Review: Okay Paddy | The Cactus Has A Point

It seems like everybody is sleeping on the debut full-length from Okay Paddy, much as we were until Sunday evening when we finally popped the disc in. And whoa -- the Scranton, PA-based quartet's The Cactus Has A Point, which streeted today, is our first great surprise of the year. Okay Paddy's sort-of surreal power pop is framed in interesting production and wallpapered with irresistable, swaying pop hooks that reference or recall things like The Beatles, Weezer ("Your Bar's On Fire," particularly), Teenage Fanclub ("Gas Money"), the late lamented The Bigger Lovers -- basically all things indie, pop and delicious. This description of the record's contents from the coffee-loving band's site is so great we're just going to reprint it verbatim: "The songs are about things like non-verbal communication, going on thinking the whole time, worrying near to death, and exchange rate feelings." All that in 10 tracks clocking in at about 28 minutes. You can stream four tracks at the band's MySpace yert, and you can download three cuts from the band's web site here. Definitely try to track down the mellow strummer "You Never Worry" and the Matthew Sweet-esque stomper "Where's The Taste." Really, you should just buy the record. The band has a handful of dates over the next couple months, so if you are just gonna sit there and wait for the record to arrive anyway, try to get out and see them if you are situated in PA or NY.

03/03 -- Khyber -- Philadelphia, PA
03/04 -- St. Mary's Center -- Scranton, PA
03/11 -- The Bog -- Scranton, PA
03/12 -- Pete's Candy Store -- Brooklyn, NY
03/18 -- The Globe -- Bethlehem, PA
04/06 -- M Room -- Philadelphia, PA
04/20 -- Temple Ambler -- Ambler, PA

Today's Hotness: Dinosaur Jr., Trans Am, Asobi Seksu

>> Esteemed music rag Billboard made a boo-boo in its item about Rhino's planned reissues of the first two major-label Dinosaur Jr. records. "Feel The Pain"? Not on Where You Been. Never was. And we see now that the error has been edited out of the piece. Good work, editors. Anyway, the reissues of 1991's Green Mind and 1993's Where You Been will be expanded for release May 16, although the bonus stuff seems downright paltry compared to the bar-setting Cure and Pavement reissues of recent years. Still, we might have to pony up for the reissue of Where You Been just to get the alternate version of "Keeblin'" it will include, since that is our favorite Dino Jr. jam. And a 10-minute live version of "What Else Is New?" That sounds like it will be amazing. Rhino will also issue a live record of J. Mascis' first live solo acoustic date in 1993. Full details here. We still have Spin's review of Where You Been in a scrapbook somewhere that has a graphic with the haunting lyric snippets: "I know you're out there... where you been... you're the only one..."

>> A lot of buzz in the last 24 hours or so about Hummer's unsuccessful courtship of indie acts. Seems the military-complex spun-off, gas-guzzling vehicle maker wanted a hip edge to its marketing and was hoping to license tracks from notables including Trans Am and others. Despite the stack of cash Hummer was offering, all the indie rockers told Hummer to go take a flying f-, err, they told them to go away. There's full details and commentary in this ILM thread, including some discussion of the practice of creating music for commercials from one of the Matmos chaps.

>> You know what's hot? The two new songs we were allowed to preview from the forthcoming Asobi Seksu record Citrus this afternoon. The first track, "New Years," has a bridge that takes the band's crushing sonic assault to a new level. The second track, "Thursday," has a lighter touch but an equally compelling melodic approach. As soon as we get the high sign we'll let you know where you can hear the tunes. Citrus streets May 30 on Friendly Fire. Asobi Seksu, with a new-ish and gritty rhythm section in tow, heads out on the road next week for over a month. Here are the dates.

