Wanna bet?

It's easy to deny the effects of climate change when you have no financial stake in it. (Although, IMHO, we all have a stake in it, but that's beside the point.) When you have to bet billions of dollars, it's not so easy.

The groups who have to bet billions of dollars on whether or not it's happening are betting that it's happening. It would be much better for Munich Re if it wasn't happening.

A common accusation is that so-called global warming alarmists have some hidden radical environmental agenda. What is the world's largest global re-insurers radical environmental agenda supposed to be?

Hunx And His Punx
Too Young to Be In Love
Hardly Art

(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

The Ergs! once told the world to "Xerox your genitals, not the Ramones." Sound advice for a 90's and 00's punk rock landscape overflowing with bands which offered little more than Ramones worship. However, the 10's (or whatever we're calling this decade) have brought about a sort of Ramone's Renaissance (See here). Hunx & His Punx' Too Young To Be In Love hits on a part of the Ramones' oeuvre which seems to be one of the least discussed: the heavy influence of girl groups on their sound. I won't be the first to point out this is basically a 60's girl group album with heavier guitars and a gay guy instead of a girl. It matters little: Hunx has an understanding of teenage love and heartbreak any Brill building pro would proud to brandish.

Scion gets it too, they produced the below video for the title track. Sadly, this sped up version doesn't appear on the album (or anywhere else I can find, for that matter.) However, this video captures the feel of the album perfectly, and the song sounds great with this beat. Enjoy!

Small things

Lemuria
Pebble
Bridge 9



(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

The release of Lemuria's latest LP on Bridge 9 records certainly raised a few eyebrows here and there. Bridge 9 is known mostly for hardcore acts, and I was unsure if the move signified a change in Lemuria's sound. It wouldn't have surprised me, I've always felt Lemuria was a hardcore band masquerading as a pop act. However Pebble is not a hardcore album per se, the band and label have maintained both camps are simply pursuing new direction. Still, the secret hardcore sound of Lemuria has been maintained here. Loads and loads and loads of sound from one guitar, one bass, drums, and two rather quiet voices.

A pebble is a small thing, insignificant. The album is appropriately titled as singer/guitarist Sheena Ozzella and drummer/singer Alex Kerns take us straight to the heart of their struggles with meaning and significance. Sometimes it's jealousy ("Different Girls") sometimes it's marginalization ("The One") and sometimes it's simply the bitterness of watching the undeserved get their way ("Gravity"). Kerns' and Ozzella's struggles are fascinating and thrilling to experience, nothing is hidden from us. It's all accompanied by such an overwhelming sound that the album can be emotionally exhausting to listen to.

Thankfully, right in the middle, we are gifted with one more form of vulnerability, the simple act of expressing to someone the beauty you see in them and the way they see the world and the shame of seeing someone lose that perspective. "Ribcage" at first seems out of place on album so fraught with emotional pitfalls. However, its revelation of a different kind of vulnerability which can leave us all feeling like pebbles works well here.

"Wise People"

Clean (sounding and) Living!

Missing Monuments
Painted White
Douchemaster Records

(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

Recently, NYMary of the fantastic Powerpop blog did a three hour radio show where she did as good a job as could possibly be done explaining what powerpop is and what we love about it. For a pretty loosely defined genre which has been going for decades, answering those two questions in three hours is just about an impossibility. Putting bands like Shoes, Foundtains of Wayne, and The Black and Whites into the same bag requires the bag to be fairly large.

I'm happy to add King Louie's latest outfit, the Missing Monuments, into that gumbo. Louie brings his own flavor to the genre to be sure, but is firmly a part of it. His heart is exposed for everyone to see, the drums and bass and mixed down pretty low - the guitar and vocal melodies are the stars here. Some of Louie's finest work in both of those areas to date are on this album.

What I love the most, however, is Louie's ability to transcend the filth of this world and take us with him to his world. The trash is still there, but the radio is playing the songs we love, and the pretty girl at the bar wants to talk to us. The opening track, "The Girl of the Nite" MUST be spelled that way. Same with "Dance all Nite." They're evocative of the glowing neon signs in this trashy world made heaven by those pretty girls and great radio stations. Nowhere is that more apparent than on the excellent closing number - "Dance all Nite." It's for anyone who's never wanted the song to end, or the sun to come up, or to get on that plane back home.

