A friend who has basically the exact same time in music as me — ie he loves Kanye — introduced me to Autre Ne Veut last night. I’m officially obsessed. @alisonmatheny, check it.
I went to go see Beach House at Summer Stage in Central Park last night, and it was awesome.
Normally I find concerts to be really anxiety producing and boring. Large groups of people jammed in small spaces give me panic attacks, and most bands have, at most, three good songs. The rest, I’m like, “tinkle tinkle tinkle cute lyric how can bruce springsteen still dance like that when the fuck is this going to be over.”
Last night, however, I realized that I am a true fan of Beach House because every single time they began a new piece, I started screaming, “Oh my god, this is my favorite song!!”
I even realized, at one point, that I was inadvertently dancing, which scared the shit out of me. The only thing that makes me more uncomfortable than being around people at a concert is watching people dance at a concert. There is nothing more unattractive than someone flailing their arms around, their eyes closed, their head thrown back, their boyfriend awkwardly standing by them, trying to move in synch with their wild, white girl undulations…
About half way through the set, a thunderstorm descended, and the milky gray black sky behind the stage was illuminated by streaks of lightening. Soon after, it started pouring, but we stayed until the end, when Victoria Legrand banged her head through the last few choruses of Irene, so caught up was she—and us—in the moment.
Fiona Apple announced she’s coming out with a new album yesterday, and it will be titled: ‘The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than The Driver Of The Screw, And Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do’.
I don’t know what it is, but that title seems dumb to me. Nevertheless, I eagerly await the album’s release with every fiber of my ticking biological clock.
The publicity surrounding the album afforded me a nice excuse to watch Fiona’s video for Criminal, which shows how uninspired the hipster aesthetic is, given that it hasn’t changed since 1997.
Whatever. I’m off to rip out strands of hair and stare at myself in the mirror.
Icon of the Week: Lana Del Rey
I’ve been thinking a lot about Lana Del Rey the past few days. Her album is dropping on January 30, which means that the publicity elves underneath her must be whirring their magic machines, bringing her to the attention of people like me, who enjoy music but don’t follow it. I’m the last stand before she hits the Michael Buble market.
Lana del Rey, apparently, has been around for a while, or at least a few months. She first appeared on the music scene in June, when she released her single “Video Games.” Since then, she’s become one of the most hated musicians in the industry, derided for her past, her lack of musical talent, her good looks, her record deals, her music videos, being sexy, eating food, walking, and the way she came out of the womb.
People hate Lana Del Rey so much that Maura Johnston of The Village Voice named “Video Games” the“2nd Most Infuriating Song of 2011.” They hate her so much that they write long, nonsensical essays giving her the power to define what’s wrong with an entire generation of young women in America, like Amy Klein of the indie band Titus Andronicus, who says:
“Lana Del Ray is waiting for you to come home so you can go to bed and act out all of your wildest fantasies which is exactly what she wants to do—what you want to do, that is. Lana Del Ray is waiting for you because she is your mirror.
(This sounds awesome to me.)
