Salad Days: The Washington D.C. Punk Revolution is a new documentary written and directed by Scott Crawford which will take a “comprehensive, honest and insightful look at the DC punk scene from the early 1980s to the decade’s end.”
The film will include exclusive archival photographs, concert footage and interviews with dozens of bands, artists, label owners, zine publishers and others who helped mold and nurture DC’s underground community during this inspired decade of music.
Starring John Stabb, Ian Mackaye, Henry Rollins, Dave Grohl, Alec Mackaye, and many more.
The release date will happen some time in 2013. Watch the trailer below.
How far would you go for love? Would you give up all your possessions? Renounce this world and all its cruelty? Would you die for love? Would you kill for love?
Kill For Love is the new album by Chromatics, a band from Portland, Orgeon led by the producer Johnny Jewel of Italians Do It Better renown. I’ve written about the Italians Do It Better label before, drawing a comparison between the IDIB roster’s sound, and the lo-fi, tripped-out, “haunted retro” aesthetic of acts like Ariel Pink and John Maus.
The Italians Do It Better sound is rooted very firmly in late 70s and early 80s disco music, particularly the more soundtrack-oriented work of Giorgio Moroder, Claudio Simonetti and Patrick Cowley. As those names would also suggest, Johnny Jewel (who produces practically everything on the label) LOVES the sound of analog synthesizers. Jewel was the original choice to compose the soundtrack to last year’s 80s-noir sleeper hit Drive, and with his trademark throbbing, moody sound, it’s not hard to see why.
Chromatics are one of Italians Do It Better’s flagship acts, and one of its most popular, so expectations for this new album are high (particularly as it was originally due for release in 2010.) Thank god then that it doesn’t disappoint. It goes without saying that there’s nothing radically new here, no re-invention of the wheel, but when a form and function are just so perfect, why would you want to reinvent them?
Having said that, there is less of a reliance on arpeggiated synth lines on Kill For Love as there has been on past Chromatics releases. Of all the IDIB acts, Chromatics seem most like a “real” band, in that they aren’t afraid to adopt the “traditional” band roles of bassist, guitarist and drummer. In fact, the addition of live electric guitar on a lot of Kill For Love is perhaps one of the most surprising aspects of the album.
Still, that chilly John Carpenter-vibe is present and correct, like a sliver of ice through a beating heart, as are the hauntingly distant female vocals of singer Ruth Radelet. The opening cover of Neil Young’s “Into The Black” is simply stunning, one of the musical highlights of the year so far for me, and as an opener it sets up the rest of the album perfectly. In a recent interview with Pitchfork, Jewel explained the rationale behind that particular cover version:
It was very, very intentional in terms of rock mythology. You can’t underestimate the power of the guitar for an American audience. It’s a really strong symbol—just everything the guitar and Western culture represent—and Chromatics is part of that fantasy. The Neil Young song was recorded in 2009, and I knew I wanted to open the album with it, for multiple reasons. Part of it was a challenge to us as beatmakers or mood-makers, to see if we could actually write songs that could stand up in a pop sense. Because if you cover a song like that, you’re biting off a lot. You can’t touch Neil Young, but I wanted to challenge us to go beyond the loop and think about songs more.
The rest of that interview is well worth a read.
You can hear (and download) the Chromatics cover of “Into The Black” right here:
Here’s another free download from the album, the single “Kill For Love”:
Moved by the news of Donna Summer’s death, South Bronx-bred aerosol artist and DJ, SERVE (a/k/a SERVE ONE), wasted no time painting the stunning mural pictured above in homage to the late singer. With “Last Dance” – the title of Summer’s 1978 classic – emblazoned by an iconic image from the cover of her Live & More LP of the same year, it’s a beautiful piece of work. “I just had to do it…” SERVE wrote on his Facebook wall to the enthusiastic response of friends. Props, SERVE. RIP, Donna Summer.
Beautiful.
Here’s another thing of rare beauty, Donna performing the wonderful “Spring Affair” from the Four Seasons Of Love EP on Soul Train:
Here’s one man band Gull (aka Nathaniel Rappole) performing “Fast Enough” at the WreckRoom music space in Brooklyn.
Gull has been around for awhile but seems to be averse to any kind of self-promotion. He’s a busker, plays occasional festivals and club gigs. His recorded output seems to be pretty much limited to the CDs he sells at shows and on the street. He’s from Richmond, Virginia and currently lives in Philly. I’d like to tell you more, but that’s about the gist of what I could find…without breaking a sweat. His website ain’t exactly informative.
When it’s finished, this documentary might provide a bit more info on the talented Mr. Rappole: later this month, Gull will be traveling to Nairobi, Kenya as part of “The Street Muse Project,” a free short film about worldwide street musicians.
For more on the WreckRoom, check out their website. You can download some Gull music there.
I consider this to be fucking great. And he’s only got half as many members as Lightning Bolt or Death From Above 1979.
Springsteen looks kind of Buddy Holly-esque in this high school yearbook photo.
I broke all the rules, strafed my old high school, never once gave thought to landing,
I hid in the clouded warmth of the crowd but when they said, “Come down,” I threw up,
My Bloody Valentine’s lovely, restrained cover of Hal David and John Barry’s “We Have All The Time in the World” was recorded for Island Records’ Peace Together charity compilation for the youth of Northern Ireland, in 1993.
The song, of course, was originally made famous by Louis Armstrong and comes from the soundtrack to On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
Considering how notoriously unproductive MBV have proven to be over the years, I wonder if there’s a bit of irony in the group choosing this song in particular to record. Some Internet sources claim that’s actually Kevin Shields singing, but I don’t think so. If it is him, well, he’s channeling Bilinda here quite successfully.
While America had the smooth jazz of Henry Mancini, Italy the lush atmospherics of Ennio Morricone, England the bold brass of John Barry, and France the moog experimentation of Jean Jacques Perry, Germany had all these rolled into one - Peter Thomas!”
In this clip circa 1969 from German TV series 11 Uhr 20, Donna Summer sings “Black Power” written and arranged by Peter Thomas. This is Summer’s first recording and it wasn’t released commercially until it appeared on a 1998 compilation of Thomas’s compositions called Moonflowers And Mini-Skirts.
Although Peter Thomas scored countless internationally released films and German television series, it wasn’t until bands like Pulp, Stereolab and Air started sampling his work that he became a hip commodity.
Powered by an incredible, high-wired rhythm section consisting of Germany´s best studio and jazz musicians (including Siggi Schwab of Vampyros Lesbos fame on guitar and Lothar Meid of Amon Düül II on bass!) Thomas created ‘sonic explosions with enough force to put a man (with his woman) on the moon’. John Bender
I’m feeling a little spooked out right now, not just at the news that the number one Disco Queen Donna Summer has died at age 63 after battling cancer, but also because I was going to post this clip today just because it is so damn good.
Taken from a 1979 TV special, here is Donna performing a live version of her classic “Sunset People” from the Bad Girls LP. The original track is one of my all time disco favorites, and one of her best collaborations with that damned pop music genius Giorgio Moroder.
In this clip Donna performs the track live while walking down the actual Sunset Strip, and play acts different roles of some of the Strip’s denziens (starlet, showgirl, traffic cop.) The track itself is different to the recorded version too, being slightly faster and sounding more “live band” than “studio whizz.”
The reason I wanted to post this clip today, before I heard the news, is that it is awesome, a real treat for Summer/Moroder/disco fans. Only now it takes on a new gravitas as the news filters through of Summer’s untimely death. And there I was, only recently pondering the thought of a Donna Summer-revival tour. She was one of the few major (still living) solo acts from the disco period not to be out touring again, and a glaring omission from the Etam Paris Fashion week “Disco Divas” show (which featured Grace Jones, Sister Sledge, the Pointer Sisters, Chaka Khan and Gloria Gaynor - what a fucking line-up!).
There are going to be plenty of Donna Summer obituaries coming through over the next few days with the passing of this true legend. If you’re aware of my other posts over the last 18 months here on Dangerous Minds, you will have gathered by now that I am a disco music obsessive. I shouldn’t have to explain what Donna Summer means to me, or to popular music culture in general. After the male-oriented “free love” boom of the 60s, she brought assertive female sexuality to the masses with “Love To Love You Baby” in 1975. Along with Giorgio Moroder, Summer redefined pop music with the epoch-defining “I Feel Love.” Hell, I still drop that track in my dj sets to this day, and it never fails to tear the roof off.
If you’re still in doubt as to how important her work was, ask Bernard Sumner of New Order who was more important to the band - Donna Summer or Kraftwerk?
Well then, here’s to you Donna Summer, performer and co-author of some of the best songs in dance, and pop, music history. You will be missed!
Donna Summer “Sunset People” (1979 TV special version)
Lemmy and Phil “the Animal” Taylor getting up to some hotel trashing shenanigans on French TV. They also put the French journalist in a headlock towards the end.
