from the edge of the deep green sea

I don’t know if you have realized this lately, but music has been sucking donkey balls for the decade or so. Future generations will undoubtedly listen to LadyGaga, Kanye West, Black Eyed Peas, and all that which is now called “music”. These generations will then try to recreate all that they deem as music and the cycle will continue. In other words, music, as you and I have known it, is utterly fucked in the ass.

But fear not, my dear friends, as there is still hope. See, some musicians out there still believe that music is something to be studied, something to create art with. Sadly, these musicians are seldom noticed and they fade away with the same intensity by which they managed to ignite that small spark that caused some attention towards them.

I’m going to cut to the chase right away – I think that the best album this year is by Dredg and has the name of The Pariah, The Parrot, The Delusion. Trying to create something better than their last album, Catch Without Arms, seemed like a highly unlikely task, but man, they did it and excelled in every way possible.

This album is very complete, the lyrics are very well crafted, and the music is completely mind-blowing – I guess this is what happens when people who studied music actually create music.

My favorite song right now is Information, it’s a completely emotionally driven song that starts off very peaceful and calm to end up in an amazing tour-de-force dementia:

Other songs get straight to the point, such as Saviour, which starts off kicking ass left and right with the guitar riff that has is trademark to most of their songs. Quotes is also on my list, extremely soothing and with a brutal chorus.

Give these guys a try, you might hear something that is not present in most of the songs present today – musicians.

BTW, my friend María and I met Dredg right after their NYC gig and they were extremely cool. They were really were amazed that someone from Costa Rica would fly over to NYC just to see them, very cool cats!

María, Gavin Hayes, and Me

Update October 09, 2009: Reading this post again and again, I ‘ve reached the conclusion that maybe, just maybe, I went a bit too far with the whole ‘no-encore’ issue.  For what it’s worth, it was a great show and I had a great time thanks to the music and the great company.  I’ll leave the post, but I really don’t despise these guys as much as my drunk self did yesterday

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I like when big bands come to Costa Rica.   Iron Maiden, Depeche Mode, and that’s about it.  What I don’t like is when bands come here, treat people like shit, and expect to get away with it, and that’s exactly what happened tonight at the Depeche Mode concert in Costa Rica.

It all started pretty damn good, Depeche Mode playing some good songs off their “Songs of the Universe” album…I was pretty psyched and loved every song in the setlist.  Somewhere along the way, the sound got fucked…the only thing that could be heard was the speakers they hear for guidance.  After that, 15 minutes of silence when the band came back and did Personal Jesus, some other songs, and then took off.

Regardless of how bad we screamed and shout (and by we, I mean the whole fucking crowd) they did not come back again on stage.  This is the FIRST concert in my life where this has happened, and I can only interpret it as a big FUCK YOU to all of us who were there to listen to their synth-pop bullshit.

Where the fuck is my “Behind the Wheel”?  My “Just Can’t Get Enough”?  I really don’t care at this point, for all I care they (Depeche) can shove these songs down their gerbil’s throat in their sphincters.  It’s not the fact that the they did not play these songs, it’s the fact that they though that this audience was not worthy of an encore.

“It’s an English thing”, you might say, but fuck no.  Muse, Bloc Party, they’ve saved the best for last and they’ve shined on their encores when I’ve seen them live.

And here comes Depeche Mode, a dying band thinking they are the shit and can give us the “fuck off, no encore for you” treatment.  Well, Depeche, regardless of what was the reason that motivated you to pull that shit on us, FUCK YOU.  You have disappointed us all like no other band.  I can’t believe I was hyped for 5 months to come across something like this.

I guess the guilty partner for this stupid ass entry was the fact that I recently acquired a Karaoke machine… Well, ~20 years after I heard some of these songs, I heard them again. And now I sit down, and I play them, and I stand in awe with admiration for what they were and what they are still are today.

