Canard Music

In no real order

Wilderness- Vessel States www.jagjaguwar.com

These dudes make anthems for aliens. Their lead singer sounds like he’s undergoing a metamorphosis or some kind of rebirth. I like them. They’re pretty atmospheric, all guitar arpeggios and wide open space. It just sounds strangely majestic and tiny at the same time. I recommend! It’s an aquired taste and a lot of people prefer their first record, but this one is my fave.

Comets on Fire- Avatar   www.subpop.com   

 

Noone is making the freak out music like these guys. Great sounds of psychedelic passion with withering guitar and spazzed out drumming.

Mastodon- Blood Mountain   www.mastodonrocks.com

Best current metal band. These guys did not compromise wih their signing to a major. i know some indie fuckheads will disagree, but they can go listen to their “hard to find albums pressed on Norwegian black Metal ham sandwiches”. Heavy, prog-ish in parts. It’s on relapse/reprise! Did Sinatra’s ghost sign these guys?

Band of Horses- Everything All the Time  www.subpop.com

Never has a band that on first listen sounded so derivative had such a lasting impact on me. This record is beautiful and the singer/guitarist has a pretty great voice and “awwww, shucks I’m on ecstacy” stage presence and banter. We saw them at Pitchfork Fest in Chicago. Our friends hated them and compared them to Journey. That should tell you about the sound mix out there and by the way, the guy that MC’s that festival was a cheeseball. These guys get compared to My Morning Jacket a lot because of the reverb activity. I agree they share some aesthetics in their sound.

Espers- II   www.dragcity.com

This folk-rock band expanded its line up to include a drummer and some more instruments. They’re kind of on the Pentangle tip, but at the end of one of their freeze dried, trance inducing drone sessions, they remind me of the end of “Epitaph” off of King Crimson’s first lp. That is a huge compliment coming from me as I worship Robert Fripp’s delay module and vintage mellotron. Great musicianship all around. This is a bliss out type of jam. “Dead King” and “Moon Occults the Sun” are my favorite.

Oneida- Happy New Year     www.jagjaguwar.com

These guys from New York aren’t afraid to get down on the prog tip. They change stylistically from album to album.”Up with People” is a stilted funk-pop-a-roll jam about 8 minutes long. The title cut is pretty great too with its meandering synth. Jagjaguwar seems to be putting out my favorite stuff right now.

Decemberists-The Crane Wife     www.decemberists.com

This is literate rock for nerds. There’s nothing wrong with this. Let your nerd-o flag fly. Pretty pop music that doesn’t insult your intelligence unless you’re stupid, in which you will not be able to comprehend its beauty. Try listening to Fall Out Boy instead you jerk-off.

Bright Black Morning Light- self titled     www.thebrightblackmorninglight.com

This is some mellow shit. If I was a pot damaged goober, I’d love this. I’m not, but I still love it. Good late night or Sunday morning music. Drones for the drones.

Built to Spill- You in Reverse        www.builttospill.com

The delay pedals! The haunting voice!

I haven’t really cared too much about these guys since ‘There’s Nothing Wrong with Love’, but I really liked this one a lot. You can shoot me now, but I didn’t say I disliked ‘Perfect..’ or ‘Keep it…’. Those records just didn’t move me as much.

Mew- And the Glass Handed Kites    www.mewsite.com

Scandinavian dudes kick up some MBV-type noise on this album. I liked it quite a bit. Atmospheric rock with a guest vocal from that grey haired wizard J Mascis. The guitars sound hyper compressed and with weirdo twang on them. Nice vocals and some pretty interesting drumming/time changes. A little prog-ish.

Viva Voce- Get YR Blood Sucked Out   www.vivavoce.com

Husband and wife team make some great rock and roll. Great songwriting, interesting structures and hot ass guitar playing.  A home produced gem of a record.

