Farce the Music

Jun 12, 2018

Jun 11, 2018

Live Review / Mastodon / MECU Pavilion

by Scott Colvin

There’s something to be said for ritual. Oftentimes ritual becomes an “obligation,” like holidays with family or school reunions. There are some rituals that are not only sacred, but necessary. For me and two of my friends, our ritual is an annual Mastodon concert. While we see each other often during the year based on our respective jobs, we know there is one day of the year* (see post script) where we hang out, drink, beer and sometimes good tequila, and throw up the horns for the best metal band going today.

Mastodon returned to Baltimore, MD (this time at the recently-named MECU Pavilion (formerly Pier 6 Pavilion) on Saturday June 2^nd for a crushing metal performance that no act could truly follow. The poor souls that had to follow Mastodon on this occasion were Primus. To be perfectly honest I’ve never liked Primus and this performance 20-some years after I first saw them didn’t change my mind. Good for Primus though, they’ve probably made more money off South Park royalties than I’ll ever see. Thankfully, 30 minutes into Primus’ set, our one friend who actually wanted to see them was either really bored by the slow-moving, meandering jams that sounded the same, or was agitated that the venue stopped alcohol sales. Probably a bit from Column A and a bit from Column B. Regardless, I was happy to bail early as I had to wake up at 6:30 for work the next day.

Onto the awesomeness that is Mastodon.

Coming off the heels of two Grammy noms (one win) for 2017’s epic Emperor of Sand (my personal 2017 album of the year), the Georgia-based band focused on the new, while satiating old fans with a splattering of sick songs from their vast catalog. FTM side-note, Robert Dean wrote one of my favorite articles of 2017 about not “getting” Mastodon and having old fans try to explain the cosmic appeal to him upon every release. While I disagreed with him, it was the most brilliant article I read all year and he deserved an online Pulitzer for Music Writing, if such a silly thing exists (if it did, I’m sure it’d be as meaningful as a CMT Award). And speaking of old fans and only slightly more off topic than my last rambling tangent, I’ve been one of those old fans Robert talked about in his article (seriously, read it). What I failed to realize before my first Mastodon show five years ago was drummer/vocalist Bran Dailor went to my high school (a year younger than me). Like, I had no idea until a mutual friend mentioned it to me.

Anyway, off Emperor, the band opened with the relentlessly punishing “Sultan’s Curse” and closed with the mythic and at times psychedelic “Steambreather.” In between they played “Ancient Kingdom,” “Roots Remain,” the pulsating “Precious Stones,” and the head bangin’, head bobber, “Show Yourself.”

Definitely a nostalgic moment for Baltimore Mastodon fans was the bands’ performance of “Ember City” which they dedicated to the dozens of fans who would see them regularly play at the legendary Ottobar back in the day (those shows must’ve been crazy bonkers to see in such a small venue).

As for their older stuff, they played a solid mix from their decade-plus career, including “Divinations,” “Crystal Skull,” Bladecatcher,” “Black Tongue,” “Megalodon,” “Andromeda,” “Toe to Toes,” “Sleeping Giant,” “Ghost of Karelia,” and “Mother Puncher,” all of which were equally powerful and divine and solidified Mastodon’s place in metal’s pantheon of greatness.

*P.S. Three days after this show, Mastodon announced an upcoming show in Silver Spring, MD with 80s, 90s, 00s indie rock Gods -- Dinosaur Jr. Looks like there is a new Mastodon ritual for my crew in 2018.

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Here's like... 30 minutes of the show... if you wanna watch it:

Monday Morning Memes: Sam Hunt, NBA, Tyler Childers, etc.

Jun 10, 2018

Awkward Gary Levox Photo of the Week

Sunday Mornin' Music / Dwight Yoakam

Jun 9, 2018

Saturday Night Music / Raging Slab!

Archives: Kanye West Memes: Taylor Swift, Sam Hunt, Keith Richards

ORIGINALLY POSTED FEB 18, 2016

Kanye West Memes: Taylor Swift, Sam Hunt, etc.

Jun 8, 2018

New Video / Erin Rae / "June Bug"

From her new album Putting on Airs.

George and George

The Current Poop of Mainstream Country: June '18

A poop emoji equals a negative rating. A strike-thru poop emoji is a positive rating.

