First Listen: John Zorn - A Dreamer's Christmas

A Dreamer's Christmas is one of those albums that'll make you smile from the very first notes. Listening on the drive to work, it made me want to be nice to everyone. Those who know me will immediately say, "Yeah, right." But it did, even to the jerk in the Audi tailgaiting me through the park. I got a sweet smile from a young woman in an SUV — hate 'em — whom I let slide in front of me in a traffic jam. 'Tis the season. And this music will definitely put you in the mood.
That may come as a surprise to those of you who associate John Zorn with challenging, even dissonant music; remember Colbert's facile attempt at humor — yes, I chuckled — when Zorn won a MacArthur Genius grant? But keep in mind that he's released hundreds of varied albums on a number of labels, from the electric jazz of his early band Naked City to the haunting Jewish melodies he's composed for diverse Masada ensembles to The Dreamers, whose music Zorn's label Tzadik describes on its website as, "Perfect for the early morning, late at night, at home or in the car..."
It turns out that Zorn has wanted to make a Christmas record for years. The Dreamers is the group he chose to make it: Marc Ribot, guitars; Jamie Saft, keyboards (that's his killer piano solo in "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town"); Kenny Wolleson, vibes, chimes and (what would Christmas music be without a) glockenspiel; Trevor Dunn, basses; Joey Baron, drums; Cyro Baptista, percussion; and guest vocalist Mike Patton (Faith No More, Mr. Bungle) in "The Christmas Song."
One of the highlights of A Dreamer's Christmas is a bittersweet interpretation of Vince Guaraldi's "Christmas Time Is Here." It perfectly captures not only Charlie Brown's holiday angst, but also the mixed feelings a lot of us have around this time of year. John Zorn has given us an album of standards — plus two originals — that we can all enjoy.
Which brings me back to my commute. I got to a green light, and traffic was backed up a few cars through the intersection. I could have slid into the oncoming lane and made an easy left turn. But I was grooving to the holiday sounds, so I was happy to wait. Good thing: Up the oncoming lane cruised a police car. That would have been a hefty ticket. Thanks, John Zorn!
Tom Cole @'npr'

Hear 'A Dreamer's Christmas' In Its Entirety

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Swearson Klank - Falling Into Infinity

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Last year DUBLAB.COM invited a diverse spectrum of music makers from around the world to contribute 8-second loops with any ambience, rhythm, tonality or texture they desired. This song was created using the exhibition’s original 8-second audio loops as their sole sound sources. No extra samples, instruments, vocals or sound sources were used in the creation of these songs. Just like the original audio loops included in the exhibition these remixes are offered to the public under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial Copyright License. This means that you are free to legally download, share, and re-re-re-re-remix these songs for noncommercial purposes. There are more remixes posted here: http://tinyurl.com/7y82uq6
Bonus:
Mary Anne Hobbs Mix 2011

Tracklist:
1) Sweatson Klank - Start at The End
2) Sweatson Klank- In Between
3) Sweatson Klank- My Love is Here
4) Sweatson Klank - Oblique
5) Sweatson Klank & Om Unit - Lost At Sea
6) Sweatson Klank- You and The Sky
7) Sweatson Klank - Morning After Pills
8) Sweatson Klank & Afta 1 - Satori

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Mrs Thatcher has set out in great detail the arrangements for her funeral. Great. Now that's sorted let's get on with it.

Viktor Hertz: Honest Logos

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Viktor Hertz

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Mark Stewart New Album Details

Mark Stewart w/ St Vincent (QEH 10/11/11)
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The Pop Group frontman Mark Stewart has announced the details of his upcoming new album, entitled The Politics Of Envy. It's due for release on March 26th next year, and finds Stewart teaming up with a host of guest musicians.
We've already run a free download of one of Stewart's newer tracks, 'Nothing Is Sacred', which pairs Stewart's ire with music from Crass's Eve Libertine, Berlin group Slope and Pop Group bassist Dan Catsis. It was released as part of a double A side single which also included his cover of T. Rex's 'Children Of The Revolution' (in collaboration with London dub brutalist The Bug).
The Politics Of Envy finds him working with others artists, including PiL's Keith Levene, Lee 'Scratch' Perry (appropriate, given Stewart's long-term connection with dub), The Raincoats' Gina Birch, The Slits' Tessa Pollitt, Factory Floor, Richard Hell, Massive Attack's Daddy G, Primal Scream, Jesus & Mary Chain's Douglas Hart and upcoming Bristol producer Kahn. The concentrated fury of 'Nothing Is Sacred' and list of track titles on here should give some indication of what to expect, sound-wise.
Opener 'Vanity Kills' features Richard Hell, Kenneth Anger and Kahn; 'Autonomia' features vocals from Bobby Gillespie; London crew Factory Floor join Stewart for 'Gustav Says' and 'Stereotype', and Daddy G on 'Apocalypse Hotel'.