Lemonheads- Lemonheads       www.vagrant.com

Essentially, if you did not already know, Evan Dando is the Lemonheads. After a good, but overlooked solo album he has teamed up with the rhythm section of the Descendents and put together a solid album of pilled out sounding punk pop. The guy (Dando) has always been somewhat of a burn out, but I’m not sure he’s put out a really stinky album. ‘Come on Feel the Lemonheads’ was the closest due to his smoking crack rocks all through the sessions. Strangely it produced their slickest record! Bill Stevenson helps out with some songwriting and Dando benefits from his tight ass power drumming. It breaks no new ground and will be largely forgotten, but it is a worthwhile, humble effort. Stay off the needle.

Silkworm- Chokes       www.silkworm.net

Anybody who knows me is aware of how much I love Silkworm. Most of them cannot understand it. They don’t dislike them, they just don’t see why they tower over a lot of bands in my opinion. I feel it is their lyrical complexity and maturity mixed with a powerful drummer and some great guitar/bass interplay. A band like Silkworm is so adept at using dynamics and space in their songs that it’s almost ridiculous. A lot of bands should stop playing all the fucking time and learn some restraint. Silkworm will rock the house down when they want to and if the song needs it. Unfortunately, Michael Dahlquist-drummer genius, was killed along with some other good folks when an asshole, waste of space plowed into their car in a failed suicide attempt. She survived while all three of them perished. Tim and Andy of Silkworm have carried on in Bottomless Pit and will hopefully relese something soon. They have some tracks streaming on their site ( www.bottomlesspit.us ) and they sound really great. The ‘Chokes’ ep is the last stuff Silkworm recorded and its awesome. Interestingly enough , there is no bass on the cd, Tim plays the “twanker” which is some kind of bass/baritone guitar type-o-thing. Don’t take my word for it though. You can order the ep direct through a link on the Silkworm site.

REISSUES

I generally send too much time and money on music I already own or have owned. Where’s the new shit that doesn’t suck?!?!?

here are some reissues from 2006 that I found to be…worthwhile.

Chavez- Better Days Will Haunt You     www.matadorrecords.com

The complete recordings of Chavez, a great guitar based rock band that were active in the mid to late 90′s. Billy Corgan should be licking their balls.

Pavement- Wowee Zowee Sordid Sentinels edition       www.matadorrecords.com

Pavement’s “difficult” album. This is the one where they dig hard on the prog tip. Great stuff. Lots of bonus shit on the extra disc. Would have liked more liner notes about the actual sessions.

Boobs: Junkshop Glam Discoteque

Brent gave me a copy of this glam collection of obscure 70′s rockers. Looks like Kim Fowley had his greasy fingers on most of these songs. “Motorboat” is a standout and they all sound like they were recorded in Marc Bolan’s gold lame trousers. Great fun for anybody that digs T. Rex, Sweet and Gary Glitter (prior to his child molesting exploits, of course!). Although this actually came out in 2005, I am making an exception for its greatness! Thanks Mr. Brence.

 

 

 

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DUE TO CONCERN FOR METHUSELA’S MENTAL HEALTH AND WELL BEING THE LINK HAS BEEN DISABLED! THOU SHALT NOT TEMPT THE LORD! 

 

YOU WANTED THE BEST AND YOU GOT…. Methusela’s ‘Black Christmas’.

After much cajoling I have posted this atrocity as one long track. That is the only effective way for its greasy finger of foul despair to reach into your soul and fart happlessly on your psyche.

Recorded in one awe inspiring night of filth and drunkeness. Methusela’s ‘Black Christmas’ represents the yawning chasm of tastelessness that occurs when some dudes have too much time and beer on their hands.

Methusela-guitar, lead vocals, despair

Peabo Chocolunch-bass, vocals, mixing-editing

Curt Vile-drums, vocals, concept

Ben Dover- organ, vocals, memory

Eat the acid…Black Christmas (LINK DISABLED)

Keep in mind that some people find this hysterical, disturbing, stupid, pointless and gross. Much of the time all of these feelings combine into one sad sigh upon basking in the black hole glow of Methusela. Not for kids!

Have a Safe and Happy Holiday Season!

