If the promo material is to be believed, Fort Lean is a place you can go. But it’s also a place that isn’t quite sure about its audience yet, a place that is really shaping up and starting to look and feel pretty solid after two EPs but also belies an underlying uncertainty about opening day. The group’s most recent effort, Change Your Name, was produced by Patrick Wemberly from Chairlift, who lends a steady hand throughout. “All the Lights” is a highlight for the band and especially singer Keenan Mitchell, and we can’t wait for the full length.
Change Your Name EP Tracklisting –
Do You Remember
Envious
The Mall
All the Lights
Well friends, we’re heading off soon for various Christmas activities (much love to the other tribes/non-believers/etc. – we just happen to love Christmas jams!). Make no mistake – EV2BK hopes that you have yourselves some merry celebrations and good cheer this holiday season!
“But what about my present?” you might ask. We couldn’t agree on which version to post, so it looks like it’s got to be a CHRISTMAS BONUS DOUBLE JAM, with two versions of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” The first jam is from John Denver and The Muppets, where Rowlf the dog(g) really belts it out with a gritty yet emotionally evocative sound that contrasts nicely with John Denver’s smooth stylings. The second take is the more classic (and arguably better), with Frank Sinatra holding it down solo on the track. Watch out for the tear-inducing tendency of this song; there’s a reason why your grandmother loves this record.
John Denver and Rowlf – Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas:
Frank Sinatra – Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas:
A couple of days ago in Sparta, Wisconsin, a man dressed up in a santa suit stumbled out of a car and proceeded to hug and then interrogate a groups of kids about the whereabouts of his reindeer. Obviously, he was wasted at the time, and was later cited for open intoxicants. Sounds pretty funny to us.
Today’s Holiday Jam is a shoutout to all the reindeer out there, especially our homeboy Rudolph, in this hot version from The Temptations. I guess they just released their 48th album back in 2007! That’s kind of nuts. Kind of like this video.
Francisco Hernandez Jr., a 13 year old from Brooklyn with Asperger’s syndrome, recently spent 11 days living in the subway system of NYC with “a MetroCard, $10 in his pocket and a book bag on his lap,” according to the Times. Francisco went into the subway so that “no one would yell” at him, at home or at school. After being found on Oct. 26, a lot of discussion has centered around how he could have possibly gone undetected for so long in the subways and subway stations, even though the cops were supposedly on the case. Few seem to doubt that had this been the son of a white lawyer in Manhattan, say, versus the son of Mexican immigrants in Brooklyn, the length of the search may have been shorter. But in any case, welcome back, Francisco.
So what would you want after being stuck riding around in the subway eating potato chips and bottled water for 11 days? Sky? Then Animal Collective has got a song for you. Following the release of Merriweather Post Pavilion earlier this year, which is widely considered one of the best records of the year, you might expect the band to take a break. Instead, the boys announced that they were releasing a new EP in December, called Fall Be Kind, consisting of a couple of songs they wrote around the same time as the songs for Merriweather but didn’t have time to flesh out. And then they also secured the first ever legal sample of a Grateful Dead song, for the second song on the EP, “What Would I Want? Sky.” I haven’t been able to get it out of my head yet.
I know this “video” is just a still of the cover art, but I wanted to post the album version because it sounds really great in stereo. Give it a minute to build and resolve and then you’ll see what I’m talking about.
Yesterday, while the Tennessee Titans trounced the Buffalo Bills in Nashville, Titans owner Bud Adams – who is looking pretty good for 86 years old – was seen vigorously giving a huge middle finger to all of the Bills fans in the audience:
And in fact, he was not only “seen making the gesture while in his luxury suite,” but again while down on the field. This has led to the NFL slapping Adams with a $250,000 fine; he issued an apology a few hours after the game. But I mean, come on! It’s this mad old dude flipping birds in a suit. That’s hilarious. This guy is a hero, like how T.I. means hero in his song “Hero” when he says, “I’m the man, it’s apparent even when I’m running errands.”
East Village to Brooklyn 