BuzzSugar

Treasure Island Music Festival: A Wealth of Awesomeness

BuzzSugar — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 12:26:24 -0700

Forget sex and drugs; these days, it is possible to overdose on music festivals. This Summer, you could probably attend a different fest every weekend and discover something new every time. Meanwhile, I've just been pining for the amazing shows I'm missing in countless other cities.

So, I'm delighted to announce that on Sept. 15 and 16, I'll be attending San Francisco's very own Treasure Island Festival in its inaugural year and bringing you all sorts of coverage of the superb lineup.

Held on an under-utilized island in the Bay and presented by the folks behind Noise Pop and Another Planet Entertainment, the two-day festival is cleverly split into a electronic day and a rock-centric day, each one featuring 14 bands. Treasure Island is also making a major effort to be green: The festival will offer zero-emissions shuttles from San Francisco to the island, which looks like this:

But the most exciting part, of course, is the music. For more details and my must-see bands, read more

Ok, so I'm giddy just thinking about the artists playing this fest, including Modest Mouse, M. Ward, and Spoon, who recently won me over with their infectious Summertime album.

I can't wait to see sassy hip-hopper MIA do her thing live, and I hope to find some new favorites too. I'm not all that familiar with Ghostland Observatory, but I have a good friend who claims that seeing them in concert is a near-religious experience. Here's the full lineup:

Saturday, 9/15

Thievery Corporation
Gotan Project
DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist
M.I.A.
Ghostland Observatory
Kinky
Zion I
Flosstradamus
Dengue Fever
Honeycut
West Indian Girl
Mocean Worker
Kid Beyond

Sunday, 9/16

Modest Mouse
Spoon
Built To Spill
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
M.Ward
Two Gallants
Earlimart
Au Revoir Simone
Film School
Devil Makes Three
Sea Wolf
Street To Nowhere
Trainwreck Riders

If you're interested in attending, tickets are available online for $58.50 per day or $110 for a two-day pass. Tell me which artists you're most interested in hearing about, and I'll be sure to tell you all about the shows.

Song of the Day: M. Ward and Zooey Deschanel, "Get to the Border"

BuzzSugar — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 13:27:34 -0700

You probably know by now that I have a major girl-crush on Zooey Deschanel, and I'm also intensely smitten with M. Ward, the boyish yet poignant singer-songwriter whose Post-War was one of my top 20 albums of last year. So, I'm really have trouble containing my excitement about this duet between the singer and the actress I just discovered via The Music Slut.

Called "Get to the Border," the song will be featured in the upcoming indie film The Go-Getter, which stars Deschanel and features a cameo from Ward. You can hear the song on the movie's MySpace page. I think it's really good, and not just as a novelty item. What do you guys think?

Song of the Day: Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins, "Handle With Care"

BuzzSugar — Wed, 27 Dec 2006 06:37:05 -0800

One of the more exciting things about today's independent rock scene is the way it fosters new musical collectives, from the multi-spoked community surrounding Broken Social Scene to the collaborations between M. Ward, Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes, and Jenny Lewis of Rilo Kiley. The latter is personified by this Traveling Wilburys cover, "Handle With Care." It may not be the best song of the year, but it's without a doubt one of the most collectively fun tracks of 2006. (It also happens to feature two artists from my Top 20 Albums of 2006.)

BuzzSugar's Top 20 Albums of 2006: Part II

BuzzSugar — Wed, 27 Dec 2006 06:00:11 -0800

Not every year can be a great year for music, and 2006 was just okay. It didn't help that this year was sandwiched between 2005-which gave us great albums by Kanye West, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and Sufjan Stevens-and 2007, which promises new releases from Wilco, Arcade Fire, and Timbaland. While choosing my Top 10 for the year was a cinch, coming up with the bottom 10 was tough.

Thankfully, I managed to scour enough of the year's music to bring you this four-part series, BuzzSugar's Top 20 Albums of 2006. Now for Part II: albums 11 to 15. (Read yesterday's installment on albums 16 to 20.)

