Monday, December 17, 2012

Recently Unearthed: Water Liars

Do you remember the other day when I talked about finding new music right around the time that the band was going extinct? Well, it happened again, but there is a happy ending.

First, there was Theodore...I picked up from Daytrotter and I must say, I love it. Really peaceful, but still whimsical music. It's like you are relaxed and floating, but still attentive and listening...it's not just background music.

Well, Theodore is kind of "no longer", but...drum roll...now there is Water Liars, which contains Justin from Theodore. I'm not going to break down the whole genealogy of the band; you can read about it on the label's page about them if you want. So, now Water Liars is there to fill that void. The sound isn't exactly the same, but not different in a bad way.

You can get Phantom Limb, their debut album like I did. I also have their session from Daytrotter. If you are feeling cash-poor at the moment, they have a free download of one of their songs currently on their Facebook page.

Since band member Justin is from St. Louis, I'm hopeful to maybe see them in KC eventually.

Watch -- Listen -- Love:



Sunday, December 16, 2012

Recently Unearthed: Live from Daryl's House

Hey, have you seen this show? If so, why didn't you tell me about it sooner?! I love TMZ...it's a guilty pleasure. Our local TV station is kind of unpredictable with their air times of TMZ so when I set my DVR to tape it, I usually have it tape a couple hours extra because sometimes it might run late or not even run at all.

One day, after I watched TMZ, I was busy doing something and just left the recording running and this other show came on called Live from Daryl's House. It caught my attention because Grace & the Nocturnals was being featured that day. Daryl Hall (Hall & Oates) has always had music that I never had a problem listening to, but I never was a huge follower or anything. When I was younger I had enjoyed Live at the Apollo quite a bit. I have appreciated his musical talents, but have not declared myself an official fan. Grace & the Nocturnals had a show scheduled locally so that caught my attention and I left the show playing.

I was pleasantly surprised by the show. I am not a fan of talk shows. With the exception of The Graham Norton Show, I despise talk shows. Luckily, this show does not spend a lot of time talking. If you haven't seen Live from Daryl's house, I'll give you a quick breakdown of a typical show:

Daryl lives in a big old house in New England/New York. Each week he has a musical guest come to his house and they play a couple of the artist's songs and a couple of his/Hall & Oates' songs. They chit chat a little, usually have a quick demonstration of food preparation or some other type of "educational" content and then they get right back to the music. It's only a 30 minute show so they don't spend long talking. It's just enough to learn a little bit more about the artist that's visiting that day and sometimes a little bit more about the history of Daryl Hall.

Well, I've mentioned this show to a few of my friends and none of them have seen it. My mom is a music fan and I mentioned it to her and she almost slapped me for not telling her about it right away.

I think you should check it out. You never know who will be on there. Sometimes it'll be someone from the past (Smokey Robinson, for example) and sometimes it'll be someone you might not have necessarily heard of before. Even when the guests were musicians I would usually avoid (John Rzeznik, would be one), I have enjoyed each show.

Check it out online or check your local TV schedule. It plays on a Fox station here in Kansas City, but I don't know how it'll be in your area. You can also watch episodes on the website for the show I linked above. Here's one of my favorite episodes (Fitz & the Tantrums):

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Recently Unearthed: William Beckett

Have you heard William Beckett? He's good. It's like deep-sounding music without being weird and too deep. If you want to seem like one of those cool hipster music people, you should be listening to William Beckett. Even if you just want to listen to some good music without trying to impress others, you should be listening to William Beckett.

Right now, as I'm writing this, I'm listening to his Daytrotter session. Again.

To me, he has kind of a sound that would have been popular in the late 80s/early 90s. Kind of The Cure, but not really, but almost kinda yes that sound, but not. I don't know. If you were in my head you'd get it. Take Robert Smith, give him a shower and a puppy to play with for 30 minutes to cheer him up a little and have him sing you a song... that'd sound about like William Beckett.

Anyway, check him out. I'm not feeling really rambly today so you'll just have to take my advice or leave it.


Sunday, December 9, 2012

Yick I'm Sick!

Ok, so I seem to always have an excuse lately for not blogging. I just can't seem to catch a break. Things were finally getting back to normal and now I'm sick. It started out just a little sore throat and wasn't that big of a deal. I took a day off from work since my voice was pretty much gone now I'm super duper major sick. Last night was miserable. I always seem to get sicker after the Urgent Care center closes.

I was up most of the night in extreme pain. I have developed a sinus infection and it felt like my face was going to explode. This morning I went to Urgent Care and got some antibiotics, so hopefully I'll be better soon.

All this illness has left me with one question: Exactly what is the volume of the sinuses in a human head? I feel like I have already "evacuated" about 12 gallons of snot. I've killed 2 boxes of Kleenex trees already.

Holy Nasonex, Batman. WTF?

Well, if you need to do a science experiment or are making a documentary about ectoplasm, give me a call.

I did learn something kind of funny. My phone doesn't really like cuss words, but yesterday I was using voice recognition to type a message and I snorted at the end and my phone wrote out "shit". I thought that was kind of funny.

Endangered Species List: Stephen Kellog & the Sixers

It's funny how I'll find a band I kind of like right around the time they break up. Ok, so according to their website, they haven't broken up: they are on hiatus. Anyway, today I'm talking about Stephen Kellog & the Sixers. I've had some of their music for awhile from Daytrotter and NoiseTrade. It's good; it's not exactly one that has grabbed my attention and I've run home to tell you about them, but it's still pretty good.

They have a kind of country sound, which I like a little, but bugs me a little. I like banjo music, but their sound is a little cheesy to me in some songs. I really like "The Bear". "Gravity" is good too... "Shady Esperanto and The Young Hearts" also.

So, if they stick around I'll listen some more. I know Stephen Kellog is doing some solo stuff too, so that's promising.

Saturday, December 1, 2012

Recently Unearthed: Vintage Trouble

Déjà vu can be an unsettling feeling, but sometimes you need to pay attention to it because you're getting that familiar feeling for a reason. Recently, I've grabbed some samplers from here and there: NoiseTrade, Paste, Amazon and have ended up with a couple of songs from Vintage Trouble. Although I have 4 downloads from them it only has resulted in two unique songs, both of which I like. They're definitely not my normal go-to sound, but having eclectic taste, their bluesy sound that makes you feel like you're at a local show caught my attention. They don't have a lot of weird sound effects or fancy doodads; it's just music.

Well, vocals were driving me nuts, but since I'm already pretty nuts it took me awhile to add it up. "Hey, that sounds like Ty Taylor" today turned into "Hey, that IS Ty Taylor!"

If you don't know Ty Taylor, I understand; however, there were two seasons of a show called Rockstar and he was a contestant on one of the seasons. The show was searching for a new vocalist for a band, first season was INXS and second season was a band for Tommy Lee or something like that. Wikipedia can tell you, I'm sure. Anyway, I've had an mp3 of Ty Taylor singing No Woman No Cry for ages and love it. I'd looked him up in the past to see what he was doing now and it seemed he was doing jingles and the such for commercials and he blipped right off my radar, but now I'm happy to say he is part of Vintage Trouble.



Now VT is opening for The Who (yes, THE Who), which is pretty awesome, so I must have good taste. Sorry I didn't pick up on their existence sooner! If you'll excuse me now, I have some music to download. Here's a sampler for you: