B-Sides in the Bins – #3 eBay Edition

Posted on November 26, 2006 by mike

Here are some things that have come in recently from eBay.

The first auction I won was a bargain! I got It’s All Around You and Standards from Tortoise on vinyl and the debut release from Brokeback which was a 7″ called “Brokeback Returns to the Orange Grove”— all in unplayed condition for $16.00 with shipping! I’m going to start trying to get the Tortoise catalog on vinyl.

The next auction was for a new Calexico and Beirut split single on the UK label City Slang as part of their very limited “Mini Slang” singles collection. Side A is a cover of the Clash song “The Guns of Brixton” by Calexico that sounds like the same version that was recently released as an iTunes-only EP. Calexico added this cover to their recent tour– typically as a segue from “Crystal Frontier.” Side AA is “Interior of a Dutch House” by Beirut. According to the label it is from the album Pompeii which must be the name of his next album although I can’t find any other reference to it. This track used to be available for download from the Beirut website and has since been taken down. I got this for the Buy It Now price of US$7.83 with shipping. There are still copies of this available on eBay– get them while they are still available.

The third auction was for a CD of the Black Sessions that Tortoise did in 1998 during the TNT tour. The Black Sessions are like a French version of the Peel Sessions on BBC. The band comes in and records a show specifically for broadcast. There is a bunch of controversy about these releases done by Sangatte Records and whether they are a bootleg or an official release. The catalog number is SANG 021 CD, but I found a Moloko Black Sessions with exactly the same catalog number and with a 2006 release. So, who knows? I paid $27.00 with shipping.

The last auction was for a tour-only Calexico CD called Scraping which was made for their 2002 tour. Scraping is made up of live tracks mostly from their January 2002 show in San Francisco at the Great American Music Hall and one song from the Roskilde Festival in 2000 and two tracks from the Temple of Music and Arts in 2001. I paid $12.90 with shipping for it. Since this release is still available from the official Calexico site, my goal here was to pay less than the $16.00. I also bid on a copy of the Aerocalexico tour-only release, but lost it– this is the last one I need to get to have a full collection of these great tour-only releases. I think it’s great that Calexico caters to their fans with these releases.

Click Here to get the great Calexico iTunes EP (for US iTunes Customers).

Click here to get the Calexico EP if you are in the EU.

B-Sides in the Bins – #2 – Iowa City 11/10/06

Posted on November 24, 2006 by mike

Hello, and welcome to another episode of B-Sides in the Bins where the author deals with the eternal battle of collecting records versus managing a personal budget.

My wife had a doctor’s appointment in Iowa City that Friday, so I took the opportunity to make a run to the Record Collector. It was pouring down rain so that was kind of a bummer, but I set out to make the best of it. I had an hour’s worth of change for the parking meter.

The Record Collector has a prominent used CD table in the middle of the store, so that is usually where I start, and then move to the racks around the sides where the new CD’s and vinyl are. A small haul this time, but some gems, I think.

Aphrodisiac – Andre Williams with The Diplomats of Solid Sound (CD Pravda PR 6383, 2006) ($7.00) This was in the “Recent” section of the used bin. I hadn’t had a chance to hear this record, yet. I know that the guys in the Diplomats have been playing shows with Andre recently. A pretty fun CD, really. Reminds me a lot of RL Burnside. Andre evidently has the distinction of being the earliest recorded rapper with his hit single “Bacon Fat.” He’s had a career that spans 50 years in recording, writing and producing. It’s great that he’s still recording at 70.

“Do You Remember?” b/w “Prove It To Me” – Andre Williams and the Diplomats of Solid Sound ( 7″ VampiSoul 45032, 2006) ($4.00) I had actually not noticed the Andre Williams CD in the bins until I found this 7″ in the singles section of the store. I really like this VampiSoul collection. The Diplomats released a single last year on that label. The label calls it their “jukebox series” so I guess that means they don’t need to have cool sleeve art. No matter it is still cool to get these singles. These two tracks are on the Aphrodisiac CD, no rare b-side, here– too bad. It might have been cool to even get a 2006 version of Andre’s “Bacon Fat” with the Diplomats backing him.

