Music to My Ears XXXVII

A five-pack of new record reviews!

Anberlin "Blueprints for the Black Market"
A hard rock-inspired alt.rock five piece, Anberlin propels a peppy approach to its music on this record. With a bizarrely dramatic Danny Elfman-like vocal delivery in sections of the opening track, "Ready Fuels," the Orlando, Florida-based band adds an almost Push Kings-esque doot-doot-doo-doo-doo sing-along bridge in "Foreign Languages." While I appreciate the band's power pop tendencies, the record's production values and the group's occasionally lackluster alt.rock leanings -- per the press sheet's comparisons to the Foo Fighters and Superdrag -- make this release whinily white bread. I'm sure the hard-rock heartthrob hoi polloi in middle America might find Anberlin's anthemic assumptions palatable -- especially given the CD insert's pinup-worthy photography and the band's too-true cover of the Cure's "Love Song" -- but I fear that there's not too much to their music. The drawn-out classic rock chorus in "Change the World (Lost Ones)" isn't overly convincing, and "Cold War Transmissions" brings in a bit of boringly radio-friendly blather. This consistency continues for the bulk of "Blueprints," and for the most part, the record rarely resonates with this reviewer. That said, "The Undeveloped Story" contains some promising progressions, and "Autobahn" and "We Dreamt in Heist" return to the Push Kings reminders. Regardless, Anberlin doesn't sustain the interesting sections or sequences enough to hold my attention. When the band's not too ashamed to revel in its unabashed power pop playfulness, Anberlin aspires to a goal worth attaining. But its hard rock approach to alt.rock falls flat, and it's really only the second half of the CD that shows any steady sensibility. I'm not sure I'll return to this for repeat listens. Tooth & Nail, P.O. Box 12698, Seattle, WA 98111.

Armor for Sleep "Dream to Make Believe"
I think I need to seek out more punk and no-wave records to review, because it seems Media Diet is starting to secure service by the more sleepy Sunday sad boy sing-along emo and melodic hardcore labels. Not that I don't appreciate receiving the records or enjoy listening to them, but so much of this style of music sounds the same to me and doesn't always demand repeated listens. Having toured with musical groups such as Thursday and Piebald, the four piece Armor for Sleep is cozily comfortable in the earnestly aggressive yet slightly prone to shoe gazing school of indie rock. "Being Your Walls," the fourth track, is the first song that really caught my attention, with a subtly cyclical and off-kilter song structure. Maybe it's the interwooven chorus or justifiably jagged guitar stabs. Maybe it's the little bit of hesitant herky jerk as the song builds to the end. The segue to "My Town"'s start and stop opening and its simple synth section maintains my interest, and this number encourages me to temper my initial dismissal and doubt somewhat. Not a bad song! "The Wanderers Guild" is a slight step backwards, but the record's rise to the occasion returns, and Armor for Sleep is redeemed by the increasingly intense "Front and Front Steps," an impressive slice-of-life snapshot. This is by far the best song I've heard on this. Whild the CD's closing four songs return to the band's more mellow meanderings, the lyrical content of "Raindrops" and "Kind of Perfect" beg some attention and analysis. The former adequately addresses how certain people in our lives can overwhelm, fill, and feed us. These are perhaps the hardest relationships to lose -- and the most frustrating unrequited loves. As satisfying as it can be to be submersed in and washed over by someone -- as sufficient as that unshared swelling can seem -- it almost always brings the corollary danger of drowning, self-dismissal, and self-denial. The penultimate piece, "Kind of Perfect," also hit me hard. Sometimes you just want someone in your life, to share your space, to settle in silently and soak up the collective experience of being together. In the next room. Silent on the other end of the phone line. Drifting off to dream. Singer and songwriter Ben Jorgensen captures the tension of passive and persistent presence and heartfelt hope, as well as the loss inherent in that longing. All in all, this record doesn't always share its strength in terms of song structure, but substantially, its content brooks no compromise. And to Jorgensen's emo credit, the last song "Slip Like Space" is an impressively intent statement of moving on and leaving behind, as bittersweet as that process and progress may be. Worth checking out. Equal Vision, P.O. Box 14, Hudson, NY 12534.

