by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Column 297: Playing God

Pandora’s Tim Westergren on the future of music.

Pandora founder Tim Westergren stood alone on the empty oak stage floor of the packed Durham Western Heritage Museum auditorium holding a microphone, looking like Peter Krause from Six Feet Under

, and calmly told the audience of music fans, musicians, business people and techni-geeks what the future of the music industry looks like. If he’s right, we’re all in for a long, boring ride.

Westergren was in town last Tuesday night conducting one of his many “town hall meetings,” where he goes among the masses like a wizened messiah and tells them about the magic of Pandora while answering questions not only about the technology, but about why it’s so damn important.

Westergren believes Pandora and Internet radio will ultimately rescue the drowning, dying music industry. It will do this by offering its listeners only the music they want to hear, and nothing else. Pandora is web-streaming radio powered by the “Music Genome Project” — a complicated algorithm where users enter a song or artist that they enjoy, and the service responds by playing selections that are musically similar.  ”Instant personalized radio,” is how Westergren describes it.

He spent the first half-hour talking about Pandora’s origin, about how he maxed out dozens of credit cards and almost went broke, but how the project  eventually broke through. He talked about how the broadcast music industry has become irrelevant, how it no longer speaks to us, and how music has become sonic wallpaper. “What Pandora has done is reconnect people with music,” Westergren said. “That’s why it’s growing.”

But it can’t keep growing unless there are musicians out there supplying the grist for this electronic mill. Westergren said rock stars of the future will be “kind of a middle class of musicians that are really talented, that are willing to work hard and travel, but that don’t have a home anymore” with traditional record labels. And that’s OK because Pandora makes great big record labels unnecessary. Here’s why.

“We (Pandora) know essentially the songs and music people like, and where they live in the United States,” Westergren said. “One vision of the future is that a musician will come to Pandora, log into his information, and literally see a map of the U.S. with his audience plotted out.”

From there, the musician can route his tour, and go to every location where listeners have “thumbed up” (akin to approving) his music in Pandora. Fans who have “opted in” will receive an e-mail two weeks before that musician hits their town or might find out about the concert while listening to Pandora. “That’s when you can start being serious about this musician’s middle class,” Westergren said. “Musicians will be able to make a living instead of living on Ramen.

“Through our service, there will come a time when the day your song gets added to Pandora, you’ll be able to quit your job,” he added. “Because that song goes out and is played for literally millions of people who like your kind of music, who can connect directly with you, who know when you’re coming to town, can buy your CD and join your fan list. It’s this magic kind of eBay, connecting music fans with music more efficiently.”

Westergren said they’ve surveyed listeners and that about 40 percent bought more music after they started listening to Pandora, while only 2 percent bought less. “We’re one of the top affiliates of sales to iTunes and Amazon,” he said.

But more than music sales, Pandora does something that broadcast radio never did — it pays musicians. “When you’re a musician and your song is played on an AM/FM station, the composer is paid a very small amount of money, but the performers get no compensation,” Westergren said. “With Internet radio, we actually pay a very large royalty to the performers. If you took all broadcast radio today and slapped it onto Internet radio it would be billions of dollars of new revenue for the music industry just from radio royalties (that musicians) are not getting right now. That’s the biggest tectonic shift that’s happening for artists.”

Yeah, but doesn’t that make you an artistic dictator? someone asked.

“I like to think of us as being an empowerer of artists,” Westergren said. “We have a team of musicians that determine what should go into Pandora, and it’s based on quality. At that point, we are playing God and are deciding what should go in and what shouldn’t. But I’m OK with that. Pandora is providing opportunity. These are musicians that wouldn’t get heard anywhere else.”

It all sounds so perfect. Maybe it is… except for one little thing: If all you ever listen to is music that you think you like — or that sounds like music that you think you like — how will you ever discover something new, something different, something that could change your life?

What fun is that? I mean, I like Bruce Springsteen as much as the next guy, but Bruce Springsteen Radio? The only thing worse than listening to non-stop Springsteen would be listening to bands that supposedly “sound” like Springsteen. Not only does that deify homogeneity, it’s downright boring.

Even more depressing: If everyone listens only to what Pandora thinks they want to hear, how would we find the next Beatles? We take them for granted as if they’ve always existed, but I’ve been told by people old enough to remember that when the Beatles first arrived, they sounded like nothing anyone had heard before. They certainly wouldn’t have fit onto Beach Boys Radio or Bobby Vinton Radio or Chubby Checker Radio.

Or maybe the ones playing God wouldn’t have let them in at all.

* * *

Two more quick points about Pandora. First, there’s a good chance that Pandora could wind up being the next Myspace in a couple of years — a once-popular online service that is now passe. If Apple ever gets its shit together and puts iTunes “in the cloud” as has been rumored since the company bought Lala.com, it could cripple Pandora. After all Apple’s “Genius” service is designed to do what Pandora does using your personal collection of music.  If iTunes becomes a subscription service, allowing access to millions and millions of songs in the iTunes library, it would provide virtually the same service as Pandora, though Pandora will claim that its “Music Genome Project” is a better solution for finding music that fits your personal taste. Personally, I’d rather have Genius’ variety.

The other point: I created a Little Brazil Radio station in Pandora, and among the “similar music” provided by the genome were songs by Staind and Jon Spencer — not exactly a perfect match. It also played a song by Superchunk which was a good fit. To see if the system was reciprocal, I set up a Superchunk Radio station, but lo and behold after more than an hour, I was never served up a Little Brazil song. If I had been, I would more confidence in Westergren’s claim that Pandora is opening up new listeners to bands, specifically small indie bands.

* * *

Tonight at PS Collective it’s the return of Brad Hoshaw after a month on the road playing solo acoustic shows throughout America. Opening is Pat Gehrman (5 Story Fall, Shovelhead). $5, 8 p.m.

Also tonight, Tim Kasher and his band play Lincoln’s Bourbon Theater with Darren Hanlon and Conduits. $12, 8 p.m. It’s a preview of tomorrow night’s show at The Waiting Room.

* * *

Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Tim Kasher dines with a "special friend."

Tim Kasher: Games People Play

Going solo, Kasher rolls the dice… on love.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Will we ever know the real story behind the songs that make up Tim Kasher’s debut solo album, The Game of Monogamy?

Probably not. “Some friends and family — people who really know me well — try to guess which songs are accounts of my life, and they’re always wrong,” Kasher said while on the road in Dallas. “To me, that’s great. That means I’m getting better as a writer.”

I, too, tried to pry the real meaning behind bitter-worded songs like “Cold Love” (The sheltered life of a couple / Is like living in a bubble), “No Fireworks,” (I thought love was supposed to spill from our hearts / I can’t feel it, no fireworks, no twinkling stars), and “There Must Be Something I’ve Lost,” (When I was young I believed in love / But hey, I also believed in God), which aren’t so much about monogamy as much as the agony of living in monogamy.

“That’s why calling it The Game of Monogamy is so crucial,” Kasher said. “I don’t feel the record is about monogamy. I still yearn for that concept, which is why I call it a game. I also think we could sit here with a panel and they’d all agree that it is a game. It’s not easy, and isn’t it also a pain in the ass?”

But where, exactly, did Kasher’s cynical view of long-term companionship come from? Maybe it has something to do with the fact that in the fall of 2009 the singer/songwriter frontman of successful indie bands Cursive and The Good Life seemed to be a happy fiancé, only to become unattached again just a few months later. Kasher, who once admitted that seminal Cursive album Domestica was about his failed marriage, won’t talk about that recent engagement, nor say if it supplied meaning for this record.

