April 20, 2008 - April 26, 2008

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Minnesota Pride: White Iron Band celebrates 10th birthday

Filed under: Music

Five years ago this week I accompanied the White Iron Band on a trip to Duluth. The resulting article, "Beer-Busted Bladders & Honky Tonk Highs," chronicled 24 hours of inebriation and debauchery. Some of the band members, particularly singer Matt Pudas, were not appreciative of my journalistic efforts. Apparently the WIB frontman had been on parole for some bit of scofflaw-ery and the promotion of his substance abuse habits in a widely distributed weekly newspaper was not a welcome development. Word on the street (or at least from Jack K. Sparks) was that he wished to kick my ass.

But apparently after five years the fatwa has expired, because when I spoke with Pudas on the phone the other day he was in a convivial mood. "Just another day, another dollar for this guy," he laughed.

Tomorrow night at the Cabooze the White Iron Band will celebrate an unlikely milestone: 10 years of existence. It will also mark the release of their third album, Devil's Sweet Revenge. On the band's web site, they've catalogued this decade in numbers: 9,600 Grain Belt Premium Beers, 3,400 whiskey shots, 190 bars, 10 years, 7 children, 6 bass players, and 4 wives. "Those numbers are too low," Pudas conceded, "especially about the beer and the whiskey shots."

Bass player number six (whose name Pudas isn't sure how to spell) has been around for about a year, which historically has meant that his days are numbered. One former bass player departed after getting into a fistfight with Pudas on the side of I-35 near Ely. Another was dropped after he was caught stealing the band's gear and selling it at area pawn shops.

The White Iron Band has its roots at Eden Prarie High School, where Pudas, guitarist Sam Weyandt, and keyboardist Ed Juntunen all went to school. They played their first actual gig at a house party on the shores of White Iron Lake, hence the band's name. "It was pretty fun from what I remember of it," Pudas recalled. The group has often drifted in jam-band circles, but their music tends more towards outlaw boogie blues. The Allman Brothers and Waylon Jennings are seminal influences. Their signature anthem is "Minnesota Pride," an infectious tribute to ice fishing, ice hockey, and Grain Belt beer.

The White Iron Band has earned the enmity of more than a few bar owners over the years owing to their drunken shenanigans. "All the Duluth trips are hard to remember," Pudas said. "St. Cloud--we just don't go there anymore. They fell out of love with the White Iron Band."

But the Cabooze has been booking the band regularly ever since they were old enough to drink legally. "They're just the most charming, lovable fuck-ups ever," says James "Taco" Martin, who books the West Bank club. "There's something just contagious about their PG-13 fun."

Download the White Iron Band's latest single here.

Posted by Paul Demko at April 24, 2008 2:49 PM | Comments (4)

 

Local songwriter Dan Israel reviewed in Uncut

Filed under: Music News

Longtime local troubadour Dan Israel has received his first major international press with a 4-star review of his most recent album, Turning, in the May issue of UK music mag Uncut. After nine studio albums and decades spent playing coffee shops and small-scale venues in the Twin Cities, Israel is elated by the sudden large-scale recognition.

"This is a moment to savor," Israel said in an e-mail. "Pretty big stuff for a small potatoes guy like myself." Israel joins the ranks of a handful of fellow local musicians who have received national and international attention this month (see: my previous blog post about local bands-made-good in the month of April).

Not only is the mention of Israel's album in such a well-respected magazine impressive, but the review is downright glowing:

DAN ISRAEL
Turning
Eclectone Records
**** (4 stars)
Ninth outing for self-effacing Minnesota rocker

Seven years ago, Midwestern rocker Dan Israel took stock of his relative obscurity, stripped his sound down to a lone guitar, and released Dan Who?, a withering examination of the troubadour's life in a hollow age. The world-weariest songs on Turning - the bluesy "Just Don't Know," the title track - continue to prick at the emotions and insecurities of the strive-a-day life with a graceful, eloquent brand of everyman's poetry, but when Israel blends those concerns with an innate pop sense worthy of Petty or Westerberg, as on "News to Me' or the driving chug of "Counting on You," he dazzles. --Luke Torn

Posted by Andrea Myers at April 24, 2008 11:24 AM | Comments (0)

 

Flyer of the Week: Hey There Cowboy

Filed under: Flyer of the Week

Our favorite flyer found floating on the interwebs this week, from the Hey There Cowboy MySpace page:

Posted by Andrea Myers at April 23, 2008 4:21 PM | Comments (0)

 

Easy Writer: Minnesotan Richard 'Dead Eye' Hayes lives life on the road

Filed under: Q&A , Q&A , Q&A , Q&A

Photo by Sue Kearns

A one-eyed Buddhist Harley rider and a 70-year-old writing teacher probably seem like an unlikely pairing.