Fall Out Boy "Take This to Your Grave"
I am such a sucker for this sound. Ecstatically enthusiastic and melodically meaningful! I don't know if I'm prone to prefer pop punk or if I just like energy and intensity with my thoughtfully tuneful and hook-laden sing-along songs. But it's getting so, as interchangeable as some of these bands can be, I almost don't care, I'm such a big fan of the genre. Don't get me wrong, I'm not so far gone that I appreciate or even begin to understand the output and popularity of Blink-182, Sum-41, and their punk-by-the-numbers commercially complicit comrades. But a band like Fall Out Boy, being quite a different animal, is right up my alley. Coming from a monied suburb of Chicago, the band combines the maybe mopey but still hopeful emotionalism of bands like the Smoking Popes with the northern Californian clash and catchiness of the early Lookout roster, as well as some of the melodic grit and grin of the much-missed Underdog Records scene. After several blissfully beatific pop-punk numbers "Saturday" adds some disappointingly screamo backups just before some frightfully delightful falsetto. I wonder whether the band really thought that worked well -- or if both are indications that they don't take themselves too seriously. I like to think the latter, as the next track, "Homesick at Space Camp," is cheekily geeky at several levels. Fall Out Boy combines sugar-sweet songwriting with enough regional place dropping and existentially emotional energy that the end result almost evokes an equation. Plug this record into a computer, and I'm sure you'll come close to a recipe for radio play. Fueled by Ramen, P.O. Box 12563, Gainesville, FL 32604.

Shai Hulud "That Within Blood Ill-Tempered"
Now this is more like it! Unlike emo-leaning bands that adopt some semblance of screamo to elicit an edge, the four piece Shai Hulud avoids such aspirational adaptation and maintains a masculine melodicism amidst its acerbic aggression. Passionate to a point (as in pointed stick, not possibility or promise), this is heavy hardcore that still holds harmony as a value and a virtue. From the very first song, the verbosely titled "Scornful of the Motives and Virtue of Others," Shai Hulud erupts with mirthfully moshing metal and high-minded hardcore. The screamo, shouted vocals don't stick out as silly but instead solidifies Shai Hulud's seriousness. The second piece, "Let Us at Last Praise the Colonizers of Dreams," adds an amusing sing-along chorus that surprised me. Even in the thick of metal-tinged hardcore, Shai Hulud still manages to shout along in harmony. Brilliant! Turning to the lyric sheet, Shai Hulud impresses me with the depth and breadth of its inspirations and influences. Without coming across as cartoonily literary, the band draws on the work of Frank Herbert and J.R.R. Tolkien, composing almost operatic metal concept album-level lyrics while chalenging Johnny-come-lately bandwagon also rans. Truth be told, the album's design screams fantasy metal, but instead, Shai Hulud sheds light on what smart metal or intelligent hardcore might be. The band is aggressive without being assholes. Melodic without being mellow. Clever without being cloying. There is no inconsistency in terms of intensity song to song, and as far as this batch of reviews goes, Shai Hulud's new record is the most consistent, complex, and crucial record I've recently received. Given the band's brand of metallic hardcore and shouted singing, it's somewhat of a challenge to differentiate songs from one another, but the entire record holds together, the overall sound is impressively massive, and the words are worth watching. Even the end notes and thank you list highlights the band's heart, honor, and humor. Think Backstabbers Inc. with the sense of humor and politics of Propagandhi. Or Dillinger Four collaborating with Napalm Death. This is an excellent record that proves aggressive rock doesn't need to be cartoony or overly corrosive. Revelation Records, P.O. Box 5232, Huntington Beach, CA 92615.

Silverstein "When Broken Is Easily Fixed"
After a surprisingly screamo opening to the first song, "Smashed into Pieces," this south Ontario, Canada, five piece falls into a pleasantly aggressive melodic style that combines hardcore and emo. While the strained screamo parts tend to interrupt the effectively assertive melodic basis of the band's songwriting, the overall effect works surprisingly well. I just wish vocalist Shane Told could carry an angry, aggro line without resorting to all-out shouting. In fact, even in the second song, "Red Light Pledge," the guttural interruptions undermine what is otherwise a forceful emotional song. The band shows a sensitive side further with the introduction of strings under a plaintive spoke-word presentation. Do bands feel a need to break down into illegibility in order to claim hardcore credibility? The band adds a subtle nod to heavy metal fret work with the guitar work under the chorus to "Giving Up" -- a nice variation that's not too over the top until another screamo section. Not to continue the song by song, but in general, were Silverstein to find another mode of distraught or slightly distorted vocal delivery, their songs would really shine. Don't shy from your more sensitive side regardless of your metal and hardcore influences. As a side note, Victory's press sheet makes a point to mention that the band took its name from children's book author -- and countercultural freak -- Shel Silverstein. It's an interesting bit of trivia, but the influence doesn't carry across on the CD itself. Silverstein possesses neither the writer's innocent bliss a la Where the Sidewalk Ends nor his more adult-oriented hippie hullaballoo such as "Freakin' at the Freaker's Ball," opting instead for forcefully forlorn songs about love and loss. Regardless, Silverstein does provide a promising brand of emotional hardcore that wins at its most melodic and only suffers slightly when the band lapses into lazy yelling. "The Weak and the Wounded" stands out as a piece with potential, and if the band considered a more herky-jerky angular approach to its song structure, it might not need the back-and-forth screamo to maintain its energy and direction. A closing tip of the Media Diet hat to Martin Wittfooth, whose artwork adds a lot to the overall packaging. Victory Records, 346 N. Justine St. #504, Chicago, IL 60607.

From the In Box: Magazine Me XXXV

My fave magazines are:

Utne Reader

Fast Company

Clamor

-- Clint Schaff

What're yours? Let me know.

Digesting the Daily XV

Recent editions of the Daily Northwestern, the student newspaper of my alma mater, featured several media-, technology-, and activism-related items that might be of interest to Media Dieticians.

Chicago Poet Is a Music Scene Staple
Bard got his start traveling with Guided By Voices and now introduces bands at clubs all over the city
(May 21, 2003)

An Alternative to Corporate Insensitivity
NU alumna, Evanston resident Marci Koblenz founds nonprofit organization for Companies That Care
(May 22, 2003)

The Best Medicine
All joking aside, Laff-In, a senior citizen comedy troupe, uses humor to build relationships, heal painful pasts
(May 23, 2003)

If you work for a college newspaper and would like to sign me up for a complimentary subscription, please feel free to do so. My address is in the grey bar over on the left.

Corollary: Magazine Me XXXV

Since October 2002, Folio magazine has been running a column called "A Great One Remembered" that recalls long-lost magazines. To date they've looked at

Mobster Times

Avant Garde

7 Days

Look

Saturday Review

Southern Magazine

Casket and Sunnyside

Scanlan's Monthly

True

It's one of my favorite parts of the magazine.

NetWork VII

PowerMingle, a second-string online network for business people, has introduce a new service: TravelMatch.

Next time you travel to another city, Powermingle's TravelMatch service will introduce you to other professionals who live there or who are passing through at the same time as you.

Personally, I think I'd rather just search for folks in the places I'm going to go to -- instead of having random matches made based on short-term same time-same place proximity -- but it's an intriguing idea. This can be used to find locals, but it can also be used to connect with other business travelers who happen to be in the same location you are.

Hiking History IV

It's rare that a Web site makes me want to pack a bag, hop on a plane or train, and actually go somewhere to explore the site, well, on site. But Bridges and Tunnels of Allegheny County and Pittsburgh, PA and Built St. Louis inspire me to do just that. The sites don't have all of the elements of what I've been thinking about as mapblogging, but they're close.

Bridges and Tunnels lets you sort the resources by location and use, and includes a good amount of engineering and construction terminology and information. Built St. Louis is "dedicated to the historic architecture" of that city, featuring crumbling landmarks, revitalized structures, lost buildings, and architectural anachronisms. The site also offers neighborhood-based tours of various structures, such as those on the north side, bringing us even closer to mapblogging.

Hiptop in hand, hit the streets!

Thanks to Metafilter.

Magazine Me XXXV

The Chicago Tribune published today a collectively written list of what they consider the 50 best magazines. I was somewhat saddened that one of my favorite magazines -- Fast Company, natch -- didn't make the cut, but it was nice to see some lesser knowns such as Mojo, Reason, Dwell, Metropolis, and Trains get their due.