“To me, the album is like (The Good Life’s 2004 release) Album of the Year, where I was chronicling the bulk of my experiences over a year,” Kasher said. “I kind of did the same thing with this record. There are specific references to my own life; I can’t deny that, but there’s so much other stuff, too. The story as a whole is a fictional account. That’s what you do as a writer — you base it on your own experiences, and then fictionalize it.”

Tim Kasher, The Game of Monogamy (Saddle Creek Records)

Kasher said he started writing the songs for The Game of Monogamy two years ago when Saddle Creek Records label-mates Azure Ray invited him to play solo at some of their reunion dates, back when he still lived in Santa Monica, California. “I thought it was a good opportunity to start writing my own record, which I always planned on doing,” he said. “I did do that once, back in 1999, but that became a band (The Good Life). This is me starting over.”

In late 2009, Kasher moved from Santa Monica to Whitefish, Montana, after his pal, Stefan Marolachakis of the band The End of the World, told him what a great time he had recording up there. Kasher compared the area of northwestern Montana to the bucolic land seen in the 1992 Robert Redford-directed film A River Runs Through It. “I wrote about half the record in those four months in Whitefish,” he said. “I was really lucky.”

Maybe splitting the songwriting between Santa Monica and Montana explains why the music on The Game of Monogamy comes in two distinct flavors. Acoustic heartbreakers like “Strays” and “The Prodigal Husband” and epic closer “Monogamy” are balanced out by some of the best pop songs Kasher has ever written, including the brass and electronic-handclap driven “I’m Afraid I’m Gonna Die Here,” and simple, swinging “Cold Love,” both of which would be radio hits in any other universe.

Kasher can’t help but be proud of those perfect pop gems. “I wouldn’t say ‘proud,’ I’d say I was pleased, for lack of a better word, with writing ‘Cold Love,'” he said. “It seems like a ridiculous concept that as a musician and songwriter you spend so much time trying to make things so complicated, and spend so much of your life trying to find ways to simplify things. I get more comfort from trying to hit those pop peaks. I love pop music, and those songs are just me being more willing to see them through.”

Backed by a solid band that includes Patrick Newbury on keyboards and trumpet, Dylan Ryan on drums and Lewis Patzner on cello and brass, Kasher had no expectations for this, his first solo tour. “No one knew what to expect, so we all prepared for the worst,” he said. “We never had any false assumptions that people were going to show up because they knew my name.”

But, thankfully, they have. “After 10 years of fairly consistent touring, here I am touring more than I’ve ever toured,” Kasher said. “I thought I’d slow down at some point, but touring is such a huge part of staying afloat.”

So are his other projects. Kasher said he’s working on new Cursive material as well as another solo record. He’s even written a couple more screenplays despite being unable to get his first screenplay, Help Wanted Nights, produced. “The long and short of it is that it didn’t work out, but I’m still feverishly trying to crack into the (film) industry,” he said.

With all that under his belt, the only thing he’s missing is writing the Great American Novel. Kasher just laughed. “If everything went incredibly well, that would be the third chapter of my life.”

Tim Kasher plays with Darren Hanlon & Conduits Friday, Nov. 19, at The Waiting Room, 6212 Maple St. Showtime is 9 p.m. Admission is $10. For more information, call 402.884.5353 or visit waitingroomlounge.com.

* * *

It’s a psychobilly explosion tonight at The Slowdown with Detroit’s Koffin Kats (Stomp!) with The Empires, Rumble Seat Riot, and Omaha’s very own The Filter Kings. $10, 9 p.m.

* * *

Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Azure Ray's Maria Taylor, left, and Orenda Fink.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Column 294: Starting Over

The return of Azure Ray.

What better way to open an interview with Azure Ray’s Maria Taylor than with a scoop?

Regarding band mate Orenda Fink, and her husband, The Faint’s Todd Fink, Taylor made the following statement: “I wouldn’t be surprised if in the next few years they pop out a little Fink.”

Boom goes the dynamite. OK, maybe it wasn’t that big of a scoop, but it was the closest I got to one while talking to these two indie rock divas (and I use the term “divas” in only the most loving way).

Taylor did most of the talking, as Fink was behind the wheel of the van that carried Team Azure Ray to San Diego after a show the night before in Phoenix. Talking to Taylor is like talking to your best friend’s goofy little sister; she’s sweet and funny and gets your jokes even when they’re not very good.

It was obvious that, so far, the tour has been hit-and-miss. “It’s going pretty good, getting better and better,” Taylor said. “We have more of a fan base on the West Coast. So the crowds are getting better, but it’s still a challenge to make people aware of us.”

The crowd’s amnesia couldn’t have been a complete surprise. Azure Ray was at its career apex with 2003’s Hold On Love. A year later, Taylor and Fink went their separate ways due to creative differences, or for some other reason I’m sure we’ll never know. In addition to her solo work, Fink went on to form Art in Manila and collaborate with Cedric Lemoyne as O+S. Taylor worked with Bright Eyes, Moby, Crooked Fingers and Joshua Radin when she wasn’t recording and touring in support of her own solo projects.

Azure Ray, Drawing Down the Moon (Saddle Creek). Released 9/14/10.

Then, rather organically a couple years ago, the duo found themselves living in Los Angeles and hanging out together. “We thought, ‘Why not just put out another record together?'” So they teamed up with long-time producer/collaborator Eric Bachmann of Crooked Fingers (and Archers of Loaf before that) and recorded Drawing Down the Moon, released in September by Saddle Creek Records. The album is earmarked by those same soothing, whispering harmonies and heart-breaking lyrics that defined Azure Ray from the beginning, which is appropriate considering that in many ways, Azure Ray is starting over.

“I think people have small attention spans,” Taylor said. “I don’t think they’ve forgotten us, it just needs to be brought to their attention that we have a new record out.” Judging by the crowds there, apparently the word didn’t make it to Florida. Taylor was unwilling to share the attendance numbers. “The scary thing is you have to pay your players and make money. We didn’t have any expectations, and we like to keep it that way.”

Still, one expects to make money playing music, especially if you’re one of the more influential indie music duos of the early part of the last decade. They both point to the Internet for the current state of affairs.

“As far as the music industry goes, I’ve lost a lot of faith that I’ll be able to make a living doing this much longer,” Taylor said. “In 2002, people were still buying records and a career in music seemed like an option. Our friends were doing so well. But that was a different time. We were just talking about this in the van, how amazing the Internet is and how it’s just screwed us.”

Taylor handed the phone to Fink. “Maria is right. The biggest change is the culture of the music industry and the economy,” Fink said. “In a strange way, being on the road now is like when we first started — we really didn’t know what was happening. It was before cell phones and the Internet. Now with technology, it’s creating still more uncertainty. The bubble has burst. The industry was cruising along for a number of years with a formula for how records were sold and how tours were sold and promoted. That formula doesn’t exist anymore, and everyone is trying to figure out how to make it work in this new climate.”

That uncertainty played a small role in both Taylor’s and Fink’s exodus from Los Angeles. Orenda and Todd recently moved to Athens, Georgia, while Taylor bought a house in Birmingham, Alabama. “We’re going to be touring so much and it’s so expensive to live in Los Angeles,” Taylor said, “And being closer to our families kind of seems nice.”

They haven’t forgotten Omaha. “We miss our friends a whole lot, especially when tragedy happens or hard times, it’s hard to be so far away from the people that you’re close to,” Taylor said. “I definitely miss it. I even miss the snow.”