Yet it works for Richard "Dead Eye" Hayes and Mary Gardner. The two formed a friendship after Gardner began researching motorcycles for her fourth novel, infiltrating the biker community with her homemade cookies. With her editing help, Hayes eventually penned his autobiography, Outlaw Biker: My Life at Full Throttle. In it he details years spent in the Twin Cities dealing drugs, helping to run a bike shop, and raising two daughters, plus high-stakes gambling in Vegas and kicking ass in general. Both Mary and Dead Eye took a moment between writing to speak with City Pages.

CP: You and Mary are an unlikely collaborative pair. Can you talk a little bit about how you two became friends?

Dead Eye: About five years ago a friend of mine, Butch, passed away. I met Mary at his funeral. She was an author that had hung around the shop while researching her fourth novel, which had some bikers in it. I ended up meeting her just shortly before it came out. She asked me to do a blurb for the book, which I did. We got to be friends. She suggested I write my life story, and she talked me into giving it a try. So I ended up giving her 30 pages of childhood experiences. That was the start of it.

CP: Did you ever think you would pen your autobiography?

DE: No. I dropped out of school in ninth grade, and I'm a terrible speller. So writing a book was not on my list of things to do. When I did sit down to write it, I really didn't think it would ever get published; I did it more as a cleansing thing. Then all of a sudden we had agents and the manuscript was accepted. I was faced with the realization: Shit, maybe I shouldn't have written a lot of the stuff I had. It was nerve-wracking. I showed the book to my daughters and other family members. Some of them had had some idea that I had been involved in certain things, but some stories were a complete surprise.

CP: Mary, as you were editing did you ever find yourself censoring things from his past?

MG: I think there was a certain amount of self-censorship with Dead Eye. I think the book is amazingly open for a man of that generation who has led that life. To be able to put all those experiences down I think is a tremendous expression of Dead Eye’s nature and to his honesty about himself.

CP: Do you think Dead Eye had any worries about having so much of his life out there?

MG: I think he’s afraid of losing some of his street cred. I think it’s not so much the violent stuff he had done. His concern was that I might be upset. Of course it didn’t upset me at all, because it’s just his life. He also reveals a lot of tenderness about himself. There might be a little concern that he will be seen as too nice.

CP: Mary, what was it like hanging with bikers? Were you ever completely out of your element?

MG: Not at all. I felt honored that I was accepted because it is a very closed community. I always thought they were beyond imaginable fun. I was one of those girls that played cowboys all the time. I'm not a tomboy, but I find that outlaw image very interesting. You have to realize, in biker society, members can be violent with each other and into criminal things, which isn't true so much now as when Dead Eye was young. Bikers are also almost always chivalrous to children and old ladies.

CP: Mary, do you ever get frustrated by negative perception people might have of bikers?

MG: I think a lot of us have trouble imaging how a life that isn’t like our life is a valid life; not just with motorcycle people. I’m not a crusader, I don’t speak for or against bikers, people just have their lives. Obviously, Dead Eye has perceived some things in ways I don’t perceive them. But we aren’t put on this earth to make over other people perceptions. I’m sure Dead Eye finds many things about me different to say the least.

CP: Dead Eye, you've really seen the Twin Cities bike scene come of age. How has it changed over the years? Has it changed at all?

DE: I think it's changed a lot, especially in regards to motor clubs. Thirty years ago a lot of the clubs where just forming. People were fighting for positions, and everyone was building reputations. We were laying the groundwork. The whole atmosphere was different. It was more "wild west." Twenty-five to 30 years ago, there was a lot of conflict between clubs. Now, I am vice president of the Minnesota Motorcycle Club Coalition, which encompasses 20 different motorcycle groups. The lines of communication are now more open between clubs. You can pick up a phone instead of a bat. I think everything has to evolve. Twenty-five years ago it was looser and rougher. I myself was involved in drugs. Now, everyone has moved on from that mentality. People have jobs, we're working, and we have families.

