Best Of 2008... 3 Lists!

I meant to do this a week ago, but here are my "best of" lists for 2008.  I don't claim to have kept my finger on the pulse, as far as what the kids might be listening to, but here are the records that I spent the most time with this past year.

NEW RELEASES :

1. Micah Blue Smaldone "The Red River"

I've long admired Micah's guitar playing and songwriting, and followed him as he's experimented with new (sometimes old) approaches, instruments, voices...  with every release, his singing and playing sounds more natural, and this is a work of tremendous simplicity and sadness.  http://www.micahbluesmaldone.com

2. Death Vessel "Nothing Is Precious Enough For Us"

This comes in a very close second behind Micah, not because it isn't as good, but it wasn't as dramatic an evolution.  That said, this is acoustic music of the highest order.  Joel's singing is otherworldly, to be sure, but it's his lyrics that really get me, quite poetic.  http://www.deathvessel.com

3. Meanings "Alas, Not Us"

One of the two on this list that were released on my record label.  Nate McDermott, who performs pretty much everything on this CD, also plays in the experimental group Paper Thin Stages.  I've always felt that his strengths were his singing, sense of harmony and idiosyncratic song writing.  This release has those things in spades!  A mostly acoustic affair, some great left-turns, lyrically and melodically.  I've listened to this record probably 200 times.  http://www.myspace.com/meaningsmusic

4. Daryl LeRoi Fleming "The Blockhouse & Bloodhound Sessions"

Just a wonderful offering from Daryl, in top form on all fronts.  A little short, but better too little than too much!  The other players on this record also doing an amazing job, and David Bernabo's production lends it a great atmosphere.  http://www.darylfleming.com

5. Dodos "Visiter"

I'm so happy that these guys have made it.  The ingredients on this, their breakthrough, aren't much changed since their earlier releases, they've been working at the same high energy / high standard level for a while now!  These songs stay in your head for weeks at a time, Meric has the gift of melody on his side, to be sure.  http://www.myspace.com/thedodos

6. V/A "Guitar Soli"

My friend Brooks helped to put this collection of post-Fahey guitarists together, and I'm frankly pretty surprised by the lukewarm response some people are having to it.  Though the musicality isn't quite up there with the stuff that was going on in Europe at the same time, there is a lot of heart and energy in most of these pieces, and the packaging and liner notes are top-notch.  I think it's a must for any fan of Jack Rose and other proponents of the "American Primitive" style of guitar playing.  http://www.numerogroup.com

7. Metallica "Death Magnetic"

Any of my friends who have read this far just said "What the FUCK?" when they saw this one... haha... but it's true!  I've always liked Metallica, the classic albums, and I was excited by the prospect of what Rick Ruben would bring to the proceedings...  I have to say that I really enjoy listening to this album.  For a bunch of 40-something millionaires, these guys are back to crazy thrashing riffs, crazy song structures, and crazy mastering levels on their latest record.  I would stay and watch any metal or hardcore band that played songs half as good as these.  I'm sure you can find them on the internet.

8. Nick Schillace "Landscapes & People"

Nick is a class act.  A fingerstyle guitarist from Detroit who plays all the right notes, at just the right pace.  Nick has amazing tone, and a feel for this music that is (maybe) second only to Jack Rose.  http://www.nickschillace.com

9. Triggers "Smoke Show"

I listened to this record quite a bit this year.  Triggers are special, but could potentially be something VERY special.  The chops are there, the melodies are there, and they play power-pop about as good as anyone.  I'm excited to hear their latest stuff, am hoping for a little more poetry and a little less "Wooo!" and "Yeah!" and "Get it while it's hot!" and "Come On!" and... ok, I'll stop.  Love these guys, even with all that stuff!  http://www.myspace.com/triggersmusic

10. Lohio "History, The Destroyer"

A huge evolution from their last release, this one is very catchy, but also very tender.  Greg and Josh have a great vocal blend, and this CD has a nice, home-spun sound.  Not terribly adventurous, but very classy and well done, front to back.  http://www.singlohio.com

If anyone on this list found it by Googling themselves, HI!  Hope you're doing well!