Something tells me that the Nov. 3 Azure Ray show at Slowdown will be like a family reunion, or a time machine that takes everyone back to 2003. The difference is that this time Taylor and Fink are in it for the long haul. They’re already talking about their next record. “With this new record, we were specifically not trying to draw from what we learned in our solo work. We wanted to recreate the same feeling from the first album,” Taylor said. “We’ll experiment a little more with the things we learned on the next album.

“It definitely feels great to be together and work together again,” Taylor said. “We’ve been friends for 20 years — two people who, since they met, enjoy spending time together. We definitely don’t take each other for granted any more.”

Azure Ray plays with Tim Fite and James Husband Wednesday, Nov. 3, at The Slowdown, 729 No. 14th St. Show starts at 9 p.m. Tickets are $12 adv./$14 DOS. For more info, go to theslowdown.com.

* * *

There are two shows going on tonight competing for essentially the same audience. Over at O’Leaver’s it’s So-So Sailors with Portland trio System and Station and Conduits. $5, 9:30 p.m. Meanwhile, over at The Barley St. Tavern, it’s The Stay Awake and Techlepathy. $5, 9 p.m.

* * *

Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Column 291: These Uncynical Days

Guster’s Ryan Miller has hope for the future of music…

More with Guster’s Ryan Miller that didn’t fit into the feature story, which was posted yesterday, here, and which you should read before you read this. Go ahead, we’ll wait for you…

You’re back? Good. I should point out that I have some familiarity with Miller and Guster. I interviewed him way back in December 1999 in the band’s tour bus before a concert at the long, lost Ranch Bowl. Miller was a whirling dervish, jumping around the bus looking for a lost Wheat CD (you remember Wheat, right?) having just done an in-station performance at KCTY The City, an Omaha FM radio station that, in its day, was sort of ground breaking in that it had no real format, no play list. The DJ’s played whatever they wanted to, and Miller couldn’t believe it.

The KCTY experiment didn’t last very long, and the whole idea of a broadcast radio station that isn’t nationally programmed seems impossible now. Which brings us to the present and Mlller’s take on current-day radio. He and the band have just spent the past two weeks touring radio stations “educating radio programmers about their single,” he said. It didn’t seem much different than back in ’99, when Miller told me one of Guster’s main goals was to break through to mainstream radio. “We like our record label and we’re waiting for our shot,” Miller said proudly, almost defiantly way back then. “We feel we’re a commercial band, that we’re real and we’ve been doing this for a long time. I say congratulations to the Goo Goo Dolls, Sugar Ray and Matchbox 20. They’ve broken through.”

Now 11 years later, Guster still hasn’t broken through, though that goal remains in their sights, sort of. “It’s not thee goal,” Miller said last Saturday. “It’s a goal. We had an opportunity when (our contract with) Warner Bros was up after Ganging Up on the Sun (released in 2006). It was a moment when we said, ‘What should we do? Should we release the next one in-house on our own record label?’ We decided to give the major label thing one more shot.”

In some ways, Guster was bucking the trend when they signed with Universal instead of going indie. Miller said the band had watched how Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails did their successful pay-what-you-want self releases, and realized it wouldn’t work for them. That model “only works for bands that are already hugely established,” Miller said. “For us, it’s really helpful to have the machinery behind us, especially people who understand what we’re doing. Without it, we wouldn’t have been able to make the video for ‘Do You Love Me?'”

That video, a stop-action piece that shows the band performing dressed in long underwear while white-hooded (Klannish?) drones decorate the stage (and the band) with paint, was picked as iTunes “video of the week,” an honor that drummer Brian Rosenworcel called in a Gloucester Times article “The biggest news that ever happened in our band’s history.” Wow.

Miller said the video and its exposure is something they wouldn’t have had without the label backing. Still, he’s well aware that there are a lot of bands that are “breaking through” on indie labels.

“I’m not cynical about it anymore,” Miller said. “It’s an amazing time to be a musician. There are so many great records coming out, I download four or five every week and some are so uncommercial. What’s happening with the whole democratization of music is so inspiring, though it’s harder than hell to break into the monoculture.”

Which made me scratch my head and wonder how any band does it. Last week’s sold out Local Natives show at The Waiting Room is a prime example. Hundreds of fans were grouped around the stage singing along to songs that have never been heard on Omaha airwaves outside of small, 2-hour boutique radio shows like 89.7 The River’s stylish New Day Rising show (Sunday’s at 9). If that’s the only outlet, is radio important any more?

“I keep asking myself that same question,” Miller said. “It’s still hanging in there. I live in Brooklyn and never listen to the radio. I listen to (Seattle public radio station) KEXP on my iPhone, which plays a lot of music that I like. We still see popular bands on the radio, so we’re still willing to give it a couple weeks of our lives.”

Miller said these days publications like Pitchfork are acting as tent poles for new bands. “It kind of started with Broken Social Scene,” he said. “That band came out of nowhere and got a 9.2 rating (for 2002’s You Forgot It In People). A great review in Pitchfork can get you to sell-out 400-person venues in 15 cities, and that gets you your shot. If you’re shitty, it all goes away.”

Miller said that’s what helped break Local Natives. “All these bands — indie or blog bands — it helps them crawl up and crawl out of this Internet-only thing and become part of the culture. Today it’s Local Natives. It was Fleet Foxes before that and Vampire Weekend before that. And now Arcade Fire has the No. 1 record in the country. That band didn’t get played on the radio. That’s why I’m so uncynical about the whole thing. All of those bands are great fucking bands and they don’t sound like anything else. It’s all happening based on merit more than anything.”

* * *

It can now be said that Eagle Seagull is no more, just as their best album, The Year of the How-To Book

, has finally been released (You can find it on iTunes; I have no idea if it was physically released in the U.S.). Its availability marks the end of years of speculation if it would ever see the light of day. We all heard the Starbucks story (though I’ve never seen it documented) and assumed that after that debacle someone would pick it up. If the waiting seemed like forever for Eagle Seagull fans (the album was recorded in May 2007), it must have been an eternity for the band. When it was announced this spring that [PIAS] was releasing it outside of the U.S., the long nightmare appeared to be over. But it wasn’t. And now, eight months after that, the record is out but the band is no more.

And maybe it’s for the best. Because I just spent the last seven minutes listening to “Theologians Tell Me,” one of the demos available from Beauty in the Beast’s Facebook page, and am now listening to it again. Drenched in delay, frontman Eli Mardock sounds like early Anton Newcombe (Brian Jonestown Massacre) belting out a sinister baroque ballad in 3/4 time, complete with a two-minute instrumental interlude. Carrie Butler does a sly, graceful vocal on synth-fueled popper “If You’re With Me, You’re Against Me.” And while “King of the Crickets” is soft and dreamy (or spacey), there are touches in the effects-laden harmonies that will remind you of Eagle Seagull — but those few moments will be the only ones that do. Rounded out by veteran Lincoln drummer Andrew Tyler (Indigenous), you can catch the trio tonight at The Waiting Room and decide for yourself if Eagle Seagull’s passing is an occasion to mourn or celebrate. I’m leaning toward the latter.

A final little post script on all this: Eagle Seagull will go down as one of the most controversial bands in Nebraska history. They were hated as much as they were loved. For a number of years they were the biggest band from Lincoln and everyone thought they were poised to break through. But it never happened. My only regret is that I never got a chance to see them perform “Twenty Thousand Light Years” on Letterman. That would have been a gas.

Playing with Beauty in the Beast is Lawrence band Cowboy Indian Bear, who has become a local favorite thanks to their almost monthly treks to Omaha. Also on the bill, Chicago avant-pop band A Lull, whose rhythm-heavy style comes by way of no less than three percussionists. The Village Voice compared them to Blitzen Trapper, Fleet Foxes and Grizzly Bear — talk about your ultra-hip trifectas. $7, 9 p.m.