“Hayloft Stomp” b/w “Can Your Frug Do The Boogaloo” – The Monroes split single with The Diplomats of Solid Sound (7″ Speed! Nebraska Records, Speed A-300, 2006) ($4.00) The boys in the Diplomats had been busy in 2006! More 7″ fun. I haven’t had a chance to throw this one on the turntable, yet. Nifty classic purple-on-silver screening on the label. The A side says “Punk!” and the B side says “Funk!”

Manna – Bread (LP Elektra EKS-74086, 1971) ($1.00) While the guys in Bread made their big hits with soft-rock songs like Manna’s “If”, and “Guitar Man, “Make It With You” and “Baby I’m-A Want You” they actually fancied themselves a more edgy rock band than AM Radio would ever have given them credit for. You can tell that the band has a rift in it as the big singles are the ballads penned by vocalist David Gates, and the more uptempo rock songs are written by the partnership of James Griffen and Robb Royer.

This was an album that got a lot of play at the Roeder house in 1972. We had just moved back to my mom and dad’s hometown and into a new house. Both sets of my grandparents lived there and I had a lot of aunts and uncles and cousins there. After a big gap in my dad’s record collection starting around when he was in college in the mid-60’s, he started buying records again and this was one of the first ones he got. This record reminds me of those times and in retrospect it was a new life for our family and a more optimistic time. The track “If” really is still as schmaltzy as it has been– but the great tunes on this record are the uptempo tracks “Let Your Love Go,” “Take Comfort,” and “Truckin’ (not the Grateful Dead song).” Beautiful harmonies layer through the soaring “Too Much Love.” This album was out of print for a long time. In the early 90’s there was a Japanese release on CD. I bought a copy for myself and one for my dad as a gift– complete with OBI strip. In 1995 Elektra released the entire Bread catalog including Manna and it has since fallen back out of print in the US. Apparently a new pressing of Manna occurred in the UK in August.

Download “Let Your Love Go” from Manna

Days to Come – Bonobo (2 CD Ninja Tune ZENCD119, 2006) ($15.00) This was playing in the store and I really liked it. I paid full price for it! I’d heard of Bonobo, but really hadn’t heard anything from him. I would categorize this album as Drum and Bass or maybe Trip Hop. Not to sound all-1997 or anything. The album reminds me of Roni Size and Reprazent’s landmark Newforms album or Morcheeba. The vocals of Bajka have have that lazy, lispy quality that Bahamadia brought to Newforms and a little like Skye the original singer for Morcheeba. I knew that my wife would really like this one, so I picked it up. One of the reviewers on Amazon says that this release– while great– will fall through the cracks of the releases of 2006. I certainly hadn’t heard much about it.

Download Nightlite (featuring Bajka) from Days To Come

What I put back : Pyramids by Pit Er Pat– brand new release, I hadn’t had a chance to hear anything from this, so I held off. In retrospect, I should have grabbed this one. Sherry and I saw Pit Er Pat open for Tortoise on their Minneapolis stop in 2004. Sherry thought the lead singer sounded like Bjork. The couple of tracks I sampled on the Thrill Jockey site sounded like they have matured. Songs and Other Things from Tom Verlaine– another relatively new release on Thrill Jockey. He released two new albums this year– one with vocals and one without. This one is the vocal release.

B-Sides in the Bins – #1 – Minneapolis 11/3/06

Posted on November 16, 2006 by mike

I thought it would be a good idea to keep track of my music purchases, and where I found them as a kind of diary. A friend of mine from the early days of endtroducing.com and The InFlux Mailing list John Book used to post to his website his record purchases from thrift stores and garage sales around the Greater Pasco, WA area. John’s deep and extensive knowledge of music always made for an interesting read. It is from this that I take my inspiration for these articles. I would like to have guest contributors to this section of my site, and have been talking to a couple of people who might be interested.