NON-2008 RECORDS THAT BECAME OBSESSIONS

1. The Misfits "Walk Among Us"

2. Pierre Bensusan "Pres De Paris"

3. Tristan Da Cunha "Instanter"

4. Frank Zappa "Joe's Garage"

5. Daryl Fleming "Better The Parcel Than The Post"

6. Stefan Grossman "Guitar Landscapes"

7. Bert Jansch "L.A. Turnaround"

8. Foo Fighters "One By One"

9. King Crimson "Three Of A Perfect Pair"

10. Stefan Grossman / John Renbourn "In Concert"

BEST OF PITTSBURGH

1. Daryl LeRoi Fleming "The Blockhouse & Bloodhound Sessions"

2. Triggers "Smoke Show"

3. David Bernabo "Mahler Box" EP

4. Lohio "History, The Destroyer"

5. Jenn Gooch "Gifthorse"

6. Becoming Projections "Rootbound Travelers"

7. Alia Musica Pittsburgh "Premiere"

8. Flotilla Way "S/T"

9. Ennui "The Myth In Which We Live"

Swamped with label stuff!

No posts lately because of all the label stuff going on...  Manufacturing Jack Wright & Alban Bailly, proofing Mikros Kosmos, assembling John Berndt and Mahler Box, recording and mixing Pairdown, etc etc etc!!!

Hopefully all of this stuff will slow down after the press send next week!

David Bernabo + Assembly... "Mahler Box" EP

David Bernabo + Assembly...  "Mahler Box" EP

Sort Of #023

Release Date : August 23, 2008

Well, he's done it again!  I could gush on and on and on and on about David Bernabo, his advanced rhythmic and harmonic tendencies, his prolific nature, or just how incredibly nice the guy is...  but I won't.  I mean, I probably will, but that will be a very long entry, sometime in the future.

In the meantime, I'd like to help David in announcing the imminent release of the "Mahler Box" EP, which contains about a half hour of amazing experimental pop and modern classical music, all masterminded by David and performed by a host of incredibly talented musicians.

From Bernabo's Myspace page :

"We have a new EP coming out that collects 8 tracks - 2 from the new record coming this fall, 2 remixes, 2 orchestral tracks, and 2 other oddities that you will never hear ever if you don't grab one of the 100 copies we are making of this.

"I posted two of the songs on this hear [sic] myspace for your streaming pleasure.  "The Newest Thing" and "Mahler Box".  Also, on board in the Assembly band are Owl Barns, Daniel Newman, Julie Sokolow, Daryl Fleming, Brandon Masterman, Nate McDermott, Lars Cleath, Scott Killebrew, and Will Dyar.

"To be one of the first to pick up the album, you will need to come to Sprout Fund's Hothouse and you can see Assembly perform (Owl Barns, David Bernabo, Chris James, Brandon Masterman, and Daniel Newman)..."

So I implore you to go to Sprout Fund's Hothouse event next weekend, and while you're there, pick up this stellar musical document and see a performance by Bernabo and his AMAZING band...  it'll be a great primer for their heady-yet-muscular new full length album "Happener-Magicker," coming later this year on Sort Of Records!

Listen to tracks on Bernabo's Myspace page.

Pairdown Videos by Nate McDermott

My great friend Nate McDermott has put together a few videos of my acoustic duo, Pairdown.  These are from a show at The Mills Gallery in Boston last month.  Many thanks to Nate for organizing this event, commissioning posters, doing sound and getting these videos together!!!

More videos here.  Nate also plays in two great bands on Sort Of Records : the endlessly experimental Paper Thin Stages and the folk / rock group Meanings.

Old Who In The What Now?

To explain the name of the blog (in a quite long winded way) : 

"Old Wired America" is something of a skewing of the phrase "Old Weird America," which should sound familiar to a lot of Bob Dylan fans, as well as your average 20 or 30-something Americana music enthusiast.

Greil Marcus wrote the book "The Old Weird America," some time ago, about the Bob Dylan / The Band "Basement Tapes" sessions.  He was trying, and I think succeeded in creating a catch-phrase to sum up the loose group of influences, archetypes and associations evoked in that fascinating set of songs...  the warm clash of nostalgia and modernity that bubbled out of that basement in Woodstock...  the Harry Smith Anthology as a cure for psychedelic hangover...  the cementing of The Band's reputation as the ultimate every-man backing band, and the beginning of Bobby D's reawakening to the American folk-song tradition and its endless capacity for storytelling and emotional textures...

Shit, what was that bit of writing just now???

Well, the phrase "Old Weird America" has also been liberally attached to a lot of the more (supposedly) subversive acoustic music that has been created in the last 20 years, as some kind of qualifier, as if to say that that, yes, there is an authentic and substantiated weirdo-acoustic tradition that the kids can feel good about aligning themselves with in these glitzy modern times!

