The only reason Coolzey isn’t the most productive Iowa musician is that Sam Locke Ward has whatever’s the pop songwriting equivalent of Tourette Syndrome. Still, I think he may have the edge on Sam for stylistic range. One moment he’s an indie rocker, the next he’s a soul singer and then he’s some sort of goofy corn field Kanye West.
Kent Williams
Posted inAlbum Reviews
Album Review: Samuel Locke Ward – In Case You Have Doubt
Iowa City’s under-employed over-achiever Sam Locke Ward is back with the 6th installment of his year-long “album a month” project, proving once again that he must not sleep in order to have the time to be this prolific. This latest album highlights his obsession with R Stevie Moore and The Beach Boys, not as imitation but as homage. Sam’s songwriting process is akin to what happens to obsessive Twitterers and Facebookers: If you write all the time, you increase in fluency and shorten the distance between the ideas in your head and their manifestations in the real world.
Posted inAlbum Reviews
Album Review: The Lonelyhearts – Years in the Great Interior
People who believe too much in the primacy of words sometimes lose touch with the music, but The Lonelyhearts keep things well in balance.
Posted inAlbum Reviews
Album Review: Huge Lewis – Ascending Into Heaven
“I have swallowed the sky/through only a straw”—the 56-second opener of Ascending Into Heaven is a quiet moment of organ and silly psychedelic lyrics that ends without resolving to the tonic. It gives no clue to the sloppy, unhinged pop songs that follow it. The rest of the songs make me think of middle period Pavement, but where Pavement grooves, Huge Lewis lurches and yelps.
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Album Review: Raw Mojo – Brickbat Theory
Raw Mojo is a rock band, full stop. Not to be reductive about what Raw Mojo does, but there’s something really basic and elemental about what they do. Hard hitting drums, loud fuzz guitars fused tightly to a deep bass into 10 strings of fury. Lyrics that don’t try very hard for profundity
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Scott Miller (Game Theory, The Loud Family) 1960-2013
Scott Miller leader/song-writer for Game Theory and The Loud Family died Wednesday, his website announced. Even though he was never a widely known artist, he had enough fans among music journalists and critics to rate obituaries in Rolling Stone, USA Today, and The Guardian. Miller’s bands had some passionate local fans; Game Theory played Gabe’s […]
Posted inAlbum Reviews
Album Review: Daddy – Songs About Prostitutes
The first time I encountered the man now known as “Daddy” was at a Kickass Tarantulas show at the old Gabe’s. Dressed in a Speedo, he was rolling around in the cigarette butts, spilled beer, and broken glass in front of the stage, bellowing like a wounded wildebeest. Whilst living in Iowa City he performed in various guises, ending up founding and fronting the legendary Family Van.
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Interview with Pete Swanson, playing tonight at Yacht Club
Pete Swanson was one half of the experimental electronic music band Yellow Swans, who made their mark as extremely ambitious musicians, and whose performances balanced improvisation, chaotically complex sound treatment and emotionally affecting harmonic progression.
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Hitting the wall
My doughty Mormon forbears–who from what I understand stayed for a while at Student Housing over by Coralville on their way to Utah–walked over a thousand miles without the benefit of modern medicine, scientifically engineered footware or Facebook. Maybe if I set off for Salt Lake with all mod cons on foot I’d get used to being on my feet for long stretches. But when I hit the wall during Mission Creek, I hit it feet first.
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Feeling The Rave
I’ve known Brendan Hanks (aka Ex-Action Model) for several years, first encountering him at a Yellow Ghetto house show where he was running his laptop off of battery power…
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Running up and down the alley
Wednesday was a Mission Creek evening for me like a meal at a tapas bar. I caught six different bands at three venues, mostly traversing the alley between Gabe’s and Yacht Club to try and sample the most interesting music on offer. Not to take away from the bands I didn’t see–Slut River has been more transcendently trashy every time I’ve caught their performances-as-insurrection–but a guy can only be one place at a time. Thus, my peregrinations described in chronological order.
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Show Review: William Basinski, Julianna Barwick and Teaadora
My first event of the festival was an overwhelming musical experience. Arriving upstairs at Gabe’s, they had set up chairs down front…