'Vanity Kills'
'Autonomia'
'Gang War'
'Codex'
'Want'
'Gustav Says'
'Baby Bourgeois'
'Method to the Madness'
'Apocalypse Hotel'
'Letter to Hermione'
'Stereotype'
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FYI

Stereogum Year End Charts

01. Girls - Father, Son, Holy Ghost
02. Drake - Take Care
03. Bon Iver - Bon Iver, Bon Iver
04. Fucked Up - David Comes to Life
05. The Weeknd - House of Balloons
06. Gang Gang Dance - Eye Contact
07. EMA - Past Life Martyred Saints
08. PJ Harvey - Let England Shake
09. ASAP Rocky - LIVELOVEA$AP
10. Jay-Z & Kanye West - Watch the Throne
11. Kate Bush - 50 Words for Snow
12. M83 - Hurry Up, We're Dreaming
13. Yuck - Yuck
14. Austra - Feel It Break
15. Zola Jesus - Conatus
16. Neon Indian - Era Extraña
17. Oneohtrix Point Never - Replica
18. Beyoncé - 4
19. Iceage - New Brigade
20. Real Estate - Days
21. Clams Casino - Instrumental Mixtape
22. Ryan Adams - Ashes & Fire
23. Wild Flag - Wild Flag
24. Frank Ocean - Nostalgia, Ultra
25. Cold Cave - Cherish the Light Years
26. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - Belong
27. Destroyer - Kaputt
28. Pictureplane - Thee Physical
29. Washed Out - Within and Without
30. Radiohead - The King of Limbs

Santa's Surrounded

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(Thanx Sam!)

Wilco (Daytrotter Session)

It was the day after my birthday and nobody had gotten me a thing. Just treated myself to a rental car and an early morning drive into Chicago. The weather was a piece of shit on this early September day, the cirrus clouds forming and moving in weird, clumping patterns until they turned into something otherwise and began to piss out the gray rains they'd stored for god knows how long. Everything had cleared up mostly by the time I arrived in just north and east of the Loop, or it's at least where it felt like I'd been directed. There was a conspicuously available parking space in a residential neighborhood - near a church and an elementary school and a dry cleaning establishment - about three blocks away, so the car I'd just met hours before was paralleled there for a few hours. As you get closer to the Wilco Loft - the one that we saw so much of in Sam Jones' documentary film "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart" - the smell of what you imagine might be the best chicken ever to be had, gets stronger and stronger. You feel like it will be on your skin and in your hair for days and it's not all bad. You wonder if they eat there a lot, but you think that they might go for great soups and salads more often than rotisserie chicken. These are all just hunches about Wilco, America's band.
The directory on the outside of the warehouse building has typewritten names next to buttons and their floor simply says, "Foxtrot." You stop questioning if you're in the right place anymore. Ascending the steps in the concrete stairway, you can hear the very familiar sound and as you get closer, you begin to make out Jeff Tweedy's voice. The door opens and you immediately comprehend where you are, but you feel like an intruder, even though you've been invited. Tweedy, bassist John Stirratt, drummer Glenn Kotche, organist Mikael Jorgensen, guitarist Nels Cline and multi-instrumentalist Patrick Sansone couldn't be kinder or more personable, but you feel like you're intruding on something that comes close to being a mythological band, in many ways. It feels partly wrong that you're drinking their spectacularly tasting coffee and snagging handfuls out of their bag of tortilla chips because you shouldn't be here, peering behind the curtain. You shouldn't be looking at the prized autographed photos of Bob Newhart and Don Rickles, both made out to who we're led to believe are each comedian's biggest fans. There are bunk beds and desks and more privately owned musical equipment than you've ever seen - all of it used to make and perform some of this generation's finest collections of songs.
When you think about Wilco, it's nearly impossible not to start with Tweedy and that voice. He's surrounded himself with some of the best players in the world - guys like the effortlessly phenomenal Stirratt, the every-dude genius in Kotche, the versatile Sansone, the flawless Jorgensen and a guitarist like Cline, who even when he "clams" a note, it's a masterstroke - but it nearly always begins with his words and the way they sound when he half-smiles, half-grimaces them out in that wonderfully raspy way of his. "Whole Love" is another stunning chapter of Tweedy getting himself caught up in all of the vagaries of the heart and the mind and all of the ways that things get painful and only sometimes turn beautiful. He reminds us of a passage from Barry Hannah's novel, "Ray," in which Hannah writes, "Americans have never been consistent. They represent gentleness and rage together. One lesson we as Americans must learn is to get used to the contrarieties in our hearts and learn to live with them." The character that gave the soliloquy in a speech is then seen thinking about himself and it seems to be where many of Tweedy's characters come from. Hannah writes, "I am infected with every disease I ever tried to cure. I am a vicious nightmare of illnesses." "Born Alone," features Tweedy singing, "I have heard the war and worry of the gospel/Ferried fast across the void/I have married broken spoke charging smoke wheels/Spit and swallowed opioid/I am the driver at the wheel of the horror/Marching circles at the gate/Mine eyes have seen/The fury so flattered by fate," and there are illnesses within, always being battled. We all fight our problems, the ones that gnaw at our ankles and get into our bloodstreams. They slow us down and they speed us up and all that we can do about them is to acknowledge that they're ours. They belong to us and we can still get along happily if we try our hardest to make it through. Wilco has taught us that. We owe them a lot. We shouldn't have drank their coffee or eaten their chips. We should have brought them a few of those tasty chickens from across the street. Next time, if they'll have us.
Words by Sean Moeller, Illustration by Johnnie Cluney, Recording engineered by Tom Schick and Mark Greenberg

I Might
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Born Alone
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