Mat
Recents Comments from Mat
Truth: "The Rat" - I felt like my balls dropped the first time I heard that one live.
on Walkmen Play The Guggenheim, Have Arty Video To Prove It at August 17, 2009 1:21 PMScore = 1
No points for D.I.Y. production values? I thought you kids weren’t corporate. You can’t get Jerry Bruckheimer videos without mass market appeal. Can’t you see they’re just giving you a chance to “get it” while yr not-as-cool-friends are like: “that video is wack” you can be like “you just don’t understand the deep phenomenology of dance and movement”.
Feel free to disagree, but if yr counting on a video to help bring more meaning and insight into a song, yr probably not even getting yr ankles wet in it.
And is it really so surprising that an Animal Collective video would turn out weird, and obtuse? The “Water Curses” video –which owned- was a 4 minute optical illusion. If you ask me, these guys are doing you a favor with this one.
I could have done without the liquid spraying hair-flip, which looked retarded even back in the “head like a hole” days, but it’s sufficiently colorful, sufficiently weird. Win.
Score = 4
Phaseone doin' work!
It's not completely absurd to think you might even get away with this in a club.
Yes.
on Phaseone Remix Animal Collective at June 8, 2009 6:25 PMScore = 1
Is this cool?
I'm a bit of a photographer - nobody pays me but I take it seriously. I did really well at Sasquatch! this year and thought some people here might appreciate some different looks. It’s taking a while to sort through the 5000 pics I took over the weekend but I’ve put some of the better stuff up in my flickr.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/matstephens/
I shot some artists that Pitchfork and Stereogum didn’t post pics of, so that’s reason enough. But some of my shots are also different.
It’s just more pictures, enjoy.
(I’m still working on getting everything up. I’ll probably have more posted by tonight…)
Score = 0
I did smell what Lisa was cooking, and yeah it sucks when someone objects to dancing-up a track because it's just "wrong", but I'm still allowed to not like this.
Most remixes are garbage, not because they re-imagine the song, but because they suck and are lazy, You can pretty much count the elements for this song on one hand, which is fine, it’s just boring.
I love this song, so any cover/remix already has an uphill battle, which I try to account for. The point is: what I like about the original, the energy, the sound, the “feel”; just isn’t in this remix. The Falke “two weeks” remix repurposes the feel of the original, not just the vocals. It makes the song different, but it’s not a different song. This remix, on the other hand, is a different song - this song sucks. And did this even really need to happen? Is it so hard to dance to this song as it is? It’s already a huge, arm flailing, ecstasy bomb. Wouldn’t a more “different” remix be more introspective?
Saying the original only belongs on some “geeks iPod” shows – by my estimate – a severe lack of faith in our nation’s dance-floors. Unfortunately, you're probably right.
Score = 0
Ahhh! that "Buggin" performance makes me want to toss a grenade - not really, but I hate it.
I don't think I have the heart to even attempt listening to all these...
on The Soft Bulletin Turns 10 at May 18, 2009 11:03 PMScore = 2
I like to shake rumpus just as much, if not more, than yr average bear. But yeah - this is terrible. A collection of anonymous beats and synths laid out like a steamroller over a wonderful song. This makes one of AnCo's most towering songs sound flat and lackadaisical. This song has exactly 0% of the tension of the original – there’s almost no building here.
It does its thing, but it kind of sounds like Hot Chip covering Animal Collective – and it shouldn’t. What a surprise: 90% of all remixes are garbage.
Score = -1
*sigh...
on Clash's 50 Greatest Albums Of The Last 5 Years at April 29, 2009 8:15 PMScore = -1
Aren’t Lykke Li and Antony (being decidedly “delicate”) gonna get stomped all over by the sound from the main stage? – They deserve the spot, but a tent might have been a better fit…
on Coachella 2009 Set Times Announced at April 14, 2009 7:35 PMScore = 0
No recent comments.
Yeah it's BS, there's no AnCo in space yall.
If anyone was interested in the story behind the actual gold record, it's recounted quite entertainingly here (www.wnyc.org/shows/radiolab/episodes/2006/05/12) by the aforementioned Ann Druyan.
Radiolab is amazing BTW, the episode on musical language would go over well here.
In reply to J's comment on Jack White's Third Man Preps Carl Sagan/Stephen Hawking 7" at November 4, 2009 2:00 PMScore = 0