|
Byron Coley
Byron Coley is an American music critic who wrote prominently for '' Forced Exposure'' magazine in the 1980s, from the fifth issue until the magazine ceased publication in 1993. Prior to ''Forced Exposure'', he wrote for '' New York Rocker'', '' Boston Rock'', and ''Take It!'' Coley is one of the first writers to have extensively documented indie rock from its inception to the present day. Coley was a contributing writer and the Underground Editor at ''Spin'' in the 1980s and '90s, and currently writes for ''Wire'' and ''Arthur'' with Thurston Moore. He has also run Ecstatic Yod, a record label and shop based in Florence, Massachusetts. Coley has contributed liner notes to albums by the Flesh Eaters, Borbetomagus, Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr., The Dream Syndicate, Big Boys, Yo La Tengo, John Fahey, Steffen Basho-Junghans, Flaherty/ Corsano duo, Urinals, and numerous others. He has also appeared in documentaries about musical artists Half Japanese, Minutemen, Jandek, The Hol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Music Critic
'' The Oxford Companion to Music'' defines music criticism as "the intellectual activity of formulating judgments on the value and degree of excellence of individual works of music, or whole groups or genres". In this sense, it is a branch of musical aesthetics. With the concurrent expansion of interest in music and information media since the turn of the 20th century, the term has come to acquire the conventional meaning of journalistic reporting on musical performances. Nature of music criticism The musicologist Winton Dean has suggested that "music is probably the most difficult of the arts to criticise." Unlike the plastic or literary arts, the 'language' of music does not specifically relate to human sensory experience – Dean's words, "the word 'love' is common coin in life and literature: the note C has nothing to do with breakfast or railway journeys or marital harmony." Like dramatic art, music is recreated at every performance, and criticism may, therefore, be dir ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Yo La Tengo
Yo La Tengo (Spanish language, Spanish for "I've got it"; also abbreviated as YLT) is an American indie rock band formed in Hoboken, New Jersey, in 1984. Since 1992, the lineup has consisted of Ira Kaplan (guitars, piano, vocals), Georgia Hubley (drums, piano, vocals), and James McNew (bass, vocals). In 2015, original guitarist Dave Schramm (musician), Dave Schramm rejoined the band and appeared on their fourteenth album, ''Stuff Like That There (Yo La Tengo album), Stuff Like That There''. Despite achieving limited mainstream success, Yo La Tengo has been called "the quintessential critics' band" and maintains a strong cult following. Though they mostly play original material, the band performs a wide repertoire of Cover versions, cover songs both in live performance and on record. History Formation and early history, 1984–1985 Ira Kaplan and Georgia Hubley formed the band as a couple in 1984. They chose the name Yo La Tengo, Spanish for "I have it". The name came from a baseb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Ecstatic Peace
Ecstatic Peace! is a record label based in Easthampton, Massachusetts, founded in 1981 by American musician Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth. The label name is borrowed from a line in Tom Wolfe's 1968 nonfiction novel '' The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test''. The label's releases are eclectic and often experimental or avant-garde. The premiere release was a split cassette featuring spoken word performances from Michael Gira of Swans and Lydia Lunch titled "Hard Rock" in 1984. Ecstatic Peace! has released more than 200 LPs, cassettes, 7"s, and CDs, of both highly established and fledgling artists, including Hush Arbors, be your own PET, Awesome Color, Black Helicopter, Free Kitten, Arthur Doyle, Dredd Foole, No-Neck Blues Band, Nels Cline, Notekillers, Magik Markers, Tall Firs, Pagoda, My Cat Is An Alien, Monotract, Sunburned Hand of the Man, Violent Soho, and many more. In February 2006, Moore signed a deal with Universal to distribute the label's albums. The label's webs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Daydream Nation
''Daydream Nation'' is the fifth studio album by American alternative rock band Sonic Youth, released on October 18, 1988. The band recorded the album between July and August 1988 at Greene St. Recording in New York City, and it was released by Enigma Records as a double album. After ''Daydream Nation'' was released, it received widespread acclaim from critics and earned Sonic Youth a major label deal. The album was ranked high in critics' year-end lists of 1988's best records, being voted second in ''The Village Voice''s annual Pazz & Jop poll. ''Daydream Nation'' has since been widely considered to be Sonic Youth's greatest work, as well as one of the greatest albums of all time, specifically having a profound influence on the alternative and indie rock genres. It was chosen by the Library of Congress to be preserved in the National Recording Registry in 2005. Writing and recording Sonic Youth's standard songwriting method involved Thurston Moore bringing in melody ideas and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
A Minute To Pray, A Second To Die (album)
''A Minute to Pray, a Second to Die'' is the second album from American punk rock band the Flesh Eaters. Released in 1981, it is perhaps their most acclaimed work. The band's roster on this album comprises Dave Alvin (guitar), John Doe (bass), Chris D. (vocals, maracas), Steve Berlin (saxophone, rhythm sticks), D. J. Bonebrake (maracas, snare, marimbas) and Bill Bateman (drums). Critical reception Reviewing the album in 1981 for ''The Village Voice'', Robert Christgau wrote, "this eschews the no-speed-limit egoism of El Lay punk convention for a more matoor view of the world, based on the idea that horror movies are worth taking seriously. Not bad for a laff." AllMusic's Patrick Kennedy later called it "a classic album of trashy-noir darkness, seamy Hollywood dreck, campy blues horror, and Stax-influenced, stripped-down guitar punk". In the 1995 ''Spin Alternative Record Guide'', Byron Coley gave the album a perfect score and named it "in my opinion, the finest album ever ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Spin Alternative Record Guide
The ''Spin Alternative Record Guide'' is a music reference book compiled by the American music magazine ''Spin (magazine), Spin'' and published in 1995 by Vintage Books. It was editing, edited by the rock music, rock critic Eric Weisbard and Craig Marks, who was the magazine's editor-in-chief at the time. The book has essays and reviews from a number of prominent critics on albums, artists and genres considered relevant to the alternative rock, alternative music movement. Contributors who were consulted for the guide include Ann Powers, Rob Sheffield, Simon Reynolds and Michael Azerrad. The book did not sell particularly well and received a mixed reaction from reviewers in 1995. The quality and relevance of the contributors' writing were praised, while the editors' concept and comprehensiveness of alternative music were seen as ill-defined. Nonetheless, it inspired a number of future music critics and helped to revive the career of the folk artist John Fahey (musician), John Fahey ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
The Holy Modal Rounders
The Holy Modal Rounders was an American folk music group, originally the duo of Peter Stampfel and Steve Weber, who formed in 1963 on the Lower East Side of New York City. Although they achieved only limited commercial and critical success in the 1960s and 1970s, they quickly earned a dedicated cult following and have been retrospectively praised for their groundbreaking reworking of early 20th century folk music as well as their pioneering innovation in several genres, including freak folk and psychedelic folk. With a career spanning 40 years, the Holy Modal Rounders proved to be influential both in the New York scene where they began and to subsequent generations of underground musicians. As the Holy Modal Rounders, Stampfel and Weber began playing in and around the Greenwich Village scene, at the heart of the ongoing American folk music revival. Their sense of humor, irreverent attitude, and novel update of old-time music brought support from fellow musicians but was cont ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Jandek
Jandek is the musical project of Sterling Smith (born October 26, 1945), a Houston, Texas-based American Lo-fi music, lo-fi Folk music, folk singer. Since 1978, Jandek has independently released over 120 albums while granting an interview extremely rarely and providing no biographical information, releasing on a self-made label, "Corwood Industries". Jandek often plays an idiosyncratic and frequently atonal form of folk and blues music, frequently using an open and unconventional chord structure. ''AllMusic'' has described Jandek as "the most enigmatic figure in American music." History A review of the debut album ''Ready for the House'' (1978) in ''OP'' magazine, the first ever national press given to Jandek, referred to the artist as Sterling Smith. Smith has kept his personal history secret, revealing only one story about his pre-Corwood years: he wrote seven novels but burned them upon rejection from New York publishers. In a 1985 private phone conversation with John Trubee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Minutemen (band)
Minutemen were an American punk rock band formed in San Pedro, California, in 1980. Composed of guitarist/vocalist D. Boon, bassist/vocalist Mike Watt, and drummer George Hurley, Minutemen recorded four albums and eight EPs before Boon's death in an automobile accident in 1985; the band broke up shortly thereafter. They were noted in the California punk community for a philosophy of "jamming econo"—a sense of thriftiness reflected in their touring and short, tight songs, and for their eclectic style, drawing on hardcore punk, funk, jazz, and other sources. The group's early recordings (up until their 1985 12" EP '' Project: Mersh'') were recorded as "econo" (Pedro slang for inexpensive, short for "economical") as possible—the group would book studio time after midnight at cut rates, tech their own shows, practice the songs before going into the studio, record on less-expensive used tape, and record the songs in the order they intended to have them on the record rather th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Half Japanese
Half Japanese is an American art punk band formed by brothers Jad and David Fair in 1974, after their family's relocation to Uniontown, Maryland. Half Japanese' original instrumentation included a small drum set, which they took turns playing; vocals; and an out-of-tune, distorted guitar. Both Fair brothers sang, although over time Jad held the frontman role. As of the band's last several releases since the 1990s, according to the album and CD credits, Half Japanese composes and plays the entirety of the music while Fair, eschewing his role as guitarist from earlier albums, plays almost no guitar but is responsible for the vocals and lyrics, which typically divide into either "love songs or monster songs." Band history Their lyrics often deal with monsters and the supernatural (especially as influenced by "creature feature" and sci-fi movies), in addition to more conventional themes, such as young love. The band was formed in Jad and David Fair's bedroom in the mid-1970s, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Urinals
A urinal (, ) is a sanitary plumbing fixture similar to a toilet, but for urination only. Urinals are often provided in men's public restrooms in Western countries (less so in Muslim countries). They are usually used in a standing position. Urinals can be equipped with manual flushing, automatic flushing, or without flushing, as is the case for waterless urinals. They can be arranged as single sanitary fixtures (with or without privacy walls), or in a trough design without privacy walls. Urinals designed for females (" female urinals") also exist but are rare. It is possible for females to use stand-up urinals using a female urination device. The term "urinal" may also apply to a small building or other structure containing such fixtures. It can also refer to a small container in which urine can be collected for medical analysis, or for use where access to toilet facilities is not possible, such as in small aircraft, during extended stakeouts, or for the bedridden. Descri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Chris Corsano
Chris Corsano is an American improviser based in Chicago, Illinois. Early life Corsano picked up the drums after seeing his half-brother Tony playing. Corsano's first drum set had Animal from the Muppets on the bass, and he largely is self-taught, tapping along to a boom box. Captain Beefheart, Capt. Beefheart, Minutemen (band), the Minutemen, and Mitch Mitchell served as early influences, depriving Corsano of a desire for pristine technique. "As long as there are basements in Northern New Jersey, there will be cheap, used and fucked-up drum sets available to young upstarts who don't know any better, from men with thin mustaches and cut off jeans," Corsano says about his childhood. Career Corsano has performed with artists including Björk, Bjork, Evan Parker, Sunburned Hand of the Man, Six Organs of Admittance, Dredd Foole, Bill Orcutt, Kim Gordon, Björk (on the studio recording and world tour for ''Volta (album), Volta''), Thurston Moore, Jim O'Rourke (musician), Jim O ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
