Current Music Blog

THIEVERY CORPORATION

The odds are, whatever you think you know about Thievery Corporation, it’s only part of the story. They’re far more than just genre-crossing DJs that spotlight some of the world’s most talented musicians, and they’re not just those guys that got audited by the IRS because they played an Iraqi war protest. Thievery Corporation is the epicenter of a community, an art scene and an empire that exists in what may seem like the least likely of places: Washington, DC.

However, once senior producer Douglas Caballero spent some time with Thievery in their version of our nation’s capitol, he learned why it couldn’t happen anywhere else:

“Rob Garza and Eric Hilton showed me that Washington, DC is more than the typical 8th grade field trip—you know, monuments, blue suits, politicians and traffic circles. At least, that’s the impression of the city that many visitors get during the day. But once the sun goes down, the city’s nightlife and its eclectic community of music and artists, becomes much more visible and I’d say makes it competitive with other East Coast cities better known for fun after dark. The most interesting facet to this was listening to Thievery discuss how the DC’s world of artists and musicians co-mingled with the politicians and pundits. A lot of names and specifics were left out of those stories.

In addition to being world-famous musicians, I was struck by how entrepreneurial the two band members have become, both co-owning hot spot night clubs. Rob co-owns a club in Mexico and Eric is actually part owner of some of DC’s best restaurants, clubs and even a music venue, which we visited and we partook in the food, music and drinks (lots of drinks). Hangovers and happy palates aside, I left DC with a new appreciation for the city’s arts and entertainment offerings.”

AMANDA PALMER

Our VP of music programming, Davis Powers, had booked Amanda’s band The Dresden Dolls on their first US TV appearance back when he worked on Jimmy Kimmel’s show. When her first solo album, “Who Killed Amanda Palmer?” (produced by Ben Folds) began making big waves online—Amanda famously wrote and performed a song begging her label, Roadrunner, to drop her if they weren’t going to promote her more—the once-underground performance artist began drawing more and more attention as an innovator of internet self-marketing.

Still, executive producer Mark Rinehart wasn’t sure whether the Embedded game plan—Amanda would organize a secret Tweet-up show, and Current would document the result—was actually going to work:

“I’d been hearing about the Secret Show/Twitter phenomena and before the shoot, I thought the whole thing was kind of played out. But my opinion changed when I saw the whole thing unfold. Seeing tons of people materialize out of know where from a simple post online was pretty amazing.”

Shana, our online producer who had heavily lobbied to get Amanda into the show, was most impressed by Amanda’s genuine willingness to turn over the day to her biggest fans:

“A lot of bands talk a good game when it comes to doing what their fans want, but in the end they either bend to pressure from the labels or aren’t willing to give up that much control. Amanda not only asked the fans in line to help dress her but came with no prepared set list. What people wanted to hear, she played. When the crowd asked her to play more on the ukelele, she brought everyone over to another area of the venue and sat down, story time style. Amanda values her fans not just as passive consumers but as an active part of her experience as an artist.”

Watch a preview for the episode below, and be sure to tune in Wednesday at 11/10c to watch the full show.

I was on cnn.com again this week, doing my best not to cuss when I was talking about Carrie Underwood and preaching the Gospel of Brother Sal. At this point I’m a little shocked that people are still surprised to hear that all this pop-country bullshit is soullessly assembled by a committee of businessmen that flip through a catalog and pick and choose pre-fabricated, dumbed-down, re-purposed renditions of both last month’s hit record and the “grief” section on a Hallmark card rack. Then they combine some little piece of ass with the best Pro-Tools mason in Nashville and a group of day players trying to earn enough scratch to pay alimony with their guitar, regardless of the quality of the product (which is, admittedly, still a large accomplishment).

The result is just more and more soulless, sterile shit, produced by the machine. I’ll try not to go off on yet another rant about this, but if you still don’t get what’s wrong with the mass-produced, cookie cutter, fetid terd squeezed out of big box stores and mini-malls that is Country Radio/ CMT/VH1, message me with your phone number, and I’ll call you and explain it personally. I’ll do this shit one American at a time if I have to.

They may have killed John Henry, but I can still stab the motherfucker who built that God damn machine.

Brother Sal is the opposite of everything I just described. Every one of the songs on Blood and Dust was written for a reason and sung and played with passion. Brian Wright produced the album masterfully and his buddies from the Waco Tragedies and their extended family play with a purpose on these songs (and every time they take the stage).

Sal calls his music “Whorehouse Gospel,” which may be the most accurate label I’ve ever heard for any music in a long time. The anchors on cnn.com asked me what “Whorehouse Gospel” meant, and I pointed out that, in fact, Jesus himself preached whorehouse Gospel. Neither of them would touch that with a ten foot cross, but we all know that Mary Magdalene had a job that didn’t involve an office. And most everyone knows Jesus didn’t hang out with the most savory characters. That was the point: he surrounded himself with the common man, the down and out, the scoundrels, which is why Christianity spread so well: we’re all scoundrels on some level.

Rock n Roll came from the Church. The early stuff rooted in Gospel is the epitome of making a joyous noise. Some brave pioneers took the sound of redemption, the sound of letting your worries and problems go, the sound of letting that little light of yours shine, out of the uncomfortable wooden chairs and judgment of Sunday morning and brought it to the people every night.  And that’s where Brother Sal fits in. There is salvation in his songs.

