Friday, November 26, 2010

snip snip snip i'm a woodland nimf

This year, I cooked the turkey.

A 30-person Thanksgiving Day celebration at Tennessee Jazz Bar in Paris, and an 18lb turkey, lovingly named Jean Luc.

In honor of this kind of twisted but also gluttonous and food-filled holiday, I want to share with you a song I probably not-so-coincidentally stumbled upon this past week. Thank you The Internet!

Please take a few shots, drink a Redbull, and then listen to the song Lawn Knives by GOBBLE GOBBLE by pressing play, just below. Don't forget the dance party and some gletta.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

2 years and bottle of red wine please.

Today I'm feeling a bit morose and reminiscent. And soon you will be too.

Here's one of my favorite break-up songs of all time by Swedish musician, Ane Brun.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Goodbye Sky Harbour...

Sometimes I feel like I have the worst memory in the world. I keep my iCal loaded with plenty reminders for concerts I would like to see here in Paris, but for some reason I feel like I always forget about them.

There is a website that I constantly visit when I'm at home in New York or visiting friends in Chicago, where I went to Columbia College Chicago for my BA in Arts, Entertainment, & Media Management. It's called OhMyRockness, and it is loaded up with more concert date information than I could even dream of.

Any day of the week you can go to OhMyRockness.com, and if you're bored, it'll give you information on artists that are playing in the area, how much the tickets are, an
d where they're playing. It's absolutely genius.

The only problem is-- right now they are only listing shows for New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles.

I can imagine that the upkeep of such a project is fairly tedious; lots of phone calls, e-mails, and surfing the web for information.

Anyway, I am hoping that I can find something like this in Paris before I ship back off to the states. It would make it easier for me to find great musicians and shows here in this lovely city.

Although, I can't say I'm doing a terrible job; tomorrow I will go see JIMMY EAT WORLD and Minus the Bear at La Fleche d'Or. I have been waiting for this day for MONTHS!

I leave you with this very simple and colorful video for the song "My Time" by Minus the Bear:

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Back to the island.

I'M HOMESICK!

Today, in the midst of sickness and never-ending rain, I am reminiscing about my car-rides to and from work at ClayNation on Long Island, to Union Pool in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, to Piano's in the Lower East Side. Last November was the best.

You know what the best part about those car-rides were? My favorite radio station, 90.7WFUV.

This public radio station, produced by Fordham University, has pretty much introduced me to 70% of all my new favorite artists. I went home almost every day with the name of at least one new band or artist. Not bad.

But what I have really been missing the most is Russ Borris and The Alternate Side, a show that plays on WFUV from 10pm-midnight, M-F.

The good news is that The Alternate Side streams their live radio broadcast online, so no matter how homesick I get, I can always listen to the station. Although, with the 6 hour time difference, I'm going to have a wait 6 more months until I get back to New York to listen to the radio broadcast time slot.

Anyhow, if you're looking for new, up-and-coming artists, I suggest you head over to The Alternate Side's website and stream the live broadcast. It's like candy for the ears.


Thursday, November 4, 2010

Obrigado!

I have NO idea how I ever stumbled upon this musician--- if I can recall, it was on LastFM.

Last summer I was traveling to beautiful Porto, Portugal, to go see my favorite band in the world, WILCO. I believe I was looking for other live shows to catch while I was in the country.

My love affair with B Fachada is true and unending. You can go to his MySpace account page and download several albums, some for free and some very cheap (2 euro), courtesy of his label/distribution company, FlorCaveira. I think I spent my entire summer in 2009 falling asleep to his album entitled "Viola Braguesa."

His older music is a mix of traditional Portuguese folk, seemingly influenced by the American indie-alt-folk group, Iron & Wine. His new album, "B Fachada é Pra Meninos," which is being released on December 10th, reminds me a bit of indie-pop groups like MGMT and Animal Collective. Makes me wanna dance a bit.

Here is an awesome, documentary film-style music video for a new song called "Joana Transmontana."

Joana Transmontana - B Fachada from Tiago Pereira on Vimeo.

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

BERLIN!!

You know those moments where you feel like you are in the right place at the right time?

This past weekend, I was in Berlin visiting a friend and touring the city. I stayed with a extremely cool guy from CouchSurfing who was kind enough to host me last minute.

My first night we were barhopping around the Kreuzberg neighborhood, a very alternative and artistic district, and at the end of the night wound up in a small bar, which I hope to find the name of one day.

I was completely in distracted the entire time by the beautiful music I heard playing over the speakers, and demanded that my friend find out who was playing. It turned out to be a Berlin musician named Susanna Berivan. The bartender must have known I was gonna pop in. It's just the perfect mix of new folk, a bit of gypsy-jazz, simple guitar playing, with a voice that gives me chills.

Here's a song for you entitled, "Schoolgirl & Alora Siodora," and a photo of some street art I found in the city.