Aberdeen City

Here’s something from a new band out of Boston called Aberdeen City.
They’re releasing their first full length ìThe Freezing Atlanticî on
October 25 and it’s produced by Nic Hard (The Bravery, The Church,
Jesse Malin).

The pulsing guitars at the beginning
of the song takes me right to a live show, even though in reality I am
sitting here in front of my computer.  The mournful, melodic voice
of the lead singer is remniscent of the voice of Brandon Flowers of
newbie breakout band The Killers.  The lyrics are haunting yet
strangely amusing at the same time.  The beat is one that will
make one either want to get up and dance or just plain mosh along to
it.  The song is flexible- it does no wrong.  The beat is
great and truly one that will be stuck in my head for a while, and I’m
sure in no time it will be stuck in a lot more heads.
  
Aberdeen City : Sixty Lives
Aberdeen City : God Is Going to Get Sick of Me

Reviewed by Pearl

What’s Happenin?

Remember that show What’s Happening? I didn’t grow up watching the
original series but instead the  reruns (and a character by that name
too) on after school in 80’s. Why am I bringing this up?
Don’t know really but it seemed like an appropriate seguey for these
posts where I introduce a bunch of great things that are not quite
related and it’s my way of putting up one mega post instead a thousand
little ones that  get  sent down into the  lonely
archive of our 4F weblog world. 

I’m also in one of those contemplateive moods where I question the
evolution of 4F.  I originally intended this site to be a sort of
smorgasbourg of topics ranging from film to politics to musci, but I
sold out, sort of.  I noticed that my audience was more interested
in the music stuff, and yes, the links (By the way, I had a nice chat
with the developer of The Hype Machine,
who has a very sincere and healthy approach to the music blog
world.  He’s made it a point to direct his audience of aggregator
watchers to the actual posts instead of directly to the music
links.  Cheers to you Hype!) .  So in hopes of regaining my
original vision of promoting the things I find to be culturally
significant, I, for now at least, will present a series of pieces that
highlight great things from ALL cultural arenas. So here goes:

Coming to San Franncisco in November: “HE REMEMBERETH THAT WE ARE
DUST”.  A group show made up of two brothers, Grady and Riley
McFerrin.  You may remeber Grady McFerrin’s masterful show posters
from a previous 4F post here. Riley makes art using mostly wood which is best understood by going to this great interview done by the folks at fecalface in an intreview about his last show “can’t see the wood for the trees”.   In his own words he explains:

Basically after having become infatuated with wood working
via construction job sites, I couldnít stop thinking about wood, trees,
lumber jacks, forests, old school wood working tools etc. This led to a
thought process about nature and where materials come from. Because of
modern technology, we get stuff completely differently then those
before us. This started to make me sad.

The show takes place Friday November 11th 2005 from 5:30-8:30 at Tinhorn Public Works–511 Laguna Street. San Francisco, CA.

I finally got out to see a show.  It has been a long time. 
Some of my friends. TLXN who were playing at the new Knockout venue
deep in the Mission (see a previous post about them here).  They
opened for another fine group called The Very Hush Hush out of Oakland. 
They have this dark tinny sound that washes over the audience. The
vocals are hidden within, thus sounding very HUSHed.  Keyboards
bring out the more melodic sounds but also ass to the droning aura.
They’ve got a series of recordings out on the SBM
label.  Have fun trying to navigate
through their site which also portends a very muted experience.

Mp3’s:
TVHH : Love Like Love
TVHH : Ex Adult

And this brings us to our literature section.  I don’t think
I’ve ever included literature on one of these posts, but I will
now.  I’m reading a very good novel called Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides,
the author of the Virgin Suicides.  Unklike his previous book,
Middlesex takes on generations of history through the eyes of his
family as he follows the path of a mutant gene that eventually leads to
the main characters uniqueness, his/her sexuality.  Not since I’ve
read Updike’s Rabbit series or Ragtime by Doctorow
have I been so captivated by one: great writing and two: a look at
history through character development.  I highly recommend this
read.

Heroes of Switzerland

Heroes of Switzerland: At first, it’s a thunderstorm of guitars and
drums, and then that voice, semi-distorted, breaks in.  The vocals
are more subtle than the instruments, but the music is layered in such
a cool way that it’s okay.  The first thing I wanted to do when I
planned writing this review was to compare it to “this band” or “that
band”.  I found that it could not happen because this band has a
sound of their own.  The guitar solo (two minutes and fifteen
seconds into the song), however, is a little reminiscent of the Red Hot
Chili Peppers, but it was also
very much their own.  The vocals sing an anthem of frustration and
desire to be free.  It is overall a very good song with a very
unique and seemingly experimental (that’s a good thing) approach towards rock.

Heroes of Switzerland : Disposable Fiction
Heroes of Switzerland : Waiting

Reviewed by Pearl

A Mixed Bag

A lot of new great music has come my way, again.  After watching
Scorsese’s American Masters tribute to Bob Dylan, I became somewhat
nostalgic (it’s not like I’m old enough to remember the music of early
America, but maybe nostalgia is something that comes with growing up in
America? A connection to our mythological past?). Anyway, I’ve
come across the music of a talented duo that call themselves Ula. 
They are stationed in our great San Franciscan turf and pay homage to
that ‘folkways’ Americana that Bob Dylan grew up on.  They area  two
piece consisting of Banjo/Vocals by Erin Lashnits and Guitar/Vocals by
Sarah Hipkens.  Check out their recordings:

Ula : Hurry Home (Jimmy Rodgers & Jack Neville)
Complete listing here

Also, and I’m quite honored to give you some tunes that came by way of Run DMC’s
management (quite an hoonor, I must say).  The Hip Hop legends are
at it again.  Since the loss of Jam Master J, many thought it was
time to just put out a greatest hits or pack it up and get mini roles in movies, but
I ‘ve got a few tracks that were remixed for ya:

Run DMC : King of Rock (Megamix by Charlie Chan)
Run DMC : Pete Rock Mega-Mix

And on the heavier side of things I present to you Flyleaf. 
I particulary dig the heavy bass.  Apparently the lead singer is
only 5 feet tall, but she belts mean vocals.  According to their
publicist : “Theyíre on Octone Records
(which is a subsidiary of Sony Music) and they come from a Texas
Chainsaw Massacre town called Belton, Texas. The female lead singer has
so much energy and produces surprisingly strong vocals ñ considering
she barely reaches 5-feet in height.”  Cool, let’s hear:

Flyleaf : I’m So Sick