Groove Neuter’s Friends and Family

The Course of True Love Never Does Run Smooth

nobody@vox.com(Bookmole) — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 06:08:39 -0500

A graduation project by several students at the French animation school Gobelins. See a list of awards and a making-of at the Ocktapodi site. Via Miss Cellania, one of my favourite sites on the web,

Oktapodi HQ

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Amazing Stuff, Corn Starch

nobody@vox.com(Bookmole) — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 05:38:37 -0500

First, here's Ellen demonstrating some of its finer qualitites

Ellen, Corn Starch and Water

Now here's someone who really knows what he is talking about.
Which is more than I do on a Saturday morning...

Non-Newtonian Liquid Behaviour

And, finally, some non-Newtonian liquid that isn't even a liquid - at least, I can't see any, can you?

Non-Newtonian Liquid? What Liquid!?

Happy Saturday, 'hood.

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Remote Control Frequencies

nobody@vox.com(W♥M) — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 18:48:27 -0500

09/05/2008 18:44:22 ♥ written by appples ()

Remote Control Frequencies-Escape Plan

Remote Control Frequencies

Ok I'm just going to start off by saying this sort of noisy, ambient, sample ridden cluster fuck of sound is so up my alley it's actually IN my alley. And to quote a famous new wave band, I just can't get enough. Remote Control Frequencies latest album Tempus is about 45 minutes of some of the coolest stuff I've heard in a while. It's all fuzzy guitar, echoplex madness, swirling drones, manic organs and vocals that are just buried under all that sound. Throw in a healthy serving of what sound like samples from late night infomercials and you've got yourself one hell of a party. I would really be hard pressed to narrow this down to one genre so I'll go ahead and describe this best as ambient post shoe gaze hip-hop.

Remote Control Frequencies is a two man wrecking crew of awesomeness consisting of R-Rock handling the vocals, keyboards, guitar, bass, noise, digital signal treatments and other effects with long time collaborator LG handling the drums. there are a few guest appearances on the album by Player 1, PJ Sumroc, and Sharkula. Despite all the sonic madness there is still an underlying pop sensibility here that is very keen. The hushed vocals do a great job of not overpowering the true artistry of the music, and overall R-Rock and LG have done a splendid job of taking elements from a diverse selection of genres and creating an pastiche of musical styles. I would definitely suggest this album for fans of psychedelic music and pretty much everyone with an open mind about music.

You can find out more about Remote Control Frequencies by visiting their myspace page at www.myspace.com/rcf (although they claim to have lost the password so it might not be updated), or by going to their label's web site at www.tslos.com, and as always be sure to stay tuned to W♥M for the latest in independent music. Next week I'll be dusting off the old phonograph to bring you a few gems from my vinyl collection. Yay records!

Stay classy internettes,
Appples

Links: myspace.com/rcf

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Some Things Need to Be Shared

nobody@vox.com(Bookmole) — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 18:27:01 -0500

The Time Is Now (Bambino Casino Mix)

Moloko

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iBeer? WTF!?!

nobody@vox.com(Bookmole) — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:41:22 -0500

iBeer 2.0. The REAL iBeer on App Store

I gotta add that I am at work and have no sound, so got no idea what this vid sounds like. But really - iBeer? Of all the lame-ass apps for the iPhone I have heard of, this takes the biscuit!

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Leeone at Acadia Cafe, Minneapolis (09/04/08)

nobody@vox.com(W♥M) — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 08:37:23 -0500

09/05/2008 08:29:50 ♥ written by vu ()

Tour Dates

09/10/08 Boston Music Festival - Ned Devine’s Boston, Massachusetts
09/20/08 Atlantis Music Festival @ Smith’s Olde Bar (Atlanta Room) Atlanta, Georgia
10/02/08 Spike Hill Brooklyn, New York
10/05/08 Rockwood Music Hall NYC

Discography

[2003] in this life, on this road.	[2004] Hail to the Queen	[2007] Imaginary Biographies, B-Sides (Digital Only)
[2007] Imaginary Biographies

Set List ♥ Arcadia, Minneapolis (09/04/08)

Leerone - To Fill the Void

Leerone

The Acadia sits across the 400 Bar, but you wouldn't know it was called the Acadia as the signage reads "RIVERSIDE". I've seen this place from the outside through its numerous large windows and looking in at the band on stage.

I don't know how often these "Diverse Emerging Music Organization" (DEMO) shows goes on, but they seem to operate on donations and benefits local artists. I caught the last few songs of Backstories, a full band and all nicely dressed. I don't really know the band's back stories (haha), I'll bet they get that a lot. They have some songs available for download on their myspace.

Eli Ratner said it was his first time playing (I thought he meant his first gig ever), but I guess he meant at the Acadia. He seems really comfortable on stage with his acoustic guitar. It would seem, according to his myspace, that he's normally a duo with Peter VonDeLinde.

It's clear that the real star is Leerone, who earlier in the day appeared in St Paul's Station 4. The report I got was that her keyboard "got messed up" and she ended up renting a full Yamaha keyboard.

Her set was understandably short, lasting no more than 45 minutes, and included a "made up" a cappella song that's not written on the set list.

