Under The Dog

Red Collar – Pilgrim Review

You know that feeling you get after you’ve been through something long and trying and you finally get the chance to be alone just relax for a little while? That feeling of reassurance that you can finally rest not just your body but your mind as well? And maybe, just maybe, things might actually get better, if only because you have some time to plan your next moves in the battle for your life.

The opening track of Red Collar’s self released album “Pilgrim” invokes that feeling, an overwhelming sense of catharsis. It does all that and more while not forgetting that feeling better requires feeling bad and how much hard work plays a role in seeking catharsis. It’s not easy to just start feeling better.

Remember being a teenager, and feeling the words of a song being written for you exclusively for your present life situation? Does that song hold the test of time? Do you listen to the music you listened to when you were a teenager?

Hidden in Red Collar’s lyrics are things that I relate to and I think the majority of people no matter what type of music they prefer can relate to. Risking everything and trying new things with uncertain results. Making tough decisions and then questioning them

Do you think that aggressive music typically lacks emotion (besides anger) and oftentimes expresses what emotions it has poorly? Can dissonance be catchy? The problem with pop music is that it mostly sounds disingenuous. A copy of a copy. It’s hard to do pop music and sound original. I know most people would not call Red Collar a pop only band, but I’m just trying to sell the hardcore and metal fans who read this that “Pilgrim” is the real deal and that no one is going to think you aren’t manly enough to like this band. Sure they aren’t brootal, but it’s fast and has teeth like a punk band.

No filler, no crap. All good. Like albums should be. Also, this band has a blog worth reading which is rare. In the blog and the music, you never get the feeling that these guys are trying to be to be uber cool, or even that they are uber cool. Because being cool does not mean being credible. Red Collar is truly accessible while remaining challenging. Forget all that Grizzly Bear Collective Panda garbage everyone is so into these days, it’s not going to stand the test of time like this Red Collar album.

Used Guitars

MySpace

official

Cursive, Box Elders, Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band – Wonder Ballroom Portland Oregon – 6/24/09

I rarely go to concerts on a weeknight, I work a ton and it starts early in the morning, I also live about an hour away from Portland. I rarely go to concerts that I’m not filming. But it was quite a treat for me to go out last night and check out a show for a band I love. I only wish I had brought a camera though venues are finicky when it comes to that stuff and since I was on the list, I didn’t want to take photos without a photo pass. Thanks to Cobra Camanda for hooking me up with tickets. If you are in a band and need PR, I’d highly recommend her as she’s always very nice to me and my other blogger friends.

What a great night I had last night. I rode to Portland with my friend Brian and we talked film and geek stuff and arrived at the venue a few minutes early. The staff was very professional and better than some other venues who’s names I won’t name. The show started on time and the first band was the Box Elders.

Portland has a reputation of concert goers being fashionably late and it was no exception last night. The poor Box Elders played to sparsely populated room. That didn’t stop them from giving it their all and I respect them for that. I wasn’t really that into them, it’s just not my thing though the crowd was digging them.

The sound is similar to the Thermals but with a folk and garage influence and while it wasn’t my thing, I do have to mention that I was quite impressed by the drummers ability to play one handed and play the keys at the same time. A rotating Leslie speaker organ at that. Most impressive.

2012

The Mt. St. Helen’s Vietnam Band was really good, I picked up their EP and album in anticipation of the show and was quite excited to see them perform and I was far from disappointed. There was significantly more people present while they played a fairly long set for an opening band and had a few things worth mentioning during the course of their show.

But first, a slight description of the band. I would best describe them as “Cursive plays a little math rock”. HUH??? While the Tim Kasher melodrama of Cursive is not present, I do get the feeling that these guys are influenced by the DC sound like Cursive, but even more so, hence the math rock.

Ok, with that out of the way I must mention the highlights. First off, I developed a mini-crush on the female element of the band as she was cute, energetic and charming. She had (see above) something that I can only describe as “broomsticks with tambourines duct taped to them”. She would raise them to the sky and bang them on the floor while dancing. She played percussion and even a glockenspiel while doing some backup vocals. All of this lead me to believe that she must be one awesome individual and really made the set for for me. I must sound like a stalker. I’m ok with that.

