Heads up.

Just back from the Pitchfork Music Festival in Chicago. Thought you guys should know there is a mega update coming probably today or Wednesday. I haven't forgotten you.

Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum

This is the new music video from the band Man Man. The song sounds a bit like Rain Dogs era Tom Waits on coipus amounts of acid. The video follows suit. One of the cooler music videos I've seen in a long time. Apparently they are actually going to play this on Nickelodeon. Man, things have changed since I was a kid. Ha, as if I'm not still.

More Bonnie Stuff

I'm thinking that very few people have probably actually listened to this song, and since it is easily one of the most moving pieces of music that I know of and I spent a paragraph talking about it in the last entry, I should probably up it here. Check out the vocal delivery on the line "did you know how much I love you". Incredible.

Bonnie "Prince" Billy - I See a Darkness

And one from the new album: Bonnie "Prince" Billy - God's Small Song

Listen to it.

And the new video for "Cursed Sleep", which features Will Oldham wrestling a man in an ET mask.

Then The Holding On

everyone will tell you its evil to be

a free-thinking pecker like bonnie old me

but ill flex my armies and blow out my gut

and prove ill be loved by any old slut

look here in my wallet, its loaded and true

and now we can leave here

and go and find you

It's hard to know what exactly to say about the many incarnations of Will Oldham's music, the most recent and steady of which is the moniker of Bonnie "Prince" Billy. I remember when I first heard I See a Darkness a year or two ago. I'd read somewhere that the album was essential, heartbreaking and beautiful. Heartbreak was kind of my bag in those days, and it's safe to say that I was probably playing the Jason Molina solo album on repeat alone in my dorm room crying right up until I got the Bonnie "Prince" Billy album. Anyways, it was one of those things. The title track, which as it turns out is a total revamping of a Johnny Cash song, pretty much left me in shambles. I don't think I recovered until the next morning. I See a Darkness is probably Oldham's best work, the kind of album fans spend the rest of their lives praying for him to top.

The other night a wonderful thing happened. The new Bonnie "Prince" Billy album Then The Letting Go was set free on the internets. I, of course, have listened to it three times in the past 24 hours. It is, surprise, fantastic. It's a different approach, but accomplishes the emotional engagement of his past work swimmingly. Relying heavily on strings and the vocal harmonies of a woman quite a lovely voice, Then The Letting Go is equal parts love and lore. Some songs focus on the yearning for another, while others introduce characters from other worlds experiencing modern human emotions through situations no modern human is experiencing. The songs seem to be more about holding on than letting go, which is sort of a departure from a lot of the previous Billy work, but it doesn't change the level of connectivity between the listener and the musician. At least not for me, but of course music this emotional depends a great deal upon the experiences of the listener for any sort of connection to be made. However, I find it hard to believe that anyone who somehow ends up with this music hitting their ears would not have experiences that would make this music poignant to them.

Highlights include the powerful and tender "Strange Form of Life", the jarringly intense "The Seedling", and the sparse and thoughtful "God's Small Song".

There's little doubt that if I make a top ten list at the end of this year that this will be on it. Hard to believe a guy that looks the way he does makes music the way he does. Though in a way, I kinda dig his look.

Here's the beef.

Alright, that last post was cruel with no downloads, so here you go.

Fantastic and catchy new shoegaze music with a Japanese babe* for a lead singer:Asobi Seksu - Thursday

The dirtiest, awesomest, most ridiculous rock and roll song of the year: Howlin' Rain - Calling Lightning with a Scythe

This song is made to have sex to on the dance floor. I haven't done it, but I can imagine what'd it'd be like if I did: Junior Boys - In The Morning

An outrageously good singer/songwriter with a stunning voice: Lambchop - Beers Before the Barbicon

Sing it with me now; "PUT ON YO WORK BOOTS, MOMMA!!!!": The Black Keys - Modern Times

I don't think anyone dislikes this song, despite it's use of the term "I've got you by the lapels": The Dears - There Goes My Outfit

Bonus DL, here is the acoustic version which is also great: The Dears - There Goes My Outfit (Acoustic)

TV on the Radio + David Bowie = Fucking awesome. I know my calculus: TV on the Radio - Province

It's folk! No, wait, it's blues! No, uhh, it's, uhh... experimental alt-country? Whatever, it's glorious: Califon - Our Kitten Sees Ghosts

One of the best songs I've heard in a very long time: Neko Case - Star Witness

Also, take note that on the right is my weekly most listened to artists from my audioscrobbler. I know you can see it, I just wanted to point out that via my skills at being the master of the internet I was able to get them to show up on my blog.

*

The longest sentence ever.

It's hard to say what has been the nicest surprise of 2006 so far. It seems every year I get so caught up in looking forward to new albums by my favorite bands that I totally forget that new bands put out fantastic material every year, and bands that have been around awhile sometimes step up their game. This year I thought I had a new Radiohead album coming. Turns out I was wrong, but then we got a Thom Yorke solo album and I saw Radiohead live twice. So the universe works itself out I guess. Wilco was supposedly recording too, but it doesn't look like that one is coming soon either. But that Tweedy/O'Rourke album turned out to be a pretty nice little hold me over anyways.

