The Chop blog be moving on...

here's the updated URL for the Chop Blog.  

www.thechoprocks.blogspot.com

There's something new there right now!

Help us out.  Go there.  Write to us.  Spread the word.

November happenings

It's been busy and frenzied, my children...

At the beginning of the month, we debuted our new lineup and opened for The Spinto Band at Bottom of the Hill.  It was awesome, as exhibited here:

The Chop was a vicious task-master of rock that eve I can pledge!

The boys of Spinto hopped up and helped us close the show with our whiskey-fueled anthem to Wilmington, Delaware.  The Spintos are a killer band and awesome dudes to boot.  Please send love/money their way whenever possible.

Also--HUGE NEWS:

"We Want It All" is available on iTunes, Amazon.com, Rhapsody and a host of other digital music vendors.  Access!  But here's the really big one.

The Chop's record slip-slithered its way into the Pandora database.  

This is actually a monumentally awesome development in our world.  If you don't know what Pandora is, please go check it out immediately.  It's a terrificly easy-to-use resource for music, and it is 100% FREE. Now we spend all day listening to the other songs that the massive Music Genome Project deems similar to our own.  You have no idea how rewarding experience this can be.

Coming soon for The Chop:  new songs, new album, new outfits, new haircuts, and a new unquenchable lust for power!

Hurrah!

New song + New lineup + Album in stores + Help needed

Dear constituents,

Many things have been happening here in the hearts and minds of The Chop. Here's a summary:

1. We are hard at work on our new lineup for the November 2nd gig with The Spinto Band.  Tom has stepped forward and taken over the bass guitar.   And with that change, we've also got a new drummer, Aaron.  He's awesome.  Check out his exploits/skills with his other band Pegataur, or with his old band BoyJazz.

2. Our album, We Want It All is now available at record stores across this great country!  (literally,  two stores that are at diametrically opposed spots of the continent).

Get it at:

Amoeba Records in San Francisco, California  (1855 Haight Street)

or

Rainbow Records in Newark, Delaware (54 E Main Street)

Please please please go in and promptly fondle/buy it.

It's also available online now at CDBaby, and soon at various other digital outlets (updates to follow)

3. We have written and recorded a new song entitled "Born in Wilmington", a tribute to our hometown of Wilmington, Delaware.  The song is in the form of a traditional Irish drinking song and is meant to be sung loudly, whilst drinking.  Lyrics are here.

It is available for the listening/downloading on our various sites and also, here it be:

Fancy yourself a writer?  "Born in Wilmington" is just begging to have more verses written.

We ourselves cut at least three from this recording.  If you submit a verse that we like, we'll send you something cool (I swear) and maybe even sing it on stage.  So submit one.  Or just write us and tell us what you think.  About anything.  

Wondering how you can help us out?

Right now what we need is reviews, writeups or mentions of any kind.  Please pass our info along to anyone who will listen.  Download our songs (album here) (drinking song here) and pass them around as much as you can.

Thank you.

Led Zeppelin II "Heartbreaker" solos do not happen in a vaccuum,

robert

My Dogs are Tired: Part II of Rob's Reportage on the Treasure Island Festival

Day 2: Sunday

I admit that I kinda didn't feel like going again on this day.  This was partly based on weariness, as I'd gone out and drank a passel the evening before at Zeitgeist,  and partly because I had a strong idea that I'd already had my peak experience with the festival (TV on the Radio the night before).  But I dragged my ass there anyway, free ticket and all, because their were bands worth seeing for sure, and I figured I'd go for awhile and leave once it got old.

The highlight of the day (my day) was Okkervil River.  The sound was good, the band was tight, and they played the songs I most wanted to hear (mainly the first two songs off The Stage Names).  They can be a bit too melodramatic for my taste sometimes, and yes the lyrics are the sort written by a proud Bachelor of English, but fuck it, I like them anyway.  As I garner from my friends, the lead singer Will Sheff may have come off a bit cheesy in his stage antics and crowd banter had I not been right up front and sort of into it.  Again we see an example of how proximity has an almost eerily mathemathical relationship with fun times had.  Okkervil barely edged out the boys in (my other favorite act) Dr. Dog primarily by performing on the big stage (with bigger, better sound) and having lots of energy.

