WUTK

Soooo, I've got my DJ shift. I'm on Saturdays from 1-3 on 90.3. If you're out of Knoxville, you can listen online at wutkradio.com. Simple enough. The show's definitely not much of me, but we do play some pretty great music. I highly recommend tuning back in from around 9 - 12 for the Edutainment Hip Hop show. It's three hilarious hours very well spent.

I'm thinking about starting a new series for music videos. If you all can think of a good name for it, I might just consider.

Crowd participation is just the best.

Put any ideas in the comments below.

The Smith Westerns - "Imagine, Pt. 3"

As I said earlier in the week, I saw the Smith Westerns with Yuk and Cool Runnings this week, and had my mind blown at how great they were. The show was rockin' in every since of the word, with just about every crack in the Pilot Light brimming with delighted hipsters. This track stuck out to me, and apparently the band, as they went buck wild while playing it.

Smith Westerns - Imagine, Pt. 3 by Vicente P

New Bright Eyes album streaming on NPR.

Bright Eyes' 8th studio album is already being called his best by some critics and fans. Listen to the whole thing here.

Get out there and enjoy that day, y'hear.

Tell Em' - Sleigh Bells (Diplo Remix)

The same guy behind Majer Lazer, Hollertronix and producer of MIA makes some pretty great remixes to. It gets a little to boringly dub at times, but the new drums make up for it. Get lost in it, fool.

Sleigh Bells-Tell Em (Diplo Remix) by diplomaddecent

Cover Of The Day - "Reptilia" and "Heart In a Cage"

Good afternoon world.

Recent events have led me to start getting in to The Strokes. I always knew that they were a good little catchy band with a ton of critical hype (at least for the first album), but I've gotta admit, they surpassed even what I had expected. I even liked the last album, which got slammed by a ton of people. The first two songs are some of their best work.

There were two cuts, however, that I've known for quite a while. The first song, "Heart In a Cage", started out as a Chris Thile and the Punch Brothers song to me. It was on How To Grow A Woman From The Ground, and it didn't really go out of its way to give credit to Julian Casablancas and gang. I'm sure its in the fine print somewhere.

Therefore, I'm going to act like its a Punch Brothers song first. It's the better one, anyway.

Chris Thile - Heart in a Cage (The Strokes Cover) by wereofftherails

The Strokes original luckily paved the way for the great song above, but it really is one of my least favorite by them. It lacks the energy and creative guitar licks that make the band so great. I really like the lyrics though.

The second Strokes song I heard Thile take on like a champ was "Reptilia", which was already my favorite song from the band. The chorus emanates this caged energy; like a hurricane in a box.

Now, try it bluegrass style.

As you can hear, they only do it live. I really like that too, because it leaves a huge incentive to go to the shows. Last time I saw these guys, they played Radiohead's Packt Like Sardines in a Crushd Tin Box. It was amazing.

"Marathon" - Tennis

These East-coast nautical bop rockers are light, simple, and unlike Best Coast, interesting. This song especially has the upper east coast day at the beach feel that tons of bands are trying to simulate. How do you go about genuinely portraying the right mood without trying to hard? Go on a seven month sail along the eastern seaboard where you learn you're pretty awesome at music. Don't try it at home.

Tennis - Marathon by Vicente P

Off to see You Just Don't.

Bruce Springsteen - Reason To Beleive

What's up interweb. Sorry for the lack of content here the last few day, but i've been super busy. JUST KIDDING, I'VE HAD NOTHING TO DO. At all. I'm getting some albums together for some reviews, but my music life hasn't been all that blogable recently. Upon coming to this realization this morning, I had an idea. One of my better one's really. I am going to add a song on here everyday I can. It's not going to have any rhyme or reason to it. I'm just going to throw something on here everyday. It's a great chance for me to feature some smaller artists that don't have enough material for me to really talk about em', as well as stuff that I generally enjoy. So, let's start with a classic. "Reason to Believe" is off of Bruce's incredible Nebraska. Just about every song on the album is remarkable, but this one stands out, to me, as the best. There's something amazing about the way he connects dead dogs, unreliable love, and holy sacrament all in three minutes. I don't know anyone else with that type of songwriting ability.



Wellllllll, I've got a nifty little announcement to make. Starting this weekend, you can tune in to WUTK 90.3 The Rock, Saturdays from 1-3 to hear me and a guy I've yet to meet spit da hawtest trax in da hol citee. For realz. I'm a dj. I'm really excited, it being the only radio station worth a damn in Knox-vegas. What's that? You can't reach it because it broadcast's so exclusively in Knoxville? Have no fear, Andy is here. If you will scoot over to wutkradio.com, you'll find instructions on how to listen over the web. If you do not, I will come to your house and play a mixtape of White Snake, Lionell Richie and Insane Clown Posse in your face, while you sleep. What now, ninjas.

Last of all, I've got some pretty great shows in my sights this week. I'm going to catch my friend Josh Manis (You Just Don't) at the Pilot Light Thursday at 10. Later this weekend, me and my Roo'mate Jake are going to catch The Smith Westerns with Yuk and Cool Runnings, also at the Pilot Light at 10. Three cheers for super indie! Hip hip ho-meh. Hip-hip ho-obscure. Hip hip ho-flanel and bikes. Looking on down the line I'm going to really try to get Sharon Jones and The Dap Kings followed by Ryan Bingham followed by Sleigh Bells in Asheville. We'll see, those are close to summer.

Welp, good night.

Sarah Palin Battle Song

And you thought that you were a patriot.

The Decemberists - The King Is Dead

Songs. Sometimes they're great. Sometimes they're terrible. Sometimes they're meh. And sometimes, they get stuck in your head. I'm not talking McDonalds jingle stuck in your head. I'm talking about a band packing up and keeping residence in your head like it's a bed and breakfast, injecting their song into your head with every passing second until it's completely taken over your life to the point of public meltdowns. Well, ladies and gentleman, it's happened. "Down By The Water" by The Decemberists. It's got me in a folk trance. I've caught myself singing it in public. I listen to it every chance I get. I have dreams of Chris Farley singing it to me by my bed side. This song is resounding with me more than any song I've heard before. Therefore, on a quest to remove the song, I bought the album and listened to it three times straight. Impressively, the album's not a one and done; far from it actually. The Decemberists have shaken their epic concept album attachment to make not a long unfurling folk story, but a collection of different shades of folk rock. In broadening their horizons, Colin Meloy's troupe of folksters let their alternative country talent shine with their studio album The King Is Dead.

Not that The Crane Wife and Hazards of Love aren't good albums. Not at all. They are both ambitious and beautiful in places, but they tended to steer towards the darker spectrum of folk, with songs running seven and eight minutes long, and while The King Is Dead has its introspective moments, the real difference in the new album is the energy. The King Is Dead is filled with fun down to earth tunes that just feel right. The album's opener, "Don't Carry It All" sounds likes a barn-stomping affair; all of the family singing along. A perfect drum part and the occasional fiddle-here mandolin-there fits perfectly. "So raise your glass to turnings of the season/ And watch it as it arcs towards the sun/ And you must bear your neighbors burden within reason/ And your labors will be born when all is done." Lyrical creativity has never been a problem for Colin Meloy. In fact, a lot of his music begs listeners to have their dictionary open, looking up the words that Shakespeare would have been inspired by, a feat making the imagery all the more poignant. You know, like Miley Cyrus. But who, in this day and age, has time to look up words in an old dusty book. I went to high school with kids that didn't know what a dictionary was. Therefore, I've prepared a nice little Idiot's Guide to The Decemberists The King Is Dead; how to understand Colin Meloy.

