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Ummmmmm ten years or so these creeps from the midwest changed music, more or less...And ten years later they have a new album that fucks harder than ever? And then there’s this mixtape, which also really fucks. I’ve probably listened to it 20 times now (and counting). I don’t know, listen to it. It’s hard to describe. (If I wanted to write about music, I probably would have kept writing about music lol)
Nov 24, 2020
Related Recs
This album turned 30 this year and is still ahead of our time imo. It rips so hard and takes its time with every track. I couldn’t name a favorite, but ‘Luau’ is almost 10 minutes long, and by the end of it I wish it were longer. It’s a very cathartic experience all the way through, if you need something to delve into your rage with this week.
Nov 13, 2024
I haven’t heard someone have a neutral take on this album (except pitchfork, ever the hipsters and perfectly on brand for reviewing this), people seem to either despise it for its hypercynical meta-satire, perfectly poised to deflect any possible criticism thrown at it, or love it. Though I largely agree with what the haters are saying, I end up falling into the latter camp. I fucking love this project, both from an intellectual and from a basic standpoint, flanking the naysayers at both sides of the bell curve meme.
“Meme” — that’s the headline of this project. C&W’s 90s-indebted breakbeat pop chugs along with Weezery guitar riffs and droll narration, only broken up by random (in the xD sense of the word) meme snippets. This may sound torturous, but something about the way they weave these brainrot vine compilation samples through their tracks is really special. I want to compare it to John Oswald’s Plunderphonic manifesto, where he (Im probably misphrasing) argues for utilising highly recognisable microsamples in experimental music, because the feeling of fleeting recognition is a powerful one unique to that technique. But also it’s just fucking funny! But I won’t give any spoilers as it feels like explaining a YLYL challenge before you watch it.
As for the actual content, I will maybe come back to write about this later. There are some really great (and not so great) reviews online about this project, which I highly recommend checking out, as well as the surrounding discourse.
AOTY. bring back tinymixtapes
Dec 30, 2024
buzzy bleepy not quite atonal not super melodic, hard as fuck and a Move of Ten standout to me personally
Feb 6, 2025
Top Recs from @emerson-ray-rosenthal
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Anybody remember a clip show about banned music videos that, incidentally, ended up on one of the networks that banned them? It was either VH1 or MTV2, and they ran stuff like Nine Inch Nails’s “Closer,” Pearl Jam’s “Jeremy,” and Prodigy’s “Smack My Bitch Up.” Anyway, I was glued to the TV whenever it came on and I think a lot of my aesthetic sensibilities came from that 90s-00s golden age, making me into (regrettably) a bit of a music video snob. No offense, but the VFX-driven spectacles of today just don’t hit when you cut your teeth on stuff from CANADA and the Directors Bureau (whose website sadly doesn’t even have their best stuff anymore). The unique exception is director Cody Critcheloe, who goes by SSION (pronounced like the latter half of *passion*), and his new video for Yves Tumor is nothing less than what I’ve come to expect from the multihyphenate: a hyperreal vision of Los Angeles replete with larger-than-life characters who are characteristically drawn up from real life, and handmade props that belong in a museum, but I’ll settle for a gallery. (In this case, it’s a smashed-up hand-painted sunburst convertible and a leather jacket with a The Cochran Firm logo.) It’s the stuff dreams are made of, cementing Critcheloe as one of the most exciting and visionary directors of our time (other notable mentions include Eugene Kotlyarenko, Anne Alexander, and Minister Akins).
Nov 24, 2020
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I found this on a massive list of Sword and Sorcery movies on Letterboxd, which is where I find obscure films that other, sharper connoisseurs already know about. Well! I was looking for something like Berserk, Excalibur, and Joan La Pucelle, and boy was this it: Bresson’s 1974 reimagining of the grand finale of the Grail Quest is as earthbound as it is transcendent, smashing the depths of legend and poetry against humanism to produce a stark vision of the end of the Age of Myth. Most of the criticisms in the Letterboxd reviews are aimed at its seeming dryness, or lack of emotion. Hooey! It’s all here. If you want to see knights cry, go watch The Witcher or something.
Nov 24, 2020
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My writing partner and I spent the last two weeks or so working on a pitch for a sports comedy about a gawky journalist who decides to pick up basketball. As part of our research, I came across George Plimpton, who older and more literary people will think of you a goose for just hearing about. Well, HONK! This here’s a documentary about that time he, a blue-blood with an unbeatable attitude, trained to play in a pre-season exhibition game against the Detroit Lions. It’s sort of like if you put JFK in Jackass.
Nov 24, 2020