On to the Dog...

They sounded awesome.  My brief history with this band:  About 4 years ago, their record Easy Beat reached my hands (via fellow Chopsman Philby, then living in the Eastern lands) and quickly attained classic status in my mind.  The entire Chop geeked out on this record months on end, and I went to see Dr Dog everytime they came through SF in the last few years and even a few times in their hometown of Philadelphia while I was in the Tri-State Mother-Area for Christmas.  During this period, they toured incessantly, released another record (great, but not quite as classic), and I saw them like 6 times in 3 years.  After this, I admit I was slightly burned out on them...still thinking they were cool as shit, but ready for a break from their stylings.  I guess they made at least a little (read: very very little, like close to zero) money because they were able to stop touring for a few months to record yet another record (Fate) which just came out.  

Anyway, it had been awhile since seeing this perennial favorite of mine, and I was excited to hear the new songs performed.  They were boss.  The songs sounded great.  The harmonies were tight. The drummer, in particular, sounded awesome.  We all agreed that he was either really on that night or took a couple steps up in ability or just maybe wrote way sicker parts for himself for all the newer arrangements.  Anyway you slice it, he hit hard.  

I guess the only drawback was they looked kinda tired.  Minus the drummer, the dudes looked worn out and not quite their usual, bouncy selves.  At least one person completely disagreed with me on this point, so, maybe I'm tripping.  Either way--they really rock the new songs and are definitely maturing as a band.  More good shit to come, for sure.

I also saw Spiritualized...who everyone (including Eric, who I took with me) was raving about beforehand.  The performance, to me, was extremely boring and too damn loud.  The lead singer stood facing at a right angle to the audience, never said a word, and wanked philosophic on hella long noise solos. The band didn't move at all or look like they were having fun.  Drag. Also--the show really was wicked loud and on top of that, during one song, the soundguy fell asleep on the slider or something because it cranked the band up to painful, Master D-in-the-end-sequence-of-Bionic-Commando-head-exploding volume.  Extra lame, to my mind.

I watched some of The Dodos, who around these parts are being heralded as pop music saviors with wine in hand, and they were definitely good. Their drummer is really really talented.  Best part of their set is they had a third guy (there are technically only two Dodos) on a riser in the back who would occasionally pop up from under a table to play xylophone.  When he was waiting for his parts, he'd be hiding under this table, and then when it came he'd pop up to play and be really energetic.  He really reminded me of a Muppet.

I skipped Vampire Weekend--who were maybe the biggest draw that day--because I saw them for free at Amoeba around a year ago.  This was, I'd say, directly before the hype machine throttled them fully (out here, at least).  I had not heard their music at that point, and was taken by Eric (the same who attended Treasure Island with me) who is infinitely more ahead of the curve then I am on any given Tuesday.  I think they have a cool sound but nothing spectacular going on in the way of performance, so saved myself the trouble and sat listening from afar while waiting for Dr. Dog to play.

I got tired and left before The Raconteurs, who I would have liked to see (I'm a big Jack White fan, and I've never seen him live) but honestly who look better on paper than they actually are. If it had been the Stripes instead--I would have made it work, but instead I went home and considered my opinions.

What's sort of interesting is that the festival organizers divided the two days' lineup at least partially by genre (loading up Saturday with more electro-dancey stuff, and Sunday with the scruffily bearded gems of modern indie rock) so you might assume a Chopster like me would go in more for the latter of the two days. Not so. In quick summary, the first day had lower expectations and more surprises, while the second day was sort of opposite.

I await your call, 

rob

The Three Keyboard Minimum is Strictly Enforced: Part 1

I attended the Treasure Island music festival this weekend, saw lots of cool bands, and have lots of highly informed and sophisticated opinions for the proffering.  Behold!

Since atmosphere is everything..let me briefly sum up my some very general experiences with the concert, as all my opinions are beholden to it.  

Firstly: I won tickets to both days!

The free-ness of this (for me) event affected my opinions (positively, I think) throughout the weekend.  Like many frugal young men, I'm usually conscious of trying to get my money's worth out of a ticket purchase. After a couple of the sets I'd be thinking, "damn, that one totally made it worth the money," then I'd remind myself that I paid exactly zero and think, "man, that was definitely worth leaving the comfort of my apartment for" and so on. 