Jessa Crispin comments on the roundup, as does The Minor Fall, the Major Lift. Both responses beg the question: What's on your list of favorite magazines? Rather than decry other folks' best-of lists, make your own.

In fact, let's do just that. I'll noodle some on my favorite mags, but, hey, Media Dieticians, what are your favorite magazines? Let me know.

Thanks to I Want Media.

Corollary: Weblog Business Strategies 2003

I'm quoted in a piece by Mark Glaser in Online Journalism Review today.

From the In Box: Weblog Business Strategies 2003

I was interested in your mention of the real-time note taking at conferences. Two thoughts: One is that you should get paid for this -- by the conference if by no one else. The second is that legal recorders can probably do this as well for anyone who is interested -- they take basically real-time notes of trial proceedings. -- Owen Linderholm

Postlude: Weblog Business Strategies 2003

I'm not going to do too much in the way of sensemaking in the aftermath of the Weblog Business Strategies conference because I don't want to take the time to reread all of my reports, identify consistent threads, or make conclusions. But I do have some post-conference extemporizing to do.

For the most part, I'm struck by the parallels between the current conversation about blogs and discussions about the state of zinemaking in the mid-'90s. When the mainstream media latched onto zine culture in 1994 and 1995, many of the same questions people are asking about blogs came up in the grassroots print media community. What's a zine? Is it "zine" or "'zine"? (I was one person who thought that the apostrophe wasn't necessary and overly relegated zines to second-class status in relation to magazines. Silly me.) Are zinemakers journalists? Will zines overtake or create a valid media space parallel to magazines?

We didn't answer those questions about zines, and I'm not sure we'll ever answer them about blogs. You see, zines have carried on. The mainstream attention faded, and zines fell back into their quaint little underground. That's not a bad thing. And in many ways, blogs are the new zines. Or e-zines. The parallels are there. While I think blogs have a better chance of walking hand in hand with other widespread forms of Web publishing, communication, and culture, I am bored to tears by questions like "What's a blog?" and "Are bloggers journalists?" (I'm also slightly amused by folks who insist on calling them Weblogs instead of blogs. Tool preference aside, blogs are native to the Web. So why say "Web"? 'Course, I also argued against the term "e-zine," so there we go.)

The subtle difference between Jason Shellen's question -- "Does anyone want us to tell you what a blog is?" -- and Dave Winer's refinement -- "Does anyone care what a blog is?" -- is an important distinction but, in the end, is somewhat moot. Defining and categorizing often leads to restriction and gradual atrophy. In the zine world 10 years ago, we had discussions about reviewzines, perzines, e-zines, megazines, metazines and the like. If you have ads in your zine, have you sold out? Who cares? Blogs already have increasingly limiting strictures imposed on them -- their linear, reverse chronological order, for two -- and I think it's less important to ask what a blog is than it is to ask what you do with your blog.

That said, I think that there's one important difference between the current state of blogging and the 1994-stylee state of zinemaking. In the zine scene, we saw a handful of "A-list" zinemakers emerge as more professional writers and editors -- and published book authors -- because of their self-publishing. Seth Friedman, Chip Rowe, Pagan Kennedy, and others got book deals because of their zines. Zinemakers got mersh journalism jobs because of the skills they honed in grassroots media work. However, while we saw a lot of mainstream media attention paid to zines -- "Isn't that cute? The kids are making little magazines!" -- we did not see professional journalists dipping their toes into the zine world. The talent flow was one way.

In blogging, the talent flow is two way, and I think some people feel threatened by that. Just like the zinemakers of a decade ago, some bloggers may be able to better themselves professionally because of their blogging. In addition, mainstream journalists and other professionals see value in participating in the blogosphere themselves. In the zine scene, we saw a lot of wannabe, second-wave zinemakers who started wading in the DIY waters because of mainstream media coverage, but we did not see the professionals wetting their toes. We groused about the "less pure" zines that were made by folks who started self-publishing because they wanted to do a zine -- rather than because they had something important they needed to say -- just as that topic comes up in the blogosphere (and in online communities and in...).

