No Age: Nouns

holy shit is it coming soon then?

I'm seeing them in dublin and am so so so so excited!

I love this band, really really excited for the album...think it will leak soon??

one of my most anticipated of the year-- new song on their myspace is the jam. the acoustic guitar totally works

agreed. this band is incredible.

is this gonna be considered their first proper album? If so it's kind of a shame that it's gonna be on subpop

these guys suck

http://www.competitiveeaters.com/images/Burritochallenge-06.jpg

If so it's kind of a shame that it's gonna be on subpop.

Why?

album is AWESOME.

yeah wtf @ matrix. who cares

as long as the songs are as good as their previous material I'm gonna love it, but coming out on subpop gives them a level of attention/expectation and therefore gives the album a higher chance of either ending up watered down or seen as a disappointment or both...

excited. they don't suck. chaki likely has weird l.a. intel that has nothing to do with the tunes, which are awesome.

nah its from seeing them suck live a bunch and thinking their recordings are terrible.

Hey chaki, go back to joannie.

Okay, now I'm on chaki's side

listening now, not as much noise on this one...I wish the whole album sounded like "Sleeper Hold"

i want the whole album to sound like "neck escaper"

i haven't heard it yet tho

their noisy parts are really pretty so i'll be bummed if they kind eschew that, but i didn't nec like how weirdo rippers was split between songs/noise. if they can meld those together...

there are definitely a lot of songs on here..some of them are not very appealing to me right off the bat. but we'll see...

right now "Cappo," "Errand Boy" and "Brain Burner" are also real loud and awesome

I meant songs as in the "split between songs/noise"

there are two fully ambient tracks, other than that they're mostly relatively straightforward songs..."Eraser" is still great

if they can meld those together...

Yes, like some kind of fusion.

yes a fusion

yeah "Neck Escaper" was probably the closest they ever came

so hip.

but so good.

I meant songs as in the "split between songs/noise"

Dead Plane on Weirdo Rippers does this beautifully. This record's going to be great.

j0rdan whats the verdict

ha. i think it's awesome. better than weirdo. my fav is "cappo", the bliss out at the end is incredible. i don't have much else to say right now cuz i only listened like twice last night. the feedbacky bits are still really nice and sequenced well.

nothing on it comes close to "Everybody's Down" or "Every Artist"

i mean they've def 'evolved' into a straight-ahead punk band, the guitars are basically all riffs instead of like some of the songs on weirdo that had these really deliberate guitar plucks coming out of the feedback. i found those really powerful in some instances but i'm not mad at them just going all out from the jump on shit like "sleeper hold"

see idk-- i like "everybody's down" alot but it feels really compact to me as do a lot of the songs on weirdos. they just seem a lot more confident now, a lot more pummeling i think

Are the tracks from the vinyl eps that DIDN'T make it onto "Weirdo Rippers" cool?

I like "Every Artist Needs a Tragedy," because you get the noisy/glissy stuff, then it cracks into the riff right before the end.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBiMt_n3Mb0

Now this is a great record! Holy mackerel, they are not fucking around.

They are not fucking around. I kind of liked this band last year and then they go and make the best album (so far) this year.

Yes.

It's so rare for a band to be able to do the Sonic Youth/Pavement/My Bloody Valentine noise + melody combo, but when it's done right it's pretty much the best sound there is. It is safe to say these guys do it right.

haha is that youtube link supposed to be an endorsement of no age?

ok I've come around and now love this as I should

I think "Cappo" did it

the "cappo" bliss out is the best part of any of their songs except for maybe the end of "sleeper hold"

I was really disappointed at first.....can't remember why

This is one of the best albums I've heard in years. I loved Weirdo Rippers but this is in another league entirely.

It reminds me of Pavement....Weirdo Rippers is their Perfect Sound Forever, and Nouns is their Slanted and Enchanted.

So, anyone going to see 'em Friday? They were sick last Saturday, so I missed 'em.

There's no denying this one. It's awesomely awesome.

So it's like pavement with...bliss outs.

It sounds fantastic.

I am going to listen to it tho.

the vocals are way harsher than pavement tho-- no real melodies and they're really really fuzzy

rock music for ringtone music heads.

rock music for ringtone music heads.
I thought you were going back to Joannie.

the vocals are way harsher than pavement tho

I meant in their career progression...Weirdo Rippers was them finding their footing and their sound, like Perfect Sound Forever. Nouns is where they perfect it, like Slanted & Enchanted.

ok ok I get it. so it's like:

weirdo rippers = The State
nouns = Silver Side Up

i was kinda excited for these guys, kept hearing stuff like they were early hardcore spazz out. but all the stuff i've heard just sounds like lo-fi indie rock. i guess i was excited cuz i think they used to be in wives? that band was great, kinda negative approach goes skin graft or something.

It's so rare for a band to be able to do the Sonic Youth/Pavement/My Bloody Valentine noise + melody combo
^^^bonkers

they just sound like shitty punk to me, definitely don't get where they are coming from but i was never really into this kind of punk stuff anyway... before i heard them i had thought for some reason they were more... progressive??

i guess what i'm saying is i WISH they sounded like shitty hardcore.

times new viking without the tunes i guess is more it.

Are they like psychedelic horseshit?

i like them

they just sound like shitty punk to me

thats cuz thats all they are

Even Decibel gave this a 9.

wow then it must be good

yeah its like pavement except its good

It's fucking great. Possibly not quite as good as Weirdo Rippers, but that was a pretty high bar to set. Teen Creeps is the highlight for me.

>>Even Decibel gave this a 9.

-- jonathan - stl, Tuesday, April 22, 2008 8:23 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Link

wow then it must be good

-- chaki, Wednesday, April 23, 2008 12:09 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link<<

lol

their last album was...mmmh.. kind of overrated. i'm scared to hear this one and like it. if i do does that mean i have to be a green vegan then and hang out @ ze smell (which is like next door to edison double lols) - to support "the scene" ?

Are these guys anything like the SST album they were named after?

my guess: no.

this is real cool, the band going through the album song-by-song
http://www.drownedinsound.com/articles/3223222

these guys suck

-- chaki, Thursday, 10 April 2008 21:27 (2 weeks ago) Link

I don't get them yet either, or Times New Viking. Too trebly, hurts my ears.

I get Times New Viking. Those are pop songs underneath all that noise.

But I still don't get No Age (to be fair, I've only heard Wierdo Rippers).

the combination of the metallic creaking noise and the two separate guitars (one being plucked kinda quietly and the other just accenting it) is killing me and then the piano comes in awwww man

oh yeah thats on "Things I did When I was Dead"

wish I saw this show, yes I like Mika Miko

http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k229/carrotwound/NoAge11x17.jpg

The show on Friday was pretty good. Yeasayer was fun. The Death Set kinda sucked.

I think I'd have liked it a lot less if the drummer hadn't been so tight.

I wanna see the Death Set really bad

"I get Times New Viking. Those are pop songs underneath all that noise.

But I still don't get No Age "

it's the opposite for me

All this hype for a less interesting version of Japanther, and Sic Alps continues to be ignored. You're all hopeless

I love Japanther! Will have to check out Sic Alps

I was a little disappointed by Sic Alps when I saw them live. It seemed more normal type 2 dude rock than I thought it would be.

"less interesting version of Japanther"

disagree. both are great.
"no age" have a dirtier sound,less funny though

no age is fine i guess.

i just think it's weird the bands out of the underground that seem to be randomly selected for "buzz"

good big marketing is a big part of the answer

The cover of this album is so terrible I don't think I can buy it.

i went to that show at the library. it was kinda weird, having people just sitting in this big lecture hall; it was almost like watching a lecture (i.e. not much audience involvement). no age sounded pretty band (and i like them). mika mika did a little better with beach balls and stuff.

ibands out of the underground that seem to be randomly selected for "buzz"

I couldn't agree more..

http://mixtapemagazin.files.wordpress.com/2007/07/battlesmirrored.jpg

all those people in battles are totally hooked up and not underground at all. plus it's on warp...

i always kinda thought of no age as a t shirt band

"<i>I wanna see the Death Set really bad</i>"

Death Set kinda sucked. Two-minute hardcore shit in-between obvious and unmediated '80s samples, but not nearly as interesting as that description makes it seem. The band with the dude from !!! who opened were better, though also kinda bland and '80s corny. But I like guy/girl harmonies, and that redeemed a lot of it from being just a not-drunk version of Dykehouse.

i just think it's weird the bands out of the underground that seem to be randomly selected for "buzz"

Weird: you think of No Age's selection as "random" and not having to do with their intense poppy streak? (Or getting noticed off of "Boy Void," a short, straightforward, incredibly catchy single?)

CURSE YOU BBCODE!

Yeah, "Doing Alright Without You" is pretty damn catchy, as is a lot of their stuff. I get the love for them a lot more than Times New Viking or Psychedelic Horseshit, even though I like both of those bands too.

But I thought Battles was boring as hell, so what do I know?

i'm not denying they are catchy nabisco but so are shitloads of bands.

actually they are from LA right? that might be the best answer to my ?

They're from LA, and they play out here all the damned time. But I dunno, are they really that much bigger than Mika Miko or any of the other Smell/Fuck Yeah Fest bands?

Yes they are

Still, LA >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Baltimore x1,000,000,000,000

someone has to be the next big something. why not them?

i thought battles album was cool. but i heart helmet drummer dude a bunch. (and i thought psych horseshit album was WAY cool.)

i've always been on the same page for the most part with siltbreeze tom. he's got a good ear for stuff. or at least stuff that isn't the same old same old. or at least the same old in funny new clothes that i can get off on.

Still, LA >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Baltimore x1,000,000,000,000

-- If Assholes Could Fly This Place Would Be An Airport

OTM

so i'd never heard no age so i went on youtube but it's mostly live stuff there and mostly bad. i can believe that the records are better though. the singer kinda sucks. but most people who like indie rock don't care about that.

best noiserock singing drummer is still:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=oqwtXeI1AFo

I knew that was gonna be Harry Pussy even before I clicked on it. Uh, best band EVER?? Yes. It's unanimous. Come back to us, Adris!!!!!!! And Bill too!!! Do techno, we don't even care!!!!

Harry Pussy played a KUCI show about a decade back -- I forget who with, which is kinda bugging me. We all took 'em for vegetarian Vietnamese food.

jon spencer does the theme to anthony bourdain no reservations. this brings everything fulll circle somehow.

and when i say the singer sucks i mean that he doesn't sing badly well. er, or something like that. you know what i mean. some people are just great bad singers. he ain't one of them. he's just some dude. he could be anyone. i hate anyone. hell, i'm anyone.