These songs were good back in the day, and they kick ass today as well. I guess what I am trying to say is, FUCK YOU modern Spanish music, you could have learned a lot from the past, gained the perspective of what’s passionate, not what’s the only thing that sells. I despise you, modern Spanish pop music, and while I listen to what was really passionate, I flip you the middle finger – you and your Paulina Rubio- Stefan-Shakira-Arjona can burn down in the deepest pits of hells.

Here is a small list I compiled, apparently my drunk self deems these as some of the most influential :

No Puedo Más – Yuri

Pure radio porta, no question about it. But for fuck’s sake, download this song and listen to it from start from finish. You can feel emotion, you can feel her wearing down while demanding what she wants. And you hear…what’s this thing…oh yeah, PASSION. I don’t give a shit about whether or not Yuri is happy, but she made her message loud and clear. Your rocked Yuri, when you were yourself before becoming a  J.C. zombie – come back, Satan and myself miss you.

Volcán – José José

I’ve tried to sing this song in the Karaoke machine and have failed miserably. Who’s the madman behind these lyrics? “Yo que fui tormenta, yo que fui tornado, yo que fui volcán, soy un volcáaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan apagado”. If I could sing 1/2048th as cool as this motherfucker, I’d be the coolest cat. Once again, this dude had passion inside out, and no matter how many 20 year old chicks you bang, José José – you own in every aspect.

Me Llamas – Jose Luis Perales

If there’s a heaven, this guy has the golden ticket – all of his songs are about some lover destroying his life – there must be some truth behind the lyrics.

If there is one voice I remember while growing up is Perales. Song after song, melody after melody, I swear that I recall this guy singing in my parent’s car stereo when I was 4-years-old. Little did I know that these songs were about some horny chick betraying our favorite Spaniard singing friend. If you were anything like me, I was only hoping to meet this skank who “se pinta la sonrisa de carmín” and smashing her face onto the sidewalk.

This guy has so many good songs that it’s impossible not to credit him (IMHO) as the most influential songwriter of the 70s/80s.  I dare you to find me a drunk who does not know the lyrics to: “ayer se fue, tomó sus cosas y se puso a navegar, una camisa, un pantalón vaquero, dónde irá? dónde irá?”.

Amor Eterno – Rocío Durcal

The musical arrangement on this song is fucking brutal, pure Mexican mariachi in spirit. Add 2 ounces of Rocío Durcal’s amazing vocals reaching unbelievable highs with a pint of the melon-collie message from the song (the song is dedicated to her son, who died while cliff-diving in Acapulco) and you have something that will last a lifetime. If you can go about listening to this song’s lyrics:

“Obligo a que te olvide el pensamiento
Pues siempre estoy pensando en el ayer
Prefiero estar dormida que despierta
De tanto que me duele que no estes”

without feeling a knot in your throat, then you are not human (or just simply can’t understand Spanish).

And that, my friends, is what I praise as the best latin music. It’s not about getting music samples, a beat, some idiots playing instruments and making money. It’s about creating something that will withstand the harshest tests of time, about showing some passion in what you do.  It is NOT about being a fucking whore and just shamelessly selling your vagina for a  dime or two (Stefan, Shakira – I’m looking at you two).

I really cannot think of anyone who can compare to the majestic masterminds who either interpreted or wrote some of the songs in this post in modern age. And it’s a true shame that these generations will never see latin music for what it stood for, for what it meant, the spirit it conveyed, and the passion it transmitted. What a fucking shame.

Yesterday I went out for a few brewskies and came back home mildly intoxicated. As I often do in this state, I launched the good ol blog blog program and was about to bitch about something. I then noticed ‘Garage Band’ was open. I had been playing with it earlier while waiting for my ride.

I played what I had done so far and liked it a lot (the power of alcohol). I then stayed awake for 2 more hours (again, the power of alcohol) sampling all the loops I could get to make this sound somewhat decent.

I just woke up mildly hungover (you thought I was going to put the ‘the power of alcohol’ here, didn’t you? See how wacky and unpredictable I am?) listened to it once more, and I am still liking it. Scratch that, I am REALLY liking it.

