Blog

Cursillistas Live Session on WVKR

Last month Maine-based psychedelic-folk wonders Cursillistas dropped by our studios to record a live session of mostly new and unreleased material.  Having played an outdoor show on Vassar’s Sunset Hill with Lau Nau and Teeth Mountain the night before, the band seemed to have brought nature indoors, playing an epic set full of washes and waves of sound.  Recorded on a rainy day in WVKR’s cozy recording studio, this thirty-minute set is like a trip to some haunted fuzzed-out alternate world where where everything is warm and dear.  A dream?  In a word, yes.

Setlist:
1) Bed of Weeds
2) Bear Tomb
3) Bona Dea
4) When The Gallows Speak
5) Moccasin Tramp

Get it here!

WVKR SHOWCASE IN NYC!

WVKR is pleased that we will be teaming up with Free Yr Radio for an excellent bill featuring live performances from up-and-coming bands as well as WVKR DJ sets as part of this year’s CMJ Music Marathon.  Chairlift, who recently released their debut album and have a song featured in an iPod comercial are set to headline the showcase, with The King Left, Bumblebeez, BM Linx and The Pragmatic opening.  Both current and alumni DJs will be spinning throughout the night.  Tickets are free (!!) with a printout of the ticket posted above.  The show will be at Pianos, an intimate venue in the heart of York City’s Lower East Side. For more info e-mail promotions [at] wvkr.org.

Check out the bands!

Chairlift

The King Left

Bumblebeez

BM Linx

The Pragmatic

See you there!

Pianos
158 Ludlow St.
New York, NY
(212) 505-3733

Please note that this show is 21+.

Arsis- We Are the Nightmare

Here is a review from student DJ Mike, who hosts a show Monday nights 10pm-12am.  Tune in!

Arsis
Arsis’ 3rd full length is one of the most anticipated metal releases of ’08. 2006’s United in Regret was generally regarded as a letdown but <i>We Are the Nightmare</i> is a worthy follow-up to the now-legendary <i>A Celebration of Guilt</i> and <i>A Diamond For Disease</i>. This album may be their most cohesive yet; all ten tracks are as catchy and memorable as they are technically virtuosic. Songs such as the title track, “Sightless Wisdom” and “Falling Winds of Hopeless Greed” are sure to become anthemic metal sing-alongs and concert staples like “The Face of my Innocence” and “A Diamond for Disease.”

Though the Melodic Death metal well is all but dried up, Arsis inject the genre with a much needed shot of adrenaline, a cocktail of mind-blowing progressions, electrifying hooks, blistering technical death metal guitar riffing, and black metal-influenced vocals. Arsis’ distinct, refreshing sound; support from a respected label like Nuclear Blast; and a phenomenal new album have Arsis poised to conquer the world.

Babin’s Grade: A
Recommended Tracks: 1, 3, 5, 8, 9 (or all!)
RIYL Dark Tranquillity, At the Gates, Necrophagist, Into Eternity

Upcoming concerts @ The Chance  (6 Crannell St, Poughkeepsie NY)
http://thechancetheater.com/

5.7 – Nightwish w/ Sonic Syndicate
5.12 (@ the Loft) – Kingdom of Sorrow (ft. members of Hatebreed, Crowbar & Seemless)
5.21 – As I Lay Dying w/ August Burns Red, Misery Signals & Evergreen Terrace

2007: Beirut and WWI

Some musings from student DJ Misho, who does a weekly show on Wednesday mornings 6-7 a.m.  Check it out!!

Beirut

I’ve been reading a lot of Fitzgerald lately, there is something so poignant, yet familiar, in his portrayals of the young intellectual bourgeois of the Jazz Age. Amory Blane. Anthony Patch. These guys were it. Tragic, and often pathetic, as they are, Fitzgerald’s self-indulgent heroes are unmistakably glamorous. Theirs was a world where undergrads drank highballs and forward young women bobbed their hair. Hot jazz and flappers played until the early morning. Alcoholism was still romantically tragic, inexplicably tied with stale cigarettes and crimson lipped women. World War I–the war to end all wars–and the trenches loomed in the backdrop. Disenchanted, Fitgerald’s heroes lived as if they were the last and final generation, recklessly plummeting themselves into glittering despair.

I’ve also been listening to a lot of Beirut.

I admit this with some degree of hesititation. Beirut is all over the indie music scene and is now too mainstream to be considered cutting edge. Therefore, to be writing about Beirut three months after the release of their second album (The Flying Club Cup) seems a bit out of date. Furthermore, their influences and allusions are, at times, painfully transparent. The band’s first album (Gulag Orkestar) was written and produced by a 19-year old Zach Condon, who had never even been to Eastern Europe, and was hailed by many as simply “a one trick pony.” Yet, there is something about Beirut–particularly in their sophomore album–that is haunting, engaging, and extremely charming.

Part of it, is the technicality of the music itself. Condon’s silky voice pulls the listener through the stagier oompa-loompa bits of songs like “Nantes” and “A Sunday Smile”. In general, the band has toned down the campy Balkan folk rock sound of their first album Gulag Orkestar and EP Lon Gisland. The result is a smoother, moodier, and–in my opinion–more enjoyable album. But, there’s more to it than that, which brings me back to Fitzgerald.

Somewhere around “Cliquot” on The Flying Club Cup I realized that listening to Beirut reminded me of reading Fitzgerald. There is the same kind of brooding glamour in Beirut’s music as there is in Fitzgerald’s novels. Not to say that Beirut is alone in conjouring up scenes and moods of the 1920s. Stars’ fourth album In the Bedroom After the War seems to be also drawing inspiration from WWI Europe, the cover art alone serving as a nod to the French Impressionists. Cease to Begin by Band of Horses and The Stage Names by Okkervil River are two other 2007 releases that invoke the same nostalgic feeling for a time past. Which led me to the question: why are so many young bands (i.e. mainly Beirut) looking back at the WWI era for inspiration?

Well, I think it has a lot to do with the similar predicaments that our two generations face/faced. The modern and the postmodern have much in common. Before the onslaught of WWI the American youth were, in truth, “lost”. With high unemployment rates, existentialism, and an emphasis on material culture young Americans found a violent kind of solace in drugs, alcohol, sex, and jazz. They felt they had no purpose. Then, of course, WWI happened. Today, Generation Y, I believe, suffers from the same feeling of being lost. We also share the same feeling of individualism. But this time, the War on Terrorism feels too far removed to have the same effect as the Great War did for the G.I. Generation. Hence, our nostalgia.

Looking back at the WWI era becomes a source of inspiration for today’s youth because we can relate, but more importantly because we can romanticise. WWI gives the old generation a sense of validation from the postmodern perspective. Yes, they were tragic figures but they had reason to be tragic; they had the trenches! There was meaning behind all their dark musings and destructive behavior. They, in this manner, become idealized. Today’s youth feels that it is suffering in the same way but we have no Great War. We have nothing. There is comfort in recognizing ourselves in the past and finding an answer.