MGMT and BRMC

Artist: MGMT
Album: Congratulations
Rating: 4/5

What did you love about MGMT? The raving synths? The primal cosplay? The muted vocals? The ironic, clever lyrics?

Whatever it was, it seems the Brooklyn duo took their sarcastic single from Oracular Spectacular, “Time To Pretend,” a little too seriously. Mocking the heroin-addicted, trophy-wife-toting, sports-car-driving rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle just became too real. Now MGMT is taking the exact opposite route on Congratulations by stripping off everything distinct about them. No more weird makeup, no more penitent nostalgia and most noticeably, nothing that sounds like the raver anthem “Kids.”

MGMT doesn’t even plan to release singles off Congratulations, hoping people will download the entire album instead of stealing a few radio-friendly hits. And not surprisingly for a band that proactively analyzes their own popularity, Congratulations is a direct response to MGMT’s overnight success. The band is reluctantly famous and they loathe every ounce of American celebrity culture.

At first Congratulations seems like nothing more than a pop album, but it grows on you.
Starting with “It’s Working,” the album sounds like a party you’re not invited to. But the more you acquaint yourself with the music, the more it grows on you, until you get inside and realize all the guests are moping around wondering where their wonder years went.

Still, the music is crammed with varied influences, particularly ’60s- era psychedelic pop with a dancey heartbeat. Plus, it encourages you to stop being so obsessed about your status (on the internet and elsewhere) or as vocalist Andrew VanWyngarden puts it, “stab your Facebook.” “Flash Delirium” is the nauseated anthem of a self- indulged generation, changing moods like an ADD teen flipping channels. “Siberian Breaks” is a 12-minute, mind-bending trip, like witnessing the end of the world. It’s proof MGMT are not your average musicians.

The lavish dose of hero worship on “Brian Eno” and “Song for Dan Treacy,” along with the line “you’ll never be as good as the Rolling Stones” on “Flash Delirium,” indicate the duo still have someone to look up to. But the bizarre instrumental “Lady Dada’s Nightmare” suggests MGMT wants nothing to do with the amount of stardom the fame monster herself, Lady Gaga, is appointed.

Congratulations asks the question, is fame actually worth anything? The answer from MGMT seems to be “well, it’s something to do.” All the band wants is for that initial praise to mean something in the long run. For now, all that matters is keeping the music fresh and MGMT deserves more than just applause for accomplishing that.

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Artist: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
Album: Beat The Devil’s Tattoo
Rating: 5/5

With a name taken from the 1953 Marlon Brando flick “The Wild One,” the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club conjures up images of switchblades, rumbles and that “my girl” mentality. But musically, BRMC are rock ‘n’ roll zombies, bringing good ol’ fashioned garage rock back to life. For good measure, the band throws in some neo- psychedelia and stompin’ Americana, sounding like a White Stripes album but with more sex, drugs and leather.

Lead singer Peter Hayes once played guitar in the Brian Jonestown Massacre before getting kicked out and the Black Rebels were born.

Beat The Devil’s Tattoo is the L.A. trio’s sixth studio album, carrying much of the badass attitude present in their career, such as the time at Leeds Town Hall when the band rocked so hard the floor broke. You don’t get that kind of reputation on accident.

Maintaining it is a different story, so how does BRMC make it look so easy? The album’s title track answers with “I thread the needle through / You beat the devil’s tattoo.” BRMC draws on the taboos of yesteryear, knowing that nothing is as prickly sweet as those bygone years when “hell” was a dirty word and piercings and tattoos made you a social outcast. For BRMC, this model works perfectly.

But BRMC isn’t a one-trick pony. Their influences and styles are far and scattered. “River Styx” is a tantalizing cruise with a fierce undercurrent where “every soul is a setting sun.” “War Machine” has all the vocal power of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Fortunate Son,” but lacks any direct anti-war message. BRMC’s guitar ranges from pop to classic rock on “Aya,” sounding like a softer version of Zeppelin’s “When The Levee Breaks.”

The 10-minute “Half-State” closes the album with distorted, atmospheric riffs and Hayes’ hazy vocals, proving once and for all, rock ‘n’ roll isn’t dead. At the same time, Devil’s Tattoo makes imitators like Nickelback and Wolfmother look pathetic. For flawless, noisy rock reminiscent of the Jesus and Mary Chain or the Velvet Underground, choose to Beat the Devil’s Tattoo.

Confessions of a Meat-Eater (editorial)

Confessions of a Meat-Eater

There’s long been a war between vegetarians and carnivores, a battle that focuses on everything from animal cruelty to the environment to healthy cuisine. Your typical meat-free character is nice about their choice, realizing it’s a personal decision. On the other hand, you have the agenda-pushing, in-your-face, “Meat is Murder!” type, the ones who strip naked outside of KFC and push pamphlets of decapitated poultry into your hands. Organizations like PETA are on a crusade to end the production of animal flesh, doing so in such a way that aggravates and alienates your average McDonald’s connoisseur and even people who genuinely care about animals.

As an unrepentant meat eater, it wasn’t until recently that I considered the merits of these anti-meat arguments, realizing there actually was some validity. I always assumed those videos of pigs kicked in the groin and cows with their throats slit were part of a propaganda machine and the images came from slaughterhouses in third world countries. None of that happened here, not in America.