* * *

Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Guster 2010

Guster: Better with Age

After two decades, Boston’s favorite pop band is still going strong.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

One of the best things about listening to a just-released Guster album for the first time: The comfort in knowing that you’re about to hear something that’s familiar, but at the same time, new and different. In other words, Guster never lets you down.

From the time the band formed in 1991 to when it released its first hit pop album on a major label with 1999’s Lost and Gone Forever, through its two successful follow-ups (Keep It Together in 2003 and Ganging Up on the

Sun in ’06), and onto their latest, Easy Wonderful, released this past Tuesday on Universal Republic, the band has consistently given its fans what they want — warm, tuneful, mature rock songs with strong central melodies and sing-along choruses.

Guster frontman Ryan Miller points to that consistency as one of the reasons why the band, which includes Brian Rosenworcel on drums and Adam Gardner on guitar and vocals, has managed to keep it together for nearly 20 years.

“Our first producer, Mike Denneen, said you’re so lucky that you’re a pop band. Pop music doesn’t go out of style,” said Miller after a soundcheck in Charlotte, North Carolina, this past Saturday.

On the other hand, Miller said he’s sometimes frustrated that Guster is not considered a “cool, contemporary band.”

“It would be nice to get reviewed in Pitchfork or get invited to Coachella or be profiled in Brooklyn Vegan or get to collaborate with Dirty Projectors,” he said. “But there was a moment when this record was being made where I realized it doesn’t sound like what most bands sound like right now, and that’s something I’m really proud of. In general, our music ages a little better.”

Better than, say, the latest by indie phenoms Sleigh Bells, which Miller said “is amazing. I know it will be played in every loft in Bushwick, but that stuff will sound so 2010 forever. That’s what it is, and it’s not a knock on them. It’s really contemporary, and I’d love to make a contemporary album. Radiohead felt contemporary, too, and their records don’t sound dated.

“I love these bands. I’ve seen Dirty Projectors seven times in three years, and I know that band doesn’t give a shit about me, but maybe they could. It’s frustrating, but our goal has always been to make a great pop record that transcends genre and is still contemporary.”

Guster, Easy Wonderful (Universal Republic)

While it’s true that you won’t classify Easy Wonderful alongside the latest by Best Coast or Animal Collective or Deerhunter, there is something contemporary about the album, at least in Guster terms. Opening track “Architects & Engineers” sports that classic Guster swing, the great harmonies, the shout-out chorus, but also sounds like a fresh direction. The first single, “Do You Love Me,” starts with hand claps and bursts with church bells. While dance track (yes, dance track) “This is How It Feels To Have a Broken Heart,” glides on a ’70s-flavored counter melody and a disco beat.

All right, maybe it isn’t contemporary in an indie music sense, but really, don’t we all need a break from the usual art projects every once in a while? Guster may not be redefining pop music, but that doesn’t mean their music isn’t good or relevant, and Easy Wonderful is arguably their best record in a decade. Will Dirty Projectors be able to say that about whatever record it releases 10 years from now (if they still exist)?

Ironically, the making of Easy Wonderful almost ended Guster. Miller said the band has spent the last four years since the release of Ganging Up on the Sun touring (for two years), having kids (Miller has two children, while Gardner has his second on the way) and writing the new album. It wasn’t until they found themselves in a New York studio with producer David Kahne (The Strokes, Sugar Ray, Regina Spektor) that the wheels began to fall off the wagon.

“It wasn’t a good mesh,” Miller said. “We didn’t see eye-to-eye (with Kahne) and didn’t have our eyes on the same prize. We couldn’t make it work. And while a lot of what was great about the record we did with Kahne, (he) wasn’t a great choice for us. He threw us for a loop.”

Miller said the experience left the band “emotionally battered.”

“After our first session (with Kahne) it was the darkest point where we really thought the concept wasn’t great and we weren’t communicating that well,” Miller said. “The process did a number on our confidence, and we didn’t know how to approach music again. We didn’t know what we wanted to do. There was a week where nothing was moving, and that was the first time that’s happened in 20 years.”

The band required a “hard reset,” Miller said. “The first conversation I had with Brian, we both said we want to be in this band. We built it up from there. After that, things were so good and so happy and so appreciative.” The band recamped at then-Guster member Joe Pisapia’s studio in Nashville for sessions that Miller said were “magical.”

“We had a lot of great ideas that came in big chunks,” he said. “It was our most creative moment, coming out of those depths.

“We needed that hard reset,” he added. “It’s an unnatural idea to have three dudes be in this band for  20 years after we met. We’re all growing, and we’re all alpha dudes. If you don’t recalibrate, if you don’t break and reset the bones, you’re not all going to grow in the same direction.”

Guster plays with Eli “Paperboy” Reed & The True Loves Tuesday, Oct. 12, at Slowdown, 729 No. 14th St. Showtime is 8 p.m. Admission is $25.50 adv.; $30.50 DOS. For more information, call 402.345.7569 or visit theslowdown.com.

* * *

Tomorrow, Guster Pt. 2, where Ryan Miller talks about radio’s relevance (or lack thereof)…

* * *

Poison Control Center might as well just move to Omaha. Seems like they play hear every couple of months, so often that people are beginning to think they’re an Omaha band (uh-oh). They’re back and completely untethered tonight at O’Leaver’s (expect some gnarly high kicks and somersaults) along with singer/songwriter genius Kyle Harvey and La Casa Bombas. $5, 9:30 p.m.

* * *

Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Column 290: Lincoln Calling, Pt. 7

Nebraska’s biggest music festival returns.

For this week’s column, I simply could have listed the bands that are playing at this year’s Lincoln Calling Festival — along with their time slots — and been done with it. What else do you need to get your asses to Lincoln this weekend?

Instead, I’m telling you to use that magic box on your desk and go to lincolncalling.com — a website that lists all the particulars in a well-organized, well-designed online experience that will do a better job than I ever could (especially with my 900-word limit).

I could have just left it there, but you know me. I had to get in touch with the festival’s Svengali mastermind, Jeremy Buckley, who’s been pulling this musical rabbit out of his hat since the first annual event in 2004.  Back then, LC was 25 bands and a handful of bars. Today it comprises 100+ acts in 11 venues over five days. It’s mammoth.

I interrupted Buckley’s usual Sunday afternoon multi-screen pro football orgy to ask a few questions about the fest. Chief among them: What’s different this year? He said it came down to three things: 1) DJs, 2) Sponsors, 3) More (and better) out-of-town bands.

Points one and two came courtesy of Spencer Munson — a.k.a. DJ Spence, who readers may know from Gunk nights at The Waiting Room. Buckley said Spence helped pull together the nearly 30 DJs who will be playing at four clubs throughout the festival.

“(DJ’s) are an additional aspect that I didn’t focus on before,” Buckley said, confessing that when it comes to clubbing, he’s one of those guys who would rather watch than do. “I don’t go to too many dance clubs, but I have a lot of friends who do and like dancing. I sometimes go with them and sit at the table, drink my High Life and watch the coats, backpacks and purses.”

Despite his lack of love for the dance floor, Buckley said he recognizes that Lincoln has a strong culture for electronic music. That’s why he enlisted Spence to find the top talent from the region.

But that’s not all Spence did. “When he and I began putting this together last spring, I told him my long-term wish was to find someone reliable enough to be our marketing guru and help find sponsors. I don’t have the personality to sell product.” Buckley said. “Spence said, ‘Let me give it a shot.'”

