Peter Gabriel and Hot Chip :: "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa"

There was a moment in the first or second season of Laguna Beach where MTV cameras captured the girls watching an episode of The OC. The Laguna cast members laughed and compared themselves to characters on the show. They noticed similarities and differences. They destroyed the fabric of the universe.

It's easy to forget this now but people once debated the truthfulness of Laguna Beach. It was a show that was ostensibly real and looked profoundly fake. And this moment of reality (or should that be in quotes?) in 2005 or 2006 was the official tipping point between what was real and what was fake. If characters on a debatably real "reality" show could watch characters on a fictional drama, whose fictional lives were loosely based on the "real" girls on the "reality show," the world might have finally found a way to eat itself. True and false might have finally dressed up as each other for Halloween and it might be October 31st forever. The universe might finally have looked too deeply into its own reflection and found not a mirror but a cliff at the edge of a black hole. We might be done.

Which brings us roughly to today - a day when Peter Gabriel and Hot Chip recorded a cover of Vampire Weekend's "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa." It is a song that name-checks Peter Gabriel in its post-chorus and it is a song that Gabriel is ready to take on. Slightly changing the sound to something ethereal (think almost Toto's "Africa") and changing the lyrics to, "It feels so unnatural. Peter Gabriel too. And it feels so unnatural to say your own name," Gabriel is fearlessly going where no man has gone before. Welcome to the brink of meaning and the brink of post-modernism. Welcome to the end of the fucking world. It feels so unnaturally fine.

Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa - Hot Chip & Peter Gabriel

Late To The Party :: Mardeen

From what I can gather Mardeen has been around for a bit. In fact, the current collection of songs dates to something like 2007 which in Indie Rock Years might as well be four decades. I mean, in 2003 people thought The Shins were as good as it would get. Fast-forward three years and those same Indie Kids worshiped at the temple of Justice. Indie-pop became electro-clash/house/blog/turn it up, my ears are bleeding. You get the point. We eat everything for breakfast and by dinner we're nauseous and hungry for something else. We are disgusting.

Mardeen is a throw-back by these metrics. It's the kind of guitar rock that Better Than Ezra would have made if they never got a record deal and Limp Bizket hadn't killed the alt-rock scene with a few punishing blows in 1998. But just because it sounds old doesn't make it bad. Most things age poorly (see: teen stars, fashion trends, milk), but some things find greater grace with time (inexplicably The Reagan era, John Travolta, and scotch whiskey). Deep down we're all a little romantic for the past. Mardeen sounds like something from ten years ago - and that's exactly what makes me like it.

"Telephones" is the less good of the two here and seems like it was loosely based on the opening three measures of Muse's "Starlight;" just listen for the fuzzed out bass-line. It has a sing-song melody that might stick in your head the first time you hear it. Mostly, it asks no questions and tells no lies. On the rock circuit these days, that passes for "capital T" Truth.

"Kids," thankfully not a cover of MGMT's smash-hit, is a satisfying little rock song. It's got a little chorus that will dig in and stay - though, perhaps, a little too disgetively and by the fourth-straight listen you might have had enough. I don't blame you. We move quick around here. After all, it's time for dinner and I feel fucking ill.

Listen ::

Mardeen - "Telephones"
Mardeen - "Kids"

Faunts :: "Feel.Love.Thinking.Of"

There is no way to discuss new-wave or synth-pop bands without mentioning a whole host of influences ranging from somewhere around New Order and Erasure right up to the Postal Service. This is a problem. I sit here and think of influences that might excite you but really, my library of possible bands is used up quickly and you end up thinking, "Depeche Mode? Does that sound like something I could be into in 2008?" And you think ... "maybe?"

But really comparison doesn't do anyone any sort of justice. Faunts do kind of sound like New Order but frankly, New Order is a much better band with a larger, deeper catalogue of songs. Comparing the two would be like asking a sixth grader to go out to bars and hit on women. It's not that they couldn't physically get to the bar (by bike) and reasonably sneak their way in under the guise of some excuse ("I'm looking for my Dad") but the truth is, they'd be too young to really pull it off. Asking Faunts to be New Order is a little too much. Even saying that Faunts can do some of the same things as New Order is too much. It's too soon. And, they have the whole rest of their lives to go to bars and pick up women. Just work on getting to Algebra on time for the moment.

Listen :: Faunts - "Feel.Love.Thinking.Of"

The Sweet Serenades :: "Mona Lee"

And we're back with The Sweet Serenades and their little (and I stress this) song "Mona Lee." It's a song that doesn't aspire to be anything other than what it is and even though that's a tautology, it's still true. Read that one. more. time.

It's worth mentioning The Sweet Serenades are Swedish (do these people wake up and piss pop music?) and for what it's worth this could easily be a 1950s Buddy Holly-throwback. That's not meant particularly as a compliment. But there's something in the sweetness of the background vocals in the chorus that carries me somewhere else. As an English sentence what you just read was expressive and indeterminate. What you just read was effectively useless. But there's something in this song that is both sickly sweet and sweetly sick. Not that simple reversing of phrasing is a good enough explanation. So hang on as we "ooooooooo" through the chorus and remember that words are just the drawings we use to speak to each other.

Listen:: Sweet Serenades - Mona Lee

Cruiserweight (and the return of alt-rock)

Cruiserweight are a girl-fronted rock band from Austin, Texas. Their press packet tells you that they've been named "Austin's Best Punk Band" for four straight years. Now, not only is Austin not known for its punk-scene, Cruiserweight isn't really a punk band. In analogy form, this would be like being named the best philosopher in Mobile, Alabama and then realizing that you were actually studying British Literature. Ultimately, this is all irrelevant. Cruiserweight sound like 90s girl-bands Letters to Cleo (unfair?) and K's Choice (of the the famous "I'm Not An Addict" anti-drug ad). Lead-singer Stella Maxwell, if this is possibly her real name, absolutely kills every song and is almost single-handedly dragging us back to 1997.