As you may have read below, my wife and I were in Minneapolis for the Lyrics Born/Cut Chemist show around 11/2. The next morning after the show, Sherry seemed to have come down with the flu and we ended up cancelling our plans with her sister and aunt. We hung out in the very small hotel room at the Millennium for most of the day. Sherry told me I didn’t need to stick around with her and suggested that I should go out for a while. So, I decided that I’d visit the Cheapos in Uptown. I’d been there for a couple of minutes a while back, but ran out of time before I could really dig. My favorite Cheapo’s location is usually the one on Snelling in St. Paul. That one works for us because there is a Whole Foods in that area as well, so we can do something for Sherry, too. She likes to go to the Electric Fetus more than Cheapo’s because they have other things besides records.

This Cheapo’s is set up pretty similarly to the other locations in the Twin Cities. It has an Applause in the basement, which is all vinyl. I didn’t have time this trip to go down there, but I will plan to go next time. My favorite thing about Cheapos is the way they arrange the last week’s worth of Used CD’s by the day of the week that they arrived. I always start there before looking into their other bins that have new and used mingled together by genre and artist. This was a good run for me as I picked up some new stuff that I’d been meaning to get.

Songbird – Willie Nelson ($9.99): Wow! This one was released on that Tuesday! (10/31). This is Willie’s new album produced and performed by Ryan Adams with his band the Cardinals with which he recorded his trilogy of albums last year. Pitchfork didn’t know what to do with this one. I believe that the review called Adams’ production “gloppy.” But, they gave it a 7.4. I think it is well-known that Pitchfork doesn’t like Ryan Adams so probably Willie was penalized a bit due to association. The album is a good listen all the way though. This album is the best that I’ve heard Willie’s voice sound in a long time. I like the choice of the Christine McVie song from Rumours “Songbird,” and I like Gram Parson’s “$1000 Wedding” as well. I question– as the reviewer from Pitchfork does– whether the world needed another cover of “Hallelujah” but it is done with care. “Amazing Grace” is a good wrap-up choice, too.

The Outsider – DJ Shadow ($9.99): Another relatively new release. I’m finally deciding to buy this one to give it a fair shake. I will probably post a review much later. If you’ve been following my blog for long, you are probably aware of my past with DJ Shadow and might be surprised I hadn’t purchased this one, yet. Frankly, I missed the $9.99 sale at Best Buy when it was released and what I’d heard of the album at that point I wasn’t sure I liked. BTW: There were no less than three copies of this CD in pristine condition in the bins this week. If you haven’t purchased this yet, take a look for it used if you are interested.

The Audience Is Listening – Cut Chemist ($8.99) : Another one I missed for $9.99 at Best Buy when it was released. This copy is a stamped promo. A very good effort. It amazes me that Mr. Macfadden waited this long for his first solo record. He has been a mainstay in the Bay Area HipHop scene and has participated in some very notable collaborations over the years: “The Number Song Remix,” Brainfreeze, Product Placement, his own “Lesson 4,” Ozomatli’s first album, Jurassic 5. My favorite tracks are “The Garden,” “What’s the Altitude,” and “The Audience Is Listening Theme Song.” The first two have been singles, and the last one is the new iPod commercial with the guy “painting” with the light of an iPod. A fun album that demonstrates the production and turntable skills of Cut Chemist and doesn’t take itself very seriously. That last part might be the advice I’d give DJ Shadow. Sometimes records need to be fun to listen to.

4th Dimensional Rocketships Going Up – The Gift of Gab ($8.99) : This is one that I’d wanted to pick up for a while. I wasn’t sure what I’d think of The Gift of Gab without Chief Xcel on production, but this album is great! Vitamin D and Jake One take turns producing tracks for Gab, and turn out a fantastic record. I really like what the Quannum “old school” is turning out these days. As they approach their Forties, they seem to be improving. While The Gift of Gab isn’t braving new ground on thie record, his familiar flow and rhyme work on this record.

I hadn’t planned on buying so much HipHop on this trip– or so much Quannum-related for that matter, but I was pretty happy for the haul. At one point in the browsing, I had so much stuff in my hands that I needed to go grab a shopping basket because my back was getting sore! I didn’t want to spend a bunch of money– I gave myself a budget not to exceed $50.