But we didn't have to contend with mainstream media makers and business people playing in our sandbox. Here, we have the opportunity to be what Carl Steadman calls microstars. Just as folks do in indie rock, minicomics, and other creative subcultures. And I think some of us feel threatened by big-name media makers and business people elbowing their way into our comfortable little commune. Likewise, we bristle because, as "pioneers," we feel that they're co-opting what we do -- or doing something that's less pure, idealistic, or whatever. That's because there are business opportunities in blogs. There aren't in zines.

Tony Perkins is not the anti-Christ. Regardless of whether he's using the term "blog" correctly -- when AlwaysOn launched, everything was a blog: articles, comments, discussion forum posts -- what he's doing is laudable and has promise. It's even bringing increased attention to our "more pure" blogging. I'm not sure whether folks get uppity because he is commercializing an aspect of blogging... or because reporters call him for blog-related interviews instead of our A-list microstars... but in the end, while AlwaysOn is not in and of itself a blog, part of AlwaysOn is a blog. And I think Perkins would be wise to up the ante on that front. (Clue: Give every AlwaysOn member their own personal, dedicated blog. Cull the best and brightest entries and give them front-page play. Take a page from Howard Rheingold's Electric Minds playbook. Clue two: Give participants ownership of what they write. Only that way will you attract the bloggers and members you really want.)

Debate is healthy. But let's not let it lead to inaction. Or factionalization. I think mainstream media and business attention is a good thing for blogging, bloggers, and blogs. I think it's good that Perkins is trying to wrap his head around it. (Although we had him at a bit of a disadvantage yesterday, and I don't think he needed to submit to Winer so quickly.) Instead of niching blogs as something that need to be created by an individual, not edited, and not commercial, lets look at ways blogging can fit into other aspects of Web publishing and Net-based communication. Because it can.

Zines couldn't.

From the In Box: Weblog Business Strategies 2003

Saw your blog on the Jupiter blogging conference and I was blown away. I was there covering it for Econtent Magazine and took copious notes for two days when all I needed to do was go to your blog. Who knew?

What I want to know is how you were able to capture the exact content word for word? What did you use for a tool?

I take notes and record all my interviews. My goal has always been to tape and than translate the transcription into text and avoid the notes backup which interferes with my ability to listen and to carry on a coherent train of thought during the interview. Unfortunately, I've never been able to find decent speech recognition software to achieve this goal. They all require training, which I can do for myself but not for every different interview subject.

You seem to have found a way to capture the text verbatim. I know of no one who can type with this type of accuracy so I'm assuming you have a tool to capture and translate text on the fly. If you do, I would be grateful if you would share your toolset with me. -- Ron Miller

I wish I could help! It's just that I type really, really fast. So fast, in fact, that I'm able to capture near-verbatim, real-time transcripts of conference sessions and talks. I call this confblogging, and my approach -- the almost-full transcription method -- resulted from some confblogging I did at South by Southwest earlier this year. I didn't want to compete with Cory Doctorow's more impressionistic, outline-oriented approach to note taking, and I decided to err on the side of more rather than less. People seem to appreciate it.

Anil Dash mentioned something interesting at the Weblog Business Strategies conference. There were a lot of people blogging the event, and in addition to people commenting on the conference as the days went on, folks such as Denise Howell and Donna Wentworth were also capturing relatively complete records of the proceedings. Anil said that for the most part, Denise and I were neck to neck in the earlier portions of presentations and panels -- and that as talks progressed, it was intriguing to see where our attentions waxed and waned. I haven't compared our reports, but for a more complete picture of what went down, you might want to read Media Diet, Denise, and Donna in parallel. My guess is that together, we produced an almost-verbatim record of the event.

While I have no idea how fast I type, even, I'm quite enamored by the idea of confblogging. It creates a valuable archive of speeches and conversations that would be lost otherwise, and it seems to provide a valuable service to people who couldn't make it to a conference. I received several emails from people who were following the event from afar solely by refreshing their page view of Media Diet. That's pretty darn cool. And it's a nice bit of egoboo for this B-list blogger.

Media Dieticians might also be interested in my confblog of Fast Company's recent RealTime gathering.

The Best of the Web IV

The winners of the 2003 Webby Awards have been announced. Full disclosure: I was a nominating judge for the community category. You can read a transcript of Howard Rheingold's speech online, as well as all of the winners' acceptance speeches. Congratulations and kudos to all involved!