, “multitalented, democratic collective” of pure rock.

Ollabelle – Reach for Love

Ollabelle – Fall Back

P.S. Amy Helm, one of the lead singers for Ollabelle, is none other than the daughter of the bourbon-voiced percussion legend Levon Helm, of The Band.

Ollabelle covered this in concert:

Bob Dylan & The Band – Ain’t No More Cane

P.P.S. Here’s another terrific cover of the same song:

John Hiatt and the North Mississippi Allstars – Ain’t No More Cane

Plus- another, unrelated cover:

Little Feat – On Your Way Down (Originally Allen Toussaint)

Buy Ollabelle’s newest release, “Riverside Battle Songs,” here.

-Benjy

Music in ads

2007-03-13T20:43:00.000-04:00

I’m a die-hard Tivo loyalist. I’ve been spoiled by commercial-free television and can’t imagine primetime without a fast-forward button. Still, as much as I hate to admit it, commercials have some redeeming qualities. They can be mildly funny, present a new useful product, and sometimes feature some pretty good music. Once in a while I see an ad that ends up introducing me to a new favorite artist. I can think of two off the top of my head, and they’re posted below. I’m going to be watching a lot of ads these next few weeks during March Madness, so I’m hoping this will be a recurring feature that shows up again soon.

Liberty Mutual (Hem – Half Acre)

I saw this ad in September and six months later Hem is my 3rd most listened to artist. We got to see them play at World Café in October and it was one of the best concerts I’ve been too. Here’s one song from each of their first three albums.

Hem – Half Acre
Hem – The Pills Stopped Working
Hem – Pacific Street

Buy Hem albums here

Volkswagen (Nick Drake – Pink Moon)

I actually heard Nick Drake for the first time on the Garden State soundtrack, but this ad was responsible for a huge jump in CD sales. Drake died in 1974 of an apparent suicide and his music went basically unnoticed during his lifetime. All of Drake’s albums are worth listening to, and chances are that he was an inspiration to most of your favorite artists.

Nick Drake – Pink Moon
Nick Drake – Fruit Tree
Nick Drake – Way to Blue
Nick Drake – Northern Sky

Buy Nick Drake albums here

Nike (Untitled)

This is just an amazing commercial with a cool song. I also included a fan edit with the original moves that inspired the ad.

Nike – MJ 2nd Generation

-Danny

American Spirit: The Canals Begins

2007-03-12T17:39:00.000-04:00

Greetings future friends,

I recently read in the Southwest Airlines magazine, "Spirit", that the angle between any tree's branch and its trunk is equal to the angle that delineates the veins of that tree's leaf. Such precision had yet to be matched in nature until the immaculate conception of a trio of tenacious young students from across the Americas: Panama and the Canals. United by a common groove and eager to quench the universal desire for a little more soul, Danny, Benjy, and Panama made a deal with danger and formed a titanium bond that would rival that of Gilgamesh and Enkidu. Yet it would not -- no, could not -- last.

The three parted ways in the winter of 2006. Panama, demoralized and furious, broke Benjy's two best thumbs and ran off to the third floor, never to be seen again. Danny went on to become a successful entertainment attorney, defending such celebrities as Chow Yun-Fat and Denise Richards. Finding Benjy penniless and crippled, Danny nursed him back to health on a diet of boiled carrots and warm milk. Forever indebted to his former band-mate, Benjy swore to turn his life around.

He started by hunting down the man who ruined his life, Panama Lee. Armed with a blowtorch, a broom handle, and a gallon of icy hot, he began to make his way south of the border. Before he could exact his revenge, however, Benjy was arrested and charged on two separate counts of indecent exposure and libel in Gallop, New Mexico. After posting his bail, Danny helped his college dropout friend get an internship at the Washington D. C. studio of "America's Most Wanted," the program of one of his clients. From there, Benjy began working long-distance with Danny on their new musical venture, sans Panama. It was America's music blog; it was The Canals.

Listen up y’all- two tracks for where we are… and where we’re going.

Kool Keith- Livin’ Astro

Taj Mahal- Farther On Down The Road

-Benjy

An introduction to The Canals

2007-03-12T17:15:00.000-04:00

Earlier this year, Benjy and I formed a band with our friend Panama. We called ourselves “Panama and the Canals.” The trio was unique -- comprised only of a banjo, a guitar, and a set of bongos. Our future looked bright. We were young, driven, and had a witty name. The only thing we lacked was talent. It turned out that bongos were more complicated than they looked, and that Benjy only knew one riff on the banjo. The band broke up after a week, but we remain good friends to this day. This blog is a result of that experience. While “The Canals” failed at creating music, we hope to make up for it here.

That’s my take on the history and decline of Panama and the Canals and the birth of this blog. However, there are two sides to every story. To read Benjy’s account, see above.

First, though, take a minute and listen to these Wood Brothers tracks. Like The Canals, the Wood Brothers continued to pursue music after branching off from a trio (Medeski, Martin, and Wood). We sympathize with them and respect their courage and perseverance. Two interesting facts about the Wood Brothers: First, somehow their debut album (“Ways Not to Lose”) is my 6^th most played even though I have no recollection of ever listening to it straight through and only recognize two of the tracks by name. Second, we could have seen them perform at World Café Live earlier this year from front row seats, but we were busy playing our first intramural basketball game (final score-- Ware 3^rd Floor: 42, Fisher Delicious Corn: 20, our first of two losses by mercy rule).

The Wood Brothers – Luckiest Man

The Wood Brothers – Atlas

Buy the album here

-Danny