This is the first time I aim for a techno song, and it (quite a surprise) came out kinda dark. I have named it ‘The Madoff Principle‘ and is available to download from here.

If you want to leave your wishes to be as cool as me when you grow up, use the comments!

While reading an entry on a blog that I sometimes frequent, I found some comments made about how totally amazing Iron Maiden had been.  I really don’t care about Iron Maiden.  When I first heard they were coming to play to Costa Rica last year, my response was “They are still alive?”

Well apparently they are alive, and have run out of money; and what’s the best way to get some money after your band’s fame has washed away into oblivion?  Tour 3rd world countries FTW!  This formula has worked so well for Iron Maiden that they decided to come back in less than a year and squeeze out some dough out of those people who live in the 80s and still think that Iron Maiden are badasses or something.

One comment that really caught my attention in the aforementioned blog is the enthusiasm that spread throughout the stadium faster than syphilis after kissing a whore when frontman, whatever his name is, said:

“L.A we didnt bother, N.Y we didnt bother.. We have to go back to Costa Rica”

Of course you would.  Chances of Iron Maiden filling up a stadium in L.A. or NYC are slimmer than Epsy Campbell finding the tilde character on a her Mac.  On a interview a while back, they told the reporter that they had no idea where Costa Rica was before coming over.  Is that supposed to make the fans feel good?  That’s the worst part on this whole ordeal; fans that would gouge their own eyeballs to touch Iron Maiden think that they have some sort of magical connection with the band, because they love Costa Rica above anything else.  Yeah.  Right.

This is not even a rant, just a random comment on how we end up with washed-up artists here a lot.  Think Pavarotti – the fat fuck can’t even sing anymore and he comes over to Costa Rica for a shitty performance.   At least Maiden still sounds like when they worked for Satan; which sadly is no longer the case.

One of the most overused quotes I have ever found is “imitation is the most sincere form of flattery”. Regardless of the fact, I think that it is right on target. Imitation is not always bad. For instance, Muse was initially called a Radiohead imitation – and it could have been the case in the early days; but they managed to grow, break the mold, and become something that Radiohead can only dream of becoming of they ever wake up from the opiate smoking inducing music they produce. Sorry Radiohead fans, this battle is by far more epic than Apple vs. PC.

Anyhow, the point is that catpeople kick ass. These guys are from Galicia, Spain, they play Indie rock and they it excel at doing so. When I found out they were from Spain, I was highly doubtful of the fact. Españoletes singing in English? What next, a Radiohead album that does not make me go to sleep? (I know, I should drop it).

Reel #1 was their first album and it is one of those records that every freaking song is amazing. I won’t say that they are better than Interpol, but there is a definite trend these guys follow that is obviously derived from Interpol. Does this mean they are lame ass copying machines? No, well yes…fuck I don’t know, but I like their music a lot.

Their music is heavily influenced by synths that resemble (apparently to only me) the synth use from the Smiths in the 80s. Listen to Everyone can tell you and tell me the synyh is not strikinly similar to The Smith’s There is a Night that Never Goes Out.

They just released their new album What’s The Time Mr Wolf?. I’ve listened to it one and it already is going to my favorite albums playlist. Their style remains very similar to their initial offer, and that is good news for me any freakin day.

Some videos for your entertainment:

Just when I was about to start working after slacking pretty much all day, I started listening to some music I had recently downloaded thanks to the recommendations from my good ol friend LastFm. I was thinking about starting to work when I listened to an instrumental band play. It sounded like Dredg, one of my all-time favorite bands – it sounded like music.

After listening to 3 songs in a row that were opening can after can of whoopassedness, I thought to myself “these guys rock. period.” Their name is Destroyalldreamers, and the album I am listening is – get ready – A Coeur Leger Sommeil Sanglant.