03/06 -- New York, NY -- Bowery Ballroom
03/07 -- Norfolk, VA -- Relative Theory
03/08 -- Washington, DC -- DC Nine
03/09 -- Chapel Hill, NC -- Local 506
03/10 -- Wilmington, NC -- Soapbox
03/11 -- Atlanta, GA -- Drunken Unicorn
03/12 -- New Orleans, LA -- One Eyed Jacks
03/13 -- Baton Rouge, LA -- Red Star
03/14 -- Houston, TX -- Walter's on Washington
03/17 -- Austin, TX -- Elysium
03/18 -- Dallas, TX -- The Cavern
03/21 -- Tucson, AZ -- Club Congress
03/22 -- Costa Mesa, CA -- Detroit Bar
03/23 -- Goleta, CA -- Mercury Lounge
03/24 -- Los Angeles, CA -- The Echo
03/25 -- Santa Cruz, CA -- The Attic
03/27 -- Seattle, WA -- Sunset Tavern
03/28 -- Portland, OR -- TBA
03/29 -- Eugene, OR -- Luckey's
03/30 -- San Francisco, CA -- Noise Pop
03/31 -- Bakersfield, CA -- Gigantic Vintage
04/01 -- Phoenix, AZ -- Modified
04/04 -- Austin, TX -- Emo's
04/06 -- Memphis, TN -- Young Ave. Deli
04/07 -- Chicago, IL -- TBA
04/08 -- Detroit, MI -- Magic Stick
04/09 -- Rochester, NY -- Bug Jar

Review: Make A Rising | Rip Through The Black Hawk Night

The foldout inlay of Make A Rising’s June 2005 release Rip Through The Black Hawk Night features a staged photograph of five masked people artfully arranged in a surreal living room scene. This portrait is an apt visual representation of the Philadelphia act’s self-described “avant chamber rock.” Songs are composed in incongruous movements with abrupt shifts between complex, classically scented string arrangements, cacophonic layers of discord, indie rock drone, folk melodies, and occasional overtly fragile indie-pop bedroom crooning.

Though the Make A Rising press materials claim otherwise, some listeners may find it difficult to sense themes building across the disparate compositions. To be fair, the latter songs on the record feature parts that dwell on themes and build into each other moreso than the openers. There is also a consistent live room sound apparent when the chamber and rock instruments are prominent, which serves to pleasingly relate movements across the diverse pieces. Electronic sounds sharply contrast the live instrumentation with vacuum-packed immediacy. The fragile, alto male vocals strike a childlike pose of vulnerability in sound and lyric on many tracks, but never go as far as to culminate or focus a track emotionally. Despite the sonic and lyric references to confessional indie rock and swooning classical music, the record remains artfully contrived and its players masked with so much prog in their program. If you enjoy the idea of your Dvorak, Stereolab, Yes, Flaming Lips, Rachels and Mr. Bungle records arbitrarily edited together into individual tracks, then Rip Through The Black Hawk Night is the album for you. -- Mr. Obb, clicky clicky Correspondent

[Buy Rip Through The Black Hawk Night from Insound]
[Make A Rising at MySpace]

Rack and Opinion: Release Date 2.28.06

To the untrained eye, this week's slate of new releases looks a bit weak. But we can pretty safely say you don't want to blow it this week. Just in the last few days we've listened to music from a couple amazing bands of which we had no previous knowledge. Both acts are putting out records this week. No big labels here, so you might have to do a little more digging than usual, but trust us, you're going to thanks us later. So write these down: Scranton, PA-based power pop quartet Okay Paddy's The Cactus Has A Point [Prison Jazz] and Chicago-based quintet Track A Tiger's Woke Up Early The Day I Died [Future Appletree]. There's also a Thurston Moore/Nels Cline thing that looks pretty arresting too. Three's a pretty good list, right? Watch clicky clicky for a review of the Okay Paddy record in the next couple days. And we're pretty sure we'll have something more to say about Track A Tiger before too long. Our complete (short) list of this week's best new releases is below.

Okay Paddy -- The Cactus Has A Point -- Prison Jazz
Ranaldo/Giffoni/Moore/Cline -- Four Guitars Live -- Important
Track A Tiger -- Woke Up Early The Day I Died -- Future Apple

Today's Hotness: Depeche Mode, The Softies, Witch

>> The Depeche Mode catalog is apparently getting the expanded, SACD reissue treatment. The first batch is said to be hitting racks at the end of March and will include 1981's Speak And Spell, 1987's Music For The Masses and 1990's excellent set Violator. A purportedly legit list of all the planned reissues, which will see the light of day in dribs and drabs through November 2006, is at this ILM thread. Depeche Mode is still out on the road supporting its 2005 release Playing The Angel, and has dates scheduled through August.