One more thing of note, they were throwing tennis balls at a floor tom and bouncing them into the crowd. That is so damn cool.

Anchors Dropped

And finally to the Cursive set. Tim played a Les Paul special the whole night and their other guitar player switched between a 12 string hollow body and a regular Les Paul. The keyboard player also played trumpet and a flugelhorn. Now that is something you don’t see everyday. I was probably the only person in the crowd that realized that it was a flugelhorn. Cursive’s new drummer is from Engine Down I hear is Cully Symington and he was solid.

They played a good mixture of tunes from Domestica to the new one, but nothing older than that. I was surprised to see Tim using a capo on some of the new material, I never thought he had it in him.

The songs were played rapid fire, oftentimes without so much as an acknowledgement to the crowd at all. One song after another almost sounded like it was DJ mixed. The fast songs seemed like they were played a little faster and the slow songs seemed a little slower. When they played “What Have I Done”, I could have sworn it was Tom Waits had possessed Tim Kasher especially when he sings “The gods must be laughing down at me”. I actually googled the lyrics thinking it might be a Tom Waits cover. Yes I know I should have recognized it. But in my defense, it’s the last song of the newest album, give me break. OK?

All in all they played a fairly long set and also played an encore of 3 songs, so when you go see them, be sure to stick around after they say goodnight when you see them on one of the dates below. Be sure to buy some merch because it’s reasonably priced and I don’t think anything was over 20 bucks.

I Couldn’t Love You

June 26th 2009
Cursive in Sacramento, CA
Boardwalk

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

June 27th 2009
Cursive in San Francisco, CA
Great American Music Hall

Buy Tickets.

June 28th 2009
Cursive in Los Angeles, CA
El Rey Theatre

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

June 29th 2009
Cursive in Pomona, CA
Glass House

Buy Tickets.

June 30th 2009
Cursive in Las Vegas, NV
Beauty Bar

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

July 1st 2009
Cursive in Salt Lake City, UT
In The Venue

Buy Tickets.

July 25th 2009
Cursive in Iowa City, IA
The Picador

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

July 26th 2009
Cursive in Dekalb, IL
Otto’s

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

July 27th 2009
Cursive in Indianapolis, IN
Radio Radio

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

July 28th 2009
Cursive in Pontiac, MI
Pike Room

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

July 29th 2009
Cursive in Cleveland, OH
Grog Shop

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

July 30th 2009
Cursive in Rochester, NY
The Bug Jar

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

July 31st 2009
Cursive in Buffalo, NY
Tralf Music Hall

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

August 1st 2009
Cursive in Toronto, ONT
Horseshoe Tavern

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

August 3rd 2009
Cursive in Cambridge, MA
Middle East

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

August 4th 2009
Cursive in Milford, CT
Daniel Street

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

August 6th 2009
Cursive in Hoboken, NJ
Maxwell’s

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

August 7th 2009
Cursive in Philadelphia, PA
First Unitarian Church

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

August 8th 2009
Cursive in Baltimore, MD
Otto Bar

Buy Tickets. RELATED POST

Stream the new Coalesce record “OX” and review.

Yes, I know this is a bit of a late pass, but it’s essential. I’ve been dying to hear my own thoughts on this and I didn’t publish till my drive was recovered because I needed the MP3s.

If you can stand to be on the Lambgoat site for more than a few minutes, then you can have the pleasure of streaming the new Coalesce album OX.

Do I hate Lambgoat? In short, no. But their commenters are loaded with hate filled vitriol and it makes me quite upset. The intelligence level is just a few steps above youtube commenters and a couple steps below Fox News. But just like Lambgoat’s saving grace is this Coalesce stream, Fox News does have one saving grace as well. It’s called Freedom Watch. Of course it’s not on their actual channel, but rather internet only. It’s really the only thing of value to ever come from Fox News.

Back to the album. It’s a little more mature in the world of aggressive with some clean singing and a few throwbacks to old blues and little southern metal tinge which you know they are down with considering they did an entire album of Led Zeppelin covers. Some of their old stuff seemed a little repetitive at times and this record does mix it up a little more. Softer moments abound but never persist. Kinda like Botch, if they were born on a farm and were much more angry.