Then you look up baby you can just where we are in the stars/Down in the filth and the full moonlight/Baby, let's dance all nite.

The filth and the full moonlight. A shitty world made beautiful by music like this. Keep 'em coming, Louie!

"Girl of the Nite"

Days go by

The Drums
Portamento
Frenchkiss

(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

As I mentioned earlier, I'm on my way back from vacation in Los Angeles. While there, I stopped by the Beach Boys historic landmark in Hawthorne, CA.



This also in the aftermath of their recent 50th anniversary reunion concert at the Grammy awards ceremony. Despite that fuckhead Mike Love being present, I thought the performance was great. I also thought Maroon 5 and Foster the People did fine jobs of performing two very demanding songs in front of the legends themselves. But all that's a story for another post.

I bring up the Beach Boys, because 50 years later I think it's great to see their influence is stronger than ever. I've read plenty of reviews which slam Brooklyn bands playing "beach" influenced music as disingenuous, but I've never understood that. Who doesn't love going to the beach? What's wrong with anyone from anywhere deciding that the beach is a part of their sound philosophy?

Portamento picks up right where their 2010 debut left off. The reverb is heavy, the guitars are minimal but pointed, and the songs are about extremes in weather, emotion, and life. The layers pile on more and more as they go on, until you're bathing in the lush sound of ultimate joy or sadness, depending on the track.

I also don't live at the beach, but I've found the perfect album for the ride down.

"Days"

Long live the King

The Decemberists
The King is Dead
Capitol Records

(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

I'm in the middle of a fantastic book my wife bought me for Christmas entitled Boozehound. It was written by the Washington Posts' spirits writer (Wait, that's a job?! Is anyone hiring more of these?) In the book, the author frequently discusses the speakeasy trend sweeping the nation. I've encountered a few during my travels myself. They will serve ol-timey spirits and they won't serve vodka with redbull or men with hats. The bartender will likely have a bowtie and possibly sleeve garters and a handlebar mustache. There may even be a password to get in.

Some of these places are truly trying to recapture the lost art of bartending - the pre-prohibition form of it which was as respected as culinary mastery. The delicate art of using powerful old spirits with subtle flavors as a sort of reaction to the Jager shotification of American drinking. Some of them are simply following the latest retro trend, which will eventually be replaced by, I don't know, bareknuckle boxing?

In the past, while I had enjoyed a great many Decemberists songs, I firmly placed them in the latter category. Quirk for quirk's sake, retro as just another flavor. The King is Dead has shaken me from that (unfair) judgement. Years into their career, they have established their sound as a fine mix of very diverse elements, and the sincerity of the lyrics and the emotions decribed therein dismiss my concerns of quirk for quirks sake. The King is Dead is another pleasant surprise in a year full of them.

Down by the Water

Truth in Advertising

D&D Sluggers
Fun is the Funnest! & This Album is a Party

(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

I'm writing this on a plane on the way back from a week in Los Angeles on vacation. I love Los Angeles, the good and the bad. It's funny how easy it is to get jaded with Hollywood, even as a total outsider. Everywhere you look, billboards, benches, signs, buses, are advertising the latest overblown television production or movie or album. These inevitably have millions of studio/label dollars behind them and are often utterly boring and like everything else on TV/the radio/the theater.

It's nice, then, to get a reminder of one of the great joys of listening to music in the first place: finding that new sound/new band you hadn't heard and experiencing a great new thing. I didn't go looking for Chip Rock in 2011, Chip Rock found me in the form of the D&D Sluggers out of Wilmington, NC. My wife bought me Hopscotch tickets for my birthday and I didn't know many of the bands. I remember being intrigued by the Indy's description of the D&D Sluggers. A game boy and a SNES used during live performances? This I had to see.

