New Girl Crush: MEIKO

so on friday i went to the first chicago date of the hotel cafe tour. though i incessantly mocked my partner in crime for wanting to go to this, i must say--it turned out to be pretty decent. and since i'm a chick, there is no shame in me liking some emotional, mushy, folky music every now and again...right?

anyhow, it was at the Park West, which a pretty great venue, if i do say so myself and it's kind of a cool set-up: performers do a couple songs, then someone else comes on, then someone else, and they join each other on other songs throughout the night. basically, just mellow music. a decent way to spend a friday night. especially when one is taking delicious pulls off a flask of tequila for the duration of the night.

anyhow, that fella who sings "Blue Eyes" on the Garden State soundtrack was there and sang that song, and i don't care how lame it is of me--i simply adore that song. cuz i got blue eyes an' shit. and that Ingrid Michaelson chick was there as well and sang this song "Overboard" that i have been mildly obsessing over in the privacy of my own home as of late, and she sang that and i liked it.

and then this chick Meiko comes out and sings and i'm sorta in love with her now. one, i really liked her songs. two, she's hella cute, and three, she has an absolutely charming stage presence. like, slightly awkward and self-conscious and super endearing. and she curses and i like that in a woman.

here, look at how hot she is:

and for all you fellas out there: this hotel cafe tour thing? yeah. it's DEFINITELY the place to find a lady. the dude to chick ratio was like 1:50. and many of the girls were very cute. just fyi.

Dear Daniel Johnston,

i'm really sorry that i thought you weren't very good for the longest time. i mean...i appreciate your story, that's for sure, i just didn't really see much merit in your musical stylings. but, as he often does, zach continued to fluff your work and continuously argued that if i was the lyric-phile that i maintained i was, i should pay attention to what you were saying.

and then i heard "Life in Vain." it may be one of the sweetest songs i've ever heard. and nevermind that your voice usually doesn't sound very good. it sounds perfect in this song. and though it could be seen as kind of depressing--as much of your work sort of is--this song isn't depressing...it's just...it's just true and sweet and quite lovely:

Don't want to be free of hope
And I'm at the end of my rope
It's so tough just to be alive
When I feel like the living dead
I'm giving it up so plain
I'm living my life in vain
And where am I going to?
I got to really try
Try so hard to get by
And where am I going to?

I don't know where is up or down
And there ain't any love left around
Everybody wearin' a frown
Waiting for Santa to come to town
You're giving it up so plain
You're living your lives in vain
And where are you going to?
You've got to really try
Try so hard to get by
And where are you going to?
Flip on your TV
And try to make sense out of that
If we were all in the movies
Maybe we wouldn't be so bored
We're giving it up so plain
We're living our lives in vain
And where are we going to?
You gotta really try
Try so hard to get by
And where are you going to?

Goodbye, goodbye

Scrilla-palooza

so, the beauty of chicago is that in the summer (if that is even a real season--i'm beginning to wonder if it's just an urban legend, what with the CONTINUAL SNOWFALL) there are lots of outdoor concerts!! mainly Lollapalooza and Pitchfork, but also an earth day one in April (but it will probably still be 30 degrees, so whatever) called Green Apple Festival (they're all over the country) at the Lincoln Park Zoo (a place that i love and cannot wait til it's warm so i can go there some more--it's the oldest FREE zoo in the country!!!).

anyhow, Pitchfork isn't all that expensive--$30 a day (Friday-Sunday) for some pretty great bands. the entire lineup has not been announced yet, but as of now, Public Enemy, Vampire Weekend, Dizzee Rascal, Animal Collective, !!!, Fleet Foxes (whom zach loves, but i'm kinda "mehhh" on), Jay Reatard, Dinosaur Jr., Apples in Stereo (yay yay yay!), Cut Copy, Fuck Buttons, and a handful of others are slated to play. that's july 18-20. just fyi.