Second thing you should know--I did not see all the bands or even try to.  I was definitely of the mind that in order to "hear every note" of music at the 2-day affair (very possible) one would be compromising any real ability to see actual "shows."  Basically, it's the idea that if you're not close to the stage or as I like to say "up in the mix" you're not really at the show.  If you're way back in a field you're more of a casual observer and to my mind are not having "the full experience." For some reason that paragraph was laden with "quotation marks" denoting "specific phraseology" that seemed to "require it" at the time.

On to the show:

The best set that I saw was without a doubt TV on the Radio.  These guys brought it hard and distorted.  I had been geeking out to their records for the last few months, so I was primed for a good time, and so we staked a spot early (forgoing some other decent acts) and were right in front for the set.  A good performance should do (at least) one of two things:  1. Hook you into liking songs (or the band itself) that you've  never heard before or 2. significantly enhance the songs you already know from the record, adding to and expanding what the recording has to offer.   TVOTR did both, but particularly the latter of the two.  They were the complete opposite of boring.  They had energy, they had horns (courtesy of Antibalas), they had shitloads of soul, and their guitar player had chimes hanging from the headstock of his Telecaster.  And also Kyp was really really awesome.

They played some songs from their new record (which is out Tuesday and which, I heard from my friends who are significantly more download-savvy, is great) but also killed the first three songs off Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes.  "Wolf Like Me" off Return to Cookie Mountain was also a fuzzed out highlight.  On their records, they use this technique where they augment the lead vocal with another that's an octave above on a lot of the tracks.  It creates a very distinctive sound and is awesome.  Even awesomer was (after seeing photos of the band) realizing that Kyp (see above) does this vocal.  Both him and Tunde are bad ass singers, and the whole band just rocks really effing hard.

I saw Hot Chip on Saturday, and I really dug them.  This was a band I hadn't really heard much of...and based on what I knew didn't think they'd work so well playing at 3PM in a not super crowded field.  But they sounded great with like four keyboards and lots of percussive stuff going on and people on stage running around and switching it up.  They were a nice surprise, because their records sound like straight synthed-out dance music, so when they had a drummer and full rock-a-thon band going, it was cool.  I was a bit farther back for this one, but close enough to feel good about it.

I was front and center for  Goldfrapp as well, mainly because I was saving an awesome spot for TVOTR who were up after them.  My friend described them to me before the show as "music that a girl listens to while cleaning her bedroom."  I found that description to be really vivid and fairly accurate.  Not my style at all.  Euro-scenesters who wore all white and rocked (at one point) two keytars simultaneously.

CSS seemed like they could be cool at one of their regular shows (i.e. a packed and sweaty club with tons of dancing), but by this point in the night I was kinda zonked and didn't feel much like pushing into the fray near the stage.  I watched most of the set, but from afar, so I can't really count this one. LoveFoxxx looked cool though.

The aspect of these festivals that makes all my friends (and often me) cringe is that you can't help but get a diluted version of these bands, and it's not really the same as seeing their proper show.  Because of the stage proximity problem, you have to pick and choose a few solid experiences...but truthfully, even if I could have an easy shot at seeing 10 awesome bands in a row right up front under the best possible conditions, I simply couldn't handle it.  I mean, my aged feet and back couldn't handle it, but also my mind couldn't hang.  After a couple, my senses are overloaded.  I need to go home, digest and analyze, and reboot the machine.

ready to roll,

rob

Prattletoads

No news.  The Dark Queen haunts my waking life.

This game is ridiculous.

Must prioritize my life.

B-Toads Update

Day 3: Last night I played through the Elevator Shaft and on into the Gargantuan Ducts...where I promptly withered and died. I had been playing a decent but not stellar game, and this fact may have helped.  Forward progress in the game is becoming increasingly based on memorization 

I was confused on this point but now I feel sure: I have never seen the level beyond this one. This means I'm back at my 12-year old ability level after three days of playing.  Onward!

Also--check this out:

http://www.battletoadsmovie.com/

Must be fake, right?