CP: You mention in later chapters that you practice Buddhism. How has that affected your day-to-day life? Many of your past occupations (drug dealing, collections bounty hunter, chef) strike me as a little un-zen.

DE: I try to be more understanding. I’m not quite as quick-tempered as I used to be. I do a little inner searching before I do something. Some old habits are hard to break. I try to be more understanding with people, but sometimes it doesn’t work.

CP: I find it intriguing that it's not entirely uncommon that motorcycle enthusiasts to practice Buddhism. Do you have any theories as to why?

DE: Maybe it’s the openness, the honesty, the inner searching you spend on a motorcycle just thinking. A lot of people turn to inner thoughts when on the road; I know I do a lot. I can be having a terrible day, and every thing is going badly, yet when I jump on a motorcycle, it just blows out all the cobwebs.

CP: Anything upcoming events that you are excited about?

DE: We’re putting on several poker runs this year. The money for one will go to Camp Courage, and another is going to Fishing without Boundaries, which helps handicapped kids. We’re also doing a toy drive around Christmas. We do work to change the biker image. A lot of people are stuck with the 60s mentality of what motorcycle clubs used to be, especially the police.

CP: Why the recent harassment?

DE: They’re looking for guns and drugs. They’re 25 years too late. We’re not really into that anymore.

Hear Dead Eye and Mary discuss Outlaw Biker, which is in its third publication and has recently been published in England, tonight at Magers & Quinn.

Posted by Jessica Armbruster at April 23, 2008 4:20 PM | Comments (2)

 

Minnesota music kicks ass, takes names in April

Filed under: Music News

It's a good time to be a band from the Twin Cities. This month, some of our heaviest hitters have released albums nationally to an onslaught of mixed reviews, including Tapes 'n Tapes, Cloud Cult, The Plastic Constellations and Atmosphere. All of these big releases make me wonder -- are we entering another heyday for Minneapolis music? Is it possible that those fabled 'Mats and Prince-fueled glory days might soon be relived by today's successful local acts, who can seemingly sell out First Avenue in a heartbeat?

Here's a breakdown of the national coverage Minnesota bands have received this month:

Cloud Cult: Despite having their asses handed to them by Pitchfork, these other-worldly indie rockers debut their first video from Feel Good Ghosts (Tea-Partying Through Tornados) on Rolling Stone's "Breaking Artist" page. An in-store at the Electric Fetus on the day of their album's release, April 8, had the store packed to the gills with giddy fans, and their show at First Avenue this Saturday is sure to be near capacity or sold out.

Tapes 'n Tapes: Although they were once Pitchfork's golden children, Tapes 'n Tapes were judged rather harshly by the blog tastemakers this time around, receiving a mere 5.9 rating for their sophomore album Walk it Off. When I caught the band at South by Southwest, their live set was inspired, sweaty and downright revelatory; but their recent performance on Late Night with Conan O'Brien showed a different side of the buzz band's mystique -- the side that is still coming to grips with the full implications of their success, shaky from being chewed up and spit out by the industry's hype machine.

The Plastic Constellations: It's a shame that this local power punk band's demise had to be announced just weeks before their stellar new album, We Appreciate You, was released -- but at least they went out with a bang. Though not officially broken up, TPC have proclaimed the start of an "indefinite hiatus." On their way out, TPC received the highest score of any of April's Minnesota releases on Pitchfork, garnering a 7.1.

Atmosphere: Their new album, When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold was just released yesterday, and already their videos for "Guarantees" and "Shoulda Known" are being featured on MTV.com, while Slug's face is splashed across MySpace as a "Featured Artist." This week promises a deluge of album reviews from national publications, and you can keep an eye out on our own site for a feature story on Atmosphere by freelancer Peter S. Scholtes.

Posted by Andrea Myers at April 23, 2008 5:00 AM | Comments (0)

 

Elvis at the Northrop, 1981

Filed under: Music

There's a new Elvis Costello record out today. It's not "another goddamn reissue"--it's twelve new songs on an album called Momofuku and you can only buy it on vinyl or download it online. Good night compact disc--into the the sweet dark of sleep for you.

We're celebrating the new by ignoring it. No review, no streaming tracks--just another installment of our Unearthed series, where we rifle around in the City Pages archives and post what we find. This time, we have scraps from an Elvis Costello show at the Northrop on January 16, 1981. Squeeze was the opener.

A funny thing: Costello was already in the business of B-sides and previously unreleased matter back in '81. He was touring on Get Happy!, but he had just released Taking Liberties, a long out-of-print compilation of cast-offs.

In our listing of the Costello concert, we hyped it as "The rock 'n roll show in January."

Here is some 8mm footage of the show from YouTube:

Here he's covering Elvis Presley's "Little Sister" into "Watching the Detectives":

And here he's doing Allison into a super-fast Pump It Up:

Here's what our reviewer, a rather stiff Martian Colour, had to say about the show:

Costello turned in a tedious hour-long set last week at the Northrup after Squeeze had impressively stirred up a nearly full house. Although Elvis was friendlier--announcing songs and actually making chit-chat with the crowd--his performance seemed tired until the end. With a pumped-up encore, Costello and the Attractions finally pulled the stops out. Among the few surprises that night, EC covered Presley's "Little Sister" and an old Sonny Boy Williams blues, among newer songs from a forthcoming LP mixed in with the old. Costello is also looking paunchier these days. Martian suggests plenty of interviews with the press, a diet of grapefruit and mineral water and lots of bed exercise...just ask James Brown.

And here's the ad:

Posted by Jeff Severns Guntzel at April 22, 2008 11:26 AM | Comments (0)

 

Over the Weekend: April 18-20, 2008

Filed under: Over the Weekend

Welcome to the first issue of Over the Weekend, a new weekly post that will wrap up the weekend's best concerts, compiled by your new fearless music leader and her band of freelance and staff writers.

The overbooked springtime show season is in full swing, and this weekend kept our group of roving reporters hopping from club to club from the minute we got off work Friday into the early hours of Monday morning. Our writers caught a total of 11 bands at 6 different venues, including The Plastic Constellations, the Chuck D Fakebook, Sam Keenan, Kraftwerk and Rev. Horton Heat—and lived to tell about it. A rundown of the shows we saw this weekend, with excerpts and links to individual full-length reviews, begins after the jump.

For starters, a summary of the first weekend on the job by your newly-minted music editor, who enjoys talking about herself in the third person and recapping her travels for your reading pleasure:

Tuesday's Robot
331 Club, April 18

The 331 Club was packed for the Tuesday's Robot CD release show, and when I arrived crooner Gabe Barnett was finishing up an acoustic set and being drowned out by the chatty crowd. It was hard to tell at first whether people were there for the music or for the cheap beer and lack of cover charge, but when Tuesday's Robot launched into their first song the throngs of patrons pressed forward and hushed up for a set of jangly, Band-era rock tunes. Lead singer Rick Widen (who goes by Rick Robot on stage) was sporting a blue bandanna and a huge grin, and their set gave off a happy, hippie-love vibe. Widen runs a loose ship, coaxing plunking piano parts and piecemeal drum fills out of his band of free-wheeling musicians. The group left a little to be desired in terms of a refined or polished sound, but Tuesday's Robot served their purpose of warming up the busy little bar on a Friday night.

Sam Keenan
Triple Rock Social Club, April 18

At another CD release show across town, Sam Keenan blasted through almost every song off his debut album, All the Dark Colored Markers Went Dry. Though the songwriter and 89.3 The Current sound engineer admitted that he was nervous prior to his set, any anxiety he had about performing was indistinguishable from the audience once he started to play. Keenan crafts a delicate style of pop that relies heavily on the addition off-kilter organ parts and quirky electronic dabblings, and his songwriting showcases a penchant for hooks and sarcastic lyrics. My favorite part of Keenan's music is his voice: syrupy sweet and breathless, its steadfast nature contrasts sharply with his erratic music, conjuring images of a lounge singer trapped in an opium den with only a pack of Crayola washable markers as protection. Keenan's new album has been in heavy rotation in my stereo since I picked up a copy at the show, and the clean production and catchy melodies beg multiple listens and late-night singalongs.

Here are some mini-reviews and excerpts from other shows we saw this weekend:

Rev. Horton Heat
First Avenue, April 20
By Jeff Shaw

Halfway through the Rev. Horton Heat's set at First Avenue Sunday night, I found myself wondering: when did the Sultan of Psychobilly turn into an elder statesman of rock n' roll? He played "Greensleeves." He covered one tune representing each decade from the 1940s to the 1990s (Nirvana's "In Bloom" was a crowd favorite, as was Black Sabbath's "Paranoid"). He made terrible puns about serfs, and promoted an anti-malaria charity. Where was the lunacy? The beer-soaked, surf-inflected rockabilly red meat?