It's so strange, there's a hype backlash and an anti-backlash and a backlash to the anti-backlash and the record hasn't even come out yet.

As the thread starter and one of the more vocal endorsers of this band on ILM, all I can say is that they are one of the best new bands I've heard in years. Maybe there's other bands out there that are better at this kind of music, but truthfully, I doubt it.

I don't think Japanther has tunes nearly as epic or pretty as some of No Age's, but I'm curious about Sic Alps after seeing them mentioned here a couple of times. Where should one start with them?

for some reason this band is very polarizing. everyone I've played it for has basically hated it except for one person who became almost equally as obsessed as myself shortly after. and everyone who likes them loves them I think....xp

sic alps are kinda different from one release to another, no? the one album i have isn't very no agey. more indie bummer psych haze with various fx filler tracks. not bad though.

anyway, that's what i've heard about them. that each new release is different stylistically from the last. i wouldn't know though cuz i only have the one album.

I'm curious about Sic Alps after seeing them mentioned here a couple of times.

-- Savannah Smiles

* Both vinyl only & limited? Not sure...

sic alps are good, but i dont see a connection between their style and "no age".

I can see the superficial similarites: contemporary indie rock that places a good deal of emphasis on the "rock" end of that equation, harkens back to the late 80s/early 90s punk/D.I.Y. roots of American indie. I'd put bands like Times New Viking, Tyvek, and The Oh Sees in the same box.

Man, I miss Tyvek. They played everywhere in Ann Arbor for about three months, then moved to New York and got famous.

this record reminding me more and more of "marked men" awesome first,self-titled record.
"ramones" are always fashionable i guess.

Zeno - Marked Men? The Rip-Off band? Really? I only know 'em thru their Fix My Brain LP on Swami from a couple years back, but that struck me as formalist, pop-leaning garage punk. Obvious Ramones influence, power pop style, traces of Reis' Sultans, even some Bad Religion in the anthemic choruses and shiny production. Not as varied or indie-rock influenced as No Age.

Admit that I haven't heard the Marked Men debut.

"fix my brain" is mediocre shit.
listen to the debut.
"marked men" are (were?) more straightforward, less "experimental" with sound,less indie than "no age"(more pure fast punk-pop), but the basics of most of "nouns" songs is more or less the same

Liked Fix My Brain, but burned out fast. Once I digested the hooks (which were great), there wasn't much underneath. Will track down the debut, as you're not the first to have recommended it.

the main difference is that on the first one, they played much much much agrassively faster and louder.like the good version of "green day" or something.

I really like the names of "rock bands" in quotes thing.

not on purpose.english is not my first language, and we use it like that on my language.
anyway, now im listening to marked men again and id say they are like the combination between the ramones and new bomb turks.

It's so strange, there's a hype backlash and an anti-backlash and a backlash to the anti-backlash and the record hasn't even come out yet.

this isn't a backlash against the hype. this is chaki telling people what he thinks of them. chaki is great and i will listen to anything he has to say about music, but I don't think he (and a few people saying "meh") constitutes your heroic backlash.

Marked Men are really good, no age is different though...

I think Marked Men have more in common with Japanther than No Age does

"marked men" are (were?) more straightforward, less "experimental" with sound,less indie than "no age"(more pure fast punk-pop), but the basics of most of "nouns" songs is more or less the same

this is pretty otm, cuz until Nouns a Marked Men comparison would be pretty offtm

yeah, but in "nouns" they cleared most of the sound experiments, to become more accesible, not as marked men are but getting closer

yeah more accessible to punk fans maybe

not rick astley fans

lol last week I went to a serious hipster night and they played that Rick Astley song and all the kids went nuts and the DJ was yelling "rick roll!!!!" it was fucking weird

true story

RickRossRoll

"true story"

it's not so rare now

SLEEPER HOLD

9.2!

"i just think it's weird the bands out of the underground that seem to be randomly selected for "buzz" "

after some listening to this album, this post srikes me with more sense.

i mean, "nouns" is great and fun, but there are at least a thousand more bands that do the same punk-garage-with a bit of grunge thing (not all of them are good, but there are a few), that arent getting this attention.

also, some of the songs here sounds like scatches, or demos, which has its disadvantages, and since the experiment effects are almost gone in Nouns, i started to think where is the originality here.
they share some similarties with The Dwarvs and Mudhoney,also on sub pop, so maybe that has something to do with the answer.

Maybe I didn't give Wierdo Rippers enough of a chance (not to say it was bad; it just didn't leave much of an impression). I'll try again.

Nouns is much better than Wierdo

<i>where is the originality here.
they share some similarties with The Dwarvs </i>

um

Except for Nos. 3 (which I can't speak to yet) and 4 (where I'm not sure if I agree), this to some extent summarizes how I feel about No Age.

Perpetua definitely hears this the same way I do -- the abundance of 90s (alt-)rock sounds, "either noise music for people who actually want to listen to music music, or pop-punk for noise dudes" -- but seems to want a lot more out of it beyond that. I dunno: part of what interests me about Nouns is how a lot of those 90s-isms seem refreshing and modern, and the way they don't really connect up with the past in any sense. (No Age sound like every new-wave skater kid I knew when I was 14, except that the new-wave skater I kids I knew when I was 14 didn't listen to much that sounded remotely like this!)

The desire for a singular point of view is a valid one, but it feels to me like one of those heavy expectations you draw out when other people are raving about a pop band whose songs you don't go for -- and never drag out when everyone's ignoring a pop band whose songs you find catchy.

Exactly, and the perception game gets us nowhere as listeners or critics.

I like this record: it's crisp and brief. It's a lovely minor album.

I'm glad he raises the question, though, because I wondered about it myself. I don't ultimately think these questions matter, but they did occur to me: do I just enjoy having this band around to slot into the early-90s fuzzy-slacker niche, stuff I grew up on that's been out of fashion ever since? (And does it sound good to people younger than me because they didn't have direct experience of that stuff?)

But more listening erased that pretty quickly; that feel is there, and a lot of the guitar parts definitely shout 90s, but I think there's something REALLY off about actually thinking of them as some kind of cultivated re-emergence or replica of that stuff, or some weird substitute for it!

Fluxblog review is somewhat annoying in that it's couched in an armature of assumptions (observations, to be generous) about other people's reactions and reasons. See that backlash/anti-backlash/anti-anti thing discussed upthread. The fact that the author's aware of and explicit about this, with his "Certain People" and "Other People" stuff, doesn't help enough.

Taken on their own terms, the band aren't exactly groundbreaking, but they are awful damn good at what they do, and the general appeal is easy to see/get. Bonus points for the fact that their style isn't entirely derivative or currently oversupplied in the marketplace.

that feel is there, and a lot of the guitar parts definitely shout 90s, but I think there's something REALLY off about actually thinking of them as some kind of cultivated re-emergence or replica of that stuff, or some weird substitute for it!

-- nabisco

Yeah, there's a bit of lamenting the 20-year nostalgia cycle going on there, which is odd given how much I've felt like Fluxblog hyped the '80s pop sound (maybe mistaken).

But, y'know, I think Alfred's pretty OTM above: it's a lovely minor album. As I tend to like a lot of stuff where I say, ya well, it's not anything new but it's doing it well (New Puritans would be one example out of many, especially as things move further out on the power pop axis), I can dig on Nouns just fine.

I'd also say that the complaint about not sounding 20teens or whatever is a little bit of a red herring, as I can't think of anything that I've heard (especially anything that's had the hype-hype) in the last five or so years where it sounded totally new and fresh and unbeholden to any prior art. At least not anything new. And, at least so far, the 2000s seem to have been characterized by the explicit past-sampling in a way that, say, the '80s didn't seem to be. Part of it, I think, is how much sudden democratizing access we've had to past music… But that's all a bit of a digression. Maybe Perpetua can tell me more about these bands that he's heard that sound like the 20teens, because I'd be curious.

they are good live btw

for the record, first article I saw about these guys was Kelefa in the Times in a CMJ live review a couple of years ago, so it's not as if it's just kids and indie nostalgics drawn to these dudes.

plz read "indie nostalgics" as "early-90s fuzzy-slacker nostalgics" if you'd rather i be more precise

link to that old kelefa piece

i first read about them in the new yorker!

Re: Mark H.

90s "fuzzy-slacker" retro, especially when punked up a bit, does seem credibly forward-thinking to me at this point, in that it gives American indie bands a way to step outside the genre's increasingly NPR-friendly confines. Taking a step back in order to move forward, y'know?

@ scott s.: what, you don't read p4k? :-P

@ contenderizer: not sure whether i agree or disagree with you here, but in case it wasn't clear i really like nouns.

i just got an album in the mail by this trio(? i think) that is really grungey, but grungey in a good way! i mean, it sounds fresh. i wish i could remember their name. and the album was produced by page hamilton! even the new melvins album sounds pretty fresh to me. not that i was ever a fan, so i really don't know fresh from non-fresh melvins. and for a while now in the more metallic universe the pigfucker/touch&go/amrep sound has REALLY been picking up steam. tons of bands that sound like jesus lizard out there right now for some reason.

um, cuz you guys were talking about the 90's.

i don't read pitchfork, actually. i only heard about jay reatard, like, 2 years ago! (actually i first heard of him in a copy of maximum rock & roll. and i've been hearing about him ever since.)

early-90s fuzzy-slacker nostalgics

Any other early-90s nostalgics going to the Bowery Ballroom show tomorrow?

was just teasing, scott, no worries... but i think 2 years ago might've been before we properly covered reatard, sadly enough!

um, about one and a half years before, to be more accurate

um, and "teasing" as in "just joshing", not as in calling you names on the playground. not unless we're playing kickball.

http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/feature/47844-through-the-cracks

Mark H:

Well, I live in Seattle, where NPR-friendly indie rock is pretty much the dominant musical vernacular. The belly of the beast. And it seems to me that three things happened in the mid-90s that profoundly influenced American indie rock during the following decade: Pavement's Crooked Rain x2 and Wowee Zowie, Built to Spill's There's Nothing Wrong With Love and Belle and Sebastian's Tigermilk. In my opinion, all great records, and taken together, they opened a HUGE new audience for smaller label rock music. But, at the same time, they homogenized what had previously been an almost completely open-ended genre. More problematically, they arguably made safe a genre that had previously defined itself by an explicit stance of cultural opposition.