And I guess there's something larger than just a not-punk band from Austin going on here. We are headed right back into the eye of the Alternative rock, maybe even grunge, hurricane. It's coming. You can choose not to watch the weather. You can stay indoors. You can ignore it. But it's coming. From a narrative perspective, we've moved through 1970s and 80s classic rock. Bands ripped The Cars (Strokes' second LP) Led Zeppelin (Wolfmother), even 80s hair-metal (briefly, The Darkness). Better or worse, rock music has been informed and driven by these sets of influences. And then something tipped.

We started going after synth bands. It started with the obvious Joy Division (Interpol 2003) and New Order (The Killers 2004), and then got more obscure. By then end of last year, MGMT had driven the synth-sound to its logical and commercial conclusion. Add to that We Are Scientists and new Killers' records that sound like Duran Duran and we've fully explored vapid 80s synth-rock with the same perversion as bands explored their parents classic rock radio stations in the early 2000s. And we're moving forward: with sounds of the 70s, 80s, and ... 90s.

We're on the cusp of a new-1991 and someone is about to release their "Smells Like Teen Spirit." It won't have the same cultural impact. Kids are oddly less angry and more digitally cloistered. The idea of teenagers taking over a high school gym seems impossibly dated. More likely, they would write about it on their blogs or have their avatar consider attending online. We are not too cut off from each other to be frustrated but we are too cut off from one another to do anything about it. But even if the emotion of grunge can't reincarnate itself, the sound can certainly be copy-catted.

So here it comes. In the form of bands like Dead Confederate and moving even further forward, a band like Cruiserweight that sounds like poppier-than-thou 90s alt-rock. It's chick-rock with an edge. It sounds a little dated right now. But in three years, it might sound practically contemporary. So as we spiral backwards - spin these tunes and let the alt-rock wash over you like a tidal wave.

Listen ::

Cruiserweight - Spread Like Fingers
Cruiserweight - Sustainer

[Elevator] Ketch Harbour Wolves

Strange name for a band, Ketch Harbour Wolves, and perhaps, even stranger that they're not more well known. Stranger still that they're giving away their entire record on their website. If you come across a better (adult) alternative value, I defy you to tell me about it. Ketch Harbour Wolves work if you like what The National would sound like if they were fronted by the lead-singer of Editors. This is not meant as a direct affront to The National, who clearly create both slightly poppier and more intricate soundscapes than Ketch Harbour Wolves - it is meant as a closest to accurate comparison. We all do the best we can.

What I will tell you is this: the album has seven songs and there isn't a lead balloon in the bunch. If they were based out of New York and not the far reaches of Canada, I can promise you that you would think of this band as a slightly more credible version of Pela - or a more digestible version of Winterpills. Basically, this is music that people that don't want to spend time knowing about music might like. It's easy to like and that doesn't mean it's bad. In fact, this band could and should end up more famous than they are now. As always, check it up or check it out. It's your world. We just live in it.

Listen::

Ketch Harbour Wolves - Leaves
Ketch Harbour Wolves - Gold
Ketch Harbour Wolves - So Long To The Ground

Official Secrets Act :: "So Tomorrow"

Months and months ago, I rubbed my own personal Magic 8 Ball and predicted a few things.

A) I would disappear for days, maybe even weeks on end. Well, there it is. I left and now I'm back. I told you the absence would be unexplained so ... there it is. No explanation. Take it or leave it.

2) That I would post major label leaks. And get threatened. Notice that Killers post about "Spaceman" just up and disappeared? Yeah, thanks Island Records and Blogger.com. Great work everyone. Good hustle all around. If you're clever you can still find the song out there.

D) I said I would find a good band that a lot of you didn't know about. I said it would rocket me out of my blog malaise and get me, somehow, against the odds, excited about music again. That band is here.

Official Secrets Act.

I'd by lying if I said this band would be huge. I can't promise that. In fact, in an alternative rock universe already over-saturated with dance-rock bands who abuse their keyboards like ADD-kids and their action figures, I can't promise this band will ever even tour extensively in the United States. Their closest musical relative is The Winter Kids and we saw them once in New York and then they never came back. There was no real excuse for them not getting bigger than they were. So, we've been burned before. But, it's worth noting that Official Secrets Act has that same level of energy and that same level of excitement. And with all of the above being said: This should. still. be. big.

"So Tomorrow" has the most frantic high-hat dance-rock beat you'll hear this year. It's going to be absolute murder on their drummer when they have to close their set with this night in and night out. Add the urgency of a keyboard riff crying out fire in a crowded movie theater and you've gotten yourself part of the way there. Yelling background vocals and a chorus that is as repetitive as it is infectious make this one of the better rock songs of the last 10-months. And all of it is only the loose, rather skeletal organization of a song that relies far more on its energy than the brilliance of its design. This song is far more hustling swingman than 7-foot center with a mid-range game.

By the time you're in the home stretch and the lead-singer is yelling, "all this waiting/just might kill me" you've hit a level of frenetic that is usual reserved for seizure, neon dance parties, and Japanese children's early morning cartoons. The facts are that this song is going to absolutely level you in the its final 90-seconds and it doesn't have to be rational. After all, this is just a little dose of insanity. The first lyrics? "Are you out of your mind?" Answer: Yes. No. Yes.

No.

Listen:: Official Secrets Act - "So Tomorrow"