Anyway, as a "wired" (though hardly weird) musician working in the modern era, I have the last 100 years of recorded music at my beckon call...  I can go to Paul's CDs here in Pittsburgh and find all manor of delights from any musical era, or I can go to the library and check out a 10-CD boxed set by anyone from Charlie Christian to Miles Davis to Pierre Boulez (conducting the collected works of Webern, twas indeed this week's ambitious library selection!)

*or*

I can just type any artist, album or song title into Google and go steal something from some messageboard somewhere!

But being the owner of a small and struggling record label, I find the process a little more nuanced, and I find myself regularly filtering my musical obsessions, keeping my focus keen for short spurts of time, attempting to acclimate myself to whole styles / schools of musical thinking before my fleeting attentions are summoned elsewhere...

Why, this year alone, I've enjoyed significant obsessions with :

Robert Fripp / King Crimson

Frank Zappa

Nirvana / Foo Fighters

Milo Jones

DC Hardcore and early 80's punk rock in general

The improv and out-music that is coming out on my own record label

John Frusciante

Pierre Bensusan

Jimi Hendrix...

And then there's the inevitable...  what happens, without fail, every year...  I expand my vocabulary as it pertains to the British Folk Revival of the late 50's through early 70's.  

The feeling usually takes me in the fall, when the sweaters come out, when the leaves turn color and when the air gets crisp...  that's when the John Renbourn records start to sound great again, that's when the Kicking Mule and Shanachie catalogs become endlessly inspiring, and that's when the gloriously understated voice of Mr. Bert Jansch grips me to my very soul!  It's intoxicating, and what's more, it's dependable...  my fleeting love affairs with all other musics are set aside for 2-4 months, every year, to accommodate a renewed and reinvigorated interest in the "young man's blues," and the sound of the fingerpicked acoustic guitar!

Well, the name of this blog is my attempt to resolve, or at least start a party amongst all of these inspirations, all of these seemingly disparate musical approaches that continue to excite and fascinate me, day in and day out, for as long as I can remember.  For as much as I pine for the purity and simplicity of the tried-and-true acoustic approach to things, I feel that, as artists, we are all irrevocably / irresistibly wired to modern times, to a constant influx of visual / intellectual / AURAL bombast of information from the internet and television...  the most traditional aesthetics are commonly come upon by the most modern of methods (how many times, in the last six months alone, have I bid on a 40 year old vinyl recording on Ebay??  More than I'd care to recount!)

So I am resolved to give in to my own nature, and to not choose a side.  Older music is not inherently outdated any more than modern music is inherently vacuous.  Music born out of honest effort will be honest music, regardless of when it was conceived.  The fun is finding the best of it all, or at least what speaks to me, in the clearest terms, at any given moment.

Okay, that's plenty for tonight...  Welcome (again) to Old Wired America!

My day off, so far...

Last night and today have been pretty productive.  

Since I don't have to report to the frameshop today, I've been doing my damnedest to catch up on manufacturing work.  Knocked out Ennui's new record, which I also listened to this morning for the first time...  really atmospheric electro pop, I think the simplest way to describe it would be Coldplay meets Discuss.  Also completed a(nother) reorder for the great Pittsburgh pop band Triggers, who are definitely doing a good job of selling their CDs.  Usually I'll do 25-100 discs for a band and they'll never sell out of them, or worse, just break up!  Now I'm starting on a new EP from Beagle Brothers, though I haven't listened to it yet.

Also got some stuff done for Abstract On Black, which is a heavily experimental imprint of my record label, Sort Of Records.  The newest release is Sort Of #019 / AOB #004, "The Harmony Of Contradictions" by Jack Wright & Alban Bailly.  It's minimal and improvised sax and acoustic guitar music, lots of challenging texture...

The whole release is up in the jukebox on the Sort Of Records Myspace page.

Well, Minette should be home from work soon, we'll probably figure out some dinner and then I might watch "Lawrence Of Arabia" or a Kinks documentary DVD that I got from the library the other day...  or I might just keep working.  As always, I've got a nice long to-do list of stuff to get done and people to contact for the record label, but I've put in a full day already, and Minette is always telling me that I need to learn to put the brakes on and relax!

Welcome to Old Wired America!

I just created this blog, "Old Wired America," having never blogged before.  I reckon I'll be talking about the little things that I do and the things that interest/excite me.  Sound good?