As a result, the phrase indie rock is now often used to describe a gentle, literate, sensitive and risk-averse strain of non-rocking rock music. Nothing wrong with that approach, but its ingratiating charm and easy marketability defines it as something profoundly different in kind than the self-consciously "difficult" outsider indie rock of the mid-to-late-80s. In part, I think that's what bands like Tyvek, Times New Viking and No Age are reaching back towards: a time when indie rock seemed genuinely independent. When to claim independence was to take a quasi-political stance in opposition to the presumed values of mainstream American culture.

Re: Scott S. - I think this renewed desire to make music in opposition is also fueling the pigfuck revival. It's probably a generational nostalgia, goes-around-comes-around thing, but it also feels like a sign of the times. War and recession and draconian political leadership (hopefully) breed this kind of thing.

x-post -- ? I mean, I admire your passion on that last point but I'm not too sure it holds up per se.

after listening since it's leaked i think they lose a bit of the punch that rippers had by having a distinct set of peaks and valleys since so many songs on nouns are based on riffs from the jump, but it's still ultimately an amazing record though i'm surprised that i think i still prefer rippers even though i thought more linearity would make them even better

contenderizer: ok, i follow now. not sure how making music for only an elite audience is a smart anti-bush political move (not trying to sound like hillary mccain here, i swear), but i think i follow your point now.

Ned - I guess I've had the impression over the past two years or so that there are a lot of bands in all corners of the American indie universe that are doing this, some in small ways, some in large, and that it's starting to seem like a sea change to me, not just isolated instances and mini-trends. The overtly political nature of the noise scene(s) and its relationship to the new crop of prickly indie bands figures in here, too.

ok, i follow now. not sure how making music for only an elite audience is a smart anti-bush political move

-- marc h.

Yeah, but college kids have to do something with all that free time.

contenderizer pretty much OTM. i see a pretty big disconnect between the so-called "indie" audiences now...like ppl who like No Age or Animal Collective or A Frames or Jay Reatard and people that like the National or Hold Steady or whatever....like 2 totally separate audiences now

^^^ This, which in turn suggests that the divide maybe isn't the "big new thing" I was making it out to be. But it's definitely getting wider and more obvious.

yeah it's weird there's this guy i work with, younger than me, we talk about music alot but sometimes it's like even though it's clear we both go to pitchfork everyday, there's a huge difference between what's on our radar...like he'll be talking about MGMT and Pretty Girls Make Graves stuff like that and I'll be like huh? and he won't know who Black Mountain or Stars of the Lid are...

his crazy "psych" band: mars volta
mine: comets on fire

(not that i don't know who mars volta is, i have their second album but it's just kinda weird how different things are, even though we both read p-fork reviews and stuff like that)

might be a divide between people who listen to internet radio and people who mostly read blogs... like, a friend of mine went to see yeasayer and was blown away that they were opening for mgmt, but my other friend who listens to woxy went specifically to see mgmt.

like ppl who like No Age or Animal Collective or A Frames or Jay Reatard and people that like the National or Hold Steady or whatever....like 2 totally separate audiences now

-- M@tt He1ges0n, Monday, May 5, 2008 3:32 PM (34 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

when was this ever really different? and is the divide really that big? i'm sure there a lot of people in both camps like cut copy. and no age/ac/national/hold steady all get covered by the same ppl really? i don't really think the audiences are that separate

hasn't it always been that way though? big indie people and lil' indie people? there might be MORE times new viking fans now than their were, say, dead c fans in the early 90's. that's the only difference i can think of.

x-post

yeah, that's true too. i can see someone picking up the new malkmus album along with the new times new viking album really easily.

or the new no age album along with the new gutter twins thing. you know?

but indie rock IS seeming less dire in some ways. and you can probably thank the crossbreeding of noize stuff and indiepop stuff with that and hopefully there will be more to come on a siltbreeze level and beyond. and you can give me all those metal albums you got scared into buying a few years back.

and if you still find yourself craving a little heaviness with your quirkiness i can recommend the new racebannon album. lotsa riffs and lots of spazzy jumping around like five year olds.

<i>when was this ever really different? and is the divide really that big? i'm sure there a lot of people in both camps like cut copy. and no age/ac/national/hold steady all get covered by the same ppl really? i don't really think the audiences are that separate

-- J0rdan S., Monday, May 5, 2008 9:10 PM (13 minutes ago) Bookmark Link</i>

i think it was a lot different. and i think they are very separate now, at least much more so than they were in the past.

i said up above yes they do get covered by the same people, that's why it's all the more strange to me.

I think that's what bands like Tyvek, Times New Viking and No Age are reaching back towards

I really like all these bands! also Blood on the Wall

I think Contenderizer is right about this kind of stuff sounding "fresh" largely in opposition to lots of strummy/chimey indie going around these days, but there are so many details attached that I don't go for:

- those really aren't the records I'd point to as creating a strummy-indie mainstream, at all, and I'm not sure I'd point to any specific records as doing that anyway

- I think it's off to imagine that strummy mainstream indie and its equivalents haven't existed all this time (or that punks in the 80s weren't bitching about "college rock" in much the same way dudes bitch about the Decemberists today, leave alone the fact that someone like Feist fills pretty much the same spot people like Suzanne Vega used to occupy)

- I would be wary of coding things so that fuzzy rock somehow means "real independence" in a way that other music doesn't, as opposed to maybe just suggesting that for the moment. (These things shift: a dozen years ago, sounding like No Age might have read as the bland mainstreaming of alt-rock, making you look to Tortoise records for something that seemed more out-there and creative and independent.) The fact that sounds SEEM to represent something political usually winds up meaning they DO, sort of, but not in the kind of absolute concrete sense we should be getting vehement about

- It's dramatic but kinda untrue to pretend like a bunch of nice indie bands "made safe" what used to be an oppositional music, because the fact is that a lot of the stuff sounds pretty much the same: the difference is that what used to read as off-radar and oppositional a while back inevitably becomes familiar and acceptable as it moves along. (One side of which is that increasingly mainstreamy people become part of your camp and start playing music within it.)

Basically yes, I think it's absolutely true that people will dig poppy bands doing things like No Age are as a kind of reaction to the prevalence of one kind of indie -- I also think it's inevitable that they'll form this narrative around it where we're going back to Dangerous Roots and Booting out the Blandoids, but that narrative is ... you know, the usual kind of not-really-true genre propaganda

I mean, a better way to organize these narratives is to talk about how time and popularity draw out certain elements of a genre, and not always the same ones.

1. The popularity of alt-rock in the 90s first drew out a strain of fuzzy classic-rockers, most of whose echoes you can trace directly into the next decade's new-metal

2. The drawing-out of the fuzzy RAWK is a lot of what sent 90s indie scrambling over into being bookish and thinky and other things Alice in Chains were not

3. Time and increasing 00s popularity have drawn a kind of middling, polite strain out of THAT and toward the mainstream

4. The drawing-out of polite sensitivity COULD be a lot of what sends 00/10s indie scrambling over into being noisy and transgressive and other things the Shins are not

But as far as "indie rock" goes, it seems like it's all always there and in play -- there just seems to be a big, ongoing split on this particular issue (arty/thinky/highbrow versus punk!/noisy!/transgressive!), which is ALWAYS there, and constantly tugging back and forth across the decades in terms of which side seems more vital, which side seems more creative and forward-looking, which side has the subcultural cred.

Nabisco OTM. I tried to be clear about the fact that I see this as a game of perceptions more than one of absolute realities, but maybe I didn't make that clear enough.

might be a divide between people who listen to internet radio and people who mostly read blogs...

-- mark h.

As a result, perhaps perversely, what audience there was was somewhat unified. You went to Melvins or Jesus Lizard, you saw a lot of the same folks you saw at Sebadoh or Polvo. I don't think that's now the case with, say, Death Cab and Jens Leckman fans on one hand, Fucked Up and Wolf Eyes fans on the other. Although all of these bands could be labeled "indie", they speak to radically different audience needs/wants.

I don't think this is naive genre propaganda (especially 'cuz I'm not prizing one approach over the other). I think it's as simple as different folks for different folks. In the 80s and early 90s, a small group of people designed "indie rock" to suit their own small-group purposes. When it became successful, it was repackaged and sold to a different, larger group of people to satisfy a different set of needs. But the first group carried on spite of this, simply 'cuz that's what people do.

as far as "indie rock" goes, it seems like it's all always there and in play -- there just seems to be a big, ongoing split on this particular issue (arty/thinky/highbrow versus punk!/noisy!/transgressive!), which is ALWAYS there, and constantly tugging back and forth across the decades in terms of which side seems more vital, which side seems more creative and forward-looking, which side has the subcultural cred.

"When it became successful, it was repackaged and sold to adopted/adapted by a different, larger group of people to satisfy a different set of needs."

- Cuz I do fall into the heroic mythology thing nabisco was warning against.

ok, even stipulating everything you said for now... if you want to call this sort of "whatever the normals don't like is what my people like" mindset "quasi-political," it seems like terrible politics to me.

"gosh, normal people are so stupid! they elected george bush again and they don't listen to the music that i only listen to so i can show how different i am from them! but at least me and my friends are still cooler!"

You went to Melvins or Jesus Lizard, you saw a lot of the same folks you saw at Sebadoh or Polvo. I don't think that's now the case with, say, Death Cab and Jens Leckman fans on one hand, Fucked Up and Wolf Eyes fans on the other.

Ha, I agree with a lot of it, but I suspect you might be gaming this comparison! The first sentence is picking from this circa-90 moment where both sides of this split were gathering together into a coherent "indie-rock" line. But dial back a few years, and I dunno: how much fan crossover were you seeing between R.E.M. fans and Black Flag shows? Or Depeche Mode wavers and Butthole Surfers shows? There was every bit as much antagonism in those days between weirdo punk and "college rock" Anglophiles. (But there seemed to be a few things around 88/89 -- Pixies, Dinosaur Jr, Sonic Youth) that started the process of winding those two threads into one.)

(xpost - yes, obviously I'm with Marc about not confusing style-politics with real politics)

if you want to call this sort of "whatever the normals don't like is what my people like" mindset "quasi-political," it seems like terrible politics to me.

-- marc c.