15. Destroyer, Destroyer's Rubies

Dan Behar is a refreshing anomaly in the power-pop paradise of his other band, The New Pornographers. For fans of “Jackie” and other Behar-penned Pornographers’ tunes, his Destroyer’s Rubies solo album is a welcome indulgence. There’s something very lively about the way his incessantly staccato vocals exchange pleasantries with acoustic guitars and clanging percussion, but his fast-paced rock also has a sinister air. Somehow, Behar manages to be at once completely bizarre and bitingly fun.

14. Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins, Rabbit Fur Coat

Like her band’s 2005 album More Adventurous, Jenny Lewis’s first solo outing is tragically inconsistent. But it’s still hard not to be charmed by her singing and songwriting, both of which have just enough edge to keep them from being too cute. In this stripped-down, more honky-tonk version of Rilo Kiley’s pop, Lewis alternates between celebratory and cynical and even gets a little help from her friends (including M. Ward) on a great cover of the Traveling Wilbury's song “Handle With Care.”

To see the rest, read more

13. Neko Case, Fox Confessor Brings the Flood

If there's one thing to be said-over and over and over again-about Neko Case, it is that she has the best voice in indie rock. But the descriptor is ubiquitous only because it's true. Case's disconcerting pipes are at once velvety and rough, and while her genre falls somewhere between pop, rock, and country, the all-important unifying factor is how she belts out her lyrics, which are at once totally off-kilter and entirely identifiable. Just listen to the opening track, "Star Witness," with its bell-like guitars, brushed drums, and Neko-domination, and you'll understand perfectly.

12. Califone, Roots & Crowns

In its more organic moments, Califone's latest album sounds born out of some folksy, dreamy forest with its whispy vocals, harp-like acoustic guitars, and gentle woodsy bass clarinets. But lest you think you've got Califone figured out, the music will suddenly move from folksy to totally far-out, like a sci-fi jam band propelled by industrial machinery. While it's undoubtedly experimental, Califone's music is very easy to digest, and the jazz-influenced complexities don't translate into cacophony.

11. M. Ward, Post-War

It’s often puzzling to me why M. Ward isn’t more popular and challenging the dominance of someone like John Mayer. The singer writes perfectly compact little pop songs sung in a plucky boyish voice, then weaves them together with head-bobbing beats and lively pianos. Maybe it’s because his jovial lyrics, like those in “To Go Home,” have an occasional dark tinge: “God it’s great to be alive / takes the skin right off my hide / to think I’ll have to give it all up someday.” Regardless, this is Ward’s most cohesive album yet, and it’s a shame more people haven’t discovered it.

The Top 50 Music Videos of 2006

BuzzSugar — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 04:45:56 -0800

Just the other day, I was saying that YouTube is helping save the music video. But if you need more proof, check out this list of the 50 greatest music videos of 2006. You're not likely to find most of these on MTV, but you can find them all on YouTube. As a result, most of these artsy videos are highly creative and refreshingly unglitzy. Highlights include the famous treadmill video for OK Go's "Here It Goes Again" and some more obscure picks, like two of my favorites below.

4. M. Ward, "Chinese Translation"

12. Xiu Xiu, "Hello From Eau Claire"

Buzz In: Which Actors Have Made Albums You Like?

BuzzSugar — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 13:30:00 -0700

Earlier this week, I gave the Dead Man's Bones debut album a listen. You may not recognize the band name, but you probably recognize the frontman: it's actor Ryan Gosling. I'm a big Gosling fan, but I wasn't expecting his music to have any substance, or for me to actually like it. Nothing against him, it's just that actors crossing over into music usually fall into a fitting cliche - epic failure.

Every once in a while, though, someone talented proves they're truly multi-talented and makes some enjoyable music. Last year, I fell for She & Him, Zooey Deschanel's project with M. Ward, and I loved Phantom Planet: The Jason Schwartzman years.

There's a longer list of tragic actor/musician crossovers, but I want to focus on the diamonds in the rough: What actors have made albums that you like?