Up/Down: Shiny and New

When I unveiled Silversoundz last year, I led with a poetic waxing in defense of music writing that was not fixated on novelty--on being the first to go on record with an opinion on new song X or album Y. It sounded like a crotchety attempt at high-mindedness, but it was also founded in practicality. With the multiplication of music media, and the ease and speed of production, it's inherently futile to try and stay on top of everything at once. Let's face it: for most, the internet has become THE portal for accessing new, if not all, music. Yet the internet has also screwed with our decision making as music consumers by making it easier to publish and access opinions...not necessarily to form them.

As we try desperately to keep up with the volume of music available, we devour more and digest less. Meanwhile, every download comes with stigma--be it an offhand review, blog comments, even the street cred of the site you're pulling music from. These are new shades of old problems, of course. But instead of reviews in a limited number of music mags, what we heard on the radio or from friends, now we have about 5,000 inputs to consider. Not to mention bands' increased ability to promote themselves.

I'm not complaining. After all, you're reading this, right? But what concerns me about the music/information overload is the way we play it off as if the mere access to it is enough to make us, for lack of a better word, cool. The internet tempts us to think less about why we like certain music, and trades us unlimited access to affirmation by knowing what virtually everyone else is listening to. In my view, this has led to a really bizarre set of collective tastes and music fads over the past few years. Not all bad, of course, but bizarre in the sense that for about 4 years running, I can't remember the last time I listened to what was generally considered good music, and thought to myself without any irony: "this is clearly good music." I think we may look back on this period as the digital music equivalent of the early 1970's. We never quite recovered from the free-love days of Napster, but until some of the looming questions about the music industry vs. digital distro get figured out, we are simply saturated in music. We will look back and applaud ourselves for the Led Zeppelins of our times, laugh about the Supertramps, and cry about our version of disco (I'll leave the analogies to you). Put simply, distinguishing the good from the bad has gotten hard.

Of course, we try. What's new is fresh and what's fresh is powerful, and what's powerful bears mentioning. So here's my contribution to the heaping pile of new music opinion.

Big Ups

1. Phoenix- Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix/"1901". This album, due out on the 26th (already leaked on the interweb), has one of the coolest fucking names in recent memory. "1901" is one of the catchiest fucking songs in recent memory. I'm all over this.

2. Iran- Dissolver. I'm not a big TV on the Radio fan, so the hubbub over this band featuring Kyp Malone on guitar nearly deterred me from buying Dissolver. But I went for it and was pleased to find the songwriting of lead singer Aaron Aites is far less consciously serious (but not any less dark) than TVoTR. Most importantly, Iran can rock. AND THEN I find out they're touring with destroyer this Summer? Dig!!!

3. Kidz in the Hall- "I Got it Made 09 (Reebok Classic)". Can you say "summer anthem"? Love the beat, love the flow, love the video, love the vibe, love that they're one letter away from a Canadian Comedy troupe. If anyone knows why I can't download this on Itunes, please explain it to me.

Big Downs

1. Dinosaur Jr.- "I Want you to Know". Not necessarily the song. The song is fine, I guess. But see this pitchfork review for an illustration of my moral dilemma above. "...Even at their most triumphant, Dinosaur Jr. come off as shy and introspective; when Mascis usually lets fly with another rebar-melting guitar solo, it's like an overcompensating apology for his lyrical and vocal sad-sackery." Come on, it's Dinosaur Jr. Isn't it the whole point to say less?

2. Ween- Quebec. I know, it's not new. But I finally got around to buying this 2003 album and resuming my fascination with Ween last week. It's disappointing. Gene & Dean do all the old Ween things, but it's just not doing it for me. This could potentially change based on how many times I listen to the song "Zoloft" so stay tuned.

3. Asher Roth- Despicable. This guy makes Snow look like Talib Kweli. If I read one more magazine article in which this guy advertises his own rap credentials, mark my words I will barf all over the magazine, right there in the store. #1 sign that you don't deserve street cred? Repeated reminders that you want it.

Tell me yours! No more diatribes next time!!!