So on the surface it seems that these circumstances may have me set up for let down. Not the case. All the sudden TV on the Radio has put out maybe the best album of the last couple years, significantly improving on the already stunning Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes with the periodically sprawling, but mostly just jaw dropping Return to Cookie Mountain. Neko Case may have topped her best record with the glorious and beautiful Fox Confessor Brings the Flood, out of nowhere this Comets On Fire side project Howlin' Rain put out a fucking awesome mixed bag of rock and roll and overdriven guitar solo stoner rock, The Dears changed it up but managed not to loose their flavor, the Junior Boys may have topped the minimalistic electro pop of their last album on the fantastically catchy and endearing So This Is Goodbye, The Black Keys take a turn away from straight headbanging and toward thick ass guitar riffs that induce such a strong head bob that you may still suffer from whiplash the next morning, Califone comes through yet again with expansive and experimental alt-country rambling on Roots & Crowns, Built to Spill made a triumphant return, Destroyer put out a hell of an album, and I'm still trying to get up to speed on this new Lambchop, which sounds beautiful as well. Was that a run on sentence? Just trying to catch you up to speed on what the veterans are up to.

Fuck, I forgot, you should really check out this band called Asobi Seksu. They put out a totally awesome shoegaze/guitar-pop album called Citrus. It's so good.

I'm sure I'll go back and post more in depth about some of those albums soon, but I was just going through and looking at where we're at so far this year and realized how impressed I am with what's going on out there. I hear all the time, even from young people, that music is going down the tubes and blah blah blah. And every time I hear it I want to grab them by the shoulders and scream "GET OFF YOUR LAZY ASS AND FIND IT!!!!!!!!!" It's really not that hard. Just read this blog! Just kidding. The year is what, half over? It's gonna be a barn burner.

Sorry my first two updates have sucked. I swear soon I'll start thinking these out before I write them, just trying to get into the habit of updating. If there is any music mentioned in here that you want to get your hands (ears) on, let me know. I'll make it happen. That's what this is all about, getting those of you who care music that you'll enjoy. I may make it seem intimidating or something, but it's not. It's just music, it's just sound and time and sometimes space that comes together in a way that your brain may or may not tell the rest of you that it enjoys. Pretty simple really. There's just a lot of it out there. Try not to miss it.

Until next time.

Please watch this video, and watch it loud. It's the best song of the year off the best album of the year. Just listen to the guitars at the end. The song is about a guy who turns into a warewolf. And he likes it.

Feeding on fever
down all fours
I'll show you what all that
howl is for

Who got a match!?!

So here we are. It's 2006, or some shit like that, who can remember anymore? Anyway, it's whatever year this is, and we're all hanging out listening to our sweet ass Sufjan Stevens albums and feeling pretty cool about ourselves. Wait, you're not still listening to that pussy crap, are you? Don't you know this year we listen to TV on the Radio at ear splitting volumes instead? Get the net!

Anyways, I was thinking (bad start, I know) that since we all do tend to get caught up in this silly tight-pants-black-rimmed-glasses-shitty-hair-cut-indie scene, and since this is my first real music entry in this blog that we should take a moment to acknowledge our sponsors, so to speak. Though the Shitty Beetle blog bows to no corporate sponsors. That's just really sad.

Okay, no more Wayne's World. Where was I? Oh yeah, music. Earlier, when I said sponsors, I really meant something else. I meant bands that were around a long time ago that made bands that are around now possible. One of my favorite bands of all time, and in my opinion one of the most important bands of all time was The Talking Heads. Now I know, to most of you they're just that band that did Burning Down the House. And fuck yeah, that's them! However, The Talking Heads were far from just another goofy 80's pop band. Shit, the Heads were doing music that sounded like 80's music in the 70's. That's right, before it was cool. But the point is that The Talking Heads were doing new things with music, fusing punk music with pop music, African rhythms with the new wave. I guess talking about music in this way can muddle up what's really important about a sound. What's really important here is that this band made some fun motherfucking music. Catchy, experimental, danceable, different, and joyous.

If you listen to bands that sound like The Arcade Fire, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!, or most any other new age retro indie non-sense, you should thank David Byrne and company, because without The Talking Heads pretty much none of your favorite bands exist.

God it feels so good to listen to this band. And I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's time for you to pull your head out of your ass and download the discography. I mean buy it. Whatever.

Download. Listen. Dance. Uh oh, love has come to town.

Talking Heads - Uh Oh, Love Comes To Town
Talking Heads - Making Flippy Floppy

Welcome to SHITTY BEETLES.

Alright so fuck Live Journal then. I mean, I blogged on that thing for a solid year, and all I managed to do was cunt it up with my over emotional bullshit ramblings and the occasional link for a download that no one ever fucking clicked. So fuck it. I'm gonna try and do this right. I'm starting a music blog. No one will read it, but I'll enjoy it.

I'm gonna try to set this up in a way that looks nice. And I'm going to update it frequently and thoroughly. And if I don't, you better bitch at me about it because this is good for me as a writer, it's good for my soul, it's good for your knowledge of music that kicks ass. It's a good thing so make me do it.

I'll update with something relevant very soon.