>> We don't suppose it will be a revelation to anyone that some who market music online engage in less-than-forthright behavior. From trolling message boards to setting up fake web sites, pretty much every sneaky trick that can be done when it comes to pushing pablum on music fans has been done already. You may be surprised to know that there is a trade association of sorts that aims to keep the play clean and the punches above the belt. It's discussed in a recent Nick Sylvester Village Voice piece here. The piece engages in a little bit of inside baseball talk, but that's the sort of thing we dig.

>> Cokemachineglow has a very nice feature on twee heartbreakers The Softies, with MP3s and such to boot. Check it out here.

>> J. Mascis' stoner rock project Witch is playing SXSW after all, according to the festival web site. This is in constrast to what we reported and then unreported last week. For all the latest on where Witch will and won't be, watch this FreakScene thread.

Coming To Your Local Bandstand: Dirty On Purpose

This spring Brooklyn shoegazers Dirty On Purpose will finally get around to issuing its debut full-length Hallelujah Sirens. The four-year-old quartet's set will hit racks in May on North Street. The label also issued the band's Sleep Late For A Better Tomorrow EP, about which we opined on behalf of Junkmedia that it recalls "the work of such touchstone shoegazer acts as Lush or Ride, every number on Sleep Late has big shimmering guitars, heartfelt vocals (though average lyrics) and melodies galore." We've since warmed up to the band a bit more, thanks to a relevant post or two over at Two And 1/2 Pounds Of Bacon. Dirty On Purpose is slated to spend much of March in the van. The tour starts this weekend in Cambridge, MA and all the stops are below.

03/04 -- TT the Bear's -- Cambridge, MA
03/05 -- La Sala Rossa -- Montreal, PQ
03/06 -- Lee's Palace -- Toronto, ON
03/07 -- Mohawk Place -- Buffalo, NY
03/08 -- Brillobox -- Pittsburgh, PA
03/09 -- The High Five -- Columbus, OH
03/10 -- Mac's Bar -- Lansing, MI
03/11 -- Empty Bottle -- Chicago, IL
03/13 -- Duck Room -- St Louis, MO
03/14 -- Conservatory -- Oklahoma City, OK
03/15 -- Hailey's -- Denton, TX
03/16 -- SXSW Convention Center Day Stage -- Austin, TX
03/17 -- Spiro's -- Austin, TX
03/20 -- Young Avenue Deli -- Memphis, TN
03/21 -- Earl -- Atlanta, GA
03/22 -- Local 506 -- Chapel Hill, NC
03/23 -- Satellite Ballroom -- Charlottesville, VA
03/24 -- Otto Bar -- Baltimore, MD
03/25 -- DC9 -- Washington, DC

Review: Man Man | Six Demon Bag

Man Man wants to play shaman to its listeners, leading us in a mad circle dance around a fire, a bar, an asylum or a whisky jar. On its recently issued sophomore set Six Demon Bag, the Philadelphia-based quintet pulls out all the stops to portray such "insanity:" pervasive carnival/gypsy backbeats; Sousa march bass lines; Eastern European and low French folk melodies; alternately growling, chanting and squealing vocals; bursts of discordant odd-time breaks; etc. However, on the record anyway, the architecture is too sound, the band too tight and well-ordered to be a genuine expression of the insanity or depravity or chaos or even of the frenzy Man Man puts on. While the music aptly signifies frenzy, insanity and depravity with virtuosity, the recording fails to embody and become these forces.

Man Man's cabaret-rock raucous sound will please listeners with a taste for the theatrically macabre. The band's commitment to its sound and outrageous musicianship could earn it a seemingly desired place in any carnival or gypsy caravan. But those who prefer the more soulful weirdness of folks who sound as if they have not chosen their lives as freakshows may be disappointed. The Man Man live spectacle, which earned favorable reviews at 2005's CMJ and SxSW festivals, likely achieves what the Six Demon Bag suggests. The record, issued last week on Ace Fu, documents the compositional elements of ritual mayhem, but lacks the risk in its performance. Risque perhaps, but not risky. When you see the shaman’s act as an act, he loses his power. -- Mr. Obb, clicky clicky Correspondent

[Buy Six Demon Bag at Insound]