Big news!

January 19, 2011 Leave a comment

This has been in the works for a few months now, and I’m so excited to finally share it with the world (er, Internet)! I started a new food/music blog called Eating the Beats, where I’ll be posting music-inspired recipes, cooking playlists, and other food- and music-related stuff. I’m really excited about this project and hope you’ll take a minute to check it out! If you like it, you can add it to your RSS feed and/or follow me on Twitter at @eatingthebeats for updates on posts.

And if you’re one of my real-life friends reading this, and you ever want to come over and help with cooking some of this stuff, get at me! I love making food in any capacity, but it’s definitely a lot more fun with other people.

Thanks for reading!

Laura

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BEST ALBUMS OF 2010.

December 26, 2010 1 Comment

One of my coworkers recently asked me how I would rate my 2010 (not in music, just life in general), on a Pitchfork scale, and I had to answer, “Ummm, probably a 9-point-something?”

This year was incredible on so many levels — the most significant being that I settled into this amazing city, got my first full-time job (more specifically, a job that I love and get excited about every day); did countless amazing things with an incredible group of friends; went to a potentially unhealthy amount of concerts; took trips to Austin, Chicago, Philly and Michigan; and I started to love and care about food a lot more than I ever have. (That last one will perhaps make a bit more sense in a couple weeks…)

I also listened to a LOT of music, without a doubt more than I have in any other 365-day period of the last 23 1/2 years. (Just a guess, but working for an online music store might’ve had something to do with it.) I listened for the first time to, and fell in love with, a ton of artists who have impacted the new music I listen to today, but I also heard dozens of up-and-coming artists and new records that got me really excited. In fact, most of my top 10 records from 2010 made my head explode in a way that music has never done to me before. Maybe to some extent I’ve changed the way I listen to music, and it’s resulted in me starting to make more personal connections than I have in the past? Or maybe not — I don’t really know. I also think it’s significant that my top five albums are all records that are best listened to from beginning to end. Some of them have very obvious “hits,” but as a whole, they’re complete thoughts with unifying themes and, in a couple cases, actual storylines.

Anyway, here are the records I loved and spent the most time with this year, with a few thoughts on and reviews of some of them. I kinda hate ranking this stuff and it was impossible after the top 10, so they’re in groups. Deal with it! Not that anyone will really read through this whole thing or care much about it; guess it’s more for my own record. (And I should also note like I do every year, that I obviously missed a lot of stuff, and there are records that I know are great but I just haven’t spent enough time with yet; hopefully I’ll catch up in the next couple months?)

the list

Filed under albums, blog, music features

BEST SHOWS OF 2010.

December 19, 2010 1 Comment

I went to about 100 shows this year. A lot of them were fantastic, but here are 20-some that were especially memorable (in no particular order, after the first one…and I’m probably forgetting plenty that were just as great):

- Arcade Fire at Madison Square Garden, Aug. 4. Not only was this the best show I went to this year, but it’s the best I have ever been to in my life. I managed to buy a general-admission floor ticket for this, and thanks to getting there a couple hours early, I was front and center, one or two people away from the barricade. Owen Pallett was on double duty, opening the show and then playing violin with Arcade Fire; Spoon was great; and Arcade Fire was exhilarating. This night was nonstop on my mind for weeks after the show, and I had the treat of seeing them again at Lollapalooza just a few days later — that was a different experience, but no less exciting. Hearing the crowd still singing the tune of “Wake Up” while leaving the park was perfect.

- LCD Soundsystem at Music Hall of Williamsburg (April 8), Webster Hall (April 12), and Terminal 5 (May 19). It was by some Ticketmaster miracle that I was able to go to those first two shows, but they were SO much fun — so much dancing, sweating, screaming the words. I think the Willyburg show was the best, Webster was the most fun, and T5 I went to because I had bought tickets before the smaller shows were announced, and my best friend was in town, so it was still a blast and I remember almost tearing up while screaming the words to “All My Friends” in the company of three of my best ones.