Spence found Scion (which is part of Toyota Corporation), who plunked down $3,700 as a primary sponsor, along with the Downtown Lincoln Association and The Young Professionals Group – Lincoln, both of which threw in $1,000. Add a handful of food and hotel sponsors, and the total came to around $6,000 in sponsorships.

“With that money we built a decent website (lincolncalling.com), and paid a film crew to shoot a video of the event that we can send to agents and bands next year to get them to sign on,” Buckley said.

The dough also helped cover guarantees for larger out-of-town bands, such as The Hood Internet, Roger Clyne and the Peacemakers, The Love Language, Those Darlins and Sea Wolf. “I couldn’t have paid guarantees back when I was taking the risks all by myself,” Buckley said. “Now we can pay (those bands) what they need. The sponsors make a huge difference.”

The trade-off for all that cash is putting the sponsors’ logos on the website, posters, T-shirts and other promotional materials. “Since Scion is the main sponsor, we’ll have industry swag at each venue,” Buckley said, adding that he hasn’t had anyone call him a sell-out for taking corporate cash. “It was a step that was necessary for bringing in national talent that’s played on Sirius and MTV2.”

In addition to the larger bands, Buckley said he’s excited about the out-of-state acts that he specifically wooed to take part in the event, such as Lawrence’s Cowboy Indian Bear, Denver’s The Photo Atlas, and Deerpeople — a Stillwater, Oklahoma band that Buckley says “plays fun pop with disturbing lyrics.”

Deerpeople are playing at Duffy’s Friday night along with a reunion of classic Lincoln band Pablo’s Triangle, whose members included Matt Focht and Ben Armstrong of Head of Femur, and Jonathan Hischke, who’s been on tour with Broken Bells. “The Pablo’s Triangle reunion is a huge coup that brings together old-school Lincoln folks and kids who know about Broken Bells,” Buckley said.

That show, which also includes bands Shipbuilding Co. and Down with the Ship, is only $5. In fact, each show is individually priced for those who don’t want to wander around “O” Street all night long.

And just like in years’ past, every band that takes part in Lincoln Calling will go home with some cash in their pockets — something that makes this multi-day festival unique. Buckley said bands get their split after paying the sound guy, covering the promo costs and paying he and his partners their 15 percent cut.

This year, advertising costs topped $2,000 — it’s all part of trying to keep the festival growing. But with 100+ bands and 11 venues, does Lincoln Calling really have room to grow?

After seven years of putting it together, Buckley says he still doesn’t know. “We haven’t reached its limit, but we’ll never get 80,000 people in Lincoln over the course of a weekend, other than for football.”

Famous last words.

* * *

Retribution Gospel Choir, who’s  performing tonight at The Waiting Room, doesn’t play gospel music and isn’t a choir. Who it is, however, may surprise you. The trio is fronted by Alan Sparhawk, who you’ll remember as the frontman of indie-rock monsters Low — yes, that Low. RGC released their latest album, 2, on Sub Pop this past January, and it roars. If you, like me, have missed seeing Low, here’s your fix. Opening is DJ M Bowen. $10, 9 p.m.

Also tonight at Slowdown Jr. it’s Paleo a.k.a. singer/songwriter David Andrew Strackany. Joining him is Zach LaGrou and Simon Joyner & The Parachutes. $7, 9 p.m.

Also tonight, Fortnight returns to Fabulous O’Leaver’s opening a show with headliners Bad Country and Nashville band Milktooth. $5, 9:30 p.m.

* * *

Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Serena-Maneesh

Serena-Maneesh: From the Abyss

Serena-Maneesh uncovers layers of sound.

Norwegian noise-pop band Serena-Maneesh dug deep for its latest album, literally.

For Serena-Maneesh 2: Abyss in B Minor, released this past March on 4AD Records, mastermind Emil Nikolaisen recorded tracks in a cave located outside of Oslo, Norway.

“It was an interesting journey, at times rough, at times inspiring,” said Nikolaisen via cell during a sound check at a concert hall in Harleem, The Netherlands, where the band performed last Sunday night. “I wanted to put myself and my collaborators in an interesting new spot with new sounds and find new universes where there were no preconceptions of any kind, like a little kid trying to find new spaces in the world to discover.”

But don’t go listening to the album expecting echoing, cavernous noises. Instead, Serena-Maneesh music is an odyssey of beats and dense, layered noise that covers — and then slowly uncovers — melody upon melody. There are moments on the nearly 8-minute opening track, “Ayisha Abyss,” where the intensity of sound is so overwhelming that you’ll feel like you’re stumbling through utter darkness, finding your way by touching the wall with your fingertips, lost in a maze of noise and whispers.

Even the album’s poppier moments, like the soaring “I Just Want to See Your Face,” glisten through layers of guitar sheen, snare drum and cacophony. What you’ll hear the first time through isn’t necessary what you’re going to hear the next time you listen, and that’s just the way Nikolaisen wants it.

“It’s like when you hear a band next door in the basement or behind walls — when you open the door and enter the room, the music reveals itself in a more… boring way,” he said. “You thought it was more mystical or intriguing when you didn’t hear it so clearly. I try to apply that principal to what I’m doing — so that the more you zoom in, the more the mysteries of the chords and the overtones and the new harmonies appear.”

Serena-Maneesh, Serena-Maneesh 2: Abyss in B Minor (4AD Records)

The band’s style of revealing melody beneath countless layers of noise often brings comparisons to shoe-gaze masters My Bloody Valentine. Nikolaisen acknowledged that he loves MBV frontman Kevin Shields’ pop songs. “I grew up on a lot of stuff that’s clearly in the music that I’ve been pushing,” Nikolaisen said. “There was a time when no one was talking about My Bloody Valentine and these bands, and we were doing it. And suddenly, there’s a lot of these types of bands popping up here and there.”

But there’s more to Serena-Maneesh’s music than MBV comparisons. Nikolaisen said that through his music, he’s trying to find a place where “symphony and Stooges meet.”

“On one side, I love rock, and on the other side, I love symphonies,” he said. “If you can integrate the mysterious, subconscious sounds of strings into something that’s more immediate, that’s a really valuable thing. The idea is that the 10th time you hear it, you still feel like you’re on an interesting journey, you’re still hearing new sounds and (discovering) things that are not exposed right away. That’s the journey that I’ve spent many years of my life trying to refine.”

Joining him on that journey has been a number of collaborators, including American indie icon Sufjan Stevens, who played vibraphone, flute and piano on the new album. “I get sick of myself and my own ideas,” Nikolaisen said about his collaborations. “You might be able to play everything yourself, but I’m depending on other people for perspective — different souls gathering on many different levels.”

And while Serena-Maneesh has toured Europe and Australia with bands that include Oasis, Nine Inch Nails and The Dandy Warhols, Nikolaisen said Nebraska has an exotic quality of its own. “To us, Nebraska is extremely exotic,” he said. “I have these portraits in my mind of Nebraska that I’ve seen from childhood. I wonder if it’s translatable to the people there. Are they really any different from iconic New York or European minds, or are they fully redneck or fully California sunshine?”

He’ll find out next Sunday when his five-piece band rolls into The Waiting Room to open for Wovenhand. Nikolaisen said fans should expect them to “push the melodic perspective in a really loud context.”

“(The concert) is almost a physical experience with pristine melodies carved through,” he said. “Our songs need to be translated slightly different than on the recording, so we’re not just repeating or imitating it. It’s really important to give listeners a new perspective on the songs and the story. We keep it elastic in a way that’s really meant for the moment, and try to portray something different every night.”

Serena-Maneesh plays with Wovenhand Sunday, Sept. 26, at The Waiting Room, 6212 Maple St. Showtime is 9 p.m. Admission is $12. For more information, call 402.884.5353 or visit waitingroomlounge.com.

* * *

Menomena at The Waiting Room, 09/22/10.

Suckers last night at The Waiting Room: There’s just something about Frenchkiss bands. They’re always entertaining. And they all seem to have a head spazz that anchors the onstage antics, provides the energy and gives the audience something to look at while quietly pondering such things as “What’s wrong with that man?” “Are those jerky movements a side-effect to whatever drug he’s taking?” “Is he dangerous?” And so on. The spazz in The Suckers was a headband-wearing beardo on lead guitar and primary vocals who switched between a pained howl and a classic Prince falsetto throughout these hazy, hash-fueled art-damaged tunes that owed a lot to Talking Heads — both early noisy and later dancey Heads. In fact, countering the grinning headband was a stand-up-straight second guitarist whose rigid stance and lilting voice reminded me of David Byrne. The band was filled out by a bass player/percussionist/trumpet player and a drummer/keyboardist (like Box Elder’s Goldberg, there were moments when he played both at the same time), and everyone provided harmonies, which was sweet. And when headband guy just plain sung, he was dynamite — he had an earthy growl that felt good to hear, especially on their last song. I will be searching out their music in the very near future.

Suckers at The Waiting Room, 9/22/10.

Menomena had a fourth member with them last night, apparently a guy from the opening band that I missed. They sounded more mainstream — more smoothed out and fluid — then I remembered them from a couple years ago. The entire set seemed less arty, or maybe I was still buzzing from Suckers, who were just flat-out more entertaining (and had better songs). There was nothing wrong with Menomena, they were just kind of boring. That said, they broke through to me every time their lead guy picked up that Bari sax and crushed out a melody. Otherwise, the music was dominated by their rhythm section (quite a contrast from the previous night, when neither band even had a bass player). The bass and drum were huge, which is enough to carry you through the first 10 minutes, but becomes one-dimensional thereafter.

Last night’s crowd was twice the size of the crowd there Tuesday for School of Seven Bells. Maybe 200? The draw might have had something to do with Menomena having the No. 8 album on the college charts, according to the latest issue of Rolling Stone. More likely it might have something to do with being around for so many years. Still, I was told that last night’s Menomena show drew a few less people then when the band came through two years ago — when they didn’t even have a charting album. Add the fact that ground breakers School of Seven Bells drew less than 100 and you have to wonder what’s going on. Maybe it’s the lack of radio. Or maybe Omaha isn’t as hip as it thinks it is.

* * *

Tonight at Slowdown Jr. it’s Saddle Creek Records band Land of Talk with Montreal band Suuns (formerly Zeroes). Sayeth Chicagoist: “Much like ‘70s bands Can and Suicide, the heartbeat of the Suuns’ music thumps out in pulses of electro-synth that rolled in the dirt with a few Fenders.” Having listened to their new album, I concur. Get there early for Omaha’s own drone adventurists Conduits (Jenna Morrison, Roger Lewis members of Eagle Seagull). $10, 9 p.m.

* * *

Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

A capture from Land of Talk's video for "It's Okay."

Column 289: Government Issue

Paying for Land of Talk’s work of art.

It was at least six months ago, maybe longer, that I stumbled across the video for Land of Talk’s song “It’s Okay.” It was being hyped on Saddle Creek Records’ website, the band’s label.

I grew up watching videos. I remember when MTV was fresh and new and actually played music videos. And though the videos being produced in the late ’80s weren’t exactly masterpieces of cinematic art, they were entertaining and fun and a good way to kill time between classes or hangovers. Well, time, as it’s been known to do, marched on, and videos became passé, especially when the MTVs and VH1s of the world set them aside for plague-like reality-TV programming.

So I’d long ago given up on music videos as being anything more than expensive, dopey commercials. And then along came that Land of Talk video. It opens with a close-up of a masked warrior whose long black hair — more of a mane — is floating overhead as if underwater while the song’s opening notes pulse forward on a cushion of beats. From there, the mini film is a pastiche of slow-motion black-and-white images of gravity-defying science-fiction landscapes, crows soaring above floating mountaintops, flaming wolves darting through misty forests, and always at the center, the masked, horse-mounted warrior with hair flowing for miles overhead, creating a star-specked sky cutting through the daylight. Finally, horse and rider come to the edge of the earth and leap slowly into space before igniting into flames. This wasn’t your typical five-guys-and-a-camera-doing-goofy-shit video; it was a visualization of a nature myth set to a modern beat. View it on YouTube here.

The video blew my mind and made me reconsider not only the song but the album and the band. Sure, I knew about Land of Talk; I’d listened to Some Are Lakes, and thought it was a pleasant, soft-pop indie-rock effort, nothing more. But after watching the video, I dug through my iTunes to find the album and listen to it again with fresh ears. And isn’t that what videos are supposed to do? It turns out I wasn’t alone in my admiration. The 5-minute masterpiece was nominated for “Video of the Year” at the 2010 Juno Awards — sort of the Canadian version of The Grammy’s — and was chosen as one of the five best music videos of 2009 by Time Magazine.

So how did a little label like Saddle Creek, and an under-the-radar band like Land of Talk, afford to make such a video? Its combination of live action and special-effects animation must have cost a fortune.

“Going in, I was very disenchanted with the whole idea of making a video,” said Land of Talk frontwoman Lizzie Powell Monday night while driving to Chicago on a tour that will bring them to The Slowdown this Thursday, Sept. 23. She said videos had become “fast-edited, sexy, nonsensical shit. And I was protective of that song and never wanted anyone to interpret it in video form.”

But when “It’s Okay” was chosen by production company WeWereMonkeys for the video treatment, Powell had little choice but to relinquish control to director Davide Di Saro. “It turned out to be one of the best creative relationships I’ve ever had,” she said, adding that when she saw the final product, “We were floored, we were speechless, it brought tears to my eyes. I was so proud to be a part of it.”

So who fronted the cash to make it happen? None other than the Canadian government through the Department of Canadian Heritage and a program called FACTOR, The Foundation to Assist Canadian Talent on Recordings. Powell said FACTOR and other government-sponsored arts organizations are vital to every independent Canadian band’s’ survival.

“All of these organizations are there to support independent artists,” she said. “Land of Talk would not exist without the government. It’s at the core of our band and most of the Canadian bands touring out there to the states and abroad, from Broken Social Scene to Arcade Fire — any bands that have not signed away their masters abroad.”

Without that government grant money, we probably wouldn’t be seeing Land of Talk Thursday night. “We wouldn’t be able to tour in a 15-passenger van and go out for three weeks,” Powell said, adding that the financial support goes beyond what a record label can provide. “Record labels are screwed now with the transition to the digital age.”

In fact, she doesn’t know how independent bands in the U.S. do it. “What you have in the States is not sustainable,” Powell said. “I feel horrible for bands with talent and skill that can’t get off the ground and get on the road. It’s heartbreaking, and at the same time, it makes me proud that we can afford this, but I’m not completely waxing Canada’s car right now.”

That’s because arts funding has been cut back under Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Powell said. “Harper’s government is spending more money on military than arts and eduction,” she said. “It’s something we’re trying to save and protect; it’s a wonderful thing to defend. Cutting funding for arts and culture is very short-sighted.”

Are you listening State Senator Gwen Howard? Howard plans to introduce a bill in the Unicameral that will suspend Nebraska’s “1% for Art” program. Talk about short-sighted.

Powell said if Land of Talk doesn’t win any more grants, we probably won’t be seeing videos like “It’s Okay” for songs off the band’s new album,Cloak and Cipher. But if it programs like FACTOR are eliminated, we may not see any more bands like Land of Talk.

* * *

School of Seven Bells at The Waiting Room, Sept. 22, 2010.

Last night at The Waiting Room felt inspired by The Cure. In fact, the opening band, Active Child, sounded so Cure-like that I thought Robert Smith was in the house. I only caught their last two songs (I missed out on the harp solo): the first song was a pure Cure rip; but the last one featured falsetto vocals a la The Temper Trap and was… pretty. Still, just keyboards and guitar. No drums, no bass, and they could have used that bottom end.

School of Seven Bells was a four-piece — a guitarist, two women vocalists (one on keys/synth, the other sometimes adding a second guitar), and real live drums supported by electronic beats/handclaps. The music was dreamy dance stuff, with both girls adding angelic harmonies. Their slower numbers again owed a lot to the Cure’s later lush music. By now Disintegration has become a sort of benchmark album for so many bands. Just a few years ago, it seemed everyone sounded like Pavement. Before that, it was the Pixies. But a certain cadre of today’s bands seem enamored with Smiths, The Cure and MBV (see tomorrow’s interview). And there’s nothing wrong with that.

The best moments came when guitarist Benjamin Curtis was allowed to run wild run free. His tone was amazing; it reminded me of every great soaring guitar solo of ’80s post-New Wave/dream rock era. The Deheza sisters sounded like what you’d imagine Azure Ray would sound like fronting a dance band. Unfortunately, too often the vocals were buried in the mix and sounded limp, like an afterthought. As with the opener, the sound would have benefited from more bottom end (no bass again). The 70 or 80 people on hand spent the night huddled by the stage, but few if any danced, except for one girl who spent the evening with her arms in the air. Maybe that’s why they didn’t come out for an encore after their 45 minute set concluded. A pity. I could have listened to them for another hour.

* * *

So the City Council approved the CVS pharmacy. Goodbye, 49r. Here’s the WOWT coverage

.

One last thought on CVS… I can say as a resident of the Memorial Park neighborhood, which abuts Dundee, that other than the cursory walk-through upon its grand opening, I will never step foot in that CVS store. Never. And judging from neighbors and other Dundee residents, I won’t be alone. A hollow threat? You don’t know Dundee very well. Very clannish; very grudgeful; some might say angry. This isn’t like when Wal Mart moved in at the expense of The Ranch Bowl, where people vowed to never shop there. I knew that wouldn’t make a stitch of difference. Wal Mart attracts every bit of human trash in every city it inhabits, people who wouldn’t care if Wal Mart ran a white slavery ring out of its appliance department, as long as they could still buy their 10 cubic foot bricks of toilet paper. CVS, well, that’s another matter. It has zero competitive advantage over Walgreens. It won’t even be convenient to access. And now they’ve pissed off the neighborhood in which it resides, a neighborhood that has a long, long memory. I do not wish them luck.

* * *

Tonight at The Waiting Room, Portland experimental rockers Menomena returns supporting a new album on Barsuk Records. This is what I said about them when they came through way back in June 2007:

Though not nearly as crowded as the prior evening, there was a large draw to see Menomena (pronounced Men-Naw-Men-Naw — like phenomena — not as I stupidly pronounced it, Men-Oh-Meen-uh). The trio featured a drummer/vocalist, keyboard/guitarist/vocalist, and frontman/vocalist/guitarist/saxophone player. Huge sound for a trio. Everything seemed keyed off the drums, which were big and brawny, the kit set up at the front of the stage so all three members could watch each other throughout the set. Trying to think of what they sounded like, the guy next to me said, “Man, it’s like early Peter Gabriel.” Bingo. Especially when the drummer sang the leads, the keyboards were in loop and the frontman added harmonies or played an odd line on baritone sax, it was 1980 Melt-era Gabriel all the way. Other times, when the keyboardist held the vocal spot, Menomena resembled early Death Cab or a more conventional indie band. They were at their best when being unconventional, however, which was most of the evening

Opening the show tonight is Williamsburg band Suckers (Frenchkiss Records) and Tu Fawning. $12, 9 p.m.

* * *

Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Titus Andronicus

Our Civil War

Titus Andronicus’ music addresses the battle within ourselves.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

A caveat before reading further: Titus Andronicus’ frontman Patrick Stickles’ comments came under the influence of having not slept in 26 hours, after he and the rest of the band drove over night from Toledo to St. Louis to play on a hot Saturday afternoon at LouFest.

“I guess ‘Lou’ is short for St. Louis,” he said, adding that the band was playing “smack in the middle of seven or eight bands. Broken Social Scene is the headliner.”

It was just two years ago that Titus Andronicus, which hails from Glen Rocks, New Jersey, began to break through the oversized, amorphous cloud that is the U.S. indie music scene with their XL Records debut The Airing of Grievances, an LP that captured their rowdy, raucous anthem-punk style.

“A lot’s happened since then,” Stickles said. “We went through a couple guitar players and made this whole other record. We’ve pretty much wildly exceeded our expectations.”

Titus Andronicus, The Monitor (XL Records)

The “other record” is sophomore effort The Monitor, released by XL this past March. While it continued in the same rambunctious fashion as their debut, the album is sprawling — more than an hour long with half the songs over seven minutes in length, and one clocking in at a whopping 14 minutes.

“I’ve never been too good at editing myself,” Stickles said. “At the time we were theorizing these songs, I guessed all would be three or four minutes long. What we ended up recording is a byproduct of me having poor temporal reasoning skills. We always strive for a level of grandiosity, but even I couldn’t have predicted that we’d go that far.”

The recording also expanded on the band’s low-fi punk sound, adding new instruments (bagpipes, fiddle, trombone, cello) that elevated these epic, drunken, Celtic-flavored sing-along ballads to a level as grand as the album’s so-called Civil War theme, which Stickles said shouldn’t be taken too literally.

“The music is set in modern times. The Civil War is only used allegorically; I thought it would be an apt metaphor,” Stickles said. In fact, the lyrics on The Monitor (named after the Civil War-era battleship) are both self-flagellating and confrontational, with slogan-like lines “Baby we were born to die,” “You’ll always be a loser,” “I was born to die like a man,” and most central to the album’s theme: “The enemy is everywhere.” Booze provides a lyrical counterbalance to desperation and hostility.

“The point is that we’re all complacent in our various societal ills,” Stickles explained. “All this stuff about the enemy being everywhere, just as often it’s inside us, our own bodies, our earthly prisons. We as individuals have to be willing to take responsibility for our own happiness and fulfillment. There seems to be a tendency of humans trying to pass the buck for their unhappiness, and say, ‘If other than xyz, I would have the life of Riley.’ To me, it’s a defense mechanism at best. It’s quite possible to achieve peace and happiness on this crazy planet, but we have to allow that to come from within rather than look for external reasons.”

Heady stuff, but beyond their deeper meaning, all those angry lines make for some amazing sing-along moments. Stickles agreed. “They tend to make the best rock and roll songs,” he said, acknowledging how much the band loves it when the crowd shouts the lines back at them. “Their enthusiasm has a way of quickly creating enthusiasm on stage.”

Stickles said the band has never played in Omaha, but heard that the city’s punks “like to rock out in the basement.” He also said he and his high school pals grew up listening to Saddle Creek Records, which opened the door to the next line of discussion.

There are probably 100 reviews of The Monitor online and in print, and I venture to guess that at least half of them compare Stickles’ rambunctious vocal style to Omaha’s very own Conor Oberst, from the overdriven screams to that distinctive Conor bray.

Stickles said he admires Oberst’s honesty. “He doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who’s too scared to lay it on the line,” he said, “though his last two records kind of left me cold.”