and then the allusive beast of them all: Lollapalooza. there's been some speculation regarding a certain superawesome british band (*cough* Radiohead! *cough, cough*) headlining, along with Nine Inch Nails (i don't care what anyone says, this will be awesome), and yesterday someone brought my attention to some more bands that may or may not be playing, including Bloc Party (please say this is true, fortheloveofgod), Yeasayer, Wilco, Dierks Bentley, CSS, Rhymefest, Gnarls Barkely, MGMT (i hope so--their chicago shows sold out earlier this year), Black Lips, Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings (who i'd like to see, as nearly everyone put this album on their top albums list from '07), and a few others. now, this is all speculation, and certainly not even close to the amount of bands that will play, but i suppose in about a week (April 7th, to be exact) we will have the full lineup for the August 1-3 shows.

anyhow, Lolla tix are up to $190 i think now. and i've yet to buy mine. i know i'll be going, so i should just buy one now, but there's some rational part of me that refuses to spend a deuce (god, i love that term so much) on--right now, at least--a MYSTERY show. and i'm broke too, so there's that.

there's a lot of great music coming through this spring and summer, and if my calculations are correct, i'm going to be spending approximately 1 million dollars on music between now and September. hmph. it may just be cheaper for me to swap out a crack addiction for my current live music addiction.

Abraham Stardust

Girl Talk...?

so, as i've said before, i'm an admitted music stealing junkie. i've come to terms with this, i'm at peace with it, and i have no guilt about it anymore.

so, i found a link to a "leak" of the "new Girl Talk" album that's supposed to be released sometime in '08. i've also found some discussion as to the legitimacy of this "leak" as well as some acknowledgment of this "leak" from Gregg Gillis himself. he says its not legit. though, i must say, i take that with a grain of salt, because like, by telling the internet world that it's not legit, the hope is that people will be like, "Oh, okay" and like, the hype continues until the actual release of the album. regardless of the legitimacy, i decided to give it a listen and make my own decisions.

here they are:

it could be legit. it's his style--that is to say, there are a bunch of shitty pop songs mashed together with some classic rock (The Who, Beach Boys, Beatles) interspersed through, along with a bit of pretty good (in my opinion) hip-hop (Public Enemy, Biggie, old Outkast) and some music that i like to listen to on a daily basis (Cake, Postal Service) and some newer "indie music" (that song from the new Mac commercial by that french/israeli chick Yaell something or other). this is definitely Mr. Gillis' style.

that's sort of where my opinion of the legitimacy of this "leak" ends...it's not complex enough, it's slow in weird places, it's too fast in other places. though, i mean, if this just a rough, unmastered "first draft" if you will, then i can totally see this.

what really made me think it's not him is that the same clip from "Bittersweet Symphony" that he used on Night Ripper is used on this mix. i just don't think he'd do that.

above all, listening to this yet-to-be-determined mix of mashups has confirmed what i've been sort of leaning towards for the past several months since i saw a shitty Dan Deacon/Girl Talk show at some church in Bmore this summer: MASHUPS ARE SO LAST YEAR.

bring on the untz. that's what i want to dance to. or at least stop fronting like you are actually talented by mashing a "unique" blend of pop and classic songs together. just go back to what true DJs do--i want the breaks, the hip hop, the grimey shit.

R.I.P. Mashups and the "artists" who create them.

"No one on the corner has swagger like us..."

so i just realized that on the Pod, there's a selection under the 'playlists' function where you can listen to your most recently listened-to songs. this is great, because lately, i've been obsessing over a few songs solely and typically spend the day moving back and forth between them.

so, on sunday, i trekked downtown to do some stuff and put this "most recent" business on. it was probably the best thing i've done in a while. because, for some reason or another, they re-routed the northbound red-line up through the clark/lake and consequently, the stop i had to get off on was significantly farther off Mich Ave than the stop i usually get off on. but i had a great fucking playlist, so it was okay. even though it was windier than a muh'fucka.