What I put back The Red House Painters 2 CD Retrospective, and Mark Kozelek’s tribute to AC/DC What’s Next To The Moon, The Gorillaz Demon Days (for some reason I haven’t bought this yet– there were many copies of this one), Gnarls Barkley’s St. Elsewhere (I’m waiting on the expanded edition of this one), Lucinda Williams’ Car Wheels (waiting on buying the Deluxe Edition), General Public’s All The Rage, mint copies of the reissues of AC/DC’s For Those About To Rock and Back In Black.

Title I would have bought if I didn’t already own it: Tortoise Standards

New titles to become bin fodder include the new one from Courtney Love (many copies!), DJ Shadow’s The Outsider, anything Coldplay (I still haven’t picked up X&Y, but I could have had many copies of that), Tom Petty’s Highway Companion (there must have been five mint copies of this one), either album from Jet sadly. Scissor Sisters. Phish is hitting the used bins. I saw lots of titles that you wouldn’t have seen three or four years ago during the peak of their popularity.

Stay tuned for another action-packed episode of B-Sides In The Bins!

Lyrics Born Karaoke Contest!

Posted on November 15, 2006 by mike

Lyrics Born Karaoke Contest

…and while we’re on the subject of Lyrics Born, today his website announced a karaoke contest for Callin’ Out. Download the instrumental track for Callin’ Out, read the lyrics and make a version of you bustin’ a rhyme over it. Winners get free tickets to a Lyrics Born show of their choice, autographed copy of Overnite Encore, a teeshirt and poster as well as guaranteed Internet Fame! Contest ends December 15th.
More details on his MySpace pages.

Listen to the original version here

Lyrics Born and Cut Chemist Live in Minneapolis 11/2/06

Posted on November 14, 2006 by mike

Lyrics Born Flyer Sherry and I took off work on Thursday so we could hit the road and make it to Minneapolis with enough time to get ready for the Lyrics Born and Cut Chemist concert at the recently reopened club now known as Foundation. The club had been recently renovated as The Level, and prior to that it had been closed after many years known as The Rogue. Sherry used to frequent the club during The Rogue days, so she was pretty interested to see how they changed it.

The information I had about the show said “10PM” which I interpreted to mean the time the show started as opposed to what time the doors were to open. Sherry wisely suggested that we take a cab from the Millennium where we were staying. We saw Lyrics Born and Joyo walking out of the hotel as we were checking in. They said that they sleep on the bus and were using a room for the day– which I didn’t know one could do! We got to the club around 9PM and were informed that the doors were at 10PM. It was cold that night so we didn’t want to stick around outside the club. We walked over to the nearby Lodge Bar for $2 draws and well drinks and kill time.

We came back over at 10:45 and hung out outside waiting for the doors. Sherry talked to the guys watching the door about the renovation. When the door opened, they let us in first– ahead of the line that had formed after we arrived. We walked around the place looking for a good place to perch for the show. Sherry said that one of the big changes was taking down a bunch of red velvet drapery that covered the walls. They also raised the dance floor. We think the place looks good.

After checking most of the vantage points in the place, we picked a really good spot next to the sound board overlooking the dance floor. I went to the bar to set up bottle service on some wine. I picked a 2003 Louis M. Martin Sonoma County Cabernet.

The first act up was Edan and Dagha. I hadn’t heard Edan before. I did some looking on the Internet and found his website. Some reviewers said that he was psychedelic hip-hop, which might be how I would describe Beck most of the time. His gear was set up on the floor in front of the DJ booth. One notable thing about Edan is he is both MC and DJ which is pretty impressive. Like the reviews I had been reading state, he is heavily influenced by old school Hip Hop. They had a small but interested crowd around them. Very interesting and ragged show. He pulled out an acoustic guitar a couple of times and had a kazoo at one point.