Finally, after much bullshit talk and procrastination, I give you ‘American Buckle’ in all of its……glory? I apologize for taking so long with this, as this stuff has only been heard by a few. I doubt Johnny Ether has heard this since it was created over a period between 1989-1991. I had Tommy Hamilton mix this stuff before he moved to Virginia. I can’t remember when that was but I think it was in the mid to late 90′s.

This project has been discussed many times over the years since the band imploded(thanks to me a dumbass) and originally was intended for posthumous cd release. None of that came to fruition, so we’ve just put everything here. There are multiple versions of some songs, some filler, some ludicrous stuff and some very sad, downbeat stuff. The Singing Spoons hope that you will enjoy their labors on what would have been a fine album and a worthy follow up to ‘Resin Cabin’.

The Sessions

The recording sessions for ‘American Buckle’ began almost immediately after ‘Resin Cabin’ was completed. The Spoons were prolific to a fault which meant that we weren’t too good at editing ourselves. All of it was recorded by Tomy Hamilton over about two or three marathon tracking sessions and multiple overdub sessions at Georgia Street.  We laughed, we drank, we smoked and we unfortunately passed out on Tommy’s bed a few times. Tommy was a patient man and always gracious toward our antics. Georgia Street Studio was located right between Duval and Bronough streets in Tallahassee. It was a run down house where Tommy lived as well as at various times Wayne Gleasman(owner of Manufacture Sound), Chris Gleasman(bassist in Gruel), Barry Stock(of Grecian Formula/Bone Ranger), Tom Lewis (engineer and member of Grecian Formula/Bone Ranger), Lee Folmar(Insect Fear), Bruce Hamilton (drummer in Gruel). This place was the breeding ground for most of the stuff coming out of Tallahassee that was influential to us at the time. Tallahassee’s scene was thriving back then…Gruel, Grecian Formula, Insect Fear, Human Scarecrow, DVC and others. Our sessions became somewhat mythically self important to us and we started operating in our bubble. There was a lot of emotional stuff going on with the young men of the Singing Spoons and our music reflected the dual personality of alcohol saturated good times and alcohol saturated psychosis and depression. Those were the two worlds I operated in at least!

Our recording sessions never featured heated arguments about artistic direction. we really collaborated well and the material shows that. John H. had really stepped it up and was contributing a lot to the song writing and was pretty much the band’s arranger. On ‘Resin Cabin’ I had a lot of songs left over from the intensive writing of college, but by the time of these sessions, I was writing more with the band’s input in mind and we would collaborate a lot. It was a fun time and we really enjoyed playing. The guitar playing during these times took on a life of its own. Josh and Chris developed a sound that Kelly Shane described as “massive”. He described the band as lurching forward as one big chord as Josh’s slabs of distorto-neil young in the cheesgrater guitar sound meshed perfectly with Chris’ Bob Mould is in your ceiling Marshall high end crunch. As for me I did my usual primitive flailing and John held it together with tuneful and supple bass playing. ‘American Buckle’ saw some experimentation as John and Josh played some horns. The ARP String Ensemble was used on a few songs to cool effect and Chris played slide guitar (!?!?) on at least two songs! One with a beer can of course!

This was a pivotal time in our lives, as within a year or two some of us would form new bands, leave town, get married etc. At the time, this was the most important thing to all of us. At some point the bubble ruptured….

Here are some thoughts on the sessions from John H. when I first approached him about doing this back in ’04! 

John

“The house was green, and the beer was cold. The original artwork for the
Resin Cabin album cover was framed in Wayne Gleisman’s (the president,
founder, and chief-executive officer of our record label, Manufacture Sound
Output Company) bedroom. We had each assembled badass guitar-amp combos,
Josh with his Les Paul/Fender Twin, Chris with the Gibson SG/Marshall stack
(a very temperamental wall-of sound), and me, with my Gibson RD Artist
bass/Crate-Peavey combo amp (okay, so the Crate-Peavey combo won’t get me
into the indie rock hall of fame, but it was loud and bright as hell). It
was evident from first listenings of the tracks that the sound of ‘American
Buckle’ was going to be fatter and heavier than anything we accomplished on
‘Resin Cabin’. In short, everything seemed in order. Tommy Hamilton was as
easy to work with as any producer a bad could ever hope for. He basically
sat and grinned, seemed to like everything, and when the tracks were played
back, he had instantly transformed them into thunder. The recording sessions
went very smoothly. For a notoriously sloppy band, we set down a surprising
majority of the songs as tight first tracks. Mike was singing better than
ever, staying on key in every song and as always, emptying his tank of every
molecule of emotion on every track. There was little to be weary of, except
perhaps, the overwhelming feeling that this was the last meaningful thing
the band would ever accomplish. While I have no intentions of divulging the
morass of intra-band personal issues that led to this apocalyptic mood, the
sense of doom proved justified. A few months later, after a brief (really
brief, like one week) attempt at keeping the band going as a trio, we were
done. Mike and Chris moved on to form Ultraboy and continue to juice up the
Tallahassee scene for a couple of years (Mike is actually still quite active
in the scene), while for Josh and myself, this proved to be our Tallahassee
indie rock swan song. None of us, I think, really held profound or at least
long-lived regrets about the Spoons’ demise. Although ‘American Buckle’
contains much of the best work we ever created, I also think that we were
devastatingly close to becoming a rather formulaic songwriting machine. Most
of the best songs on American Buckle were the older ones; the later tunes
felt stilted and comparatively uninspired. It was almost as if (if I may be
so bold) we were transitioning from the frenetic-inspired mode of the
Replacements Let it Be/Tim era to the slightly lost,
doing-it-for-the-sake-of-doing-it mode of Paul Westerberg’s early solo
career. All this said, I am ecstatic that the Buckle is finally being
released. What’s amazing to me is how fresh the tunes sound, well over a
decade after they were recorded. I am not claiming that we were somehow
magically ahead of our times or anything – these songs still resonate of
early 90s indie power-chord heart-rock (?) – but I do think that there are
lots of folks out there who’ll find these songs catchy, intense, heartfelt,
and worthy of multiple listenings. I certainly hope I’m right. I know “Loofa”
still kicks my ass. ”

I appreciate John’s honesty. When he first wrote this a few years ago, I suggested he was being too harsh, but now I think he was right. We prided ourselves on being prolific, but occasionally this meant a dip in quality. Looking back, maybe it ended for a reason when it did. I know that sounds cliche’, but it had run its course and we were pretty exhausted as I remember. I would also like to say that we did attempt to continue without Josh, but I wasn’t into it very much as I was more into personal destruction at the time.

Other Spoons! Contribute your memories if you’ve still got ‘em!

SOUND

A few of these were from the first sessions with Tommy and were done pretty much for free. He used a reel labeled “shitty work tape” for about 4 songs. “Colorado”, “Business trip”,”Backrub” and “Buzz”. All of these were taken from a rough mix cassette because the original reel had disintegrated when I had Tommy mix these. So the sound on these is rougher than the others but are included here because the songs are good, except for “buzz” which was totally lost(see below).

“Colorado” is the original version and not the one on the ‘buzz’ single. It is superior I believe to that one, but for some reason this one wasn’t used.

“Buzz” has been lost and this was the original version as well and possibly better than the single version. (FOUND!!!!!! 12/13/06 see below)

SONGS

Hello, Mr. Shovel

Red Onions

You’re Broken

Balloon Song

Dress of the Dream Girl

Dress of the Dream Girl (version 2)

Gold 100

Gold 100 (version 2)

Theme from Larry Csonka

Answer for Doofus

Rhyme Hag

Backrub

Colorado

Business Trip

Lilly’s Pad

Lilly’s Pad (version 2)

Loofa

Loofa (version 2)

Side

Windshield/Disaster

J’s and J’s

J’s and J’s (version 2)

Drops

Hall Killing

Permanent Mountain

I Had to tell You (Roky Erikson/13th Floor Elevators cover)

Always Fuss (mike duets with the lovely Jen Kermeen)

Too Awake

Here’s a Wall

Here’s a Wall (version 2)

American Buckle

Closet Call

Buzz (original version) -added 12/13/06

 

 

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