anyhow, a handful of songs came on that were so.effing.wonderful. that i couldn't help but strut. you know...walk with a swagga'? awww yeah. ha. without further ado, here's a playlist that you might want to listen to if you need to put on haughty airs and strut down the street like nobody's business:

1. "Paper Planes," M.I.A.
2. "Rich Girls," The Virgins
3. "Get Close (King Honey Remix)," Plastic Little
4. "Loose," Spank Rock and Benny Blanco (mainly Miss Amanda Blank's verse--seriously, it makes me like, want to beat bitches up or something)
5. "Wolf Like Me," TV on the Radio
6."Disco Infiltrator," LCD Soundsystem
7. "Simon Says," Pharoahe Monche
8. "Bendable Poseable," Hot Chip
9. "One More Chance (Remix)," Notorious B.I.G.
10. "Time to Get Yummy," A-Trak (LCD/Gwen Stefani mash-up--sheer brilliance, fyi).
11. "Mikey Rocks," The Cool Kids

there you have it. if you want to strut, put these on and shake ya ass.

The Best Thing In The Entire World!

i know, i know. i make this declaration pretty frequently. but this is not hyperbole, friends, this truly is the most bestest thing ever. in. the. whole. entire. world.

Hulu.com is an archive or something that has just gone public. it has loads of tv shows and movies that you can STREAM FOR FREE.

my workday has just gotten a whole lot cooler. and less productive, simultaneously.

i'm currently watching one of the funniest episodes of arguably the FUNNIEST SHOW EVER, Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia: The Gang Dances Their Asses Off.

FUCK.YES.

Dear Kevin Barnes (Part II)

i know, i know. i hate you. and i still sort of do, but perhaps this is the first step in a meeting of the minds, of sorts...perhaps i can start to let go of some of my animosity. but you have to promise to stop trying so fucking hard. deal? anyhow, apparently your band did "Shakedown Street" at Langerado (excellent choice of venues if i do say so myself--all those wooks and hippies prolly ate that shit right up), and i read that you also did it solo acoustically at SXSW. way to go, brah. i'm totally down with this.

Not quite Love, but not quite Hate,
Sarah

Super Awesome: Bishop Allen, just in general

so, a while ago i "discovered" Bishop Allen. i'm not quite sure how i stumbled upon them...but i did...and that's all that really matters to me. we found eachother.

so today, i'm perusing You Ain't No Picasso (a pretty decent little site, i must say), and i find that at SXSW this year (which i am still REALLY bitter about not going to. next year, i say, next.year.) they covered Fugazi. how wonderful. apparently, Bishop Allen cites punk-rock as an influence, along with Jonathan Richman (whom i saw last week and l.o.v.e.d.), and Talking Heads.

and because a while back when i first got a listen to Bishop Allen, i didn't really do any further digging--i just located some mp3s, downloaded them and listen on a frequency that near obsessive--i've just recently found out about these "influences" and such, and i'm more in love than i was previously. i mean, everyone cites Talking Heads as an influence, as well they should, but whatever.

anyhow, i read about the Fugazi cover and then read that they've covered both Talking Heads and Jonathan Richman, and i immediately went to the hypemachine to try and locate said covers. (as i've mentioned in previous posts, i'm a cover fanatic). and i found the Heads one. "Psycho Killer" of course. and though it may be cliche or whatever, i reallyreallyreally love this song for some reason. and Bishop Allen did it total and complete justice.

anyhow, you need to check out Bishop Allen. really, seriously.

Iggy...oh Iggy...

so last night was the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony. zach told me about it, but i got confused and couldn't find it on tv, so i didn't get to watch it. (it's okay though, i watched back to back episodes of Anthony Bourdain, who, by the way, has just earned the distinction as my old-man crush.) anyhow, Madonna got inducted. i'm not a huge Madonna fan--don't get me wrong, i will belt out "like a virgin" any day of the week--but i AM a HUGE iggy pop fan. god, i love that man. anyhow, he did "Ray of Light" and hilariously enough, it's fucking awful. madonna thought so too. i love the look on her face when he's performing, and then the incredibly insincere and forced accolades that she offers backstage after the performance. truly hilarious.

