Tag Archives: video

Smashing Pumpkins Anniversary Tour

I laughed when I read this at Pitch­fork. They threw a sim­i­lar tantrum when I saw them in July 1996, play­ing 20 plus min­utes of feed­back, alleged­ly because they’d been asked to play longer to avoid traf­fic snarls with the crowd leav­ing a Phillies game. Some things nev­er change, huh?

These 90’s reunions would be much more appeal­ing if the bands could seri­ous­ly get their acts togeth­er. I’ve skipped Stone Tem­ple Pilots and Smash­ing Pump­kins sim­ply because I expect­ed both to be dis­as­trous, not to men­tion that it feels too soon for these reunions. (I’m look­ing hard at you too, Pavement.)

The Thermals Sign to Kill Rock Stars

I got the press release that the Ther­mals signed to Kill Rock Stars just as I got home from the office. I think it’s great that they were able to stay on a clas­sic North­west label, but it seemed more strange that they would­n’t re-up with Sub Pop.

Coin­ci­den­tal­ly, Swedes Loney, Dear — a band signed in the post-“Young Folks” hys­te­ria — recent­ly depart­ed Sub Pop as well. Not to get too pulpy, but is there more to this than meets the eye? Loney, Dear were poor­ly reviewed and their Sub Pop debut, Loney, Noir, was a stinker. But the Ther­mals seemed to be the sort of act that Beg­gars Group would’ve poached in a heart­beat just a few years ago.

I’ll stop beat­ing around the bush: I’m shocked that a band like the Ther­mals would end up on such a tiny label at this point in their devel­op­ment. I know the music indus­try is bad, but labels like XL are still sign­ing bands and reis­su­ing albums a year after every­one in the blo­gos­phere down­loaded them. But that’s just business.

Think of it anoth­er way: if Deer­hoof — a band that crit­ics once show­ered with praise — does­n’t gen­er­ate heat a month after drop­ping their new album, Offend Mag­gie (7.6, no less), can they work a band that may have out­lived its hype cycle? At this point in his­to­ry, it does­n’t even seem to mat­ter if a band is hit­ting its stride. Every­thing is yes­ter­day’s papers the moment it leaks.

Don’t believe me? Read this pul­lquote in the Pitch­fork news piece from this after­noon and tell me it did­n’t make you wince.

Gorgoroth’s Gaahl Discusses His Influences

This isn’t new, but it’s a pret­ty hilar­i­ous video. I love these guys. Look at the mise-en-scene! It’s per­fect! The sense of style and ded­i­ca­tion that goes into being a true Nor­we­gian black met­al war­rior is noth­ing short of total­ly ridiculous.

I need to fol­low up and watch these episodes on VBS TV by Peter Beste. You can watch the first episode below:

Ignored Netflix Movies Fight Back

I real­ly need to fin­ish watch­ing Bertoluc­ci’s La Com­mare Sec­ca already. It’s good, trust me! There’s just nev­er enough time to watch it! For­tu­nate­ly, Helen holds up her end of the Net­flix sub­scrip­tion by devour­ing TV on DVD. She just fin­ished the final sea­son of Homi­cide. I think that’s sev­en full sea­sons! I salute her ded­i­ca­tion and insom­nia. I sim­ply can’t com­mit to that sort of late night view­ing, nor am I will­ing to sub­mit Helen to tor­tur­ous for­eign lan­guage films for hours at a time.

In oth­er seri­ous movie news, I’m head­ed down to Ritz at the Bourse to watch Godard­’s Vivre sa Vie on Thurs­day night. It’s not much, but I’ll take what­ev­er reper­to­ry crumbs Philly man­ages to get.