Highlight of the show seems to be the announcer calling her "Leeroni" and "Leerona".

PS, more details later, including pictures and art.

Links: www.leerone.com myspace.com/mynameisleerone

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Stolen from Ginger_sister, a Musical Meme

nobody@vox.com(Bookmole) — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 09:44:52 -0500

Stolen from Ginger_sister, who got it from someone on Facebook

Rules:
a) Go to your Itunes music library
b) Turn your shuffle on
c) list the first line of the first 20 songs
d) See if any in your 'hood can identify the artist and song, without Googling them

Answers in the comments box, and please - do this yourself - I tell you, it is a good way to listen to stuff you might not have heard for quite a while!

It's the loneliness, that's the killer
When morning comes to Morgantown the merchants roll their awnings down
Poison like the air we breath this complicated world we weave
When I wake up early in the morning, lift my head, I'm only dreaming
The cup that caught your blood was stained, destroyed, taken away, away
Driving out through the windmills, and some of them were still
Three months in here, can't catch the tears
Turn the ugly light off, God, wanna feel the night
Can you keep it down? Can you keep it down?
We've been a rocking all over the world
What did you learn in school today? Jack shit.
One Two Three Four, let me hear you scream if you want some more
Them that's got shall get, them that's not shall lose
I see my reflection, I don't like what I see
If it's a bad day, you try to suffocate another memory. Scarred.
You must be my lucky star because you shine on me wherever you are
It's going down, yo the girl got a gun, best run
(ohh sha la la la) Tedium is overcome from obscurity, through melody
Every time you touch her sets your heart on fire
Ooh, right through my head, I ain't got the blues no more, I said

I cheated a bit - I mean, if a song is called Flaunt it, and the mix that comes up just has the words Flaunt it, I suspect you would guess! And I didn't bother saying how many spoken word or instrumentals came up, either, cos I could not make the list work if I did that.

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W♥M Updates (September 2008)

nobody@vox.com(W♥M) — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 21:36:12 -0500

09/03/2008 21:26:18 ♥ written by vu ()

Love Psychedelico - Standing Bird

Love Psychedelico

The Valley Girl's swanky new hair

I can't believe September is already here.

Appearing tomorrow at the Temple Bar is Love Psychedelico, who we've previously mentioned a few times on W♥M.

It's too insane, this band sold out the 14,201 seated Nippon Budokan in Japan - several times, I might add - and the lucky people in Los Angeles gets to see them in an intimate setting.

Find out more details about the gig on our news.w♥m and their official (US) and myspace.

Also, tomorrow I'm supposed to be around for a free show at the Acadia Cafe to see singer/songwriter Leerone. I believe earlier tomorrow she will also be at Station 4 in St Paul for the "Concert for Change Festival". The republican convention happening in St Paul is just coincidental.

You can find details of her other appearances on her website or the 'space.

One last announcement: many of you probably don't know that I am a closet comic book fan. I am the creator of the almost-ten years george-perez.com and I got the announcement that Perez was involved in an auction to help save and preserve "the Superman House". It's all over the news, but I thought I'd mention it here as I feel strongly about it. You can read all about it on ordinarypeoplechangetheworld.com

By the way, the most interesting item in the auction is a hand-written draft of Neil Gaiman's upcoming book. It's currently at $530, way above my budget.

In actual W♥M news: the podcast is going strong!! Stronger than ever.

I'm pleased to announce the re-appearance of former W♥M writer Valley Girl on this Sunday's podcast. Now that I've embarrassed her, I can guarantee another awesome dudecast.

Also, I have just added radioexile.com to news.weheartmusic.com. If you have a blog and/or website and would like to be on our link roll, just send me an email.

W♥M #11

OH! Also, as a favor, I 'investigated' wordpress using a free version via weheartmusic.blogsome.com. I spent a lot of time looking its codes and I can tell you that if you ever want to customize your WP blog, you will need to really understand how CSS works. CSS have really replaced the original html, in my opinion. It's very flexible and it's also easier to understand.

My first impression is that it's half-manual and half-automatic. WYSIWYG doesn't always work, even with some of the best plugins... and if you really want to do make splashy posts, you still need to hand-code things (much like how I compose all my posts prior to putting it on vox).

I also like the ability to create users and "comment approvals". There's a lot of cool stuff, but you know, for new users, I would have to recommend them to check out vox and sites.google.com. I'm not afraid to admit that WP is too complicated.

OH2! Watch my crappy video! The music at the end is by Dylan Champagne, which I will be reviewing soon-ish.

Search Box!

UPDATE 9/4/08 8:40pm: People have complained about the vox search - I will admit it's not the best (I think it doesn't index anything older than 6 months). So starting today, you will see a box on the very low/right of the sidebar. The search also search W♥M News and Press Release, as well as any future websites in the WHM family. I have tested out IE and Firefox and even Chrome, but if you are having issues, please let me know.

Also, as a special bonus, is a drop-down menu of current writers. Clicking on a name will take you to their articles. If you're still active, send me a note and I will add your name to the list.