I left a lackluster performance by the Flaming Lips on the main stage early, lured by this mix. What I got was a high energy show with all kinds of sounds I had never thought I'd hear on stage. What makes it truly worthwhile, is that the D&D Sluggers quickly rise above the tempting gimmickry of their video game based sounds and deliver fantastic, well-produced songs which would sound great with any set of instruments. I bought This Album is a Party at the show, and it quickly became the album of the summer. I couldn't stop listening to "Very Direct". I still can't, actually. It's bonus level style backing track and pitch perfect crooning mix so unbelievably well with the guitar to produce a dream-like final product that's irresistable. Fun is the Funnest is their earlier 2011 offering, available for free download at bandcamp (click the link at the top of the post). The sound isn't quite as polished as This Album is a Party, and they seem to get the required videogame references out of their system here. It's worth a listen, but This Album is a Party is where their songwriting and attention to detail truly shine.

This video contains parts of "Very Direct," and "Receipts"

7-inch of the year

Cheap Girls vs. Lemuria
Split
No Idea Records

(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

Allow me to put aside my facade of critical impartiality to say that these are two of my favorite bands on Earth at the moment and that this split was my favorite piece of wax in all of 2011. Not only that, these are two of my favorite guitar players AND three of my favorite songwriters actively making music right now and there was little chance I wouldn't love this album. Two tracks on the Lemuria side and one on the Cheap Girls side left me begging for more. Not only that, but two of the three tracks have been recorded as excellent Nervous Energies sessions acoustically:

Lemons:


Pure Hate:


The Dinosaur Jr. influence in both of these three-pieces is readily apparent, but it never overpowers the unique sounds they've worked hard to develop. Sheena Ozella shies away from the solos but amply fills the sonic space with layered fills and rhythm playing. Cheap Girls' Adam Aymor will give you the solos but never to the point where the free but structured meandering of the vocal melody leaves the spotlight. We'll get to Lemuria's 2011 full length offering soon, but we'll still have to wait a bit for the next Cheap Girls album. This split has done much to make that wait more difficult.

Flower (punk) Power

Black Lips
Arabia Mountain
Vice Records

(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

Forgive me for paraphrasing, but I read an interview once with Greg Cartwright during which he was asked about what it was that made Crystal Gazing Luck Amazing, that wonderful swansong from the Compulsive Gamblers, sound so good. Greg's answer was something along the lines that "we didn't fuck with it too much." Producer Jim Diamond let the band make the sound they wanted, and the whole affair was wrapped up quickly. The light touch produced a finished product which allowed the emotion to shine through the muddiness of its low end with fascinating and powerful results.

I've always felt Atlanta's Black Lips prospered from a similar approach on their albums. In fact, I liked the boozy sound they produced. It was the sound of a band having fun but getting their point across. 2005's Let It Bloom, for example, was produced in King Khan's home studio in Germany, and sounded fantastic.

My first reaction to the news of Arabia Mountain's prodcution by Amy Winehouse collaborator Mark Ronson was one of a bit of confusion. I always felt his work on Back to Black was brilliant, the two of them made a fantastic team. However, the precision beats and Dap King horns seemed like they might sound out of place on a Black Lips record. Additionally, I worried the party sound of the Lips could be lost in Ronson's approach.

I am very happy to say my intuition was completely wrong. In fact, the two have combined to produce a fantastic album which has erased the bad memories of 2009's 200 Million Thousand.

I had a great conversation with my local record store owner the other day about music criticism. We were discussing the early reviews for Mark Sultan's Whatever/Whenever and were struck by much of the negative criticism regarding that album. I'm always a bit surprised when bands get bad ink for not evolving their sound. I don't need evolution from everyone. I'll be perfectly happy for say, Nobunny, to continue to release the same sound album after album. Same thing with the Black Lips. However, Arabia Mountain has shown an evolution in their sound. What's great about it is its subtly. There are a few new sounds here, but it's definitely still a Black Lips album. And a Mark Ronson production.

Check out Spidey's Curse:

Okay, let's try this again

The Aquabats
Hi-Five Soup!
Fearless Records



(Editor's note: The sad fact of the matter is that I have a very demanding job which leaves me very little, if any, time to write blogs. I restarted The Midpoint with the hopes that simply having dominion over a small slice of the web would guilt me into regular posting. Several months later I see that isn't the case, sadly. I will do what I can, starting with my favorite thing to write about, new(ish) music! I don't care that it's almost March of 2012, I'm going to write about my favorite albums of 2011 in alphabetical order by band name.)