- Owen Pallett at Webster Hall, April 23. Writeup and some great photos.

- Screaming Females at various venues. One of the best concert moments this year was when Screaming Females’ Marissa Paternoster joined Ted Leo on stage at Siren Fest to sing “Woke Up In Chelsea.” The Screamales’ newest album, Castle Talk, while fantastic, isn’t my favorite record of theirs (that’d be Power Move), but they quickly became one of my favorite live bands.

- Janelle Monáe at Terminal 5. Monáe blows my mind. Despite the horrible crowd at this show, she was unfreakingbelievable.

- Sufjan Stevens at the Beacon Theater, Nov. 14. Click for lots of words about that show.

- Samantha Crain at the Bell House and in the eMusic kitchen, June 15 and 16; Frontier Ruckus at Southpaw and in the eMusic kitchen, June 17. Can’t say enough about either of these artists. Click that link for a little on both.

- Lost in the Trees at various venues. I saw this band three times this year, every time was pretty magical. I also interviewed frontman Ari Picker. Writeups and photos from their shows at Bowery Ballroom and The Bell House.

- Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeroes at Webster Hall and Lollapalooza.

- Anaïs Mitchell at Joe’s Pub, April 23. I’ve been following Anaïs Mitchell for a few years now and she’s so lovely live. She and her band played her entire folk opera, Hadestown, from start to finish.

- The Low Anthem at Bowery Ballroom, April 14. Hands down, the most magical crowd-participation moment I’ve been a part of at a concert.

- Superchunk at Music Hall of Williamsburg, Sept. 19. I’ll save my Superchunk spiel for when I write about their record Majesty Shredding on my best albums list, but this show ruled. It should also be noted that I ran to this show from the Williamsburg Waterfont after seeing Pavement.

- Carole King & James Taylor at Madison Square Garden, June 30. When my editor jokingly handed me a CD of Carole King and James Taylor’s Troubadour Reunion Tour, I’m pretty sure he wasn’t expecting me to respond with, “Oh, thanks, I bought tickets to see them in June!” Laugh all you want but I am a shameless Carole King fan. She is amazing, and even if you don’t like the music she performs herself (you know, “So Far Away,” “It’s Too Late,” the theme song from Gilmore Girls), just remember that she also wrote a bazillion hit songs for the likes of the Shirelles, Dusty Springfield, etc. etc. I’m not as well versed in James Taylor’s catalog, and I enjoyed his parts of the show, but King really owned it. I hope I have that much energy when I’m 68.

- Kanye West at Brooklyn Bowl. 2:30 in the morning after way too many hours at Brooklyn Bowl. This was the turning point that officially made me a Kanye fan.

- Against Me! and Green Day at Lollapalooza. SO GOOD.

- Sharon Van Etten, a million times at various venues, but especially at Mercury Lounge in November. I’ve seen Sharon Van Etten perform about six times since moving to New York, and she’s always beautiful and breathtaking but never has she been better than when she headlined Mercury Lounge. It was the first time I’d seen her with a band, and first time I heard her perform most of her incredible new record epic.

- Titus Andronicus at Brooklyn Bowl. It took me a while to get into Titus Andronicus’s album The Monitor, but it was worth the effort to keep listening. This set, while only 45 minutes long, sealed the deal. They were exhilarating and energizing, and I can’t wait to see them again.

- Yo La Tengo and Bonnie Prince Billy at Maxwell’s, Dec. 7. My first Yo La Tengo Hanukkah show will definitely not be my last (unless they stop doing them…). I haven’t listened to much of Bonnie Prince Billy’s music and had never seen him live before this, but his set blew me away. He and the band were a little kooky but so beautiful and captivating. Yo La Tengo was fantastic, too, and it was cool to see them in such a small space. Also, Kristen Schaal and Kurt Braunohler did standup in between the bands and they were great.

- The New Pornographers at the Bell House, June 20. The full lineup of one of my all-time favorite bands, who put out a really great record this year, playing at one of my favorite (small) venues in Brooklyn.