Digital Suicide

(a bit whiney this one. But I'll bet you can relate.)

It's impersonal. It's faceless. It's full of stalkers. It's a waste of time. It's Facebook.

And I refuse to socialize like this anymore. I deleted my Facebook, as best as I can*.

A friend said to me, "If you delete your Facebook, you'll basically cease to exist."

Well, fine. I don't want to exist if that's what this means. I'd rather be a ghost, floating through life unaccounted for, off the grid. Gone.

I remember when MySpace first became popular. Some friends were talking about being up all night, talking to each other. I felt left out, so got an account as a joke. I predicted it was a fad, but five years later, I'm an adult and still using a similar childish application.

So now, I refuse to allow my friendships be numbered and ordered and pushed into grids. People shouldn't be shelved away like dusty library books. And I'm tired of being watched silently by people who are supposed to care about me. If someone does care, they "like" it. That's it. No one really talks to me online anymore or reads what I write except five core people.

I already talk to these five on a daily basis and would tell them about my day-to-day regardless. For everyone else, shame on you. Why the fuck am I forced to talk to you through social networking? Yes, forced. If I delete my Facebook, I'll never hear from you again. Why can't you be adults, living people dammit, and just give me a phonecall one day? Why are we communicating through screens? Smoke screens, even! Are you expressing true emotion or putting on a front? How the hell can I tell? Why are we ranking each other, ignoring each other, adding each other, like some kind of insane baseball card collector?

I've felt this way about social networking for a long time, but I didn't stop because I wanted others to care about what I had to say. Yeah, that's right. I stopped caring about the stupid shit you were spewing, but not enough to stop spewing it myself.
And nobody cared, except those five people. Those five people that I would rather talk to in real life anyway. It's degrading to do otherwise.

Now I don't care who cares about me. I don't know why I ever did. But this is like inviting everyone you know to a birthday party. Of those who show up, you know they really care. Well, no one has showed up to my life, so I'm cutting the cords on this dead weight. (haha, that sounds like a suicide note. And maybe it is, in a way. I'll no longer be anyone now. I've committed digital suicide.)

Goodbye, Facebook. Good riddance.
I'm going to treat the people in my life like people. I'll now have hours of spare time freed up that I won't waste on your stupid website. So I'm going back to reading books. Keeping a journal. Going outside.
I'm going to create, love, breathe and die.
It's sad that I let you get in my way.

Computers are a weed, rapidly outgrowing themselves. They are a virus that replicates the human mind.
They will never outgrow the capacities of the human brain because we will never accommodate them.
A human being cannot create something better than himself.
Even the Tower of Babel crumbles beneath us.

I predict a great computer crash. When they cannot advance any further at all, people get stuck, stop feeling amazed with pixels and .mp3 downloads.
Then people will return to their lives and embrace them like never before. It will be a time of great prosperity.

Or not.


*You can't really delete your Facebook, only deactivate it. This is disturbing in and of itself. Facebook will always retain your personal information. One log-in and you'll get it all back, exactly how you left it. I'm not going back, I've promised myself, but it'll always be there.

Where The Teddy Bears Go To Die

Artist: Where The Teddy Bears Go To Die
Album: Where The Teddy Bears Go To Die
Rating: 4 out of 5
These aren’t exactly the Care Bears. Where The Teddy Bears Go To Die, Flagstaff’s most devilish, ursine death metal bandits, are releasing their self-titled debut this Saturday at the Orpheum’s third annual Hammerfest, blaring with all the growling and screaming of a grizzly versus a boy scout troupe. As the band’s vocalist, Gupie, puts it, the music “wraps you in its bear hug of cuddly rage.”
Since their formation in late 2008, the Teddy Bears have left their claw marks on Flagstaff’s local scene, playing with other heavyweight acts Regicide and Black Orchid. The Bears are Gupie on vocals, Mike Mercer on bass, B Low on guitar and Johnny Longhammer on drums. The quartet mixes thrash metal with hardcore punk, part Dethklok and part Sex Pistols, driven by their sardonic sense of humor and cynical social commentary.
“Drunk Driving Speed” is their snarling kick-off, a sarcastic one-finger salute to MADD, the cops and anyone driving alongside them. And even if it’s an old joke, the Bears mock Hot Topic groupies and dime-a-dozen pop-punk bands on “Skinny Jeans."
In the eponymous track “Where The Teddy Bears Go To Die” a New Kids on the Block tape is placed inside a talking teddy bear (Teddy Ruxpin, for those of you who remember those things) creating some of the creepiest, darkest metal riffs on the album.But the Bears have a violent side, too, like manic-depressives that went off their meds (bipolar bears?). Angry anthems and dark, hateful lyrics abound on songs like “Da Tofr Da Beddr” when Gupie sings “Landfill mouth/The s**t you spout/It can’t even be real/Clogged up ears/Don’t even hear/Too numb or dumb to feel.” The enraged “Ho Bag O’ S**t” curses out some cheatin’ whore with more f-bombs in two minutes than even the best gangsta rap.For their first studio album, Where The Teddy Bears Go To Die have done well, able to entertain metal fans (and a few non-fans) with the best and funniest thrash metal has to offer.