The Great Debate: Medical Marijuana and the City of Los Angeles.
In the press, as of late, there is much talk about closing down Medical Marijuana Dispensaries. So much so that our fearless D.A. Steve Cooley has taken it upon himself to go to war with the dispensaries and the City Council that continue to try to regulate these establishments.
The issues that the City Council continue to struggle with is attempting to make dispensaries maintain a certain number of feet from public schools, parks, libraries and or any other places children could gather. However, a bigger issue seems to be lurking from behind.
That issue is the D.A Steve Cooley, and what I’m now referring to as his lack of understanding when it comes to the constituents that reside in the city of Los Angeles.
I’ll explain. (more…)
Why I Don’t Do This Anymore, Part II: Eric’s Breaking Point!
by Eric Summer
When I left you, my loyal threes of readers, hanging two weeks ago, I was rambling on about potential career paths for music school graduates and how I’d arrived at the conclusion that I didn’t want to do any of them. If you remember, there was a fascinating tutorial about symphony playing, chamber music, weddings, and studio playing. If you don’t remember the “fascinating” aspect, then you’re just not remembering it right. I’m pretty sure I put “fascinating” in there somewhere. It’s OK if you don’t remember; memory can be a funny thing. I won’t fault you for it.
Anyway, I’d neglected at that point to mention one interesting offshoot of studio playing, which is called “sidelining.” That’s when some movie or TV show or commercial needs an orchestra on-screen, and the music has already been recorded. It’s basically just musical pantomime. You just fake playing along to the recorded track. I did a few of those–a few music videos and a car commercial or two, I think. The best money I ever made was on a sidelining gig. On the flipside, a different sidelining gig was pretty much the penultimate straw for me as a professional musician. Let me describe it for you: it was a music video for a John Legend song, directed by the acclaimed director Kanye West, so there was already a talent-vacuum in the room that could have snuffed out the creative fire of Beethoven, John Lennon, and Stephen Spielberg combined. But that wasn’t really what set me off, nor was the grand-canyon-sized disparity between the amount of money the sideliners were paid and the middle-finger-shaped pile of gold the Kanye-Legend juggernaut no doubt made on the deal. It was just one guy who did it, but he was a guy I was familiar with in many forms over the course of hundreds of gigs. It was Professor Cranio-rectum (real name unknown). This was a guy who didn’t know what he was talking about, but wanted everybody on the gig to know he really had something to show us rookies. So he advanced the notion that since we were playing pop music, we shouldn’t use vibrato. There was no vibrato in pop music, according to the Professor. (more…)
DELTRON 3030 RECOMMENDED: Max Tundra – Parallax Error Beheads You
Last week I went to go see Deastro @ The Echo. He (Yep. Solo. His band quit on him mid tour.) played an uneven set of new material. Some tracks were good. Others not so much. Still a deal for the price. The pleasant surprise of the night was the headliner, Max Tundra. I’m using “headliner” here loosely because at most there were 36 people there. I’ve had more people watch me play RockBand. A truly pathetic showing. Having said that, I thought it was terrific show. I’m using that obvious Curb reference because, on stage, Max Tundra is the British love child of George Costanza’s looks..and Elaine Benes’ sweet dance moves. It made for a highly entertaining show. Beyond the spaz theatrics there were some really great songs. His sound is tough to pin down. Even he seems hard pressed to explain it:
“Each song contains many facets and genres, and the starts of songs are often stylistically extremely different to how they each end up, touring via a few styles along the way,” There are micro-melodies on the album – generally, layers and layers of stuff,” says Max. “Hopefully, the more you listen to it, the more new stuff will reveal itself, stuff you didn’t notice the first few times you played it. It’s intricate but that should mean it’s more rewarding over the distance, so that people can go back to it and hear new things each times
Did that help at all? I didn’t think so. Let me try: At its core it is layers and layers of spaced out swirling electro glitch beats with smooth Prince-esque R&B falsettos.
Give it a listen.
Highlights: “Will Get Fooled Again,” “Which Song,” “Until We Die”
The Year of the “Super Group”: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Attempted Wilburys
by Deltron 3030
People love to throw around the word “super-group” for bands that don’t don’t necessarily deserve the superlative. Audioslave, you were no super-group. You were Rage minus the passionate vocals. Velvet Revolver? You just reminded us how much we missed the non Chinese Democracy version of Guns and Roses. No band since the Traveling Wilburys has truly earned the moniker….till now. 2009 has been a breeding ground for “Super-groups”. Some great. Some not so great. Let’s attempt to cover them all here today:
Monsters of Folk
- Conor Oberst (Bright Eyes, Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band, Desaparecidos,)
- Jim James (My Morning Jacket)
- Mike Mogis (Bright Eyes, Lullaby for the Working Class)
- M. Ward (She & Him)
What I first dismissed as a gimmick tour of convenience and similar artists ended up actually being a very good band. This is definitely one of those instances when it is OK to say that the band is greater than the sum of its parts. I mean that in the most positive way possible. Nothing here feels forced. There are no quotas of what needs to be covered. No one here is fighting for airtime. It would seem that they cast their egos aside and channeled their inner Wilburys. The jokey “Monsters” moniker and the fact that they rocked out in full Kiss regalia for Halloween tells me that they’re doing this simply for the fun…and it shows on the album. Getting Bright Eyes to have fun. Who knew that was possible?
Chickenfoot (more…)
Notes from Vivace’s November Playlist
Automatique: “Stepping on Your Feet”
Funeral Party: “Carwars”
Leslie and the Badgers: “Los Angeles”
(more…)
The Beatles Never Broke Up
09/09/09 was a special date for the Beatles. Not only did we get their re-mastered albums (in mono and stereo versions) and the Beatles Rockband game but, according to the website http://thebeatlesneverbrokeup.com/ , we also got a new Beatles album. Do yourself a favor and read the story behind the “new album” and then read the equally out there FAQs. As ridiculous as this story is it is fun to believe that there is someone out there crazy enough to have believed that he traveled to another dimension…and his sole focus in this alternate reality was the Beatles. I guess if people can believe in creationism there’s no reason why they can’t believe in a world where the Beatles never broke up, their 12th album sounded a helluva lot like Wings mashed up with solo John and George, the CD format “never caught on” and cover bands were outlawed.
This raises the question “If the Beatles never broke up does that mean Sir Paul would never write and record the title track to the “Spies Like Us” soundtrack? If so, that is a world I don’t want to be a part of.
I considered this story to be a fun quirky piece of original storytelling…until I saw he lifted the main constructs from “The Twelfth Album“, a short story published eleven years ago. I guess if you’re going to create a killer Beatles mash up CD you might as run the gamut of plagiarism and steal a back story to go with it.
Download this mash up if you love the Beatles/Post Beatles. It’s a good listen and it is always fun to hear treasured songs reinvented. Just ask GirlTalk.