The current Poop Rating of the Mediabase Top 20 is (-30) overall which is 20 point decrease(!!) from January (the last time we did this chart), and the lowest score since we started doing these ratings. That ends the previous upward trend of the chart with an absolute nosedive in quality. Though it's true that winter singles usually have deeper subject matter while summer singles lean towards shallow, party-ready music, this is bad no matter how you look at it. The best song on the chart is far and away Blake Shelton's "I Lived It." The worst is uh… I'll just pick one of the -4 rated songs at random… let's go with Sam Hunt's "Downtown's Dead." And yet again, there are only 2 solo female performers represented here. It's hard to be optimistic given this precipitous drop-off. Let's hope for better next time.

Chart info from Mediabase/Country Aircheck.

Florida-Georgia Line Fans Upset Over Band's New Direction

"TF is this?? Old crusty ass 40 year old man music?" asked a furious Lindseigh Locklin on her Twitter account. What she was referring to was the embedded Spotify link to Florida-Georgia Line's newest single "Simple." "Really disappointed N FGL RN" continued Locklin. "They shud no we like them BC we DONT like old timey country music like they're new song." [sic]

Lindseigh's isn't just an outlier of an opinion either. "Simple" is ruffling feathers all over the FGL fandom.

A public Facebook post from Coreigh Akers of Popknot, GA expressed similar concerns:

Have you guy's heard FGL's new song "Simple? I don't know what to think yet. I wanna like it because its them but where are the beats? And why does it sound old …like something from 1998 or something? If I wanted to listen to Randy Travers or Mark Chestnuts, I'd get a dusty ass CD out my parents' room. Why are FGL selling out like this?????"

While it's early to say whether or not the new "old crusty ass 40 year old man music" direction will hurt album or ticket sales, it seems clear that the act's younger fans aren't particularly pleased. One college-aged man has even started a Facebook page called "Bring Back the Party, FGL."

Jason "Broseph" Parks, in the mission statement of the page, which boasts 324 dissatisfied fans (and is growing by the day), says the following:

We our the true fans of Forlida-Georgia Line and we ain't gone a take it any more. We come here to party and too drink beer and not to listen too are grand parent's music. We hearby are telling Tyler and Brian to BRING BACK THE DAMN PARTY! We won't country rap and cool sound effects and music we can dance with hotties too! If your in agreement with me, join up!

At press time, it still wasn't clear whether the unhappy FGL fans had heard the duo's other new song "Colorado."

Jun 7, 2018

New Video / Dierks Bentley & Brothers Osborne / "Burning Man"

Five CMT Awards Memes

Exclusive Video Premiere / The Underhill Family Orchestra / "When the Trumpet Sounds"

Today, we've got a video premiere from self-described "southern prog pop" group, The Underhill Family Orchestra. I'm glad I kept an open mind when I read the words "folk-rocking collective" in the introductory email. Normally, I'd have moved on, having been bored to tears by most "collectives" in the past, but I clicked play, and was immediately drawn in. "When the Trumpet Sounds" is rollicking folk rock with gospel undertones and a danceable tempo. This is an Americana band that actually sounds like they're having a great time, and it's infectious. Fun is not a bad word. Vocalist Steven Laney has some David Lee Roth swagger and even sounds like him a little, and that's awesome. Give this video a look - it's hilarious - then give the album a listen - you won't regret it. Recommended if you like: Shovels & Rope, Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats, The Band, JD McPherson, etc.

Below the video, you can also stream the full album Tell Me That You Love Me.

Steven Laney about the video:

"This video is in part inspired by old straight to VHS movies and a lot of British television ('AbFab,' 'Red Dwarf') with the pacing of old casting reels. We have a good deal of sentimentality for that 90s cassette look from watching 'McGee and Me,' 'Captain Power,' 'Monty Python,' and the like. As we were creating the 'characters' we were playing, they became caricatures of ourselves and we just rolled with it. Ben is kind of a health nut and workout junkie, Roy is super organized, and I'm kind of a mixed bag that loves dogs of all kinds (hot and otherwise). The energy during the shoot was so fun because we knew what we were doing was silly and with that came a stream of creativity from every member voicing great content ideas."