As for the comparisons, “I’ll tell you because you rep the Omaha readership,” Stickles said. “I think it’s a little short-sighted.

“The constant comparisons to anyone gets old, even if it’s Jesus Christ. Doesn’t everyone want to be themselves? Don’t we all want to blaze our own trail, though I know this is rock and roll, and there’s not too much under the sun? But it seems kind of like, uh, cheapening slightly to say that if you’ve heard one guy you can pretty much guess what this guy is going to sound like. After awhile it feels like a feedback loop, a house of mirrors, like sometimes (reviewers) get these things to sound so similar that I’m reading reviews of other reviews. But maybe that’s me being a self-righteous, entitled type. Even if it were true, is it helpful? Who’s to say? It’s not in my control. As I put my art out into the world, it’s out of my hands. History will judge.”

It will indeed. Now go get some sleep.

Titus Andronicus plays with Free Energy Thursday, Sept. 16, at The Waiting Room, 6212 Maple St. Showtime is 9 p.m. Admission is $10. For more information, call 402.884.5353 or visit waitingroomlounge.com.

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An addendum to yesterday’s CVS Pharmacy item: There’s an organized protest taking place today at 4:30 p.m. on both sides of Dodge Street outside The 49’r. It’s called “The Rally to Preserve the Integrity of Dundee.” Find out more at the event’s Facebook page. Will it make a difference? Who knows… it couldn’t hurt…

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So, tough choice for tonight: The Pixies or Titus Andronicus? I grew up listening to The Pixies and love all of their albums. I consider them to be among the most influential indie bands in the last 30 years. And tickets are still available in the $35 to $65 range. The show is at The Orpheum and starts at 7:30. I guess since it starts so early, there’s no reason to not go to both shows…

Opening for Titus Andronicus at The Waiting Room tonight is Free Energy, a hot hot hot new indie pop band from Philly that sounds influenced by ’70s arena acts like Cheap Trick, The Knack and yeah, Thin Lizzy, along with a healthy dose of Pavement. 9 p.m., $10.

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Column 285: Sonic Youth

Tapping the mind of a 17-year-old.

Out of the blue last week I received an e-mail from Molly Misek. Ms. Misek had read my column/review of the Concert for Equality and wanted to interview me for an article for The Network, the highly esteemed Marian High School newspaper. I said sure, but to be fair, there’d have to be an information exchange — she could interview me, if I could interview her.

Look, how often am I going to get a chance to interview a 17-year-old about the music that surrounds her everyday life during what arguably is/will be her most formative years? Do you remember what you were listening to when you were 17? It’s very likely that you’re still listening to that same music today. And let’s face it, how else is a guy of my vintage (with no kids of his own) really supposed to find out what today’s youth is listening to?

Molly’s questions keyed on the Benson concert, the issues surrounding it, and, of course, the bands. Her piece will focus more on the cause than the music, even though it was Conor Oberst — not the plight of illegal immigrants — that drew her attention to the show. “It wasn’t about the issue at all. I’m a fan of Bright Eyes,” she said. “Everything Conor does is pretty awesome. I’m mostly a fan of him, and can’t say I was a fan of any other bands that played, but I’m not so into the super Omaha indie scene.”

Her love of all things Oberst began in 7th Grade when her cousins visited from Laredo, Texas. “They’re super-big fans of Bright Eyes,” she said. “Anyway, we were in Target and we see this guy in dark glasses and this shady kind of hair, and my cousin said, ‘Oh my god, that looks like Conor Oberst.’ She walks by him and says, ‘That’s his voice, Molly.’ Why would he be in a SuperTarget across from my house? They finally made me go up and ask and he said he was (Oberst), and autographed her shoe or something. After that, I got interested in his music and his albums. I wish I had been more of a fan, I would have appreciated it more.”

These days Molly’s record collection consists of about 60 CDs and 3,500 songs on iTunes, about half of which she actually purchased. “I used to buy a lot of CDs,” she said. “Before I got my Macbook I would buy them the regular way, from iTunes. Now that I have my Macbook, I rip them from YouTube if they’re good quality. I was never an ‘illegal person’ — I will buy a song if I feel the band deserves the money for it, not that any band doesn’t.”

Her last purchase was an Interpol CD, bought at Target or Best Buy. “It was probably not even a month ago,” she said. “I went through an Interpol craze and bought their previous three albums.”

Misek said she discovers new music on websites like Spinner.com. “They have a ‘Free MP3 of the Day,’ and I download it every day,” she said. Spinner has a few mainstream tracks (Weezer’s “Memories” is available), but its focus is almost solely indie music, with new tracks by bands like !!!, Revolver, and Broken Social Scene.

How does she define indie? “Indie music is considered anything that anyone doesn’t know about,” Misek said. “There are people who say, ‘Bright Eyes is too mainstream.’ Everyone can be a snob sometimes. When something becomes popular, you can become angry because you knew about it before anyone else. I needed to let that go and like music just to like it, not to be perceived as ‘cool’ or ‘indie.’ A lot of time indie music isn’t even that good.”

Her current favorite song is the new one by Enrique Iglesias. She also likes Lady Gaga (“I think she’s pretty revolutionary”), the new Arcade Fire, Miike Snow and Kid Cudi. “People like rap because it’s good at dances,” she said. “It’s easy to listen to. I’m not a huge fan of rap, but I won’t delete it from my iTunes.”

Molly goes to shows “every couple of months,” and would attend more all-ages shows, but “it’s a problem because I have to get a notarized parent’s signature. It’s a lot of work.” She didn’t know that places like The Slowdown can keep parental slips on file.

To galvanize a stereotype, I rattled off the names of 15 old-school bands like Boston, Journey and REM. Misek was familiar with all of their music, except for Tom Jones (“I’ve heard of him”), The Moody Blues (“never heard their music”), The Dead Kennedys, The Minutemen (Why would she know their music?), and one of my dad’s favorites, Herb Albert (while she knew about The Pixies because they’re one of her dad’s favorites).

Over the course of our hour-long phone interview, we talked about radio (“I used to like 89.7 The River, but now they play more hardcore stuff”), metal (“Weird metal bands are more popular with guys. It’s just gross”), Katy Perry (“I like her despite being normal bubble-gum pop”), and the “next big thing” (“From my point of view, it’s electronic”).

Even though technology has changed the way Molly’s generation listens to music, not much else has changed since when I was her age. Back then, I was always looking for that song that would change my life. Molly’s no different.

“Sometimes you’ll be listening to a song and then one lyric will hit you, and you’ll think ‘Oh my god, I so know what you’re talking about,'” she said. “Maybe I’m too romantic, but music is an expression of the soul. It kind of changes your mind a little. If you identify with a song, isn’t that what it’s supposed to do? Isn’t everything in your life life-changing?”

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Tonight at The Waiting Room is the return of Eux Autres. As I said in this vintage 2005 interview, it’s pronounced “ooz-oh-truh,” and it means “The Others” in French, of course. The brother-and-sister rock band from Portland has Omaha roots. Guitarist/vocalist Nicholas Larimer graduated from North High School in ’96, while his drummer/vocalist sister Heather graduated from Central in ’90, where she was “the cheerleader that never smiled.” Since that story was written, the band added drummer Yoshi Nakamoto (The Aislers Set, Still Flyin’) and released a second album, Cold City, on Happy Birthday to Me Records, along with a handful of singles. They’ve got a new album, Broken Bow, waiting in the wings for a November release. Check out their latest free downloadable single, “World Cup Fever 2010.” It’s good. Opening is The Third Men. 9 p.m., $7.

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2010 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.