Fight - Eugene S. Robinson

'Everything you ever wanted to know about ass-kicking but were afraid you'd get your ass kicked for asking.'

From a review:
"Fight is part encyclopedia, part panegyric to fighting in all its forms and glory. Robinson’s narrative – told in his trademark tough–guy, stream–of–consciousness noir voice – punctuates this explanatory compendium of the fighting world. From wrestling, jiu–jitsu, boxing and muay thai to bar fighting, hand–to–hand combat, prison fighting and hockey fights, from the greatest movie fight scenes to how to throw the perfect left hook, Fight is a scene–by–scene tour of the bloody but beautiful underworld that is the art of fighting."

I've had this for a while but figured I would post it in case anyone wanted to check it out. He's probably best known for his band, Oxbow, and the madness that took place during the live shows. He's also been involved in professional body-building, mma fighting and even bouncing... and obviously writing.

Even the pacifists will enjoy this.

Buy It Here

Goes Cube

01. Bluest Sky
02. Grinding The Knife Blade
03. Restore
04. The Only Daughter
05. I Hold Grudges
06. Saab Sonnet
07. Goes Cube Song 30
08. Back To Basics
09. Goes Cube Song 57
10. Urbana-Champaign
11. Clenching Jaws
12. Victory
13. Another Day Has Passed

This is the first full length from this nyc trio and I have no idea how to describe/label it, but I'm very happy I picked it up. It's heavy, melodic and loud. Give it a listen.

buy
myspace
listen

Supermachiner - Rust (Deathwish - 2009)

This was a Converge side project featuring Jake Bannon, Kurt Ballou and Ryan Parker.

Disc one is basically the Rise Of The Great Machine album that was originally released in 2000 on Undecided Records. Disc two is everything else that was recorded at the time that wasn't released. Everything was written between 1994 and 1998 and recorded in the winter of 1999.

I've been waiting a long god damn time to hear the rest of these songs.

Disc 1
Disc 2

Godspeed You! Black Emperor

The best instrumental post-rock band ever. They formed in Montreal in 1994 and released their first album, F#A#∞, on Constellation Records in 1997. That was the first record I heard by them and the lp came with an envelope that included a diagram labeled "Faulty Schematics Of Ruined Machine" along with a penny that was run over by a train (see it here). The final side of the record has a locked groove at the end of the last track so it plays the notes F# and A# on a loop forever.

The core of the group was basically 9 members although the lineup changed somewhat over the years. In 2003 they disbanded and have been on "permanent hiatus" ever since. I'm just happy I got to see them play... which was also one of the best shows I've ever been to.

This band is the reason I got into this genre, and pretty much changed music for me.

Here is their discography along with some live performances. Enjoy.

F#A#∞

Part 1
Part 2

Slow Riot For New Zero Kanada

Listen

Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven

Part 1
Part 2

Yanqui U.X.O.

Part 1
Part 2

Tiny Silver Hammers (Live)

Listen

Live At The Polish National Home (Brooklyn)

Part 1
Part 2

John Peel Session (Live)

Listen

Wolfram|Alpha launched today...

from the site:

Wolfram|Alpha's long-term goal is to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable and accessible to everyone. We aim to collect and curate all objective data; implement every known model, method, and algorithm; and make it possible to compute whatever can be computed about anything. Our goal is to build on the achievements of science and other systematizations of knowledge to provide a single source that can be relied on by everyone for definitive answers to factual queries.

check it out here

the program will become self aware at 2:14am on August 29 and will launch a thermonuclear war. anyone not wearing 2,000,000 sunblock is gonna have a real bad day.