This Most Awesomely Hilarious Thing I've Seen Today

ya know...part of me wonders if i should be offended. i mean, i don't consider myself to be a "hipster" at all. in fact, "hipsters" generally aren't keen a people like me...but i do like indie music. and i do adore spankrock. and i wear leggings. mainly because it's fucking cold in chicago and they're a nice thin layer to provide a little warmth. and i don't like walmart either, but that has way more to do with the fact that every walmart i've ever been in smells funny and is teeming with sad fat people. and i in turn, feel sad and fat by association when i go there. but anyways, this is still funny. check out this dude's myspace. his name is MC Lars. he's an english major (haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!) at Stanford and also raps about edgar allen poe. *sigh* a man after my own heart...

UGH.

if you want to feel better about yourself for any reason at all, read this and be thankful that you are not a mildly retarded, vapid, name dropping, whore who is attempting neo-carrie bradshaw style blogging.

ugh.

ugh.

Oh. Dear. God.

seriously, if there was a god, he's sooooo totally all about me. not only did i post some shit a few days ago about how i love everything that Danger Mouse touches, and how i was wondering what the new Gnarls Barkley would be like, and then like suddenly the new Gnarls' video is out...but NOW. NOW, i find out the Danger Mouse will be producing Beck's new album!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

if i haven't had the opportunity to talk your ear off about Beck and how he is THE most perfect creation on earth, consider yourself one of the few. Beck is like, one of my absolute favorites. i love everything he puts out with a different sort of emotion. i feel like if i ever had kids and like, you know how parents say they love all their children the same, but in different ways...? that's exactly how i feel about everything that Beck has put out. i feel as though he is the most innovative artist of our time and consistently puts out interesting and relevant material. it almost always has a new sounds, while keeping with his general sort of amazing-ness, but alwaysalwaysalways ends up sounding so fresh.

simply put: i love Beck and he can do no wrong.

and now like, my favorite producer with my favorite musician? holy.fucking.shit.i.think.i'm.going.to.die.of.euphoria.

yesyesyesyesyes.yes.

Soooooo Trippy, Mang.

(fyi, i tried to post the video below two days ago, but it wasn't up on youtube yet. if i had been able to post it on monday, this would be funnier. and more relevant. but since i could only just post it now...the impact is sorta lost. but whatevs.)

this is hilarious!

i was having a hard time concentrating monday afternoon...perhaps that was a seizure...?

...speaking of Gnarls Barkley

here's the video for their single, "Run" from the new album!!!

and yes, that IS justin timberlake...

Srsly. What is this World Coming To?

oh.my.god.

we should just bubble wrap up children and lock them indoors in sterilized padded cells.

My Other Girl Crush

so...i frequently speak of my love of scarlett johansson. i really love that broad. she's curvy, she's smart, she has a husky voice that i wish was my own, and her fashion sense is always impeccable. i love her.

but my other girl crush is quite the opposite. sort of. but not really, if i think about it. maybe just scratch the curvy thing. whatever. anyhow, Amanda Blank is a chick emcee from philly who has done work with so many incredible folks--Plastic Little, SpankRock, and M.I.A. (i can't believe i've finally got on board the M.I.A. train, btw). anyhow, she's raunchy as hell, says the craziest shit, and spits ridiculously fast. plus, she's a little hottie, and she wears the most out-there fabulous stuff on stage.

annnnd, she's super nice (and even cuter) in person! i say this because, despite my extreme intoxication on valentine's day, i saw her in the ladies' room and like, accosted her, and though most certainly made an ass of myself, i'm still rather pleased with my little chat. seriously, it's like i bumped into scarlett in the restroom--what with my level of adoration for ms. blank.

anyhow, she's coming out her debut album soon (cannot.fucking.wait.) and i'm seriously dying to see her perform.

and URB has a super interview with her. read it. and fall in love with her.

here she is with naeem from spank rock: