Uh, OK Simon, so MIA herself (and/or her fans/PR people) makes you vaguely uncomfortable, offends your sensibilities in some way, etc., but--do you like the damn music? (Or was there just not room to get into that in the article, which, fair enough, but I'm curious as to your thoughts, honestly.) I have to admit I'm deeply disappointed with this review, given that it comes from someone who's usually so good about taking the music seriously. It takes as its premise the idea that people are attracted to MIA because of the ideas she's associated with rather than the music she makes, and in the process of countering this straw man argument commits the same sin of treating her as the subject of a dissertation rather than something to be listened to. In the end it comes off as a very well-written version of the kind of argument teenagers have about music, debating its social status rather than its artistic worth, and there are a lot of people who would agree that this does an extreme disservice to her very, very wonderful music. The (quite frankly innaccurate) context people keep trying to put her music in wouldn't be a problem if people stopped doing shit like this, focusing on the marketing rather than the goddamn art. In other words, this article just perpetuates the things Simon's complaining about. If he wanted it to stop, he could have given us an actual review of the album. But he didn't. And so here we are.

There are certainly other things I could object to, but I think that's the basic problem, and for me to further quibble with arguments about where she went to fucking school (I've said it before and I'll say it again--fucking British people) would just keep the bullshit flowing, whereas I'm trying to make. it. stop. Please.

ADDENDUM: Simon has a reply to some of the objections raised, although not mine of course. But it's still arguing points that I think ultimately aren't important. Look, if you really have a problem with people talking about MIA being grime or dancehall or a refugee or a revolutionary (which I do too), push back by talking about the music outside of that context. Don't make this bullshit the center of the discourse. And please don't use "massive hype" as an excuse (which admittedly Luca does more explicitly than Simon)--it just feels massive because it's being aimed directly at people like us. It's not actually that big at all, and quite frankly I'm shocked that anyone who's had any exposure to a major label hype machine could say that in good conscience. You're trying to argue hipsters out of something here, and that's just banging your head against a wall. Change the terms if you care that much.
posted by Mike B. at 5:27 PM 0 comments

Wednesday, February 16, 2005

Is it just me, or does the cover of the new Bright Eyes album look very Wesley Willis-ish?

And what does this say about Bright Eyes? I'm just askin'.

(I guess it also looks kinda Danielsen-y upon closer look, but that's kinda weird too.)

posted by Mike B. at 5:32 PM 0 comments

Madonna to sound like Kelly Clarkson? Awesome.

posted by Mike B. at 12:20 PM 0 comments

Uh, hi, Village Voice readers. I guess I've been "outed" now with my real name--well, aside from that thing with tha Unicorn last year, and aside from my ballots, and my Flagpole articles, and...but anyway--so hi to my co-workers, too. Or not. I guess this'll tell me how closely they read the Voice.

The latest installment of the Blueberry Boat project--i.e., what you're looking for--can be found here. Sequential links to all previous entries are at the top of that one. You may also be interested in the Blueberry Boat Chronicles, an attempt on my part to re-order the album chronologically. Finally, there have been assorted other little bits about the Furnaces, which you can probably find best by doing a search.

Stick around, if you like; this blog's about a lot more than just the Fiery Furnaces. It's about Kelly Clarkson and Courtney Love too!

But seriously, I should have at least one summation up in the next few days. You may notice that there are still a few songs left to do, but I don't think they're germane to the story, so although I do have some ideas on them (and I'm like thisclose to getting "1917") they'll have to be bonus tracks for later. So keep checking for that.

Hey Deborah, does this mean I can get on the guestlist for the North6 show now?

posted by Mike B. at 10:19 AM 0 comments

Tuesday, February 15, 2005

Seriously? This is the best thing ever. Here's the chorus:

Refrain, refrain, refrain, refrain
And we're repeating it again, again and again
Refrain, refrain, refrain, refrain
And we're repeating it again, again and again

Yes. Yes. Yes. And the song is fucking fantastic too. God bless you, popjustice.

This is sort of the definition of the phrase "gleefully embracing."

posted by Mike B. at 5:30 PM 0 comments

It is a lovely day here in the city, in the sixties apparently, and I'd been hungering for some outdoors since I walked to the subway this morning. Around 3:30 I decided it was finally time (I'd eaten lunch intra-office, after all) so I set off.

I ended up in the park, soaking up the winter sun as it set over DSW and eating a not insignificant portion of an Entenmann's Fudge Iced Golden cake with my bare hands. It was wonderful. It had actually been kind of difficult to find an actual ground-based patch of sunshine--I could see it, up there in the sky, landing on building roofs or even entrances farther down the Avenue, but couldn't seem to actually track the damn thing down. The park was a reliable choice. I put the cake box on the grocery bag next to me and slowly finished off the last little square, the encrusted roofs of frosting extruding over the slightly stale cake maybe a little too far, this particular cake over-iced, I thought, maybe, but then dismissed it. The damn thing was delicious. Even better with your bare hands too, sometimes.

Next to me, there was a gay or gay-ish man talking on his cell phone. "Where was your neice who killed herself?" he said. Later, he said, "Did I tell you I'm going back to school? I'm taking a course at Cooper Union on memoir writing. I got a scholarship." After he hung up the phone, he picked up his book and started reading it again. The book was called Dry. Earlier, he had said, "I guess he didn't really kill himself, but he was fucked up all the time, and he died at forty, so same thing." Earlier, he had said, "If one more person told me you oughta write a book I figured it was time, you know? Not like I'm doing anything else with myself."

Around the corner, a small girl was sitting in one of those strollers-with-sleeping-bag things, napping, bathing in the sun. She woke up and turned her head up and opened one eye. She stretched as much as she was able and the sun embraced her completely, as much as it was able, diffused by the ugly architecture and the barren trees.

posted by Mike B. at 4:36 PM 0 comments

MP3blog fite! I know it's like a week out of date now, but let me just add one thing that for some reason did not seem to get said...

What Paul and a few others were trying to do was not make an argument on the basis of morality. Rachel is right that this is not a defensible position to take in this context. What they were making, instead (which was good to hear, given the by-now played-out arguments over the morality of downloading), was an argument on the basis of practicality. As is pointed out, labels do tolerate and even encourage MP3blogs, because it is good publicity. But this support is clearly conditional and tenuous, even if that's never explicitly stated by either party.

So Paul's argument, aside from the general subjective rip on Scenestars, was made because he doesn't want to see MP3blogs go away. His point was that if you do shit like this, record companies will stop tolerating the practice of allowing MP3blogs to post tracks from unreleased albums, because it will start to cross the line between promoting an album and giving it away. One song is an acceptable loss leader; three or four starts to get murky, and anything past that--which, if you don't do what Paul did and try and nip the problem in the bud, will start to happen, I guarantee you--will start to bring cease and desist letters. And these are different from a simple request to take things down--these are legal fines, legal matters. These hurt. Ask Kottke. The phrase at hand is "chiling effect."

Even if you've been explicitly told by a PR person that it's OK to post three tracks, it's up to you to use your personal judgment not to, because unless you explicitly state that these tracks are up with the encouragement of the director of marketing at Elektra--which wouldn't look good, given the general image of an MP3blogger, right?--some other blog is going to get the idea that it's OK to do this with any album, whether or not you've gotten explicit permission. Ultimately, whether or not giving away a significant portion of an album is good or bad for an artist isn't the issue--the issue is that this would be bad for MP3blogs. They're clearly not going to last forever, but we all have an interest in ensuring that they last as long as possible, and I think Paul's point was made in service of this goal.

UPDATE: Ah, I see that Paul's just said pretty much what I just said. So, uh, never mind.

posted by Mike B. at 12:57 PM 0 comments

Oh, and also: went to the special dinner last night with my special lady in Williamsburg, and right above the Bedford stop there's a wall of posters saying "PULL UP / THE PEOPLE / PULL UP / THE POOR / MIA" in that distinctive green-and-pink MIA grafitti style. What was so best about this was that you could see beneath them the posters that had been there before--advertising the Oasis/Jet gig. I dunno, it was sort of bittersweet.

I'll miss the days--I do already--when we could pretend like we had MIA all to ourselves...

UPDATE: Sasha has a picture of this at the top of his latest post.

posted by Mike B. at 12:43 PM 0 comments

So I went and I downloaded a decent sampling of the MP3s from upcoming eagerly-anticipated albums over at Stereogum. And what the fuck? Did we all get together and decide that the big indie sound for first quarter '05 is "boring pussy bullshit"? Are we pushing back against MIA and LCD by being shitty?

That is, of course (and with the exception of tracks Matthew's already posted, like the Out Hud and the X-Wife) except for Bunky! Who I am totally in love with and want to write a long review of, maybe. I'm even willing to forgive the name now.

Also, could someone please get Clap Your Hands Say Yeah and the Jealous Lovers new singers? Because everything else is fantastic. But those singers, man.

posted by Mike B. at 12:34 PM 0 comments

Monday, February 14, 2005

We played an outdoor show this summer at which a small child danced on a picnic table to a song I wrote. This was the pinnacle of my music career so far. But now I get this note, from a nine-year-old:

Hi M! Al. put on your cd yesterday i think your band is great!
love,
Ar.

So awesome! I replied telling her that we should write a song about tigers sometime, and also not to eat too many hot dogs.

posted by Mike B. at 12:46 PM 0 comments