All in all I am pleased with this recording and plan to make a purchase myself, just check out the packaging above. For 22 bucks you can get a t-shirt and CD if you order from Relapse. Now who wouldn’t want that?

I am This

Hard Drive Failure

I seem to have major problems with external hard drives, I just destroyed my second one, my first one was damaged by dropping it while it was writing something. 500 gigs of data, mostly music and the like, I felt it was a pretty good piece of machinery, but sadly, I broke it.

I bought another one pretty quick afterwards. I was very careful with it and I never moved it or anything like that. Now this one has the problem of not responding after a few minutes of use so I am able to recover the data, 2-5 gigs at a time. Unfortunately, I can’t use my laptop to do this because it screw up all the other usb stuff for god knows why though I think I may be overloading my usb ports with usb hubs. So I have to use an old desktop that I go from Fry’s that was outdated when I bought it. I now use it to seed torrents, mainly out of print stuff, creative commons political materials and fan edits of movies. 

Did I mention I don’t have a monitor for it? I have to VNC it all the time, since I don’t really use it except to run one task, it’s not that big a deal but it is now complicating my job of moving 500 gigs, 2-5 at a time. To further complicate that, 200 of those gigs are my music collection and thus is making it difficult to post any mp3s. So I gots to take a little break while I handle the crisis at home. Please understand and I’ll hopefully write some content that will just wait for mp3s.

In the meantime, enjoy this totally rad Pharcyde video

If you don’t buy anything from Deathwish Inc. during their summer sale, then you are not very smart or your parents started charging you rent

Sorry about the annoying seizure inducing graphic but right now at Deathwish Inc., there are CDs for a dollar. 1 freakin dollar. They send me CDs and MP3s so I’ll write about them and I am ordering some stuff. Mainly because they don’t send me older stuff and I don’t care about that though they can feel free to send me a t-shirt some time(I’m a Large).

So what will 1 dollar buy you? How about Jesuseater’s self titled EP? Maybe Converge’s Unloved and Weeded Out? Or how about Ringworm’s The Promise? All of these great titles and more can be had for a buck.

Maybe you like vinyl. They got that too. Carpathian’s newest LP Isolation is 8 dollars. End of a Years’ self titled 7” is only 4 bucks. Or my personal favorite, Life Long Tragedy’s Runaways is 5 freakin dollars. You can’t even get a fast food value meal for that much anymore and this will last you longer.

There is so much stuff on here it’s hard to even decide. Well they gotcha covered there and have a 5 CDs for 5 Bucks or 10 for 10. There is absolutely no excuse for you not to get some of this amazing stuff from Bannon and company.

You may find yourself saying “But I don’t like the best aggressive music to come out in the past 2 decades” and to that I say this…”it’s your lucky freakin day you gosh dang nincompoop! They have a Jawbox 7” and Thee Silver Mt. Zion and Stephen Brodsky CDs on sale as well

So forget about anything else and buy some gosh darn stuff from DW or else you are a poopie pants ninny who is stingy and no one will be your friend let alone ever have sex with you. In fact, that happens to work retroactively and you will suddenly find yourself realizing that you have never had sex in your entire life. Oh, and your porn collection will delete yourself. Act now before there is nothing left.

Pulling Teeth – Vicious Skin

I’m going to see Cursive on June 24th at the Wonder Ballroom in Portland

That’s right, if you got beef with me, now is your chance to get at me and do your worst and catch a really awesome show at the same time.

But more importantly, they are playing with Box Elders and Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band, both pretty decent groups but I like Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band more.

Will I see you there?

Mt. St Helens Vietnam Band – Cheer For Fate

Cursive – The Casualty (Live at SxSw 2009)

So Many Dynamos – "The Loud War is streaming over at Buzzgrinder

I‘ve never talked about this band before as I just discovered them recently, but if you are into bands like Dismemberment Plan or Meet Me In St. Louis then you owe it to yourself to hop on over to Buzzgrinder and give this record a listen as it will blow your mind.

Anyways, sorry about the relative silence lately, I’ve got 2 albums I’m doing PR for and family in town so I’m too busy for Under The Dog right now.