Brother Sal writes about personal stories and feelings in such an honest and sincere way that even if you haven’t been through what he’s been through or lived his life, you can still relate to the earnest emotions pouring out of your speakers.

I can’t emphasize enough what a brilliant job Brian Wright did producing and arranging this album, and the band plays like all of America and Russia’s nuclear weapons are in midflight across the Pacific Ocean, there’s a meteor hurdling towards Earth, UFO’s are hovering over all our major cities, and the swine flu just crossed with Ebola and is running rampant in pig-monkey hybrids attacking children and sharing dirty needles. Every guitar, piano, organ, horn, bass, drum, mandolin, fiddle, and hand clap rings like there are only five minutes until Armageddon, and they came up with something better to do than fucking. It’s Rock n Roll in its truest form.

Now go get you some.

My disdain for the major labels is well documented. The mass-produced, cookie cutter, bullshit “music” that major labels spoonfeed the masses sucks, and so do their new media business practices. Now that these two factors have lined up, it’s only a matter of time before the majors go the way of the dinosaur and Chrysler. This makes me very happy. Come, share my joy and passing anger, with my top three videos that can not be embedded.

1. Blur, “Country House“

I’m pretty sure Damon would be delighted for music bloggers to be able to embed this video and feature the song 14 fucking years after its release. And hell, that might even help the label move some units to a new, younger audience.

2. Ryan Adams, “Answering Bell”

Any song with a banjo in it is meant to be shared.

3. Weezer, “El Scorcho“

So now what the fuck am I supposed to post on half-Japanese girls’ facebook pages?

Senior Producer Alex Simmons (left) interviewing Common

COMMON

For a lot of artists, talent carries them as far as they go, but for Common, it’s more than just his unrivaled ability that has gotten him to where he is today. Common is among the most respected rappers alive for several reasons. Of course you can’t ignore his raw talent and intellect, but beyond that, he works his ass off and is constantly hustling, but not just to get ahead. He works so hard to bring it for his fans and give them the music and the shows they deserve. (You don’t have to take our word for it—everyone from Pharrell to Will.I.Am to Mos Def takes the time to tell us how much they respect Common.)

Quite frankly, we lost track of how many cities Common hit on his way across the country promoting his latest album—even watching the footage we used of him moving from town to town to town was exhausting. Common didn’t complain at all, but he probably had a right to, according to co-producer Manoj Gopinanth.

“Always on the go from city to city, during his promo tour, he was pretty sick with the flu. This never stopped him from taking pictures with fans and radio station employees, talking to people who called his name out, and putting on a crazy show for his hometown Chicago in an old warehouse. Seriously, if I had the flu and tried to rock an hour long set, I’d probably be dead. I guess that’s why he has been a mainstay in Hip Hop since the early 90s. Passion and genuine love for the art of hip-hop definitely exist within Common’s soul.”

In addition to being extremely driven and gifted, Common’s about one of the nicest people you’ll meet. Whether you’re interviewing him for a TV show or if you’re a fan who approaches him on the street, Common will look you in the eye and sincerely speak to you as a friend. Senior producer Alex Simmons was struck by how much fans and other artists alike respected Common:

“’He is one of the coolest people I’ve ever met.’ That’s what Nate from Cold War Kids said when I mentioned we had been doing an episode of Embedded with Common. It turns out that Nate and rest of the guys in Cold War Kids had met Common at a festival a year or so back and he made a big impression on them. Nate went on to say that having a quick interaction with Common was kind of an epiphany for them, they realized that it is possible to be a rock star and be friendly and connect with the people you run across.

That is the impression that everyone gets when they meet Common. When shooting with him I’m constantly impressed by how he will have a real conversation with anybody that he meets, whether it’s a fan, a radio station employee or a fellow artist. He looks people in the eye, genuinely wants to know who they are what they are all about.

And without Val Vogt, who was Common’s assistant during the time of shooting and now runs his new media endeavors, none of this would have happened. Thankfully Val would often leave Current playing on Common’s TV and through that he became a fan of the network.”

LYKKE LI

Embedded executive producer Mark Rinehart helmed this Tour Stop segment, which started where most of our show does: asking the artist what they’d like to do. Lykke loves to shop, especially in used clothing stores like the one we hit up in San Francisco:

“She was a shopping machine. Vintage stores like Wasteland are huge overwhelming places to me. Lykke was completely oriented the whole time. Amidst the chaos, she had an ability to find great items quickly and efficiently. Oh and the Current umbrella that she was using was not intentional! It started pouring and it was the only umbrella I could find in my trunk. Glad we had it. She would have been soaking wet for her sound check if we didn’t have it.

My favorite interview response (that didn’t make the cut) was what she said when I asked her where she saw herself in 10 years. Without missing a beat she said, ‘I want to be in a long silky dress in a warm country with ten babies and I want to have a whisky voice.’ Loved that.”

Here’s the promo for this week’s episode:

Tune in Wednesday, November 4 at 11/10c.

UPDATE: Check out Common and Lykke Li on the full episode of Embedded.

1. “Southern Man,” Neil Young
2. “Sweet Home Alabama,” