Music: April 2006 Archives
In gearing up for this weekend's Tool show, I took a walk down memory lane, and re-visited all of the past Tool concerts that I have attended. Before I got into blogging, I submitted my concert reviews to the ultimate Tool fan site, toolshed.down.net. Over the weekend, I dug around on the site, and found out that all of my reviews are still there. Save for the first one (which got its own dedicated page!), you'll have to search for my name in order to see my review:
- Tool in Cleveland, 11/18/96
- Lollapalooza in Chicago, July 25, 1997
- Ozzfest in Alpine Valley, Wisconsin on 7/19/98
- "An Evening With Tool", May 17th, 2001
- Lateralus Arena Tour, September 9th, 2001
- United Center, Chicago IL, August 28th, 2002
The interesting thing is that with each passing year, the number of reviews housed on t.d.n. grew. I think this is a combination not so much of Tool's growing popularity, but rather of the huge growth of the Internet. Back in 1996, when I went to my first Tool show, there weren't too many "regular folk" who were hip to the Internet. Fast-forward 5 years, and you can tell how Internet penetration has grown in America.
And of course, the other interesting thing is that I am a huge Tool nerd, and I will of course be writing a review of my 7th Tool show, at Coachella. But the times have changed (yet again), and I'll most-likely be posting it here on my own blog, as well as on t.d.n.
-Andy.
Seeing as how Kevin and I are still playing tons of Mario Kart: Double Dash (when will it freakin' end already?!?!), I am still listening to lots of music. I have been listening to a lot of my older CDs, and in the last two weeks, I rediscovered how absolutely astonishing Poe's 2000 record, "Haunted" is.
I mean, this album is just freaky-good. It truly stands the test of time, with such standout tracks as "Wild", "Could've Gone Mad", "Control", and "Amazed". If there is any flaw to this record, it is the little segues, which weave the overall story of the album together. While these little "conversational transition" tracks definitely have their place, and are an integral part of the album as a whole, they do dampen listen-ability after awhile.
Still, it has been nearly 6 years since this album came out, and I have been wondering why there has been no follow-up (because I would buy another Poe album in an instant). I finally sat down with my good friend Google tonight, and tried to dig up the reason why.
Some digging later, and it appears that Poe has been sucked down the hole of a nasty contractual dispute with her record label (Atlantic, I think). That last link is an update from Poe from last November, but I haven't been able to find anything more recent than that.
The moral? Big record labels suck, go indie use something like Tunecore to bypass the traditional music distribution channels entirely.
Oh, and I really hope that Poe records some new material soon.
-Andy.
So, Mike and I are planning to venture out on a crazy road-trip this weekend. It's looking like we'll be stopping in Three Rivers, CA to visit Elizabeth, as we make our way down to Indio, CA for the second day of the 2006 Coachella Valley Music Festival.
In years past, I have always looked on at the Coachella concerts with a bit of envy -- I would like to go, but it is just so blasted far away, that I have never been able to get the motivation together to go. I was even going to sit out this year, even though two of my favorites, Tool and Sleater-Kinney, are playing.
What pushed me over the edge, however, was when I found that Massive Attack is playing at Coachella. Massive Attack almost never tours, especially on these shores. So that, combined with the aforementioned two bands, all playing on the same day (which means I can save a lot of money by only attending that one day), really sealed the deal.
But aside from my favorites, I'm also going to try and see Seu Jorge, Youth Group, Minus the Bear, Wolf Parade (Stan is way into them), Matisyahu, Bloc Party, and the Go! Team. I've actually never even heard anything for the last 3 bands, so I'm planning on going in "totally blind" -- we'll see how it goes.
The planning and preparations are in pretty good shape at this point. I have the tickets in hand, bought some supplies, and booked a hotel. I just have to print out some directions, and pray that my car survives the mass of miles it is about to receive.
-Andy.
Technorati Tags: Tool, Coachella, Massive Attack, Sleater-Kinney
Today is the day that the first single from Tool's upcoming album, "10,000" days, was due to be released to radio stations around the country. However, in keeping with my whole "radio is dead" theme, it didn't really make sense to me to spend hours and hours listening to crappy rock radio (filled with tons of ads), just to catch a glimpse of Tool.
So, I downloaded the new single off of the Internet instead (which is a far better distribution mechanism for music anyway).
In short, it's good, but I'm going to reserve my full judgement until I hear Vicarious in context with the entire album, or until I listen to Vicarious 10,000 times -- whichever comes first. Throughout it's 7+ minute lifespan, Vicarious alternates between sounding like a lost track from Lateralus, to being completely different. From flowing and moving to stopping and syncopation. From vocals that nearly fade beneath the music to those that shout and demand to be heard.
Certainly, there is a lot to tide me over here, until the release of "10,000 Days", on May 2nd.
-Andy.
Technorati Tags: Music, Tool, Vicarious, 10,000 Days, Lateralus