Their New Stuff Sucks

It's always funny when people say a band hasn't been good since____. There are legitimate claims that everyone should have stopped seeing the biscuits in 2002, and certainly since Sammy (the original drummer) left. But if you stop and listen to the music, you might realize that the music is good, they still play the older material and can still show signs of life. Mastodon included. The new album is good. Some people saw early shows (heard and loved early albums) of every band and love to say that everything since sucks. No, some people like their music now, and whatever people say will not affect that. If you want to get down to it, everyone is taking off of chubby checkers, Elvis, the Beatles, led zeppelin, and Mozart. So yeah, all the new stuff sucks, intelligent comment. Open your ears, maybe your soul will follow.

surfs up

Narrows - New Distances

1. Chambered
2. Sea Witch
3. A Restoration Effort
4. I Give You Six Months
5. Changing Clothes
6. Newly Restored
7. Gypsy Kids
8. The Fourragere
9. Marquis Lights

This is the first full length from this band featuring Dave Verellen (Botch) on vocals and Ryan Frederiksen (These Arms Are Snakes) on guitar. The ep they released was fantastic so I've been looking forward to this for a while, and it doesn't disappoint.

myspace
listen
buy (it's only 8 bucks!)

This Album RULES

Timelord Zero (Chronovore)
Agorapocalypse Now
Timelord One (Loneliness Of The Long Distance Drug Runner)
Dick To Mouth Resuscitation
Moral Distortion
Hung From The Rising Sun
First National Stem Cell And Clone
Question Of Integrity
Timelord Two (Paradoxical Reaction)
Trauma Queen
White On White Crime
Druggernaught Jug Fuck
Ex-Cop
Flamingo Snuff

I don't like everything this band has done but the new one blew me away. If you haven't heard of them it's basically Scott Hull doing the guitars, bass, and drum programming with three vocalists.

Timelord Zero is only available on the cd version here by rewinding the first track to -3:22

Based on previous posts I expect no one to download this.

listen

play him off, keyboard cat

yet another internet fad... some of these are great though.

the original


best one

sunny sunday...

A beautiful day today and a great end to a great weekend. The Mastodon show on friday night was probably one of the best shows i've ever been to... except for the $5.25 PBRs... Intronaut opened and no matter how many times I listen to these dudes I can't get into it. They sounded ok but I just don't like the tunes. Kylesa was pretty good as well, although i think they were having some technical/sound issues in the beginning of their set. Mastodon sounded amazing. Certainly one of the best live bands playing right now and definitely the best i've ever seen them, or pretty much any band play. The setlist was:

Crack the Skye in full

Bladecatcher
Colony of Birchmen
The Wolf is Loose
Crystal Skull
Capillarian Crest
Megalodon
Seabeast
Iron Tusk
March of the Fire Ants

The only thing that could have made it better is if they had played Hearts Alive.

On Saturday Todd and I headed to New York to see Mono play at Le Poisson Rouge. "The Red Fish" for all those straight people out there... The show was good, but the bar/bartender beforehand was definitely the best part about the trip. I'm not even sure how to describe it... the bartender had a mouth like a sailor, and the dude next to Todd had some choice conversation starters for the Scottish fellas next to him...
"So, you got the swine flu over there?"
"You guys seen the Loch Ness Monster?"

Mono was great and intense as usual. The Wordless Music Orchestra played with them and and opened with a piece that pretty much sucked and never went anywhere. During Mono the crowd was amazingly quiet and they played as expected. The setlist was mostly new stuff and the best song of the night was an old one, Halcyon (Beautiful Days)... I'm very happy I got to see that live.

Today I listened to Ribbed all day.

Evelyn Glennie - She is deaf

see the 4.00 min mark, and the 27.30 mark for some quick stuff. I thought some of what she was saying was interesting, but the music she throws is almost unbelievable for a deaf person.

Between Two Ferns

Between Two Ferns With Zach Galifianakis from Between Two Ferns

rainy sunday...

here is the new cky... Carver City

Volume 1 was/is awesome but that was 10 years ago. I haven't listened to anything else this band recorded and I'm not sure what to expect from this... but I liked the song I heard.

I can't listen to it now because the crack the skye 2xlp showed up today and it sounds ridiculous.