- Belle & Sebastian at the Williamsburg Waterfront, Sept. 20. Another one of my all-time favorites, who put out a somewhat-disappointing-but-not-terrible record this year. Hadn’t seen them since 2006 (with the New Pornographers, in Toronto); this show was outside and it was supposed to storm, and by some miracle, the rain held off.

- My Brightest Diamond at Bowery Ballroom, Jan. 22. Shara Worden is something else.

- Bob Dylan at Terminal 5, Nov. 22. I had low expectations for this, as I’d never seen Bob Dylan before, but he and his band were phenomenal.

- Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings at the Apollo. First time at the Apollo, with great seats and a phenomenal band. Sharon Jones is so much fun.

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My new job + new album reviews (Julie Doiron, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, more)

January 9, 2010 Leave a comment

Exciting news: I have a new part-time job! It’s for a really awesome new music and culture site called Critical Mob, and I’ll be uploading/managing content and photos, as well as doing a lot of writing. Please check out the site and let me know what you think! It launched pretty quietly but the guys who run it (who are fantastic, and I’m so excited to be working for/with them) have some great stuff in the works.

Below are some recent reviews I’ve written for the site. A couple of them are rewrites of pieces of mine that originally appeared on the East Village Radio blog last year (the CM guys used to provide the content for the EVR blog), and some are totally new. They’re not necessarily new records though; some are part of our Top 25 of 2009 and others are on my own personal best-of list (not on the site yet).

Phoenix’s Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
Yo La Tengo’s Popular Songs
Dark was The Night compilation
Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ It’s Blitz!
Julie Doiron’s I Can Wonder What You Did With Your Day
Discovery’s LP

And between this and my other writing gigs, I am thrilled to say that I am actually freelancing full-time now–like, actually supporting myself completely off of music writing/Web-related work and not a combination of that + my savings–and I couldn’t be happier!

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Best music of the decade

December 21, 2009 Leave a comment

I will preface my best-of-the-decade list with this disclaimer: In 1999, I was 12 years old and my favorite “band” was probably 98 Degrees. Eve 6 and the Offspring were in heavy rotation circa eighth grade—my first rock concert was the Offspring with MXPX and Cypress Hill when I was 13 (in 2000 I think?). From about 2001 to 2003 or so, I was obsessed with New Found Glory, Less Than Jake, and the Get Up Kids (absolutely no shame about the last one—I’m still a big fan). While the aforementioned artists are nowhere to be found on this list, I am proud to say my taste in music has changed drastically in the past 10 years. Also, the way I listen to music has changed drastically—mostly in just the past three-ish years, when I started writing about it. So, I feel the need to put it out there that a lot of music that came out in the early 2000s, I probably didn’t listen to until at least 2005.

Considering all of that, a lot of the stuff on this list isn’t on here from a music critic’s standpoint—it’s a combination of records I absolutely love for various reasons and listened to on repeat at some point in the past 10 years, and records that aren’t necessarily what I played the most this decade but that are just really good. For some of these, I’m still discovering more and more things I love about them. But a lot of the following albums are from the later half of the decade. In some cases, there are bands I listened to a lot (The Decemberists and Rilo Kiley, for example) who I didn’t always listen to as full albums, so I picked one record to represent them on the list but it’s not necessarily my absolute favorite from beginning to end.

Also, surprise, surprise, there’s a LOT of great music I missed in the past 10 years and I’m sure I’ll still be hearing for the first time going into the 2010s and beyond. I even discovered some of it—or at least learned why some of it was the best—while writing about Billboard critics’ top albums of the decade just a few weeks ago. My top 25 are ranked, but the order of them has been changed over and over and it will never be perfect…but I don’t really care because they’re just numbers and yeah, I know, these lists can be kind of dumb to begin with. The 50ish following are in alphabetical order because ranking 25 of them was hard enough.

