Is there such a thing as dumbed-down IDM? Not inferior, but approaching it from a slightly different angle is David Last, less brainiac and more booty-shaker, moving away from digital detritus and towards more organic dancehall rhythms. Perfect for intimate gatherings. Served to chill. I’m jonesin’ summer BBQs. Can you tell?
Lilys
I just love it when people ask me, “What’s your favorite kind of music?” It’s always people who really don’t know me, and I love it even more when my hesistation to answer immediately leads them to further clarify. “Rock? Rap? What about Jazz?” But I always answer, simply, “Lilys.” Kurt Heasley, the force behind Lilys, is a musical chameleon, changing colors and styles at will. He started as an American My Bloody Valentine, then shifted to psych-tinged Kinks, then drifted into Pink Floyd, came back again to the Kinks, then passed on into mellow pop-influenced electronica, and with the last release, 2003’s Precollection, touched on UK indie pop. Each shift usually throws me for a loop, but I keep coming back, and I keep answering, “Lilys.”
Someone Else
“An undying fear of commitment has fueled 24-year-old Sean O’Neal’s eclectic discography…” So began an interview I did with the Illadelph native, then of Flowchart, back in 1998 for URB. Seven years later, not much has changed — in that quite a lot has. Sean recently added netlabel unfoundsound to his stable of ventures (he also runs Fuzzy Box Records) while steering his music away from the richly layered drum ‘n’ bliss and quirky electronica of his Flowchart days toward wry, minimalist techno under the alias Someone Else. You gotta love a fool who can make your head bounce and put a smile on your face (just listen to those tweaked mouth noises on “Goofball”). These tracks make up the first of six unfoundsound releases to date; all are available as free, high-quality MP3s under a Creative Commons license (if anyone gets “sharing the sharing,” it’s Lawrence Lessig). There’s also an entire release of Philadelphia field sounds which unfoundsound invites you to mess around with and submit as a demo.
Malcolm Middleton
Malcolm Middleton is one half of Scotland’s Arab Strap. On his second solo album, Malcolm expands on his earlier work and the sounds he churns out for Arab Strap. Folksy one minute, almost danceable the next, Malcolm shares the highs and lows with equal beauty. But make no mistake, this being Scottish, the self-loathing is still there; just listen to the chorus of “A Happy Medium.”
The Happies
A handful of us here at the 3hive were involved, musically, many years back. First, at an AM radio station we basically hijacked for a summer, then at a CD exchange (remember those?) called Sonic Garden. Blurb designed the logo. Soon after that fell to pieces, Sam and I started up an indie distribution company called Happyville (I’m sure we’d unanimously agree that 3hive is our best venture yet). ANYWAY, The Happies are sorta namesakes, and are not-so-coincidentally, from the state of Utah, where we initially made our acquaintances. They also make endearing, quiet, lo-fi pop songs, for which I am a complete sucker. Thanks to Todd Simmons for dropping this into the ol’ s-box.
The Weakerthans
In light of the recent discussion in Wisconsin to legalize cat hunting (if you haven’t heard about this, check here), it seems appropriate to post The Weakerthans, whose “Plea From a Cat Named Virtute” is actually told from the perspective of a cat. Katherine slipped me a disc of their melodic Canadian punk/pop, replete with a little steel guitar here and some blazing noise there, and it’s been the only rotation in my car’s CD player for a few weeks now. As for the licensed hunting of feral cats, it seems like The Weakerthans would likely not approve. To my knowledge, 3hive has no official position on the matter.
Out Hud
Let’s hear it for the Golden State! No, Out Hud ain’t no Midwest transplant, but straight outta Californ-I-A. Between Out Hud and !!! (with which they share members) the Williamsburg myth loses steam (hasn’t it already?), proof that geography has little to do with rhythm. “How Long” is retro without kitsch, funk with a pinch of punk, and completely danceable. Get down on it.
Swoon
Need another reason to move to or at the very least vacation in Sweden? Swegazers. Yeah, that’s Swedish shoegazers, and our pick today from the suggestion box, Swoon, have coined the term. Like one of the masterpieces of shoegazing, Lilys’ 1992 album In the Presence of Nothing, which deliberately mimicked My Bloody Valentine, Swoon are not ashamed to show their influences, and like Lilys, they do it so well that their songs can stand alone on their own merit. So those of you wondering what your band would sound like if you were raised in Sweden on Chapterhouse, Ecstacy of St. Theresa, Ride, and even Lilys, that’d be Swoon.
The Frames
First, some bidness. We’re happy to announce our first reskin since we started 3hive just over a year ago. Jon has whipped up some hot new colors for spring and a tighter, meaner sidebar featuring our patented Navotron technology. If you’re having trouble seeing any of this new sweetness and hence have no idea what we’re going on about, holding down your shift key and hitting the refresh/reload button in your browser a couple of times should do the trick. And now…
Although it would be easy to dismiss the Frames as a Celtic Indigo Boys for the way their fans can sing along so dutifully to “Star Star” and “Lay Me Down,” consider this post (and the hardly-facile climax to “Dream Awake”) an admonition not to dismiss The Frames so quickly. The harmonies are sweet, the lyrics are tepid, the guitar strumming is as reassuring as a bubbling brook — and in spite of all this, they sound awfully fine to these aging ears.
Bettie Serveert
My brother-in-law Pete has been wanting to suggest something for 3hive for awhile now, I think, and although he’s pretty much committed to the music of his glory days in the mid- to late-80s — think U2’s Boy or Rum, Sodomy and the Lash by The Pogues — he pulled through with Bettie Serveert. “Attagirl,” off the Dutch band’s recent album of the same name, kind of has a new wave groove going, maybe. Anyway, Pete’s a hero of mine, along with my sister-in-law Cindy, because they actually hired a babysitter(!) for my favorite niece and nephew and went to see Bettie Serveert live(!!) not too long ago. They even got her autograph(!!!). I can hardly remember those days…