10 posts tagged “bloc party”
I miss you too.
So I've been a crazy busy bee, but it's with good merit. I was hired to be the blog editor over at Mezzanine, a cool venue I've always had good and drunken and sometimes good drunken experiences at (everyone remembers this, right?).
I've been neglecting my own poor blog, so I am sorry that I've been a bad partner. I have much to say about Radiohead in the next few weeks, why I like that stupid Jesse McCartney song, and much more. I promise to show some more TLC.
Here's some Tripwire shenanigans since the last time we tango'ed; I seriously still love that Wallpaper picture...and in the mean time, I can be caught over at the wonderful Mezzanine blog talking about His Thickeness and other inane stuff. Yay!
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Interview - Trapped In The Van With Darker My Love
Words by JENZ
"There is an incredible amount of trust going on right now," I say as I am led into an unmarked white van by two strangers I've never met.
"Wait - are you gonna kill us or are we gonna kill you?" Tim Presley says with a glimmer of wicked in his eyes. Oh, boy...I'm having second thoughts about this interview...(more...)
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Live - The Faint @ The Fillmore | SF
Dear drunk sluts at this week's The Faint show at the Fillmore: really? When my friend Danielle tells you "Dude, you're so drunk you're embarrassing me," pack your shit up and go the fuck home. I'm trying to dance front-row, man...
I was not alone in sharing this sentiment.
The Monday sold-out show was packed skinny-jeans-to-skinny-jeans, and I
wasn't about to let some inebriated ho ruin the party by getting all up
in my grill. (She then flailed around some more after Dee's comment,
slammed herself into a banister I'm sure on accident, and wobbled away
from our trio all the while flipping us off. Awesome.) (more...)
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Exclusive Download - You Say Party! We Say Die! "Moon (Wallpaper Remix)"
Last week we shared the news that You Say Party! We Say Die! is getting their remix on via Remik's Cube. The album comes out digitally on August 26, and features remix versions of the tracks originally found on their sophomore release, Lose All Time. One of the cuts, Wallpaper's version of "Moon," is now online and you can download it below exclusively from us.
This is the first time that the two artists have worked together, and
Ricky Reed (Wallpaper) saw this tune as a gangsta rap throwback remix
(think Ice Cube's "Today Was A Good Day"). (more...)
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Live - Conor Oberst @ Bottom Of The Hill | SF
I once was two people away from buying a ticket to see Bright Eyes, and when I approached the box office, the ticketperson informed me that I was oh-so-close, but no dice.
"You know what then? Fuck you," I thought in my head as I went to have a consolation ice cream across the street.
That was six years ago. And I never got to see Conor Oberst in any form until Friday. It's been a long time in waiting.
(more...)
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Live - Bloc Party, Does It Offend You, Yeah? @ The Fillmore | SF
You ever have one of the bands you're completely stupid about? Like, someone asks you "Hey, have you ever heard of so-and-so?," and you start drooling and nodding like an idiot, unable to comment properly on your love for these groups?
I was in the presence of two of them last night, and I forgot my bib... (more...)
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Live - Hercules And Love Affair @ Mezzanine | SF
You
know what is tragic? Entering a room full of beautiful men than you
can't have. This is the ultimate shitty situation for a straight girl,
and something I have nightmares about... (more...)
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Download - The Morning Benders' Covers Album
We've been following the dudes in The Morning Benders even since our very own Jenz hung out with them at a local playground. The indie popsters will be hitting the road once again in September, joining up with Ra Ra Riot for not-to-miss tour. (more...)
How about Bloc Party robots? Huh, huh?
I was on the fence about the new 'Party single "Flux" - to me, it initially sounded like they were trying to hop on the electrohouse coattails of JUSTICE and Digitalism, so I passed on it. Plus, it's such a different turn than what the Londoners had been delivering as of late - guitarist Russell Lissack's axe shredding was noticeably absent. I felt like "The Prayer" was a good step in a new direction, but "Flux" seems to be adding that and elements of a more toned Prodigy together, which I'm interested to see develop, if any.
Through and through the song has grown on me, and the video just came out:
Wow. The best thing about this video is that the robot in the beginning has one of those LED scrolling sign belts. Root for hipsterdom.
My question, is: which veggie monster is my indie rock boyfriend? These things are important to know...
I tend to not post a lot of personal anecdotes about myself on the internet because it's that: on the internet. Sometimes though, on rare occassion, I feel a burst of truth come forth and I feel the need to share.
I just read this here. Never before has everything made so much sense in this struggle I've been with myself about being in San Francisco instead of London, where I fell in love for the first time, fell into the music and club community, and fell on my face for this city that affected me in such a way that I think about it every day.
And, of course, it was written by someone who knows exactly what it's like.