Anyhow, I am listening to track #8, Sombrer dans la Folie, and I am still not even close of getting tired even though this is like the 8th time I’ve played it. I’ve tried to find a fancy adjective that would somehow describe it, but after exhausting my vocabulary in the search of such adjective, all I can say is that it is “fucking brilliant”.

Do yourself a favor and download it, it’s worth listening to.

Listening to LastFM is amazing, you can find amazing music there based on the music you currently listen to. I was growing a bit tired of copying and pasting artist and album info to find some of their music in torrent sites, so I wrote some applescript code that gets the job done.

This code ONLY works if you are listening to Last.FM with iScrobbler, because the script uses the iTunes applescript dictionary to get the current iTunes song, and iScrobbler does exactly that – play LastFM tracks on your iTunes.

You can watch the script in action in the following link: LastFMFinderinAction

So in order to use:

1. Open Script Editor and paste the script below
2. Compile the Code and save it as an Application so you can quickly invoke it, call it “FindLastFMAlbum” or something more creative
3. Download and Install iScrobbler
4. Tune in a station that you want
5. When you find hear a song you like, invoke the app, it will use artist + album parameters to find the album that has the song

The script:

property this_artist : “”

property this_track : “”

property this_album : “”

property serch_url : “”

tell application “iTunes”

try

if not (exists current track) then return

set this_artist to (get artist of current track)

set this_track to (get name of current track)

set this_album to (get album of current track)

end try

end tell

–Demonoid

set searchString to replace_chars(this_artist, ” “, “+”) & “+” & replace_chars(this_album, ” “, “+”)

set search_url to “http://www.demonoid.com/files/?category=2&subcategory=All&quality=All&seeded=0&external=2&query=” & searchString & “&uid=0&sort=”

open location search_url

–PB

set searchString to replace_chars(this_artist, ” “, “%20″) & “+” & replace_chars(this_album, ” “, “%20″)

set search_url to “http://thepiratebay.org/search/” & searchString & “/0/99/100″

open location search_url

on replace_chars(this_text, search_string, replacement_string)

set AppleScript’s text item delimiters to the search_string

set the item_list to every text item of this_text

set AppleScript’s text item delimiters to the replacement_string

set this_text to the item_list as string

set AppleScript’s text item delimiters to “”

return this_text

end replace_chars

Yup, I am intoxicated, so I’ll try to make this short and simple so I won’t have to delete this post….Tears for Fears, Mad World: Amazing Fucking Song. Here are the lyrics, you can find download links for the original version and the one Gary Jules wrote, which was featured in Donnie Darko (you have not seen this movie? WATCH IT NOW) and also on an ad for Gears of War (blow shit up game). In bold my favorite parts of the lyrics:

All around me are familiar faces

Worn out places, worn out faces

Bright and early for their daily races

Going nowhere, going nowhere

And their tears are filling up their glasses

No expression, no expression

Hide my head I want to drown my sorrow

No tomorrow, no tomorrow

And I find it kind of funny

I find it kind of sad

The dreams in which I’m dying

Are the best I’ve ever had

I find it hard to tell you

‘Cos I find it hard to take

When people run in circles

It’s a very, very

Mad World

Children waiting for the day they feel good

Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday

Made to feel the way that every child should

Sit and listen, sit and listen

Went to school and I was very nervous

No one knew me, no one knew me

Hello teacher tell me what’s my lesson

Look right through me, look right through me

T4Frears Lyrics: Here
Gary Jules: Here.

Just got this e-mail from the Bloc Party newsletters:

Cool, new single…perhaps this one will be the one single that will make me have faith in these guys once more….let’s have a listen, shall we?

I think the song overall is pretty damn good – it does not suck as bad as Mercury (god, my head hurst just remembering those awful vocals), I actually kinda like it, I think it’s the only one song that resembles something from Silent Alarm – which will always be something good on my book.

Ah yeah, in case you wanna snag it (7 day link):

http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=batch_download&batch_id=bVlEc0w2U1BtNEozZUE9PQ