Regardless I should have some content coming in soon so just relax.

http://www.buzzgrinder.com/stream-so-many-dynamos-loud-wars/

Brother Ali Video – Good Lord

Ever been to a mosque? Me neither.

Now you have… Truth is

New Alexipharmic feat: P.O.S., Grynch, Cas One and Sarah Smalley – Stardust

Alexipharmic is new to my radar. 99% of my inbox is completely irrelevant to my blog so it’s nice to get something I can actually post every so often. Today I was dropped this song titled “Stardust”. It’s a nice tune with some guitar samples and sequenced drums. The lyrics are on a struggle theme and are cliché free. The diva vocals by Sarah Smalley are appropriate and this track makes me look forward to whole record.

Go ahead and stick this one your iPod, and jam it out… Elephant Memories says it’s ok.

Alexipharmic feat: P.O.S., Grynch, Cas One and Sarah Smalley  – Stardust

Make a trip on over to iTunes or purchase a physical copy of American Beauty, because 50% of the proceeds are going to Mercy Corps. Or better yet, check him out on tour as 100% of the proceeds are going to Feed the Children. That is something I can really get behind.

Nintendo Wii Punchout! Want!

Oh my goodness, usually I am against rehashes of old classics as they are usually never as good as my expectations and I’m kind of a snob like that. This time around, I fully and wholeheartedly support the Punchout! remake except for one fledgling detail. The absence of Iron Mike Tyson, Kid Dynamite

The Advantage – Goonies 2

Kid Dynamite – Hateful

Cage – I Never Knew You Video

New video From Def Jux rapper Cage entitled I Never Knew You off of his new record “Depart From Me”. The video is directed by Shia Lebouf (yeah I know right?) and it it’s pretty darn good though I must say that he sure dresses differently then before and he sure has lost a lot of weight.

“I Never .Knew You” is a strange choice of a lead off single if you ask me as there is some really out there stuff on this album that I really think could make Cage and Def Jux blow up. Songs like “Kick Rocks” and “Fat Kids Need An Anthem” take the Outkast/Janelle Monae afro punk to a whole new level.

Grand Ol’ Party Crash feat: Jell-O Biafra as G.W.B.

K’naan T.I.A. Music Video

Another K’Naan video has come around and this one is sharply edited and is directed by NABIL who did a Kanye video, not that I really care about that as I really only enjoy Kanye’s first album, you know, the one where he mentions that he was in a car wreck every other line?

Anyway, in case you missed him last time I wrote, he’s from Somalia and he’s more gangsta since he grew up in the real hood. Ok, maybe not but hey, I don’t think I could survive in Somalia, but don’t you dare call it a libertarian paradise,

K’NAAN "T.I.A" music video directed by: NABIL from nabil elderkin on Vimeo.

via: Nerd With Swag – K’Naan – ‘T.I.A’ (Music Video)

T.I.A.

ABC’s feat Chubb Rock

R.I.P. Jay Bennett

Jay Bennett died in his sleep last night.

R.I.P. on your way to the great gig in the sky.

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart

Looks Can Be Deceiving

You may find yourself watching a band and think to yourself, "these guys sure don’t look like they should be playing this type of music". I personally think that while this may be true, there are plenty of exceptions to the rule though I cannot think of any examples off the top of my head.

Props to this girl, she sure can beatbox with the best of em. I really wonder how she learned to beatbox along with a little melody at the same time, but it goes to show, you can judge a book by it’s cover. MC PAUL BARMAN Feat: Princess Superstar – MTV Get Off The Air Part 2 via: Music Marketing [dot] com

New Tracks From Coalesce’s OX spotted in the wild

I read a ton of cell phone and gadget blogs, and they always things like, “Brand new Palm Pre spotted in the wild” and since I don’t really blog about cell phones (not 100%true) I just always wanted to say that, coupled with the album being named after an animal and you have comedy gold… Plus I really like saying things out of context…

Do these folks look like the kind of gentleman that would make the kind of loud ruckus that these fellas make? Yeah I thought so too. These guys are from the Midwest and though pervious records were not indicative of any backwoodsiness, this new record has a sort of southern tinge without being all in your face about it like Clutch.