plinth-pedestal: an architectural support or base (as for a column or statue)

trillium-any liliaceous plant of the genus Trillium having a whorl of three leaves at the top of the stem with a single three-petaled flower

bonhomie-affability: a disposition to be friendly and approachable (easy to talk to)

dowager- widow holding property received from her deceased husband

loam-a rich soil consisting of a mixture of sand and clay and decaying organic materials

strata-Layers (the plural of stratum); in archaeology this term generally refers to layers of earth.

anon-at another time; "ever and anon"

gabardine-a firm durable fabric with a twill weave

lynchpin-anchor: a central cohesive source of support and stability; "faith is his anchor"

culvert-a transverse and totally enclosed drain under a road or railway

reverie-absentminded dreaming while awake

panoply-a complete and impressive array

avarice-extreme greed for material wealth

I haven't seen vocabulary like that since The Black Eyed Peas classic, Elephunk.

The King Is Dead also features a panoply of guest artists. R.E.M.'s Peter Buck appears quite a bit, along with Dave Rawlings Machine's Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings Himself. However, these are in no way the only influences apparent on the album. Bits of Tom Petty show up every few hooks or so. Both "January Hymn" and "June Hymn" have traces of Avett Brothers in in their blood. "Down By The Water" sounds like it could be The Boss himself. Even the rallying cry "This Is Why We Fight", one of the weaker songs on the album, reminds me of Muse's epic rocker "Knights Of Cydonia" every time I hear the entrance, and while some might condemn The Decemberists for losing their typical sound and picking up others, the musical execution and emotionally enthralling songwriting makes it all alright.

All in all, The King Is Dead is a great album, mainly because that's all it's trying to be. You can hear the work put into the songs. With all of the help from outside sources, the album has a very communal sound, stretching the boundaries this band had set before. Here's too hoping there's more like it to come.

Cover Of The Day - Halo

It's a classic. Well, not really, but Beyonce's (Not Kelly Clarkson's) hit Halo has found it's way into quite a few artists creative little hands. Something about it's infectiously catchy chord structure has attracted artists from across the genre board.

The original, although not life changing, was a pretty great billboard hit. I don't really know what else to say about, and I mean really, you know it, so why should I try.

102 Beyonce - Halo by hectorbuena

Florence and The Machine gave the song a try on BBC and did a pretty terrible job with it. I mean, they copied the instrumentation pretty much completely from the original, and Florence sounds worse than Wing. I still don't really understand her appeal.



MAJOR LAZER! I know it's not an exact cover, but it's pretty close. Gotta love you some Lazer. Yes, I know, this is the exact instrumentation too, and no, he can't sing well at all, but his name is Major Lazer. When you've got a name so packed with absolute incredibilitude, you can do whatever the f*^% you want to. I would kill to see this act in concert. Kill.

Halo (Beyonce Cover)- Major Lazer by brycool

Finally, just when all hope for a decent cover was lost, ceo, half of Swedish electronica pop duo The Tough Alliance, has delivered a pretty unique intriguing version of this pop power house. Using his own mix, ceo turns the solemn drown-in-love sound of the original, and makes it hazy dreamscape with swirling synths and echoing vocals. It's pretty refreshing from the others.

Ceo - Halo (Beyonce Cover) by handclapmovement

P.S. There are a trillion youtube covers of this, and not one of them is worth anything. Go look for yourself.

P.P.S.

BEYONCE IS HAWT!

Reddit! The other white meat.

I just threw the name of my blog out on reddit, and this guy put it on a really nice list for the whole reddit/music to see. I know he's putting up everything he got, but it's nice to see AFK on the same list as Music For Kids Who Can't Read Good and Gorilla Vs. Bear. So, thanks reddit!

In other reddit news, I found this really awesome song literally seconds after I started looking at the music section. Check it out.

Lost In The Trees - Song For The Painter by the ruckus

So in case you haven't gotten the point, check out reddit/music. It's got some great stuff.

It's 2011. Just thought you might want to know.

No one that comes in the (computer) store and fills out our paperwork seems to know.

Byeeeeeee.