Agree with nabisco about the fact that prior to the mid/late 80's, there wasn't as much overlap (guilty as charged WRT the heavily-gamed comparison). I'm not denying that, or saying that there was anything super-great about the omnivorously weird indie community of that era. I'm just saying that the phrase "indie rock" was coined during those years in order to describe an artistic relationship with commerce and the mainstream media, and that it has subsequently become a way of designating something very different. And I'm making this point in order to highlight the existence/emergence of a shadow-indie scene that has more in common with what was going on in the 80s/90s than what is commonly called "indie rock" today.

You know, like Earth Prime vs. Earth Two. That kind of thing.

"You really did have to be some kind of disaffected and/or drug-addled weirdo to be genuinely enthusiastic about a lot of the stuff that came out on labels like SST, Homestead, Touch & Go, AmRep, Sub-Pop and Shimmy-Disc"

Hey! oh right...

American indie rock simply wasn't tremendously appealing to most people, and that wasn't by accident. Even the most mainstream-friendly bands typically had a quality of punk/outsider opposition. I suspect this arose from the fact that it was, by and large, being made by people who felt at least somewhat outsider-y for people who felt the same.

As a result, perhaps perversely, what audience there was was somewhat unified. You went to Melvins or Jesus Lizard, you saw a lot of the same folks you saw at Sebadoh or Polvo. I don't think that's now the case with, say, Death Cab and Jens Leckman fans on one hand, Fucked Up and Wolf Eyes fans on the other. Although all of these bands could be labeled "indie", they speak to radically different audience needs/wants.

Sorry, I didn't mean to be talking about the 1980s so much as what you seem to be saying about the present day. If you're arguing that bands like Fucked Up or Wolf Eyes are making a quasi-political statement, and that part of what defines their particular brand of indie rock is that the common folk don't like it (and not "by accident"!), then whatever that statement is, its politics probably don't square with most of our political values in 2008.

"contenderizer pretty much OTM. i see a pretty big disconnect between the so-called "indie" audiences now...like ppl who like No Age or Animal Collective or A Frames or Jay Reatard and people that like the National or Hold Steady or whatever....like 2 totally separate audiences now"

This is a pretty hilarious dichotomy, given that I kinda use my girlfriend's sister and brother-in-law as my template for earnest indie cornballs, and they're way into both Animal Collective and Hold Steady.

"how much fan crossover were you seeing between R.E.M. fans and Black Flag shows? Or Depeche Mode wavers and Butthole Surfers shows? There was every bit as much antagonism in those days between weirdo punk and "college rock" Anglophiles."

i think there was more crossover than you would think. there was way more antagonism between metalheads at punk shows i went to in the 80's then there was between new wavers and punkers. new wavers and hardcore kids got along okay cuz they always had a few things in common and there weren't that many of them! so they stuck together. at least where i was. college radio embraced all kinds of stuff and it was really not that hard to hear synthpop and the buttholes and rem on the same college radio show. it was all kinda "college rock". what i noticed at the end of the 80's and beginning of the 90's was a much younger audience being turned on to these things cuz they had more access to it and younger audiences tended to gravitate toward more friendly fare. or less challenging fare. and i think this changed things to some degree. there was a new audience that hadn't been there before and people took advantage of that. you could make money making indie rock! that changes everything. it wasn't music for and by nerds anymore. all of a sudden there were "cute" punk bands. this was a new thing.

er, antagonism between metalheads and punks at punk shows, i should have written.

Re: Noize politics

Something worth noting would be that there are two ways of seeing "independent," either as "left alone" or as "not beholden." The "left alone" is a lot more of an oppositional stance, whereas simply not being yoked to a major label doesn't mean that you can't sound like you're on one, especially anymore.

And saying that the politics of opposition, a thread that's common through a lot of rock and punk, doesn't square with the politics of 2008 is kinda silly—it's like saying that the Yippies didn't square with the politics of '68.

I think the question here is under what terms No Age are going to be praised. Their two PF reviews explictly yoke their worth to the scene-ness of the scene from which they came. That is, their goodness is reflected in, or maybe even caused by, the old-school indie-ness of the social and artistic situation from which they sprang. This is the specific nostalgia that seems to be at play here, much more so than the sound itself.

Personally, I don't think that's a good thing. Our affection for scenes as listeners stems from our desire to have a good story to go along with our favorite bands, and while that's fine, I don't know if there's any necessary connection between a vibrant scene and good music.

Fuck the hype. The Smell bands are the epitome of mediocrity. They can keep their scene. I'd much rather listen to the ThreeOneG/GSL bands than this shit.

If you're arguing that bands like Fucked Up or Wolf Eyes are making a quasi-political statement, and that part of what defines their particular brand of indie rock is that the common folk don't like it (and not "by accident"!), then whatever that statement is, its politics probably don't square with most of our political values in 2008.

-- marc h.

i think there was more crossover than you would think. there was way more antagonism between metalheads at punk shows i went to in the 80's then there was between new wavers and punkers. new wavers and hardcore kids got along okay cuz they always had a few things in common and there weren't that many of them!

I agree with Scott here. I would actually say the antagonism was directly related to the crossover. The lines between hardcore, punk, new wave, college rock and indie didn't seem as clearly defined. And so kids from diff backgrounds were showing up at all kinds of shows and this caused the antagonism. If everyone stayed in their little boxes there wouldn't have been the antagonism you get when you throw diff kinds of folks in one room with a band playing. (Funny thing: In the midwest the diff between the Depeche Mode kids and the Butthole surfers wasn't always that huge. Both liked hypnotic sound and drugs!)

I mean, sure, there was a huge chunk of HC dudes who basically hated everything else. But don't forget -- the same label that put out Black Flag was also putting out the Meat Puppets, Minutemen and later Dinosaur. Somebody mentioned Cobain up above. His tastes speak of that era: You could like the Melvins, R.E.M., Vaselines, Sonic Youth, Smithereens, etc.

Ha, I agree with a lot of it, but I suspect you might be gaming this comparison! The first sentence is picking from this circa-90 moment where both sides of this split were gathering together into a coherent "indie-rock" line. But dial back a few years, and I dunno: how much fan crossover were you seeing between R.E.M. fans and Black Flag shows?

I actually think less crossover occurs when labels really solidify. If there's no label and no set of rules surrounding that label then listeners are more apt to explore diff sounds. Look at HC's history in the 80s.

2. The drawing-out of the fuzzy RAWK is a lot of what sent 90s indie scrambling over into being bookish and thinky and other things Alice in Chains were not

Also, I kind of agree with this, but I would move it back a few years. Original emo, as well as stuff like Beat Happening and Sebadoh can be see as embodying those things that hardcore did not (the rise of the meathead culture in the mid- to late-80s).

I think the question here is under what terms No Age are going to be praised. Their two PF reviews explictly yoke their worth to the scene-ness of the scene from which they came. That is, their goodness is reflected in, or maybe even caused by, the old-school indie-ness of the social and artistic situation from which they sprang. This is the specific nostalgia that seems to be at play here, much more so than the sound itself.

That's the way it feels to me, too, from reading those two reviews. It feels like they're yearning for a robust, energetic new scene to develop, with No Age -- or whomever else will serve this purpose -- spearheading that development. But I admit that there might be more to No Age than I've heard yet (I need to listen to them more).

That is, their goodness is reflected in, or maybe even caused by, the old-school indie-ness of the social and artistic situation from which they sprang.

I don't see their "scene" as "old-school indie-ness." In fact, that's where No Age don't seem like an older indie band. It feels very L.A., very American Apparel, very post-Fort Thunder/Brooklyn. But that's just me.

I should also add Vice to that hipster salad I just tossed.

You went to Melvins or Jesus Lizard, you saw a lot of the same folks you saw at Sebadoh or Polvo. I don't think that's now the case with, say, Death Cab and Jens Leckman fans on one hand, Fucked Up and Wolf Eyes fans on the other.
Ha, I agree with a lot of it, but I suspect you might be gaming this comparison! The first sentence is picking from this circa-90 moment where both sides of this split were gathering together into a coherent "indie-rock" line. But dial back a few years, and I dunno: how much fan crossover were you seeing between R.E.M. fans and Black Flag shows? Or Depeche Mode wavers and Butthole Surfers shows? There was every bit as much antagonism in those days between weirdo punk and "college rock" Anglophiles. (But there seemed to be a few things around 88/89 -- Pixies, Dinosaur Jr, Sonic Youth) that started the process of winding those two threads into one.)

(xpost - yes, obviously I'm with Marc about not confusing style-politics with real politics)

-- nabisco, Monday, 5 May 2008 22:43 (Yesterday) Link

just because I'm from MN, I guess I see sort of see this division as an endless reworking of "Husker Du Vs. The Replacements"

"I mean, sure, there was a huge chunk of HC dudes who basically hated everything else."

this started happening in a big way in the mid-80's and then it was taken to extremes by the late 80's and 90's.

in the early and even mid 80's you still saw lots of weird mixes on college radio and crossovers and people weren't as rigidly defined. if you liked ANYTHING "alternative" you were a freak to most people. cuz all this stuff was brand new (in the states at least). by the late 80's you saw people become defined pretty definitively by the genre/scene they identified with the most. the hardcore/youth crew types. goths. indie kids. etc. but early on it wasn't that big a deal if you liked dance pop, synth pop, the cure, punk rock, etc. there was so much to choose from. (i was gonna write something like: but then the boring normal people got involved and ruined everything...but i won't cuz that's mean.)

that's one of the reasons why so many people got turned off by hardcore as early as 1982 or 1983. cuz it really did start out here as a fairly non-judgemental diy kinda thing that anyone could get involved in. it was fun. and then it was not fun for a lot of people. a lot of people didn't want to take a blood oath to go to a show. and i can understand that.

er, that was me...

Started back in '83
Started seeing things so differently
And hardcore wasn't doin' it for me no more
Started smoking pot
Thought things sounded better slow
Much slower, heavier
Black magic melody to sink this poseur's soul

VU Stooges undeniably cool
Took a lesson from that drone rock school
Manipulate musicians hack righteous drool
Getting loose with the Pussy Galore
Cracking jokes like a Thurston Moore
Peddle hopping like a Dinosaur, J...