Towards the middle of his set, he played some obscure stringed version of “Strawberry Fields Forever” and they handed out white daisys, which we saw people carrying around most of the night. Sherry and I agreed that they were pretty entertaining. I’m going to check out some of his music later.

My plan was to take pictures at the show without using a flash– which could have been accomplished if there would have been more stage lighting. The pictures I have for Edan and Cut Chemist’s sets are not very good as a result. During Lyrics Born’s set I started using a flash. Those pictures turned out better, but are over exposed in my opinion.

Cut Chemist took the stage next after Edan carted his gear away. Cut Chemist’s set was set to some improvisational video editing done by “Tom” on an Apple Powerbook. Cut Chemist and Tom performed in the middle of two big video screens. There was no stage lighting during this. I think this was a pretty cool effect. I think it was DJ Shadow that said on many occasions that having people watch him perform instead of dancing always bothered him. The set was a continuous mix of songs off of The Audience Is Listening like “What’s the Altitude” and “The Garden” and the new iPod commercial song “The Audience Is Listening Theme.” Other tracks mixed in included “The Number Song” remix he did for DJ Shadow. During this song, Edan came out and rapped which was pretty cool.

At the end of the set, Cut grabbed a DV Cam and during the thank yous and crediting the people who helped he filmed himself and the audience– getting the names of the places that some people were from. He also thanked Vitamin D, who spent the set sitting next to us as he was working on sound. I hadn’t heard of him before. Sherry asked him why he called himself “Vitamin D” and he replied that it was because sunshine has Vitamin D. Vitamin D did quite a bit of the production on The Gift of Gab’s solo album 4th Dimension Rocketships Going Up. After the segments were taped, Cut Chemist came back out on stage and started doing a turntable/video set scratching the video captures he just took over what seemed to be the beat to “Chemical Calisthenics.” That is the first time I’d seen anything like that, and the crowd really responded to it! I’d like to get a boot from one of these shows.

It was during Cut Chemist’s set that a guy came up and asked me if I was taking pictures as a hobby or if I was professional. I explained that I was shooting for my blogsite. He said that his name was Rob and that he was the promoter for this show and that this show was a kind of homecoming for him. He said that earlier in the week he was concerned about a low turnout, but that the show ended up turning out well. He asked me for a business card, and I ended up making one with a Sharpie on the back of another card for a barber shop that I found. Later in the night, Jim the house sound guy told us that he thought it was cool that Rob let us stay in the V.I.P. area! We were hanging out all night in the V.I.P. area and didn’t even know it! Rob, if you read this– thanks!

Next up was Lyrics Born and Band. I was really happy to see that he was continuing with the live band on this tour. The band had the always-amazing Joyo Velarde on vocal duties, B’Nai Rebelfront on guitars, and Darius Minaee– who were all on the new Overnite Encore album released on Tuesday of that week. The band also included Uriah Duffy on bass and Kat Ounao on keyboards.

During the first part of LB’s set, I walked around the very crowded floor to try to get some shots. There really wasn’t a stage to speak of, just a rope cordoning off where the band was. As a result all of my pictures are at crowd level. For that reason, Foundation isn’t a great club to see a band in. I’d suggest that they get a stage that they can install and remove as needed.

The Lyrics Born live set pretty much echoed the Overnite Encore album in song choices and down to the false start intro to “Callin’ Out”, but the fact that they had been performing these songs so long really gave the songs some polish. He also introduced some new songs– two from Overnite and a new song called “Differences” that might be on his next album which was a testimony about the differences between the ladies and the guys with some of the standard observations about women taking too long to get ready. The song works really well as it is kind of a “June and Johnny” duet and has a great piano break. I can’t wait for the new album to come out.

I brought Sherry down to the floor so that she could get closer to the stage. At first she seemed skeptical but had a good time. We only had a couple of people between us and the stage. LB and Joyo work really well together and the live band really adds to the energy of the show. LB delivered his standard message of love and peace that I don’t think can be delivered enough these days. The whole crowd was moving and dancing. One comment my wife made earlier in the night was that she didn’t feel that enough people were “shaking it.” I have to agree with her. The Cut Chemist should have been a floor filler– with dancers, anyway. And LB really brought the funk.