UPDATE 9/6/08 8:53am:

How to add Google Custom Search to your blog
1. Create a Custom Search via google.com/coop. This will be great if you have multiple blogs and/or websites. Unfortunately that also means duplicate results if you cross-post same articles.

2. Copy and paste this code into your blog's main page. On vox, the sidebar width is only 150pixels, so you may have to change the "size" to less than 15. Change "Search" to "Go" if you want to shorten the submit box - however this box is not necessary (the return/enter key should work just as well).

How to emb audio on your blog
One of the nice thing about vox, is that it allows anyone to emb media on any website that allows embedding.

Click on any audio and there is an option for "emb", which admittedly DEFAULTS to autoplay=true. You must change this to false.

If you're not too crazy about the 500 pixels (too large), you can change all "500" to "320" or "200". There is a small hack for 150 pixels, but you must "wi" in place of "pi" after 150 for the image and it will work. This probably won't mean a whole lot to any of you unless you start using the embed feature on your blog.

Another hack you might want to check out is to just place the "mediaURL" to your own MP3. Have fun and ask me if you're still having trouble setting up any of these for your blogs.

I have added our latest podcast on the sidebar, just click on the play button and it will automatically play.

Links: weheartmusic.com news.weheartmusic.com

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SURFACE UNSIGNED 08 NATIONAL SHOWCASE!

nobody@vox.com(a New Breed of Monkey) — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 17:22:10 -0500

Well, well, well. What can I possibly say, other than its no big surprise!

Last Saturday was the northern final and we went through to the National Showcase with style! The coaches (2) were full yet again and quite a few made their own ways there. Big respect and thank you to everyone who made the effort to come and support us, and I don't think we disappointed if I do say so myself!

It was also Wattos birthday so it did get quite messy, but we all knew it would.

For those who couldn't make it, or if you pussied out at the last minute, we played six songs (The Man Who Tried to Play God / A Million Doors / Trapped Under The Smog Of The Industrial Blanket / Festival in Colne Lancashire / Mannequin / Cradle to the Grave) on the huge stage in front of a packed out Academy 2. The crowd went mad for it from the first chord and the band all enjoyed every second!

So now its the National Showcase......

13 bands, 4 music industry judges, a professional film crew and YOU! This is the big one people.

Its being held on Saturday 13th September ( not long from now!) at Birminghams Carling Academy (Main stage)!!!!!!

If you thought last Saturday night was big you aint seen nothing! Lets show them how we do it up north! We will again be running transport and have 150 tickets to shift, so get in quick. Many of those who attended Saturday night have already booked on, and a few are talking about an over night trip. Either way, you've gotta be there!

I can't help but think that this is our time. You laugh, but one day we'll be in charge...

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Mighty Aphrodite

nobody@vox.com(Smiley) — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 08:40:55 -0500

Mighty Aphrodite - Opening Scene

    Had you told me in 1996 that the same Mira Sorvino who played a teary, betrayed lover in the movie Beautiful Girls had won an Oscar the previous year for a Woody Allen film, well, I would not have believed you. Sorvino's character in Beautiful Girls was sloppy, and a little pathetic, and completely off the radar of what my college roommates all loved about that movie (brotherhood, homecoming, growing up). Now, 12 years later on, married and settled, I find Sorvino's character in BG a lot more relate-able. All of which leads me to Mighty Aphrodite.
   Recently, I decided to better my understanding of one of the elder statesmen of American film, Woody Allen. When I began researching which films to start with, I found a lot of commentary recommending Allen's 1995 picture, Mighty Aphrodite. And while I knew that Mira Sorvino had a major role and had won an Oscar for her performance, I was not prepared for how much I enjoyed her performance as a prostitute longing for the American Dream.
   But let me back up.
   The story is fairly simple (it is based on the legend of Pygmalion - interestingly, so is Audrey Hepburn's My Fair Lady) a couple adopt a son who turns out to be a child prodigy. Over the course of time, as the child grows, the marriage falls apart. The wife begins having an affair, while the husband becomes somewhat obsessed with finding the boy's birth mother. Naturally, the birth mother turns out to be a prostitute.
   From there, the story becomes an exploration of the urge to help others versus the desire to please onself, replete with a Greek chorus intoning observations and warnings to the lead character.
   With all the elements in place, Allen does a great job of low-key directing, using his trademark medium shots in lieu of close-ups, as well as coaxing an over-the-top but believable performance from his cast. The dialogue is the best form of wit in that the humor comes through the situation being developed and the characters interpretation of events rather than set-ups, insults, or puns. Neither Sorvino's prostitute, nor Helena Bonham Carter's Amanda are played for sympathy, rather, they are played as people who have made, or are making mistakes, and dealing with the consequences like grown-ups by learning from and moving past those events into new situations.
   The only low point for me was the denouement wherein we learn what has happened to all our characters in the months after the climax of the film. While the body of the film was able to take cliches like a well-meaning hooker and a neurotic adoptive dad and mix them into something fresh and interesting, the final moments of the film fall back into overly-familiar territory. Indeed, the final punchline can be seen coming and should have been left out altogether.
   However, although the denouement is somewhat trite, the gentle good-humor of the film and engaging cast create an understated, warm film about love and sex and how they sometimes meet.

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