Oh, it was there, too. The visual spectacle of the Rev's red blazer and Jimbo's upright bass acrobatics paled in comparison to the searing guitar sounds of songs like "Wiggle Stick" and "Baddest of the Bad." But all the old favorites were on display, from the cocktail cool of "It's Martini Time" to the classic fractured fable "Bales of Cocaine." And he tore the head off of "Psychobilly Freakout" during the first encore, just to prove the crown of rock lunacy was still rightfully his. Rev, I never doubted you for a second.

Current Fakebook with Chuck D, Atmosphere and Brother Ali
Fitzgerald Theater, April 19
By Peter S. Scholtes

Excerpt: "Chuck D never performed Saturday--Slug and Ali freestyled together at the end with Chuck nodding along from his couch, his smile genuine and fatherly as Ali got the biggest cheers of the night with a line about representing Minnesota 'like Morris Day.' (Did Chuck's 'you can throw me a bone' remark--basically signaling his willingness to join in--get lost in the confusion?) But Chuck was the star of the show all night anyway. Mary Lucia seemed truly nervous for a change before her interview, and deferentially refrained from interrupting Chuck's rambles, which were long but very funny. Like the documentary, Lucia avoided controversy. She never brought up the overwhelming whiteness of Public Enemy's live audience, or of the one that night. Perhaps she, or her interviewee, were wary of a subject that can be (and no doubt has been) used to score cheap irony points against artist and audience both."

Click here to read Peter's full review, with photos by Jon Behm

The Plastic Constellations
First Avenue, April 19
By Desiree Weber
Photos by Daniel Corrigan

Excerpt: “Set opener 'We Came to Play' seemed to say it all. From the unbridled enthusiasm to the simple and earnest lyrics, this song – minus the explosion of confetti halfway through – seems to capture the TPC spirit. While over a decade in the music biz didn’t land them next to Madonna at the VMA’s or on TRL, what makes these dudes so lovable is their earnestness about who they are: a group of friends, a Minnesota rock band and damn fine entertainers.”

Click here to read Desiree's full review

Kraftwerk
Myth Nightclub, April 19
By Nate Patrin

Excerpt: “To see Kraftwerk in the suburbs is only the most literal manifestation of how far their influence has spread, since every song they rolled out felt comfortable and familiar in all the contexts it's spawned since the '70s and '80s – Italo-disco, synth-pop, electro, techno, house, Southern bounce and dance-punk. Funny how such a technology-indebted music is a lot less prone to obsolescence than every major technology that accompanied it; any quaintness there was to be had in this show was in the film footage projected behind them, like the kitschy '50s fashion shoots during 'The Model' or the low-polygon 3-D computer faces from the cover of Electric Café during 'Boing Boom Tschak.'”

Click here to read Nate's full review

Posted by Andrea Myers at April 21, 2008 9:00 AM | Comments (0)

 

Back to the Terrordome: Peter S. Scholtes reviews Chuck D and Slug

Filed under: Concert Review

Chuck D, Slug and Brother Ali
Current Fakebook Series
Fitzgerald Theater, April 18
Review by Peter S. Scholtes
Photos by Jon Behm

What's so cool about Chuck D? Start with the first Public Enemy lyrics I ever heard--which, it turns out, were also the first Public Enemy lyrics that Minneapolis rapper Slug ever heard. "You go ooh and ahh when I jump in my car/People treat me like Kareem Abdul Jabbar," Chuck rapped on "Timebomb," a Meters-sampling track on a Def Jam label sampler that turned up shortly before PE's 1987 debut. At the Fitzgerald in St. Paul Saturday, sitting onstage with Chuck D and Current Fakebook hostess Mary Lucia, Slug rapped those lines to try to describe something that you can hear more easily than explain: the instant authority of Chuck's vocal delivery. To paraphrase Slug, Run-DMC yelled at you to say they were cooler than you; Public Enemy yelled to say, "Shut up, I've got something to say to you."