Rock and Roll genius, ride the middle of the road
Milk that sound, blow your load
Shoot it further than you ever said it go
Four stars in the Rolling Stone

Oooh sludge rock,
That's hard as harsh
Just gimme indie rock!
It's gone big
Come on indie rock
Just give me indie rock

Taking inspiration from Husker Du
It's a new generation
Of electric white boy blues
Come on indie rock
It's gone big
Come on indie rock
Just give me indie rock

Breaking down the barriers
Like Sonic Youth
They got what they wanted
Maybe I can get what I want too
Come on indie rock
It's gone big
Come on indie rock
Just give me indie rock

Time to knock
The hard rock on it's side
Time to knock
The shit right up a storm
Turn to amaze
With the indie sludge
Grunge!
Aaah!

he Facts We Hate Well Never Meet Walking Down The Road Everybody Yelling "Hurry Up, Hurry Up!" But Im Waiting For You I Must Go Slow I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts When Is This World Coming Too Both Sides Are Right But Both Sides Murdered I Give Up Why Cant They I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts The Civil Wars And The Uncivilized Wars Conflagrations Leap Out Of Every Poor Furnace The Food Cooks Poorly And Everyone Goes Hungry From Then On Its Dog Eat Dog Dog Eat Body & Body Eat Dog I Cant Go Down There I Cant Understand It Im A No Good Coward & An American Too A North American That Is Not A South Of A Central Or A Native American Oh I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts Im Guilty Of Murder Of Innocent Men Innocent Women Innocent Children Thousands Of Them My Planes My Guns My Money My Soul My Blood On My Hands Its All My Fault I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts I Must Not Think Bad Thoughtsthe Facts We Hate Youll Never Hear Us I Hear The Radio Its Finally Gonna Play New Music You Know The British Invasion But What About The Minutemen Fleasheaters Doa Big Boys And The Black Flag Were The Last American Bands To Get Played On The Radio Please Bring The Flag? Please Bring The Flag! Glitter-Disco-Synthesizer Night School All The Noble Savage Drum Drum Drum Astronauts Go Back In Time To Hang Out With The Cave People Its About Time Its About Space Its About Some People In The Strangest Places Woody Guthrie Sang About B-E-E-T-S Not B-E-A-T-S I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts The Facts We Hate

<i>I'm not sure I understand yr objection, marc. People who feel alienated by the culture they inhabit tend to communicate with that culture in an alienated fashion. In other words, to be alienated is to be out of step, disharmonious, in disagreement with the world around you. Therefore, alienation is even further self-marginalizing, and the art made by profoundly alienated people stands a very good chance of being marginal, too - at least with regard to how well it satisfies mainstream (non alienated) tastes. This doesn't mean that such art is politically meaningless, but perhaps it does mean that its potential political impact is muted. Is that your objection? That those who define themselves as outside and in opposition to the culture at large are poorly able to influence it?</i>

It's not an aesthetic objection. I thought you were initially arguing that one reason for the goodness of this, for lack of a better phrase, Indie Rock That Self-Marginalized People Like-- music that dedicates itself from being different from whatever the masses like, even if the masses like stuff that sounds like what they liked last year-- is that it's making a political statement. And that's elitist as shit, man.

You can and should champion any of those bands based on how awesome they sound, but politically, this supposed category of music would be on the side of the Establishment, maan-- needs the square Establishment, in fact, in order to have something to vaingloriously rebel against.

dedicates itself to being different from whatever the masses like, and damn my use of html instead of bbcodes again.

i mean elitist in the political sense here. sorry, i feel like i'm still not being as clear as i mean to be.

Talking about grand narratives like this is funny, because I find myself agreeing with people who are posting to disagree with me on details! Like Scott OTM about the old kinship between the kinds of people who listened to college rock vs. punk/hardcore, and the overlap -- it was certainly that way in the town where I grew up. But there was still a clear sense that these were two different types of fans, even when we were all listening to the same records. (I have a really vivid memory of this guy Greg coming up to me in a Steel Pole Bath Tub t-shirt and saying "you probably listen to lots of Blake Babies and shit"; but then again we also became friends based on stuff like that.)

It seems like everyone who follows indie rock is catching and thinking about this again these days, though -- a flare-up of tension between pop indie and underground indie, however you map out the history of that. There have been a lot of points in my life where I'd instinctively take the side of defending mainstreamy indie (because I was the kind of kid who listened to new-wave and Blake Babies, not Steel Pole Bath Tub), but it's started to feel lately like rougher stuff really is getting marginalized and buried. This started to really sink home to me when I'd read about bands and see them described as really out-there, noisy, gritty, etc. -- and then I'd listen to the records and they'd be ridiculously poppy! Which suggests that the scale has slid a bit far.

I mean, just note the fact that NO AGE are sparking this discussion, and getting held up as a return of those scrappier values -- but in lots of senses, No Age sound like pop bands you'd hear on alternative radio in 1995! And when that seems refreshingly scrappy, you know some kind of correction is in order.

I agree with the point that certain elements who are pushing No Age really hard are doing so because they represent a "scene" and everyone's waiting for the next Brooklyn or whatever the fuck. The band themselves certainly propagate this though. It was interesting to see them play--they're just two friendly-seeming dudes, their music is very transparent in that there's two of them and it's easy to tell how they're making sounds, and the guitarist did this kind of democratizing punk show thing by passing his guitar around the audience at the end of the set so everyone could make noise. I mean, yeah cool, ignore the fact that he's on a stage in a big club and not in your friend's basement or something. I sort of irrationally think that they're pulling a fast one on people in presenting some kind of DIY basement aesthetic in an easily consumable way, but that's way too harsh.

It shouldn't really be that shocking that one can write snappy little punk songs AND fuck around with delay pedals, but maybe it is. I do honestly think there are some fine tunes on Weirdo Rippers but am feeling underpsyched for Nouns.

I mean, just note the fact that NO AGE are sparking this discussion, and getting held up as a return of those scrappier values -- but in lots of senses, No Age sound like pop bands you'd hear on alternative radio in 1995! And when that seems refreshingly scrappy, you know some kind of correction is in order.

xpost: and this is where the No Age thread and the VW thread combine.

This started to really sink home to me when I'd read about bands and see them described as really out-there, noisy, gritty, etc. -- and then I'd listen to the records and they'd be ridiculously poppy!

I so agree. I'm convinced that had Pavement came out today, they'd be tagged "noise-rock."

Marc -

I just don't think there's anything wrong the intentional outsider-ism you're describing. Like I said, I think a lot of the more aggressively weird 80s post-punk/post-hc/independent rock was made by people who felt disconnected from the values & tastes of American culture at large. And I don't think it's at all "elitist", if one feels marginalized in that sense, to preemptively reject (and, yeah, to sneer at) the culture that seems to be rejecting you. It may be classically teenage, it may be counterproductive, but it isn't elitist per se, because it doesn't derive from privilege or entitlement. Quite the opposite.

If you feel out of step with your supposed peers and their culture, you have at least two basic ways to respond:
1) You can blame yourself for the disconnect and attempt to better fit in.
2) Or you can "blame society" and make an active virtue of your alienation.

I'd argue that the second is often the better option, especially where artistic creation is concerned. It's empowering to say, "No! My way is the right way. Fuck all the squares who don't get it."

And while I'm framing things in psychological terms (not aesthetic ones), I don't think that necessarily devalues the political dimensions of such rebellion. Any act of political defiance must be based, at least in part, on a desire/will to oppose. People who don't actually LIKE making waves tend not to make their voices heard.

...needs the square Establishment, in fact, in order to have something to vaingloriously rebel against.

Agree w/ Nabisco about how strange it is to have this discussion about a band as inoffensive and pop-friendly as No Age.

And agree with CA Destroyer about how there's something distasteful about the way the indie press salivates over artist-authenticating scenes. Reeks of the indie pillaging that went on in the wake of Nirvana's big break, when everybody suddenly wanted to be part of something small and cool and secret. These little sub-movements become cargo cults for the world at large, and they monstly can't sustain it. The attention tends to undermine (if not destroy) the scenes in question.

I'm convinced that had Pavement came out today, they'd be tagged "noise-rock."

Well but they were! Kinda. Geeks first heard them 4-tracking on the Westing stuff, which really is pretty grotty and jacked-up; and not that I can remember exactly, but I don't think the reception of Slanted was like "hey, here's this new pop band." Apart from people who were already knee-deep in record lore (which I think was a much smaller number in those pre-internet days), they presented as pretty scrappy, maybe in about the same way No Age do.

(So yeah, I am holding a bit of a double standard here, which is that there's now a big audience for whom Pavement are a pop band, so you'd think the "scrappy" line would have moved over a bit. I'll admit that that's kind of an irrational double standard: no matter how much we talk about music "progressing," it just doesn't really work that way.)

I didn't see it that way back then. Pavement were lo-fi, yes. But they were indie rock as indie rock could get. That how we (my fellow "geeks" and I) saw them. Noise-rock was a term reserved for Scratch Acid, Pussy Galore, Drunks with Guns, Thrown Ups, etc.

Yeah but that's a shift in the use of the term "noise," I think, more than any huge difference in reception between No Age and Pavement. I agree that No Age are getting pinned with the "Return of Scrappiness" banner more than the actual sound suggests, but I don't know that the way some random college freshman first hears No Age is going to be SUPER different from the way one 15 years ago would have heard Slanted? (Assuming today's had previously been listening to Franz Ferdinand or the Futureheads, and yesteryear's had been listening to Blur and alt-rock.)

Apart from people who were already knee-deep in record lore (which I think was a much smaller number in those pre-internet days), they presented as pretty scrappy, maybe in about the same way No Age do.

-- nabisco

Then again, quantum's right, too. The fact that Pavement were labeled as "noisy" was always a little baffling to me, especially once S&E came out.

Substitute "Heckler Spray" for "Debris Slide" and the above makes (a little) more sense.

Nabisco, I'm not following you there. I understand your point that Pavement's sound is perceived as more poppy than it was 15 years ago. I simply don't remember anybody calling Pavement "noise rock" back then. That's not how the term was used for the most part (from my angle, of course). A perfect example (in the reverse) is Times New Viking: A lot of folks call them "noise" and "noise-rock" these days. And while the tape hiss is squealing like crazy, I don't think they would've been called "noise" or "noise-rock" in '91 and '92. They would've been considered a lo-fi/indie rock band first and foremost. That's just me, though.

Hmmm, recently read an interview with these guys-- they seem very sweet and well-intentioned. The Nouns stuff on their myspace, though, didn't do much for me. This may sound silly, but didn't that band Further do this kind of thing better on their Grimes Golden ep back in '94? (as far as lifting cues from Pavement and other "noise-rock" bands...)

I guess some of their songs sound Weezer-ish, which is inevitably gonna invoke some of my personal musical prejudices...

I just don't think there's anything wrong the intentional outsider-ism you're describing.