1. Wilco – Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (Nonesuch)
2. Belle & Sebastian – Dear Catastrophe Waitress (Rough Trade)
3. Sufjan Stevens – Illinois (Asthmatic Kitty)
4. LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver (Capitol)
5. Modest Mouse – The Moon and Antarctica (Sony)
6. Arcade Fire – Funeral (Merge)
7. Radiohead – In Rainbows (self-released/ATO)
8. Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Show Your Bones (Interscope)
9. Regina Spektor – Soviet Kitsch (self-released/Sire)
10. The New Pornographers – Mass Romantic (Matador)
11. The White Stripes – De Stijl – (Sympathy 4 the R.I.)
12. Death Cab For Cutie – Transatlanticism (Barsuk)
13. M.I.A. – Arular (XL)
14. Fiona Apple – Extraordinary Machine (Sony)
15. Radiohead – Kid A (Capitol)
16. Rilo Kiley – The Execution Of All Things (Saddle Creek)
17. The Decemberists – Her Majesty The Decemberists (Kill Rock Stars)
18. Yeasayer – All Hour Cymbals (We Are Free)
19. Yo La Tengo – Popular Songs (Matador)
20. Grizzly Bear – Yellow House (Warp)
21. Wilco – A Ghost Is Born (Nonesuch)
22. Sufjan Stevens – Michigan (Asthmatic Kitty)
23. Bon Iver – For Emma, Forever Ago (Jagjaguwar)
24. Animal Collective – Feels (Fat Cat)
25. Postal Service – Give Up (Sub Pop)

See the rest after the cut!

Filed under albums, blog

Best music of 2009!

December 21, 2009 Leave a comment

Wow, 2009 was an awesome year. Not just for music, but for pretty much everything. Lots of big things happened: I graduated college, moved to Brooklyn, and found out that, despite what many others have said is nearly impossible, I really can actually make a [very modest] living by doing only things I truly love to do. And I spent the year with some pretty amazing people too, most notably a really special group of girlfriends who I could not have lived without in 2009.

But it was a good year for music too. I went to some amazing shows, many of which have been documented somewhere on this page and I listened to a lot of records. I also got to interview some cool people, my favorite of whom was definitely Andrew W.K.

This is the second year I’ve actually made a year-end music list and it wasn’t easy. There’s a lot of music I didn’t listen to that I probably should have… This is just some of the stuff I really liked in the past 12 months and, just like my decade list, I could spend forever tweaking it if I had the time. It was also the first time I actually made lists for other places (Billboard, Critical Mob, and the Village Voice Pazz & Jop Critics’ Poll), so that was kind of cool.

Anyway, here goes (and if you’re feeling nostalgic, here’s last year’s post):

20. Discovery – LP (XL)

When I heard that dudes from Vampire Weekend and Ra Ra Riot had a side project, I totally did not expect it to sound like this. While Discovery’s LP isn’t all that deep, it was such a fun summer record and the tracks with Angel Deradoorian (Dirty Projectors) and Ezra Koenig (Vampire Weekend) are great, as is the remake of Ra Ra Riot’s “Can You Tell.” The lyrics “My bed’s too big for just me” will always make me think of my dad’s house, where I spent 10 years sleeping horizontally at the very head of a queen-sized bed.

Discovery’s MySpace

19. Miike Snow – Miike Snow (Downtown)

This record snuck onto here very, very late in the game: One of my editors said it was her favorite of the year so I had to go back and listen to it again and wooow, I must not have been paying attention at all the first time I heard it! Dear guys in Miike Snow: Please stop writing songs for other pop musicians and keep them all for yourself.

Miike Snow’s MySpace

18. Dark Was The Night compilation (4AD)

Dirty Projectors with David Byrne? Feist with Ben Gibbard? Feist with Grizzly Bear? New Yeasayer song? Epic Sufjan Stevens track? Enough said.

Dark Was The Night Web site

17. Raveonettes – In And Out Of Control (Vice)

This record is clean, catchy, and has a song called “Boys Who Rape (Should All Be Destroyed).” Can you argue with that? Didn’t think so.