For the encore, LB and band did “Hello” and Cut Chemist joined on turntables for a rousing end to the night. After the show we stood in line at the merchandise counter so I could get a couple of CDs and Sherry got a really good picture taken with him. We wished that Joyo would have been out at the counter, too. I picked up a copy of Overnite Encore and Season Two of The Lyrics Born Variety Show, that you can only get on tour at this time.

We had a great time that night and will certainly be out to see LB on tour for his new album next year.

Download “Lady Don’t Tek No” (mp3)
from “Overnite Encore: Lyrics Born Live!”
by Lyrics Born
Quannum Projects

Buy at iTunes Music Store
Buy at eMusic
Buy at Napster

Ray Blue Live at CSPS in Cedar Rapids 10/20/06

Posted on November 11, 2006 by mike

When I received the e-mail from CSPS offering free tickets to see jazz saxophone player Ray Blue as part of the Legion Arts’ 15th birthday, I jumped at the chance. Sherry and I had seen Ray Blue a couple of years ago with some friends at a Liars Holographic Theatre performance. Liars is a “fake” radio show somewhat in the spirit of Prairie Home Companion with skits and music. The night we saw Ray Blue, it was a special show where the cast got to perform original songs in addition to the skits.

Although Ray Blue was born in Virginia and was raised in New York and currently lives between New York City and Berlin he spends a significant amount of time in Eastern Iowa. This is apparently due to his time spent here studying to get his Masters Degree in Clinical Social Work at the University of Iowa. In addition to the performances at the churches and schools, he also talks on social issues.

The show at CSPS was a record release show for his new album Transvision on the German Neu Klang record label. In addition to the Cedar Rapids show, he would go on to play Munich, Berlin and dates in France. Ray is a critically acclaimed jazz musician and we are very fortunate to have him visit as often as he does. The ensemble who played with Ray were known as “Cross-Continental Spirit” and shared some members with the band of the same name who played on the album. The band included his regular collaborator David Daoud Williams on percussion, Calvin Hill on bass, Sharp Radway on piano, and Gregg Servance on drums. The Transvision album and Cross-Continental Spirit are a project in a classic quartet style with percussion and is a tribute to friendships.

Ray came out dressed in a very regal green outfit in an African or Eastern style. I was surprised a bit as most of the pictures show him in a trademarked blue suit that we’d seen him wearing at the Liars show. Nonetheless, it’s a style he can pull off and complimented his golden sax. The rest of the group was dressed more subdued. The lighting was minimal but lit the performers during their solos and also lit the backdrop from time to time to dramatic effect. CSPS is an art gallery in addition to the cozy performance space. The sound guys did a great job filling the room and kept the levels very comfortable. I forget what a great space CSPS is to see shows. The best-kept secret in Cedar Rapids indeed! Unfortunately there wasn’t very many people there– maybe twenty or so, and I wonder how many got free tickets? The group played a second show on Saturday night. I hope that show had more of a turnout.

The show pulled all of the songs from the Transvision album and also pulled a couple of other songs– a standard cover of “In A Sentimental Mood” by Duke Ellington that Ray put on his album Always With A Purpose. Ray demonstrated his jaw-dropping circular breathing technique a couple of times. He is able to hold a note while inhaling at the same time. It seems like he can hold the note indefinately!

The first set was a bit more subdued and felt a bit like a warmup. But, the second set had a lot more energy and I could tell the band had gotten its groove. Sherry and I left the show that night amazed. I felt like maybe this show was like experiencing Miles Davis or John Coltrane back in the Fifties and Sixties playing the Jazz clubs in New York. I picked up the new CD, and it is able to stand up next to my Coltrane CD’s in my regular Jazz rotation.

Ray Blue will be back in Iowa in February of 2007 for another couple Liars shows, and according to their website the first show is already sold out.

Visit here for clips from Ray’s albums including Transvision.

Time to play b-sides

Mike Roeder muses over things musical

Monthly Archives: November 2006