Hmm, as I see it, we're not that far from each other now, just emphasizing different points. I don't think there's anything wrong with intentional outsider-ism, per se, either-- just that if you were espousing it as a political statement, consider the politics of something that seeks to exclude ordinary people. As art or as something other than a political argument, I don't have necessarily have any problem with it. Some albums only a few people will like. That's fine!

"ordinary people"

wait, i'm confused-- are you subverting your own original point?

I see real (or at least potential) political value in square-hating intentional outsider art, especially if it seeks to build communities in opposition out of what would otherwise be just a bunch of isolated malcontents. Again, such attitudes and acts may be self-marginalizing, but that doesn't make them worthless.

(Apologize for the word "squares" here, but it seems like a universally comprehensible shorthand, if an unfortunate one.)

Apologize, though, for belaboring this thread with so much crap that seems almost entirely unrelated to the new No Age album, Nouns, which is pretty damn great.

yeah seriously shut up

ha, at the risk of sounding knee-jerk self-deprecatory and/or somehow undermining your arguments here by association, i pretty much agree with everything you've said on this thread, contenderizer

Reeks of the indie pillaging that went on in the wake of Nirvana's big break

Yeah, I guess the first thing to figure out with No Age is if there is a scene behind them worth pillaging. At least when that went down with Nirvana some regional bands and predecessor bands (Mudhoney etc.) got scooped up and probably had much longer/more prosperous careers than they were ever thinking they would.

Of course these days it's a lot harder to be an unnoticed band, and it's a lot harder to have being noticed translate into some level of success. With regard to the Smell, are there other bands that are even worthy if being pulled out? Is there value to this scene beyond No Age? I hear the names--Mika Miko, Abe Vigoda, etc. but it's going to take more than No Age and HEALTH to convince me that this is something out of the ordinary.

Apologize, though, for belaboring this thread with so much crap that seems almost entirely unrelated to the new No Age album, Nouns, which is pretty damn great.

Seconded! Only point was that where squares equals people less with less education or lower incomes, going against them for its own sake isn't a political statement I agree with. Which has nothing to do with Nouns, which really is pretty damn great.

When I first heard some tracks off Nouns, a month or so back, I thought it might be the new Times New Viking. I thought they'd cleaned up their sound. It wasn't, and they haven't.

vw, no age= west coast vs east coast fite. y'all just wait

Yeah, I guess the first thing to figure out with No Age is if there is a scene behind them worth pillaging. At least when that went down with Nirvana some regional bands and predecessor bands (Mudhoney etc.) got scooped up and probably had much longer/more prosperous careers than they were ever thinking they would.

-- CA Destroyer

HEALTH, though, are really damn good. I have maybe higher hopes for them than I do for No Age. At least what they're doing is less easily pegged as nostalgia.

i know i've sounded kinda so-so on No Age, but honestly they are a zillion times better than vampire weekend.

i'll actually probably end up liking the NA album just fine in the end.

In the internet age, I wonder if amazing local scenes could develop to the point that things did in Seattle before the suits showed up. These days, the rubberneckers and tourists show up almost as soon as the first generation bands do.

that concerns me to some extent, and i honestly don't think that it's just the luddite in me speaking. the ecology needed to develop something really amazing seems to be accelerated to an unhealthy rate due to internets. i'm sure that there are kids out there who are like, "fuck the internet", etc... but, by and large, i'm guessing most are myspacing it, indulging in blogolalia, etc.

jess wrote a good thing once on how blog buzz kinda kills bands because they only get to make an awkward first record, tour a bunch, and then are old news or done by the time they should be making their 2nd and third actual good records.

Just to clarify, Quantum, part of my point was that there's been a shift in how the word "noise" gets used. The average rock listener in the 80s/90s wasn't likely to have much sense of "noise" as a genre term or scene. But 00s noise, as a genre, gets discussed widely enough (internet, etc.) that average listeners can hear or get pointed to a band like No Age as being kinda like this "noise" thing everyone talks about.

I.e., the same usual path of words, just like "emo" or "twee" or anything else: nobody in 1994 would have called half of today's bands "emo" or "twee," because those words had specific genre meanings for small numbers of people -- flash forward a decade, and more and more people have heard the terms, and use them in increasingly broad, general ways. ("Emo" has other complications that make it a bad example, but you probably know what I mean -- I doubt people in the early hardcore days ever thought that even straight-up indie bands like the Promise Ring would ever be considered "emo!" And the emo-ness dilution between Rite of Spring and Promise Ring is not dissimilar from the "noise" dilution between old noise and No Age.)

"ust that if you were espousing it as a political statement, consider the politics of something that seeks to exclude ordinary people."

ayn rand was pretty indie rock. i mean, she had the haircut.

I doubt people in the early hardcore days ever thought that even straight-up indie bands like the Promise Ring would ever be considered "emo!" And the emo-ness dilution between Rite of Spring and Promise Ring is not dissimilar from the "noise" dilution between old noise and No Age.)

I see what you're talking about. And we're kinda saying the same thing -- with a few tweaks, of course! I actually think No Age is far more poppy than early Pavement. Yet you are right, the "noise" tags follows them around. (It also followed around Wives, which, to me, was really just rambunctious punk rock.)

This seems to be the current climate: Indie rock, as a tag, usually refers to pretty polite and mannered music. I wonder how man fans of, say, the Shins could sit through Sebadoh III in its entirety?

plenty, i would bet!

I don't know. I think Gaffney would freak them out after a couple tunes!

The Freed Weed is a better benchmark. III doesn't really have that much to throw folks off. You can always just skip through the last 5 min. of "As the World Dies..."

jess wrote a good thing once on how blog buzz kinda kills bands because they only get to make an awkward first record, tour a bunch, and then are old news or done by the time they should be making their 2nd and third actual good records.

yeah, that was on idolator, right? i remember reading that and nodding solemnly and then awkwardly trying to paraphrase bits and pieces of it to friends later on (seriously)

'cos there's a whole list of "the class of mid-aughties" blog-buzz bands who ended up releasing sophomore efforts to disappointing sales/critical response and so forth, right?

The Freed Weed is a better benchmark. III doesn't really have that much to throw folks off. You can always just skip through the last 5 min. of "As the World Dies..."

That's a good point.

guys sebadoh is not that crazy, okay?

the term "emo" is a whole other can of worms, though, right? like, if i'm not mistaken, the skateboarding magazine thrasher tagged some mid-eighties dischord bands with that term, or "emo-core", to be more accurately, and then it just took on its own bizarre life. as is the case with so many other secondhand or latter-day attributions, the supposed progenitors of the sound in question are horrified or at least "wtf??!!" that such a bizarre, reductionist label would be applied to their stuff

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbdh0Qm_5A0

It's true about the dangerousness of insta-hype. Used to be that a band's popularity spread slowly out in circles from the earliest of early adopters, to the next set, to the next set, to the next. As a result, the people getting turned on to the band could always feel that it was their new thing, and that the only other people who knew about it were "cool people". This slow build and slow accumulation of cred-points gave bands time to build up solid catalogs and super-dedicated fan bases before the magical "cool secret band" sparkles wore off and the whole world caught on. I suspect it's why bands like Sonic Youth and Pavement are so fondly remembered today: because die-hards followed their careers for quite some time before the rest of the world caught on.

Now everybody gloms onto stuff more or less in unison, overnight, and all in plain view of one another. Hipsters don't have time to annoint new bands with a good dusting of sparkles before the commoners take them away and make them all grubby with finger germs. Therefore, hipsters end up rejecting and backlashing against bands almost as soon as they become aware of them (which is funny/sad), and nothing gets to be new & cool for long enough to establish durable cred.

This slow build and slow accumulation of cred-points gave bands time to build up solid catalogs and super-dedicated fan bases before the magical "cool secret band" sparkles wore off and the whole world caught on.

what are you trying to say? that back in the day, when fewer people listened to a band, then that band was somehow able to channel these "cred-points" into awesome songs and get better?

the way I see it, blogs and the internet now function the way college radio used to.

Hipsters don't have time to annoint new bands with a good dusting of sparkles before the commoners take them away and make them all grubby with finger germs.

????

or maybe you are trying to say that bands are better when fewer people like them???

guys sebadoh is not that crazy, okay?

It's not about craziness. It's about breadth and exploration. Sebadoh could follow up the most simple yet beautiful little ballad with some schizo-jammer. But I think this stuff has kind of been lost to time as this thing called indie rock has gotten more and more popular. I mean, the opening two songs to Smash Your Head on the Punk Rock are just amazing -- from the thrashy "Cry Sis" to "Brand New Love." If Gaffney and Lou are ying and yang, respectively, then modern indie rock has ditched the ying!!! (Can you tell I worship Gaffney?) That's a bummer for me. I like the idea of bands being able to do both the ballad and the thrashy freak jam.

what are you trying to say? that back in the day, when fewer people listened to a band, then that band was somehow able to channel these "cred-points" into awesome songs and get better?

-- que

No, cred points don't = good songs. But cred does attract potential new fans. And as long as cred builds slowly, it can give a band time to write good songs while still operating under the radar. So that when things finally do come to a boil, and the whole world comes knocking, the band has a working method, a solid catalog, and a cadre of die-hard fans that will stick with them even when the cred dissipates.

the way I see it, blogs and the internet now function the way college radio used to.

It's not about craziness. It's about breadth and exploration. Sebadoh could follow up the most simple yet beautiful little ballad with some schizo-jammer. But I think this stuff has kind of been lost to time as this thing called indie rock has gotten more and more popular.

fair enough--they could do that. but you also picked the shins for your comparison, which is like the biggest strawman you could probably ask for. the shins aren't trying to be deep or exploratory. at all. i don't really think there has been anything in music in the past 10-15 years that has caused bands to be "less" experimental, just because "indie rock" (whatever that means) has become more popular.

I dunno. It seems as if I could replace "Sebadoh" and "the Shins" with all kinds of bands and still come to the same conclusion. Whenever any genre starts to gain in popularity, the music's more anti-social, more "out there" traits are the first to be abandoned. You can even see this within Sebadoh's career.

Are any of you indie rock intellectuals going to see No Age at Bowery tonight?

I'm too busy crying in my beer!

eh, but, invoking the word "hipster/s" is just feeding a demon of nonsense, imo. it's too loaded and divisive and invariably divisive, so i personally try to avoid that word, in the interest of maintaining some level of reasonable-ish discourse.

Are any of you indie rock intellectuals going to see No Age at Bowery tonight?