Anyways, there just happens to be a couple pre-release tracks floating around the intertubes and I’ll letcha know where they are because I am such a nice fella myself.

http://www.noisecreep.com/2009/05/18/coalesce-the-purveyor-of-novelty-and-nonsense-exclusive-str/

http://www.myspace.com/coalesce

Also, check out the statement about their packaging:

OX, the follow-up to 1999’s herald 0:12 Revolution In Just Listening, was recorded with engineer Ed Rose at Blacklodge Studios and mastered by Mike Fossenkemper at Turtle Tone.  OX is set for a CD and LP release on June 9^th in North America, June 15^th internationally, with both formats featuring extensive packaging. The CD version will be housed in a six-panel digipak with an embossed front cover and contain a 24-page booklet with seven distinctive die cuts. The LP will come in a gatefold jacket with embossed front cover and a custom printed inner sleeve with a unique die cut center.

Being co-owner of a record label myself, let me tell you, 6 panel digipacks say a lot about a band as they are expensive. This album comes out the first week of June, then they tour europe.

Pre Order

Sometimes selling out is waking up

Little Saturday Mixtape

I had a great night last night, I did some pet shopping, ate some pizza, fed a lizard, watched the JJ Abrams Star Trek film, made wonderful connections with a loved one and didn’t smoke any cigarettes.

That’s the perfect end to another week of work. It’s Saturday morning and I thought I’d make a little mixtape while I play some Evony and catch up on feeds.

Very Not Safe For Work

1. Blue Scholars – Loyalty

2. MC Paul Barman – The Joy of Your World

3. MDC – I Hate Work

4. Me First and the Gimme Gimmes – On The Road Again

5. The Melvins – Honey Bucket

6. Mike Watt – Piss Bottle Man

7. Moistboyz – Roy

8. Jawbreaker – Fireman

Burnt By The Sun Heart of Darkness Webisodes

Burnt By The Sun are making a new album called Heart of Darkness and they are kind of silly which you will see by episode 4. In episode 3 the producer talks about making the heaviest record from New Jersey ever. That’s a tall or but Burnt By The Sun are up for the challenge.

http://www.myspace.com/BurntByTheSun

You Will Move

How did I miss this Atmosphere skit video?

Last year when Atmosphere’s newest record “When Live Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold” came out, this promo video surfaced but I completely missed it.

Atmosphere – Greatest Rap Battle Ever: Slug Vs Faheem – For more amazing video clips, click here

Faheem is Brother Ali’s kid. Slug got owned. "If life gives me lemons, ima throw them at your car"…

F*ck You Lucy

Toxic Holocaust – Nuke The Cross Video

Ho ho ha ha, what have we here? Thrashers Toxic Holocaust have a new video for their track “Nuke the Cross”.

TOXIC HOLOCAUST – Nuke The Cross

Now kids, what have we learned? Toxic Holocaust is a 3 piece. They need haircuts more or less often, but that can really go either way. Oh, and they really like fire…

War Is Hell

Cursive is finally making their way through the west coast.

One of my friends has seen Cursive a few times and he always reminds me that they can really hack it onstage and now after almost 3 years I’ll be able to see them.

I’ve had previous opportunities but I always let them pass me by and I am not going to miss them this time. Word on the street is that they are firing off mostly new material with some crowd pleasers as well.

No idea who the openers are for this leg of the tour, but I really wish it were Man Man.

Well lets see these dates already!:

JUNE 13    DENVER, CO            WESTWORD MUSIC SHOWCASE
JUNE 18    SIOUX FALLS, SD        NUTTY’S NORTH
JUNE 20    BILLINGS, MT        YELLOWSTONE VALLEY BREWERY
JUNE 21    MISSOULA, MT        THE OTHER SIDE
JUNE 22    SPOKANE, WA        KNITTING FACTORY
JUNE 23    SEATTLE, WA        NEUMO’S
JUNE 24    PORTLAND, OR        WONDER BALLROOM
JUNE 27    SAN FRANCISCO, CA    GREAT AMERICAN MUSIC HALL
JUNE 28    LOS ANGELES, CA        EL REY THEATRE
JUNE 29    POMONA, CA        GLASSHOUSE
JULY 1    SALT LAKE CITY, UT    CLUB SOUND Moved to “The Venue”

From the Hips live at SxSw