Raveonettes feature on Billboard.com

The Raveonettes’ MySpace

16. Wilco – Wilco (The Album) (Nonesuch)

I typically hate when artists use their own names in their music (Lady Sovereign, I’m looking at you), but Wilco pulls it off in “Wilco (The Song)” for two reasons: 1) They’re Wilco. I will love them no matter what they do. 2) The song was meant to be funny and kind of tongue-in-cheek, but also the ultimate message was that Wilco will love me no matter what (Jeff Tweedy sings something like “I’ll be your sonic shoulder to cry on”), which is just so sweet and totally what I want to hear from my favorite band.

Wilco’s MySpace

15. Camera Obscura – My Maudlin Career (4AD)

If you keep reading you’ll notice that this year I was a sucker for songs/records with some sort of Motown influence. Hello, “French Navy”!

Review of Camera Obscura’s My Maudlin Career on Billboard.com

Camera Obscura’s MySpace

14. Anni Rossi – Rockwell (4AD)

This record was so incredibly underrated. Anni Rossi has one of those voices that might be a little off-putting to some (think Joanna Newsom), but I love it and this girl is so talented (she’s plays violin while standing/stomping on a suitcase). Also, 4AD wins big time as far as the best set of releases for the year (they’ve got four of my top 20 spots).

Anni Rossi’s MySpace

13. Passion Pit – Manners (Frenchkiss)

While I do love the actual music, this is on here more than any other reason for sentimental value, as it will always remind me of the crazy and amazing summer I spent with my closest girlfriends after graduating college and before moving to New York.

Review of Passion Pit’s Manners on Billboard.com

12. Great Lake Swimmers – Lost Channels (Nettwerk)

I compare this a lot to my No. 10…I love the harmonies and Tony Dekker’s voice is sooo smooth.

Review of Great Lake Swimmers’ Lost Channels on East Village Radio

Great Lake Swimmers’ MySpace

11. Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavilion (Domino)

While this album isn’t as high up on my list as it is on many others, “My Girls” is still probably my favorite song of the year—and the combination of the drums and the “wooo!” is definitely my favorite sound of the year (weird, I know).

Animal Collective’s MySpace

Top 10 after the cut!

Filed under albums, blog

New music feature (my first cover story!!!): Andrew W.K.

November 22, 2009 3 Comments

But—you can’t read it online (at least not yet). Sorry! There are photos of it after the cut, though, and maybe that will get you to buy the magazine ;)

So, after covering Andrew W.K.’s presentation at CMJ for PompOnline.com, I was asked to write the cover story on him for the survival-themed issue of Pomp & Circumstance, which is out now! It’s my first cover story so, if you can’t tell by the way I’m typing this, I am SO excited. I’m still waiting to find out where you can buy the mag in New York, Chicago, and Michigan…so more on that soon.

Andrew W.K. will always make me think of being on drumline in high school, because all the guys in the grade above me loooved him and would always bang on shit while singing/yelling “Party Hard” (they did this at our band camp talent show one year). But now when someone mentions Andrew W.K. (which, if you live in New York, is ALL THE TIME), I’ll be more likely to think of a really freaking cool guy who has an amazing outlook on life and just wants to make people happy, even if he tends to do some really crazy stuff. Also, my interview with him—a couple weeks ago in Brooklyn, before the photo shoot—was one of the best I’ve ever done, not because of the questions I asked but because it wasn’t forced and actually felt like a conversation. Sorry for being super cheesy but the whole experience, the magic of everything coming together perfectly, helped reaffirm that this is really what I want to be doing right now and all of my hard (and sometimes unpaid) work will pay off sooner or later. Hopefully sooner rather than later…

Anyway, on Thursday night Pomp had a party for the issue release and there was a panel about survival with W.K., author Tony O’Neill, and comedian Lianne Stokes, which was filled with talks about hard drugs and losing jobs, and also involved W.K. sitting like a statue for what had to be at least 15 minutes. Many, many thanks to my amazing friends who came to hang out—I had so much fun!