I refuse to see them outside of The Smell.

it's too loaded and divisive and invariably divisive

i'm clouded at the moment. apologies for the tautology happening there.

i meant to write "invariably pejorative"

invoking the word "hipster/s" is just feeding a demon of nonsense, imo. it's too loaded and divisive and invariably divisive, so i personally try to avoid that word, in the interest of maintaining some level of reasonable-ish discourse.

So, what's a good, non-divisive word to use for the people who pay attention to trends in music/art/fashion and keep an eye out for cool new stuff, if not "hipsters"?

"people"

"i don't really think there has been anything in music in the past 10-15 years that has caused bands to be "less" experimental, just because "indie rock" (whatever that means) has become more popular."

Really? Because I'd think that immediately being able to make money off of how you sound today would limit the desire to try new things with your sound, especially if such experimentation was negatively rewarded financially. Or, if you can get gigs sounding like OKGO, why bother trying to sound like anything but OKGO?

I was talking about this with my girlfriend recently, about how a lot more bands seem to a) have only one good album, and b) spring like Athena, fully-formed. Bands that have a lot of career growth, as opposed to a bit of refining of their sound, tend to be rarer, at least in terms of percentages (since the raw number of recording bands is so much higher than it was even ten years ago).

I realize that you're playing ILX Contrarian a bit, but it's not that controversial an argument, and it's one that makes sense.

No, que, "people" doesn't work. It's only certain people who do this. Typically young people in urban and/or collegiate environments. Why should it be troubling to admit this?

because i think it's weird to label people like that. you just have people who are more interested in seeking out music, "music fans" would work if you want, right? people who are actively reading about/checking out new music versus people who don't. isn't that what you mean?

No, cuz it's not just music fans. It's a specific group of music fans - culture fans really - typically young people living in cities. And I think it's important to admit that cred matters here, it's at least part of the dynamic. Backlash got discussed upthread, and so did the fascination with homegrown scenes. Pretending this is only about the music and that weird kinds of imaginary value (like hipness) don't figure in is disingenous.

again, not that this is life-or-death stuff, but i have to tilt slightly towards contenderizer on much of this discussion. some of these chimeras are well-worth taking into account, i'm thinking

The other side of that blogtention (to make an ugly portmanteau) is that it's easy for me to find out about and support (at least distantly) bands from, say, Texas or Florida or whatever formerly-backwoods area.

Plus, I'd say that there's a HUGE vantage point mistake in assuming that EVERYONE has heard anything just because there's blog hype. Blog hype is a small, tiny, infinitesimally minuscule minority of the population, even the music-listening population.

It's like calling Chaki "the backlash."

i'm trying to think of a recent "noisy" band that was embraced by normal indie rock folks and all i can think of at the moment is the blood brothers. they were on jimmy kimmel once. (or at least they could be pretty noisy from what i remember. i've never heard their later stuff.)

no age sound like they come from 1995 and maybe that's why i like them and maybe it's only part of it. either way, i don't see how coming up with a new word for hipster will help y'all understand their appeal or whatever. it's just music! i'd propose the idea that maybe the guys in no age don't really think about it too much, or at all, they just kinda play stuff that sounds cool to them, end of story.

And if only I could find my old Motorbooty with the Bank of Indie Cred article in it…

I lost my small Motorbooty collection somewhere along the way. Often, at night, I weep for it.

oh man now i'm remember big chief

skull avenue mack game

they just kinda play stuff that sounds cool to them, end of story.

Their Platinum Jive was better, though still hit-and-miss.

motorbooty was rad, as far as i can recall. i think my copies have been incinerated

the drummer in this band is so weak.

Loved Motorbooty mostly for Mark Dancey's illustration, which also graced all the Big Chief stuff. He played gtr in the band, but I loved his comix much more than his music. Big Chief (the band) never did much for me.

And chaki is the backlash.

i hated these guys before they blew up.

that's important

thank you

No way in hell could I make it through the entirety this epic thread, but I wanted to recommend the "Eraser" b-sides (Urinals cover/Nate Denver cover/Nerves "cover"); they're all really nice.

I got a Sic Alps album after them being mentioned in the same breath as No Age a bunch lately (on here, anyway). I think it's a collection of their singles. I'm putting it on now.

awesome, liveblog.

Just got back from seeing them at the sold out Bowery Ballroom show. Couldn't have asked for anything more. They are the real thing, a legitimately great band.

Congratulations, this thread's making the Vampire Weekend one look good.

Did Contenderizer used to be someone else?

xpost
i ended up getting into that show on a +1, it was really fun

This entire thread summed up:

"back in my day, you had to use a tuner to hear new music... on the LEFT side! lolz"
"oh wow, lolz"

Basically, the class of canonical 90s indie rock bands that current "nu-indie" more often give a nod to *had* less of an overall audience then, MTV/Beavis & Butthead play aside.

Today, people don't listen to as much mainstream anymore, so the playing field has been neutralized, as has been pointed out in a gazillion threads since I Love Music started.

In every decade, there were "THESE type of underground rock fans listen to THIS, but THOSE type of underground rock fans listen to THAT" type shit. In every city, on every given year.

This, plus the whole 90s-band-playing-out-an-entire-classique-album-live thing has confirmed that the 90s rock bands are now Radio Freedom Rock. (As Radio Freedom Rock occasionally gave a nod to, well, Freedom Rock.)

...

anyway, No Age. Nouns. On first listen, it's alright. Maybe this will grow on me, maybe it won't. It sounds a lot like Lync's These Are Not Fall Colors, with occasional Branca-tones.

The mini-book inside the album reads like a wordless Buddyhead. Surprised I didn't see anyone from The Icarus Line in there.

Harry Pussy played a KUCI show about a decade back -- I forget who with, which is kinda bugging me. We all took 'em for vegetarian Vietnamese food.

Ah yes, Harry Pussy with Un, from Philly. I treated them all to Vietnamese. That whole day was great, until Bill heard the recording of the live set on the air right after. He asked that I erase the tape in his presence while they were breaking down. I did. doesn't affect my opinion of Harry Pussy as much as my opinion of Bill at the time.

The mini-book inside the album reads like a wordless Buddyhead. Surprised I didn't see anyone from The Icarus Line in there.

That couldn't be a further scene from what these guys are into, as far as I can tell!

I like that little booklet, anyway. More the pics of their practice spaces and the beach at dawn and stuff. They have definitely captured a real L.A. thing there.

anyway, No Age. Nouns. On first listen, it's alright. Maybe this will grow on me, maybe it won't. It sounds a lot like Lync's These Are Not Fall Colors, with occasional Branca-tones.

The mini-book inside the album reads like a wordless Buddyhead. Surprised I didn't see anyone from The Icarus Line in there.

I def agree with you. I also hear a little Treepeople.

That couldn't be a further scene from what these guys are into, as far as I can tell!

I'm sure you're right. I saw the picture of that Vegan Express place, and that was the last thing I saw on Buddyhead before I stopped checking the website.

I hear some old-ass superchunk. I like it.

That Vegan Express place is kind of decent, and I'm a major meat eater. It smells like feet in there, though.

the drummer in this band is so weak.

i don't think so. he's not a monster, but he plays hard, loud and fast enough. by recent indie standards (excepting, like, lightning bolt) he's a big hitter.

I hear some old-ass superchunk. I like it.

yeah both these guys and times new viking have very superchunky moments. which is ok with me.

I hear some old-ass superchunk.

By the way, I got the vinyl in the mail today from Subpop, and it came with a free download code. I already had it downloaded, so I don't need it. Would it be inappropriate to offer it up here? If you're me, at least, you might download it and love it and then purchase the physical copy the same day.

jesus one pitchfork review and look what happens...

If so it's kind of a shame that it's gonna be on subpop

-- Preview of the Matrix 12, Thursday, 10 April 2008 18:13 (4 weeks ago) Link

was this so wrong???

also WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU PEOPLE TALKING ABOUT

v good question

No Age: Awesome Lo-Fi Rockers, Committed Vegans

LA’s No Age are one of the most exciting bands around — for evidence, look no further than their newly released album Nouns. I’m also happy to say they are committed, resolute vegans, and have been so for years — Dean Spunt since he was 15, with Randy Randall jumping on board a few years after that.

As a vegan myself, I often tell people that the move from meat-eating to vegetarian is much easier than the one from vegetarian to vegan. If you’re willing to make a steady diet out of pasta and pizza, no matter where you are, you can pretty much avoid meat. Avoiding pasta, cheese, eggs, and all animal products is another matter. It ain’t easy — especially if you spend much time, oh, say, anywhere between NY’s East Village and Berkeley, CA.

No Age spend much of their time on the road, where dining options often range from McDonald’s to KFC, and somehow manage to stick to a vegan diet all the time. When I spoke to them a few weeks back, they were having none of the bitching about how “difficult” that choice is. Said Dean, “People always ask us, ‘Isn’t it hard to be vegan on the road?’ and we’re always like, ‘No, not at all.’ I mean, sometimes you have to go to a grocery store and buy some fruits and vegetables, but other than that….no.”

As for “cheating” with the occasional bite of cheese, Randy doesn’t stand for it. “I mean, who am I cheating?” he asked. “It’s a choice I made, and it’s something that I enjoy doing and I find value in it.”

It’s the “enjoy doing” part that meat eaters have a huge problem wrapping their heads around. I constantly encounter the assumption that I must be miserable not eating meat, since I am “denying myself” so much gastronomic pleasure. “Right,” Randy agreed, “like you’re depriving yourself of something. And it’s like, ‘No, I’m actually enjoying the best parts of food…’”

And honestly, Dean said, often it’s non-animal consumers who are more adventurous. “When I decided to go vegan, food opened up a whole new world,” he told me. “It was like, Thai food, Ethiopian food, Indian food — I didn’t even know about those things before, you know?”

“The choices in food being vegan are so much more infinite than being a close-minded, suburban meat eater,” Randy chimed in. “Leaving fast food behind and exploring new cultures in food was a lot more interesting.”

Is that meant to be some kind of ammo for your dislike of this band, Chaki?

should we tell them that there are millions if not billions of non-vegans that eat indian and thai food? i wouldn't care about these guys being vegan if that interview didn't totally make it sound like they just did it to differentiate themselves from the, ahem, close-minded suburban masses

Y'know, I'm a vegetarian, and one of the fastest ways to bore me is to talk about vegetarianism or veganism. It's like talking about tastes in pornography—why would I care that Dean Spunt likes Blackzilla and Randy's into piss play unless they write songs about it? And frankly, I'm having a hard time thinking of worse topics for songs than "Man, being a vegan means that I totally eat some Ethiopian food, which you can do if you eat meat too, I guess."

should we tell them that there are millions if not billions of non-vegans that eat indian and thai food?