Onstage, and in the 2007 documentary that screened Friday night at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival (Public Enemy: Welcome to the Terrordome), Chuck credited his father with inspiration for that spine-tingling vocal boom--and I flashed back to my own dad's get down here now yell. Chuck is a pops of teenagers himself--"Be confident in your age and corniness," he said--and amply demonstrates his lung force simply by talking (he also took questions after the film Friday, and spoke at Central High School Saturday afternoon). His true genius, however, is rhythm. Though it's hard to tell from just reading those "Time Bomb" lyrics (which I copied, adding italics, from Chuck's 2007 paperback Lyrics of a Rap Revolutionary on Offda Books), there's an almost basketball-like hesitation-before-shooting in his phrases. Only five of the 22 syllables in "You go ooh and ahh when I jump in my car/People treat me like Kareem Abdul Jabbar" fall squarely on 4/4 beats--"Ooh," "jump," "treat," and the second syllables of "Kareem" and "Abdul." (Notice that the emphasis is natural with those last two.) Everything else falls on swing beats that any drummer would tell you define funk.

Of course rappers were funky from the start, but I'm not sure many were ever as funky as Chuck D--and I'm not sure many are today. In the case of Minneapolis artist Brother Ali, Slug's Rhymesayers label-mate, who opened the Fakebook show at the Fitz with "Uncle Sam Goddamn" ("This is dedicated to Reverend Wright," he said), it's one of the few comparisons where the younger rapper comes up short. Ali performed "Letter From the Government," a song based on the opening lines of PE's "Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos," paying homage to PE rhythm while deepening PE rhetoric. Still, even as that tune finds Ali getting looser, closer to the permanent swivel of Public Enemy noise, the cadences seem to be playing catch-up with the ideas rather than stamping them into your head. There's a quality about Chuck D's greatest lyrics where he seems to have been waiting his whole life to say what he's saying. And when he says it, the words, not the beats, make you want to dance. (Ali, who wore a t-shirt of Mount Rushmore with skulls for heads, has something like that kind of impact on a new song told from the point of view of a Palestinian suicide-murderer.)

Slug performed as well--without beats or DJ, but with longtime collaborator Nate Collis on acoustic guitar--and I'll write more about his new Bruce Springsteen-writing-from-within-other-working-class-people's-lives songwriting direction in a City Pages appreciation one week from Wednesday. Thankfully, Slug told the long, amusing, and somewhat beside-the-point story of how Tom Waits ended up beatboxing on his new Atmosphere album (which comes out at midnight tonight, Monday night, at Fifth Element) so I don't have to. But to summarize: Slug is a Tom Waits fan. Waits's son Casey Waits is an Atmosphere fan. Slug and Casey became friends. After six years, Slug said, "Have I known you long enough to ask you to hook me up with your dad?" Said hook-up happened over the phone. Waits asked for a four-track tape of a song, and returned it with the three other tracks filled, though Slug wasn't sure they were, at first: On one track, Tom Waits played a shaker; on another, a guitar. On the third track, he beatboxed. "When he's ready for me to rap one of his joints," said Slug to the Fitz audience, "He'll send it to me, and I'll play the flute on it."

Chuck D never performed Saturday--Slug and Ali freestyled together at the end with Chuck nodding along from his couch, his smile genuine and fatherly as Ali got the biggest cheers of the night with a line about representing Minnesota "like Morris Day." (Did Chuck's "you can throw me a bone" remark--basically signaling his willingness to join in--get lost in the confusion?) But Chuck was the star of the show all night anyway. Mary Lucia seemed truly nervous for a change before her interview, and deferentially refrained from interrupting Chuck's rambles, which were long but very funny. Like the documentary, Lucia avoided controversy. She never brought up the overwhelming whiteness of Public Enemy's live audience, or of the one that night. Perhaps she, or her interviewee, was wary of a subject that can be (and no doubt has been) used to score cheap irony points against artist and audience both.

But it's not particularly ironic that a black nationalist "follower" of Louis Farrakhan, perhaps more than any other black rapper, would be the one to galvanize the most young whites before hip hop became teenage America's default party music. This particular white boy's impression (living at the time, '88 to '90, in the mostly African American city of Washington, D.C.) was that Farrakhan was more of a badge of black provocation toward whites (particularly on campuses) and toward the white media than an emblem of solidarity among blacks, Muslim or otherwise, much less of anti-Semitism. In other words, Chuck set his sights on exactly what would provoke white liberals, what would piss them off, and what would ultimately persuade them. (Whose "fear"? Theirs.) Onstage at the Fitz, he spoke about his envy of heavy metal for being able to fill large stadiums where hip hop could not. He cited Charles Schulz as a "big influence." Founding his group with a born reality-star (there were long, hilarious passages of the documentary showing Flavor Flav and Chuck bickering over Flav's apparent lack of seriousness), Chuck D was a peacemaker in military gear. "There was nothing pretty about us," he said at the Fitz.

Chuck was so quotable that I'm picking and choosing now, but here are some other highlights: He stressed the importance of paying respect "to everyone in front of the stage, and everyone behind the stage" (a generosity he showed both Friday and Saturday by staying later than promised--plus it's apparent he just likes to talk); he told a story about how Eddie Murphy tried to date his sister when they were kids, about lying to Murphy, having to say she wasn't home; he related how It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back was recorded after touring with Stetsasonic (with Prince Paul) and absorbing their influence; he remembered how Stetsa's Daddy-O was a prophet of hip-hop globalism; he said of Atmosphere and Brother Ali, "This was our dream: That rap could come from anywhere"; he added, "Celebrity is the drug of America," and "corporations want you to be a consumer only"; he revealed that his wife used to live here in Minneapolis-St. Paul, and that he named Busta Rhymes after a football player who lives here now.

Speaking of spouses, amid the improv rapping at the end, Brother Ali communicated that his pregnant wife was at the hospital "right now" getting ready to give birth. When he and Slug were done, Mary Lucia, that subtle maestro, seemed happy to have just been there: "Thank you all for a dream come true." -- Peter S. Scholtes

Posted by Jeff Shaw at April 21, 2008 8:27 AM | Comments (0)

 

Say It Ain't So!: Desiree Weber has seen the Last of the Plastic Constellations

Filed under: Concert Review

The Plastic Constellations
First Avenue, April 19
Review by Desiree Weber
Photos by Daniel Corrigan

The Plastic Constellations rocked First Avenue’s main room last night – and if you missed it, then you may well have missed the last chance to see them. Ever.

“But they just came out with another record,” you may say. True, but from all appearances it looks likely that their record release show was also their last hurrah. So after twelve years, four albums and lots of touring, The Plastic Constellations (or TPC, as they like to refer to themselves) are hanging up their spurs at the ripe old age of 26.

Speaking of their latest album, the aptly titled We Appreciate You finds TPC mellowing its post-punk bashing with a slightly more melodic take on angst. It’s still fierce and loud, but this time the boys came up with some hooks. It’s an evolution of, not revolt against, their tried and true sound. If you haven’t done so, check it out.

But back to the show.

TPC also stands for Two Parts Confetti. More photos by Daniel Corrigan.

Set opener “We Came to Play” seemed to say it all. From the unbridled enthusiasm to the simple and earnest lyrics, this song – minus the explosion of confetti halfway through – seems to capture the TPC spirit. While over a decade in the music biz didn’t land them next to Madonna at the VMA’s or on TRL, what makes these dudes so lovable is their earnestness about who they are: a group of friends, a Minnesota rock band and damn fine entertainers. The last thing these guys could ever be accused of is being self-absorbed. And they know how to throw a party. The entire Doomtree crew showed up and various members jumped in to add some spice to songs like “Perched on a Porch” and “Bring What You Bring.” (This makes more sense if you know that guitarist Aaron Mader is also part of the Doomtree clan.) In a nod to their own prodigal selves, TPC tapped Shoe Shiners to play in the first opening slot. They’re a gang of 15-year old “indie rock geniuses,” so if you don’t know them yet, you may soon.

Throughout the set, the mutual appreciation was palpable – or as bassist Jordan Roske put it, “We’re here for you, you’re here for us.” And what’s not to appreciate about a band that arms their audience. Yep, you read it right: during “Let’s War” the crowd was armed with dozens of cardboard swords, shields and scimitars emblazoned with the TPC insignia. Rock on!

And rock they did. Bouncing and kicking their way through “Smallest Skyline,” it was almost hard to imagine that it was written when the band was in 8th or 9th grade! Even before the guys left the stage, the crowd was already chanting for their return. The encore was a “do it big or go home” rendition of “Sancho Panza” and in a fitting gesture, the last song was sung by Roske who used to be their lead singer way back in 1995.