My MSU buddies Nick and Robb flipping through the mag


Me and Andrew W.K. after the panel. My Michigan friends and I bonded with him over our accents.

Photos of the magazine + more from the panel and party after the jump!

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Baby’s first CMJ

November 14, 2009 Leave a comment

First, I know this post is wayyyy overdue. CMJ ended three weeks ago, but I’ve spent those three weeks catching up on real life and uh, going to even more shows because I’m a freak, and writing a lot (for things slightly more important than my blog). The next couple of weeks are super slow on the show front though, and I’m really not complaining.

Anyway, I survived my first CMJ! Hooray! It was a crazy, crazy week, but ultimately a lot of fun and a great experience. I went in not having a badge, so I just planned ahead and got on lists for the non-free shows I wanted to go to…and then all of a sudden I found myself with a badge, but didn’t really end up needing it! My apartment was pretty much a hotel: Four friends stayed here for almost the whole week, and the fellow Michiganders in the awesome band Frontier Ruckus (five band members + two significant others) were here for three nights. One night we had I think 15 people sleeping here including my roommates and me. That is probably never happening again.

Throughout the week I was doing daily write-ups and photos for Under the Radar‘s Web site, and I also covered a panel for PompOnline.com (Web site for Pomp & Circumstance magazine) and did an interview for Heeb, which hasn’t run yet. So uh, I was pretty busy.

Stuff I wrote that week:


PRE-CMJ: The Syndicate/Rachael Ray’s The Feedback party + PHOTOS (The Union Line, Fanfarlo, White Denim [pictured])


DAY ONE: Sneak Attack day party/BrooklynVegan showcase + PHOTOS (Laura Marling, The Antlers, Love Language, Think About Life, Javelin, Walter Schreifels Band, Nathaniel Rateliff and the Wheel [pictured])


DAY TWO: Mumford & Sons, Twenty Seven Media showcase, ABC News Amplified showcase + PHOTOS (Sleigh Bells, Phantogram [pictured], Mumford & Sons, Computer Perfection)


Life Lessons from Andrew W.K. (writeup about Andrew W.K.’s CMJ lecture/presentation)


DAY THREE: Quite Scientific Records showcase + PHOTOS (Lightning Love, Chris Bathgate, Frontier Ruckus [pictured])


DAY FOUR: self-titled magazine and Pop Mart Media showcase, Green Label Sound party + PHOTOS (Delorean, Holly Miranda [pictured], Cymbals Eat Guitars, Miles Benjamin Anthony Robinson, Amazing Baby, Chromeo)


DAY FIVE AAM Showcase/day party + PHOTOS (Dum Dum Girls [pictured], Headlights, the Dutchess and the Duke, Lightspeed Champion)

Artists I think you should check out NOW:


- Sleigh Bells: I know they hardly have any songs and have probably been a bit over-hyped… but whoa, Alexis Krauss (the singing and dancing half of the band, pictured above) is my new hero.


- Delorean: Freaking awesome dancey music from Spain. Would’ve liked to see a longer set and be in a setting where I didn’t have to take photos and notes because I would have much rather been dancing!


- Mumford & Sons: Gorgeous and fun British folk. Their debut LP is already out in the UK and they’re signed to Glassnote Records for the U.S. release.


- Laura Marling: I adore Laura Marling. She’s 19 years old and blows my mind. She was my No. 1 artist I was looking forward to seeing all week and did not disappoint (also British folk). So charming, such a beautiful voice, great lyrics, just love her. She has an album coming out sometime next year and I’m sooo excited to hear it.


- The Antlers: It honestly took me a little while to get into the Antlers, even though I’ve had their record, Hospice (Frenchkiss), forever, but seeing them live definitely helped that. “Bear” is absolutely one of my favorite songs of the year and live it was phenomenal.

A few others: Dum Dum Girls, Nathaniel Rateliff and the Wheel, The Union Line

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