Shhh, you're giving it away!

Avoiding pasta, cheese, eggs, and all animal products is another matter. It ain’t easy — especially if you spend much time, oh, say, anywhere between NY’s East Village and Berkeley, CA.

There is so much good vegan food out there. I love how the coasts think everywhere else in America is nothing but Cracker Barrels or something.

Plus, a shitload of pasta is vegan.

Is that meant to be some kind of ammo for your dislike of this band, Chaki?

-- Savannah Smiles, Monday, May 12, 2008 3:22 AM (12 hours ago) Bookmark Link

sheesh a bit defensive? everyone knows these guys are terrible. i need no ammo. also awesome quote by dean in the new SPIN. "I want to meet My Bloody Valentine and cook them curry and make them drink Komboucha."

There is so much good vegan food out there. I love how the coasts think everywhere else in America is nothing but Cracker Barrels or something.

it just falls from the sky! manna! no need to look for it or anything when you're on tour on the interstate in a van hundreds of miles from anyplace you know. and you don't have an iphone.

man, i'm a meat-eater, but when i was growing up we were HAPPY to find a cracker barrel on long car trips. it meant you were going to get a decent-enough meal.

it just falls from the sky! manna! no need to look for it or anything when you're on tour on the interstate in a van hundreds of miles from anyplace you know. and you don't have an iphone.

gorcery stores are not hard to find.

a good man, on the other hand...

*flees*

*looks for signs on the interstate for gas stations, fast food restaurants, and grocery stores*

sheesh a bit defensive? everyone knows these guys are terrible. i need no ammo. also awesome quote by dean in the new SPIN. "I want to meet My Bloody Valentine and cook them curry and make them drink Komboucha."

-- chaki, Tuesday, 13 May 2008 00:17 (12 hours ago)

I'm just sayin'; you do an awful lot of research on a band you think stink! Clippings from Spin, the "MTV Newsroom"... are you keeping a slam book?

(don't get me wrong - I don't have HALF the megaboner for this band that people seem to be pitching; most of the gushing pieces have been genuinely ludicrous - but I don't think they're shit, either - they've got some fun fuckin' tunes!).

uggghhhhhhhhhh so now they're the vegan band on sub pop

i like to lol at their ridiculous music , quotes and fans.

...and diet

I don't really care how ridiculous their quotes are, or who their fanbase is, but I thought they were pretty good live and liked Weirdo Rippers or whatever. I have yet to really listen to the album, but you're not really putting up any sort of argument that goes anywhere, chaki. There are a lot of bands with obnoxious fans and band members who say stupid shit. Like, most of them.

im not putting up any argument cuz its music. if you like it cool! im just guna lol @ u.

that's cool

hey chaki, what are your favorite bands? I'm sure I can find a shitload of pull quotes that I can lol at too!

melvins and minutemen.

everything about the minutemen is awesome and inspiring and makes me glad to be alive.

Watt's a bit of a ball hog though.

melvins and minutemen.

-- chaki, Tuesday, 13 May 2008 21:53

From Metal Invader

M.I: In my info-searching orgy about MELVINS I read about the existence of "MELVINS super fans". I didn't really understand what the definition of a "MELVINS super fan" is. It's like having all things you guys ever released or is it something beyond commodity fetishism?

King Buzzo: I don't even really get what it is you are asking so I'll just say that a "MELVINS super fan" is someone who lets me rape their sister.

And believe it or not, I like The Melvins. Minutemen are just about the three nicest guys on the planet from what I know, so they get a pass. But that's like you asking me who my favorite band is and I respond with "Andrew W.K.," or someone else who is unbelievably affable.

The point is that if you want to find little details to lambast bands, you can find 'em for just about anyone that's done enough interviews that pop up in Google searches, especially punk bands or anyone putting out music, at any poin in the last ten years, on an independent label. You don't like No Age. Fine. But pulling out articles like those is predictable and tedious. It's redolent of hating something that the "Internet" likes and you don't, only because it's vaguely in your field of taste.

whats the difference of loling @ douchebag NoAge quotes about how awesome they are for being vegan and loling @ douchebag Mike Love quotes about how awesome he awesome he is because he meditates? are you like 14? calm down, beavis.

oops

NoAge quotes about how awesome they are for being vegan

But that's like you asking me who my favorite band is and I respond with "Andrew W.K.," or someone else who is unbelievably affable.

Andrew WK once did an instore autograph session where I worked, and followed it up with a 1.5 hour shit-a-thon in our bathroom. And I really had to go to the bathroom. Of all the ways for Andrew WK to piss me off, though, that's pretty lovable.

I just got in from watching No Age, and after Jay Reatard & Times New Viking they were kinda meh. I'll probably download this album anyway, but I don't really see what the fuss is about.

I like the new record.Stiil,I wish they meat.

eat meat.

whoa this album totally totally rules. everything that was annoying or generic about the EPs has really been cut away. nouns is as fun as their live show last year, which i really really loved.

dont care what they eat or what they say, theyre already on sub pop and from LA, so who cares if they get popular? pretty good situation all-around here...

Andrew WK once did an instore autograph session where I worked, and followed it up with a 1.5 hour shit-a-thon in our bathroom. And I really had to go to the bathroom. Of all the ways for Andrew WK to piss me off, though, that's pretty lovable.

-- Z S, Wednesday, 14 May 2008 23:29 (6 days ago) Bookmark Link

MASSIVE LULZ

whats the difference of loling @ douchebag NoAge quotes about how awesome they are for being vegan and loling @ douchebag Mike Love quotes about how awesome he awesome he is because he meditates? are you like 14? calm down, beavis.

-- chaki, Wednesday, 14 May 2008 22:12

x-post - totally forgot to respond to this.

The difference is that your loling at NoAge quotes coincides a little too well with the massive unwarranted backlash to the fact that Nouns is receiving accolades from music writers. That's a lot different than Mike Love quotes from thirty years ago. And frankly, your pull quotes are more risible because they're obviously fueled by your frustration as to why this band is the beneficiary of critical praise when it might just be because, hey, the album's fucking good.

It's one thing to have accurate, detailed, articulate criticism of a band, especially one that's three or four albums into their career. But what I find frustrating about the No Age criticism is that it seems to arise out of people being confounded as to why other people seem to love it and they don't, which ultimately is about taste. And the fact that the only argument against No Age (that I've read so far) is that, "It's not that good" is lazy and unproductive towards furthering any sort of discussion. So what if someone else's taste doesn't align with your own, and boo hoo if that falls on a number of people instead of just one. Why polemicize and go on some evangelical-type mission to bring an indie band down when they're, for all intensive purposes, releasing their first album?

Stiil,I wish they meat.

I saw them a couple of nights ago.

The stuff from Weirdo Rippers stands out a mile, the lo-fi studio experiments become brilliant performance gestures live. The hooks really hook.

The exception to this is Sleeper Hold.

It bothers me the politics of Pitchfork, I think Nouns is a good album, but not so remarkable that it would have gotten that score without the hype. Weirdo Rippers was remarkable enough, but I suppose it hadn't reached its fever pitch yet.

The waves of sound are surprisingly concrete, the way they stretch the songs is beautifully in control. They never really give in to any jamming instinct. It is gloriously uptight, yet all over the place.

Dublin "hipsters" are the worst in the world. They don't even know how to have good contrived haircuts and the girls in front of me with the fat asses couldn't dance for shit.

Okay, now I'm back on Chaki's side

just cuz everyone is no age cr8zy right now, i wanted to encourage everyone to get "erect the youth problem" by wives, which was the band these dudes were in before no age.

it's fucking great, listening to it right now, super spazzed out noise rock meets negative approach type wild n wooley hardcore.

soundz good. I've not been able to track it down yet tho...

Has anyone seen the video for Eraser. Really clever.

Would I like this?

I can't recommend anything to you anymore, chum, because I'm afraid you'll think either my ears or headphones are shite.

So much tinnyness you might not find it roomy enough. Still, nice guitar atmospherics and its as catchy as hepatitis.

Why not try watching this video on youtube for a taste

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n368OU17cz0

The fact that people keep describing it as lo-fi is a big plus sign for me, because that means it's probably not super smashed.

I think that's more because of how blurry it sounds but more the cheap transistor feedback that was all over Weirdo Rippers, which is way cooler if you're investigating.

playing for free in new york tomorrow

http://flavorpill.com/newyork/events/2008/7/11/river-to-river-presents-no-age-w-telepathe-and-abe-vigoda

I quite like this. But wtf is this thread about?!

It hasn't been 5 years yet, so I can still accurately call this my favorite album of the last 5 years.

I was thinking of polling this but I'm not sure if ILM ever loses its shit over No Age.

What happened to these guys? Are they done?

They're not done. just taking forever.

wow, was just rediscovering this record and Weirdo Rippers over the weekend. forgot how good "Brain Burner" and "Sleeper Hold" are especially. never checked out Everything in Between, any good?

Yea def. More of the same, I guess a bit weaker but still wonderful.

the combination of the metallic creaking noise and the two separate guitars (one being plucked kinda quietly and the other just accenting it) is killing me and then the piano comes in awwww man
― PoMXII

EIB has Fever Dreaming, one of their best songs.

EIB has cleaner, thinner production and it sounds kinda generic and much less lively than Nouns.
I hope it's just only a one-time slip.

on the other hand, Losing Feeling was awesome, maybe the best thing they did.
i hoped they would continue with that direction on EIB, so my disappointment became stronger.

I liked EIB way more than Nouns, though not as much as WR (which benefited from shockofthenew). All three are worth yr time though.

SO good live too (though most people I know HATE their shows - haha).

they were great live

Loved WR... then Nouns came out and I found it disappointing, maybe cuz I didn't know which direction they'd head in after WR?
Seemed like loads of possibilities, then... oh... it's just a really good record that sounds like them.

I think I got over that and just settled in to liking what they do by the time EIB came out.

saw them play a great show in the summer of 2008 at floristree in baltimore, i have that recording if anyone wants it. setlist:

Miner
Here Should Be My Home
Every Artist Needs a Tragedy
My Life's Alright Without You
Boy Void
Cappo
Teen Creeps
Dead Plane
Sleeper Hold
Eraser
Brain Burner
Neck Escaper
Ripped Knees
Male Masturbation [the Urinals cover]
Everybody's Down