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On the streets here, rubbishy grey damp streets of London, place of a million faces, a million strangers, a handful of friends, we forge out slowly the pitter-patter of our daily lives, the bump-bump-bump of our heartbeat as it beats by like a sub-woofer in a passing race-mobile. So much is romanced about London - its grime, its rat-race glamour, the jigsaw of a thousand homes choc-a-blocked together along your street, that we forget quite how humdrum it is, how much it has in common with the suburbs, fields and high streets that lie beyond it. Have you ever read 'London Fields' by Martin Amis? It paints well this grey meadow we live in, and yet the most resonant feeling I had for the London Amis described was that it was as provincial as the small town I grew up in. That's London.
London is a ticking clock, daring you to outrun it, to bluff its sell-by-date, to squeak out through a gap before it crumbles around you, Indiana Jones-style. There's a bar on the corner of Bethnal Green Road that each night counts down the seconds to last orders on an LED and it's a bit like that. 20,000 seconds left. Tick tock tick tock. When do you start counting how long it is you've been here? More importantly, when do you stop? I've lived here for two years now properly; when our band started and even when we were first signed I used to travel in for everything. I kind of always knew there was a time limit on it. When I first lived here I was sleeping in our manager's spare room in Harlesden and I haven't been as depressed living somewhere since my first year at college. Not because of him I should point out, just because I was by myself. I couldn't find any rhythm in my steps, no inspiration in the streets around me. It seemed dark and oppressive and lonely and I could see myself just being enveloped by it. But now we've come to understanding, me and it. We've signed an entente cordiale. At first we kept ourselves to ourselves, nodding politely to one another. Then without realising it we built a bond from the things in common we didn't know we had. I started to marvel at its buildings, get lost in its cemeteries, trace its history with my fingertips and find a solace in the place I carved out in it. It budged over, made some room for me.
Now it is a home, as close to a home as something this big and gruff and grey can be. I've nested with the person I love, made a little verdant pocket of our own, an oasis in its brickwork. What more do you need? Exactly. It's become the repeating cartoon backdrop on my windows, the rest-spot between endless tours, the puzzle that spider-webs away from me, that I found a me-shaped hole to fit into. It's a three-dimensional vortex that has no pattern or reason but somehow can be made to balance, like some nightmarish algorithm that if you spend long enough at you can teach yourself how to solve.
I suspect it may have the last word though, that it will far outlast my attempts to grapple with it... but maybe I will still escape yet.
I've been in love with Bloc Party for a while. I was supposed to see them when Lissa and I were on vacay back in 2004 in London, but our flight was the week before their Astoria show. I know, my life is so hard.
Since I started working there, annually I do the annual popscene family top 10 albums of the year. I was flipping through some of my past top 10 lists on Listography earlier today and realized we're motherfucking halfway through the year. How the hell that happened already, I don't know. But that means that I only have six months to decide what 10 albums defined my year. Sounds easy, but you try whittling your life down to only half a day of music. I bring this all up because I started thinking of what albums this year have influenced my tastes, that I like, that I make out to, et al et al. And while I'm super in love with Bloc Party as a whole set, catalogue-wise I am still warming to A Weekend In The City. Will it be on my top 10 list at the end of the year? Who knows.
But, okay. That doesn't mean I'm not obsessed. I have to put that out there. Like, who else gets fucking stoked on "Hunting For Witches" being the third single? Or that "The Prayer" has a whole box set with it with remixes? Me. And maybe Kim, I should call her.
Anyway, it was brought to my attention while having dinner with Vroo and Ted last night that "The Prayer" was indeed the second single off the record and the video has been released...
...and I'm not sure how I feel about it? 'Cos I'm a photography kid I am picky about imagery and am a total art fag, so I like what the director Walter Stern (who did the The Verve's "Bittersweet Symphony" as well as some Prodigy and Massive Attack videos) did with effects with the cigarette burns, but the band look way bored. So sad.
Then there's the classic performance video which I hate most times but I like for this song - "Two More Years" is also poignant for me in other ways personally.
And then, there is this video.
Man, being on your period sucks. But the video is actually really well filmed and has a good cadence with splicing the shots in sequence, which doesn't happen too much. Silent Alarm was such an intregal part of my 2005, I think I am attached to this band by default.
And, of course, here is the video that started it all:
There is an alternate video here that is SO BAD I couldn't bring myself to watch the first half, let alone post it.
Yeah. This is what I do at work.
Oh, and the whole thing about boyfriends relates to Russell and this picture:
Explanation only given in person though.
Oh, sweet Jesus...So I'm like two weeks late in posting this clip, but hey. At least I posted it.
Unnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnh.
(I would like to note that they are now upping me in NEWS now and not just CORRESPONDENT FROM SF WHO LIKES TO GET DRUNK AT SHOWS AND WRITE ABOUT THEM. I am moving up in the world.)
Linky-loo: here.