There’s nothing like saying goodbye without regrets, and The Plastic Constellations sure did that. Now the only thing to regret is if you missed it. -- Desiree Weber

Posted by Jeff Shaw at April 20, 2008 7:15 PM | Comments (0)

 

Future Classic: Kraftwerk Live at Myth

Filed under: Concert Review

There is something inherently funny about the idea of Kraftwerk playing in a suburban venue surrounded by strip malls. No slight to Myth, which is as good a place as any to catch the electronic music luminaries, especially with one of the better sound and lighting systems in the metro area to do the group justice. It’s just that after about an hour and a half of experiencing an audio-visual spell of rapturous synthesized electro-pop from the band that defined its parameters, exiting the club and catching a glimpse of a Mattress store and a Carpet King on the immediate horizon feels a bit odd.

Then again, it's not a ridiculous kind of funny: not only did Kraftwerk do for synthesizers what the Beatles did for the guitar-bass-drums lineup – every digital-minded pop artist from Giorgio Moroder to Timbaland to LCD Soundsystem would be radically different without their influence – they helped popularize a somewhat tongue-in-cheek view of technology and science in music; anyone who can't see the humor in the deadpan android braggadocio of "Robots" needs to put away the granola for a while.

And to see Kraftwerk in the suburbs is only the most literal manifestation of how far their influence has spread, since every song they rolled out felt comfortable and familiar in all the contexts it's spawned since the '70s and '80s – Italo-disco, synth-pop, electro, techno, house, Southern bounce and dance-punk. Funny how such a technology-indebted music is a lot less prone to obsolescence than every major technology that accompanied it; any quaintness there was to be had in this show was in the film footage projected behind them, like the kitschy '50s fashion shoots during "The Model" or the low-polygon 3-D computer faces from the cover of Electric Café during "Boing Boom Tschak."

Kraftwerk's most famous songs have undergone an interesting aging process, or maybe an anti-aging process; "The Man-Machine" sounded both classic and futuristic on its original release in '78, looped under Jay-Z in '97 and opening the set tonight. Many of their songs were tweaked and ramped up a bit – including a remixed version of "Robots," which was performed as a sort of brief peak-of-set interlude by the band’s famous mechanical doppelgangers, and multiple mixes of their 1983 single "Tour de France," which was also the focus of their most recent album, 2003's Tour de France Soundtracks. But hearing songs from the latter record like "Vitamin" or "Aéro Dynamik" or "Elektro Kardiogramm" mixed in with classics like "Neon Lights" or "Computer World" or perennial set-closer "Musique Non-Stop" proves how little their music's actually needed to change – when your music sounded like the 21st century in 1977, it'll sound like the 21st century in 2008, too.

As for the musicians themselves, they've aged about as well as their music. They're all in their fifties and sixties, yet they carried themselves with a youthful enthusiasm – lead singer Ralf Hütter couldn't help but shake his ass during a few songs, albeit with feet firmly planted in front of the keyboard -- and they also managed to pull off the black leather tracksuit look remarkably well. (This carried over to their post-"Robots" outfits, which were basically the same suits only with glowing green wireframe piping. I bet Daft Punk have the same tailor.) As far as their setup, they’ve come a long ways from the old days where they performed on Moog synthesizers and banks of electronic drums, but while it might seem kind of startling to see laptops perched atop the four members' keyboards, it makes perfect sense: you wouldn't want the group that gave us Computer World to work any differently.

Posted by Nate Patrin at April 20, 2008 10:01 AM | Comments (2)

 

Toking with Bob Barker: Dude bids 420 on Price is Right--over and over

Filed under: Comedy

In honor of April 20, here's the YouTube video of Evan Gotti, who bids 420 on everything:

The best part is how he throws all the other bidders off. At the end, someone pulls the classic Price is Right screwjob, bids $421 ... and wins. Bob Barker's reaction is priceless.

If you're looking for the story of how "420" became association with marijuana, you can read about it here:

One lazy afternoon in 1971, five students at San Rafael High School in San Rafael, Calif., met up exactly an hour and 10 minutes after school got out. The Waldos, as they called themselves, congregated outside their school's Louis Pasteur statue and went on a mission. Earlier that day, they had obtained a treasure map from a friend leading to a secret spot near the Point Reyes Peninsula. School got out at 3:10 p.m., so they used the code word "420 Louis" to indicate the time and place where their adventure would begin. The secret treasure was a pot patch that one of their brothers had grown.

Posted by Kevin Hoffman at April 20, 2008 12:04 AM | Comments (1)

 

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