Has life got you down? Do you need a shot in the arm? Not that kind…

We here at Truer Sources of Sound have been up day and night putting together a once-in-a-lifetime package for all you music lovers out there who have not experienced a combination of two of the greatest pleasures of being alive in this modern age:

1. pre ’79 Bob Dylan

2. Vinyl

It’s simple, for a limited time only – the next 30 days – you can sign up for “The Bob Dylan Plan”. The Bob Dylan Plan consists of 1 used vinyl copy of every Bob Dylan studio album released from 1962 through 1976* – 15 albums total - mailed straight to your door, no hassles!

Every self-respecting music lover needs to have a collection of Bob Dylan’s 60′s and 70′s albums on vinyl. For those of you in the world wide web audience who have never been introduced to the music of Bob Dylan this is a special treat. And for those of you who don’t own a record player, now’s the time…they’re cheap! (note: expect scratches and dust on these records, believe it or not it will add to the listening experience.)

Now for the details: Sign up in the next 30 days and come Aug 1, 2009 you will begin to receive, each month, a used Bob Dylan LP in the mail. The order in which you receive them will be kept a strict secret. You will then receive one per month near the beginning of each month for a period of 15 consecutive months. If you make it all the way through the 15 months you will then receive a special, mystery 16th album.

Here’s how to order: send us an e-mail at tsosrecordclub@gmail.com indicating your desire to be a part of the club. Include your name, mailing address you’d like the records sent to and e-mail address that you use for PayPal. On Aug. 1 you will be e-mailed an invoice for the cost of your record – you will pay this via PayPal. Once those funds are received we will mail you the record.

SPECIAL NOTE: We are not marking up the cost of the record and mailing. Whatever the lowest price we can find we will pass along to you. For the early albums (the 1st 3-4) these prices are ranging from $14-$20.00. For the rest of the albums they are anywhere from $8-$14.00, a real bargain. Keep in mind that you will not necessarily receive the albums in order.

Questions, concerns, suggestions? Let us know by using the comments section below.

And remember, Truer Sources of Sound is dedicated to being your internet destination for quality music information and community.  

*an astute observer will note that there were more than 15 Bob Dylan albums released between the years of 1962-1976. For manageability we have chosen to omit the Greatest Hits albums, the live albums and the outtakes album “Dylan”. The Basement Tapes might be the mystery 16th album, you never know, but we do not consider it a studio album.

Choir boys meets indie-folk rock stars. I am not a huge fan of all grizzly bear songs but I hear that their new album is something special. I am not sure whether I will listen to it prior to seeing them live because I always find it extra special to hear a song for the first time live. I love their Friend EP which I purchased about two years ago. Plus they are on Warp records which kicks ass.

The tickets were expensive at $41 a piece but I got 8 of them nevertheless.

1. Capt AKAK
2. Meg
3. JP
4. George Pants
5. Kia Sonata
6. OceanRain
7. Ebee
8. Amelia

To purchase more check here: Cross Your Fingers

Los Angeles, CA – 06/11/09

I don’t know if it’s because I’d been working for what felt like five years straight without a day off and I’d just come to the realization or if it was because I was extremely tired, maybe both, but the Handsome Furs were transcendent.

The Monolators opened for them and weren’t. They played their Queers-esque songs too fast and didn’t seem like they practiced much. They also seemed to have no dark side.

The Cinnamon Band were more interesting – they were like the Jayhawks if everyone except the drummer and guitar player had contracted swine flu and croaked and the 2 remaining members were on the “memorial tour”. The two of them drank Tecate after Tecate the entire set and sang esoteric songs about growing up in the South. The drummer seemed like a maudlin drunk. However, they had some good drawling harmonies and some of the songs weren’t too bad.

Then the Handsome Furs began setting up and it became immediately apparent that like baseball there is a stratum in music – some people are born to play and others are doing it because they just really want to. Dan Boekner was born to fucking rock.

I listened to Big Black intermittently in High School mostly because they had the angriest lyrics of all-time. That was the only other rock band that I’ve heard where a drum machine was featured as the entire percussion section. Yes, there’s been the Postal Service and others, but no one has rocked out like Big Black, until Dan Boekner bought his first Alesis.

There is a definite William Gibson vibe to Handsome Furs; the feeling that if you walked outside the club it would be drizzling a cold acid rain on a population of androids and their leather-clad human masters. It’s an interesting counterpart to the mostly anti-technology/sad-state-of-modern-culture lyrics but the drum machine, the synth and the odd movements and coked-out appearance of his wife made for a decidedly post-apocalyptic evening.

Alexei Perry is certainly playing a part on-stage but if there’s even a shred of reality in her appearance and actions then she’s definitely a drug-user and probably borderline-schizophrenic, which is probably why I find her attractive. During the show she alternated between grinding her teeth, licking her lips and rubbing her nose and making weird jaw contortions. Dan didn’t seem similarly afflicted, just like he’d been up for several days and now really needed a nap.

In between songs Alexei would run around the stage and do big butterfly thank-you’s with her arms – she’d put her hands on her chest and then throw her arms out to the audience. During songs she would stand on one leg and pirouette and then other times do Muppet-esque dancing with her arms while attending to the drum machine and synth. I wouldn’t be harping on this if it wasn’t such a compelling sight. The tableaux made you really want to go hang out with both of them after the show. You felt like Dan would be sitting in a chair in an old dingy hotel room with a bottle of whiskey and a cigarette while Alexei was in the bathroom snorting cocaine cut with comet so you could really feel the burn. He’d then make some offer like, “if you want to fuck her tonight go ahead, I can’t get it up anymore.”