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Live - Bloc Party @ Concourse Design Center | SF
One of my worries for the past three months hasn't been the war in Iraq, or my apartment always being in discord, or the fact I totally am working 40 hours a week on top of taking 18 units at school and going to shows. No. I have been concerned whether or not Bloc Party was going to duplicate "The Prayer" live.
I thought it kind of funny I was spending St. Patrick's Day with a British band, but made no qualms as my good friends Kristin and Kim accompanied me inside the Concourse Design Center on Saturday. This venue is typically used as a conference center and reminds me of a carpeted cafeteria, so after we checked out the merch booth and I scored a sweet Bloc tote, we made our way towards the floor. The Concourse isn't exactly known for its sound, and thus you need to be in the first half of the venue for the sound to be good.
We ended up on the stage left side of the railing after realizing we couldn't see anything on the floor. Lead singer Kele Okereke was softly singing the lines to opening track "Song For Clay (Disappear Here)" off Weekend In The City, a moody and postpunk-influenced song that grabbed most of the sold-out crowd's attention that they were on stage.
And then Bloc Party brought the party.
Bobbing my head during "Positive Tension" and screaming "So fucking useless!" at the top of my lungs. Going batshit insane during "Hunting For Witches" with that crazy weird pitter-patter of blips and down-spiraling computer intro. Swooning over shredder Russell Lissack during "Like Eating Glass" with all of the layered and woozy guitar. Singing through "I Still Remember" and literally pointing out "my left behind" during "Banquet" with the girls, I could have left the show fully satisfied until I heard the first looming, ominous claps and Kele's low voice for "The Prayer." Not only is this my favorite song off Weekend, I think it's pretty much the sex and have seriously been anxious to see if it would sound as good live. Not only was it delicious and creepy, I also am a sucker for songs you can clap to. Only me.
After a few wipes to my forehead to bat away the sweat, and collecting Kristin after she snuck backstage with essentially the greatest of ease, we blasted "The Prayer" on Kim's car with the sun roof and windows open and singing at the top of our lungs. I saw Bloc Party at the Greek in August of last year, and something seemed a bit off; their meshing with each other wasn't as smooth as I remembered. Between then and now, though, they have managed to knit themselves back together and are ready to rule the world. Bring it.
By Jenn Hernandez
Mar 21, 2007 in
NEWS
The 'Party delivered. And man, it was delicious.
We also went bat-shit insane for "Hunting For Witches."
Mmm, review to come.
Hello, I am alive. I'm just now recovering from Noisepop, believe it or not. I got way exhausted at the end of the festival and ended up feeling woozy every day for almost a week after. Grand total of hours worked at my real job: 32. Hours worked at Noisepop: about 30. Hours in school: approximately 24. DO THE MATH.
Would I trade it for anything? Hell to the no. But last week was my kick-back time, so now I am back in full effect.
I went to Youth Group on Monday, wherein I was treated to indie tunes from them and the Submarines, who I am slowly falling in love with. I also debated with Vroo, Jenn, and her boyfriend Eric about his dog being an asshole and Bloc Party being renamed "Fuck Party" (as in, hello band members, you are all hot). Speaking of which, I need to get hopping on that review stat. Friday I'm at Presets and Saturday I'm at said Party...Thursday's Epitaph showcase hell that I was going to subject myself to because I love my brother might not happen because he doesn't know if he can make it up in time after work. I am secretly stoked.
Currently I am pulling an all-nighter with Kim (who's taking a cat nap) and Heather so I can study for Spanish Art history rightfully. Hez put on a mix CD that just ranged from hellogoodbye to the Killers to a random rap group, as well as let me borrow her Mary J. Blige retrospective album. A-mazing. Hez also found a site called musicovery.com through stumbleupon.com that I think might be my new best friend...I will explore and report after this exam passes (midterms are for me this week).
Some good bits of news that I am loving: Placebo in April, Low in June, and Daft Punk WITH The Rapture in July. In addition to Ratatat, Blonde Redhead/Annuals, The Shins, Ben Gibbard, and Muse, I am fucking exhausted just looking at the concert list I have. Hooray for good music.
I'm trying to score Eric Clapton tickets for me and my dad on Sunday...if anyone has leads, let me know.
I think I will end this post with the greatest MySpace friend request I've gotten in a while: Wanya from Boyz II Men. I have a sneaking suspicion he/the fangirl who runs the page read all the way back in my blogs from October to know I went to see them the three remaining singers perform. That amuses me to no end.
Actually, I will end this post with a public plea/open letter.
Dear Amy Winehouse,
STOP DOING COKE. I am sorry you and your boy broke up, but really, if you cancel the April popscene show I will be a very sad Jenz.
Love, me
What if Bloc Party can't duplicate "The Prayer" live????????????????????????????????????????????????
Mood: worried
Today after I conferred with my photo documentary teacher on my lynching foto project, I went to Cafe Rosso on campus to grab a chai and then interviewed Stellastarr* for the Tripwire before my art history class. Aw yeah.