It isn't the mid to late 90's anymore, that strange time when you could tune into a popular radio station and hear ska tunes quite frequently. (It's true! That really happened) So don't expect to hear the Aquabats' latest on the public airwaves anytime soon. However, looking back, despite the Aquabats upstrokes and early horn usage, lumping them in with the third wave felt like a bit of a stretch 15 years ago. More an association of convenience. Weird costumes? Horns? Some ska rhythms? Sure, lump em in! If that's the case, placing Hi-Five Soup in that group is certainly not warranted. The album seems to have been developed around a series of irresistible keyboard riffs and lyrical hooks. The subject matter has drifted into the realm of singer MC Bat Commander's day job, Yo Gabba Gabba. If YGG is a show designed to be enjoyed by children with their parents, Hi Five Soup is designed to be enjoyed by parents with their children. The swashbuckling "The Shark Fighter," anthemic "Just Can't Lose," and joyful "B.F.F." have upbeat rhythms and sugary hooks to catch goofballs of all ages and offense-free but still humorous lyrics. At the end, we've experienced a great deal of exclamation marks and sounds we never thought we'd hear on an Aquabats album. And we've had fun that I keep coming back to a year later.

Here's B.F.F.!

Dr. Kwangil Koh

I don't know much about graphology, but I understand everyone has a 'personal font' of sorts. Here's mine:



As I'm sure is the case for everyone, each little letter in my 'font' has its own history. The overall gist in my find, I think, is the overwhelming joy I felt on the day I realized you don't have to write anything in cursive. I had the meanest nun in the Bronx teach me penmanship, and to this day I loathe it.

Today, I want to talk about the lowercase 'x'. I don't remember what it looked like before my undergrad days, but ever since my sophomore year, I've drawn them this way. I had a math professor named Dr. Kwangil Koh who taught Modern Algebra who always drew his x this way and I adopted it in my personal handwriting.

I was at an art show a couple of weeks ago where I ran into an old professor from the Math department who told me Dr. Koh passed away recently. I was unhappy to hear this.

As an undergrad, I double majored in Math & Mechanical Engineering. During my time, I found engineering professors to be mostly wonky types. Some generally interested in educating, others not. The ones who weren't mostly wanted to be left alone to their research, I felt. The Math department was very different.

I can only speak to my experience at NC State, although I've heard it's the same on many other campuses. The ones generally interested in educating were small in number, but intense in their passion for teaching. They knew how to tap into the portion of (I believe) everyone's brain where mathematical logic rules the day. They knew where the conceptual pitfalls lied, and they knew the best way to get headstrong undergraduates around them without crushing their confidence.

The other group, however, seemed to be in the majority. These were the mathematicians who acted as a high priesthood, guarding the secrets of the mathematical universe from lowly students. Their arrogance and laissez faire attitude toward teaching was something even my 22 year-old self found disgusting. Looking back, I'm appalled by their behavior.

Dr. Koh was of the former variety. He had a big smile and was patient, and clever, and kind and everything an educator should be. Regardless of what I'm writing, every lowercase x is a brief but sincere mental tribute to the man.

You may have noticed a certain album's 20th birthday recently. It reminded me that the 25th anniversary of the release of Billy Bragg's Talking With The Taxman About Poetry was this past month.

I don't think I first heard it until 18 or 19 years ago, but it's one of the few to which I've never stopped returning. We love all things Billy Bragg here: Political Billy, Romantic Billy, Billy backed by a full band, and Billy alone with his guitar. Taxman has some of the finest examples of each. Personally, I'll always be a sucker for romantic billy - a wonderful showing of which we get with the opener, "Greetings to the New Brunette"




There's a bit of a mystery as to who's providing the gorgeous lead guitar on this song. No slight to Mr. Bragg, but it's technically far more complicated than just about anything else he's done. The great Johnny Marr is listed in the credits only for "Electric Guitar," but it certainly fits his style.

In any event, decades later it's still one of my favorites and an album I imagine will never be too far.

And we're back