That’s obviously an exaggeration but I’m not kidding, there was a palpable sense of danger and enlightened decadence that they exuded. But oh yeah, the music was good too. They only played one song off of the first album, Plague Park, the rest being songs from the relatively newly released Face Control.

Having heard the first two bands, and a lot of other mediocre bands at other shows and on records, it helps to make plain the fact that in many ways true talent is a natural phenomenon, is born. While the other bands were sincere, probably practiced more than the Handsome Furs and had some good songs, it was like a different kind of human had landed when the Handsome Furs started in on their set.

And this wasn’t even the best that I’ve heard them play. They seemed tired and a little crazed, but they still played an incredible set of modern music, music to watch the world crumble to.

This event is on Saturday and should be a lot of fun and incredibly weird. I’ll drive if anyone wants to go…I know it’s the day after a show but trust me, any event the MJT puts on is worth going to.

http://museumjt.stores.yahoo.net/evofmuandrew.html

If you don’t know anything about the MJT Google them or look at this book: http://www.amazon.com/Mr-Wilsons-Cabinet-Wonder-Jurassic/dp/0679764895/ref=pd_bxgy_d_img_b

Jay Reatard and The Oh Sees are teaming up for a pretty decent line-up at the echo. It is on a Friday night and I know you have nothing better to do in the greater OC/LA area….

To be honest, I am not that familiar with the Jay fella but Bloodclot and others rave about him (Bloodclot’s Video Pick of Jay Reatard). I have his singles album on the ipod but have not checked it out yet.
The Oh Sees on the other hand, I am quite familiar and a big fan (I placed them on my top esoteric tracks list). The Oh Sees are a San Fransisco based psychedelic/noise/garage rock band (a la Wooden Shjips except not as repetitive). Some of their albums are a bit too experimental/minimalistic for my palette; quite a feat really. Their most recent album (about a year old now) “The Master’s Bedroom Is Worth Spending a Night In” is not only an album with a great title but is one of the few records which does not warrant skipping a track during a drive on the freeway. Some of you might remember seeing The Oh Sees open for The Dodos about a year and a half ago at a coffee shop at USC and SilverLake Lounge; the lead singer, John Dwyer, is pretty entertaining, ripping on his own simplistic guitar cords, etc.

I have six tickets at about $17 dollars a piece. I am thinking Masa beforehand for a Friday Night feast.

1. Capt AKAK
2. JP
3. Ebee
4. Justin Shabbaz
5. mroyed
6. marlyn

Asobi Seksu – Strings from album Citrus.

MP3 of the day. Seriously. While driving into work this morning stuck in traffic, this song came on the ipod shuffle. I had forgotten. Now I remember. So should you.

I enjoy a fresh new, exciting band as much as the next LA hipster, but it hard not to stay firmly rooted in the heritage through which our musical branches are so derived. Old faithful is back (with avengance apparently); none other than the white trio with a spanish name Yo La Tengo. Even though I did not grow up listening to their albums, I do feel that it is the music of my youth. A life filled with excitement, frustration, passion, and love (my real childhood did not really have any of these but it sounds better) during a time where we are free to explore our creativity without judgment. I have lost count as to how many albums YLT has produced but it is probably upwards of 12. So far Ride the Tiger is the only one which I have not enjoyed.

The forthcoming album is rumored to contain new sounds “that could be the bravest musical statement to date” with a “stylistic range that is startling”. That my friends are bold statements, but anyone who heard their last album, I am not afraid of you, and I will beat your ass, knows that as YLT has aged they have been more willing to experiment with new sounds/genres. This is somewhat counter intuitive, but who really give a fuck because the end result is typically greatness.

In honor of this announcement and the name of the new album itself, I say we all state our favorite album and song. Mine would be I can hear the heart beating as one and song would be  Sudden Organ.

This means they will be on tour soon as well……..screw the present moment, live in the future. Namaste.

Sample song off the new album: “Periodically Double or Triple”

This site has had a lot of videos of outstanding muscians and true artists. I’m neither of these, but I do enjoy playing their music. I did come up with this one thou which is fun to play/mess around with. If you think this is crap, sorry CAPT. asked to see it.

I like this band a lot and I’m going to the show. I’ve seen them live before and it was an amazing experience, mostly because I’d never seen a dude, a guitar and drum machine produce such bad-ass music.

If anyone else wants to go that’d be cool. If you haven’t heard their music before check out their first album 1st – Plague Park.

TicketWeb Sales

Here is a review of live from December 2007: “Combined with the physical playing of bassist Lou Barlow and the frenetic pounding of drummer Murph, Dinosaur Jr.’s formidable noise obliterates the vocals in concert. Fortunately, it’s not the words that exert most of the band’s power.
In its best moments, the band executes impressive dynamic shifts, such as the way the noise subsided to leave space for the singing in “Been There All the Time,” another of the new songs. That one also revealed another side of the band’s appeal: surprising melodic twists that elevate the music above its sheer muscle.” [Orlando Sentinel]

Personally, I have only seen J. Mascus (the band’s guitarist) play as a solo artist for his side project J. Mascus and the Fog. He absolutely rips on guitar. But my brother, FerrisSC, saw Dinosaur Jr. play about a year ago in Texas, stating that one of his friends was so overwhelmed by the sound that he fainted. Whether or not that is an embellishment, I am not going to miss this band while they are still together. Who is with me? I will buy extra tickets based on the comments section.

Troubadour Event Details

I got 6 tickets. $35ish a piece.

1. Capt AKAK
2. M Pailes
3. JP
4. George Pants
5. Tinman
6. WBrecords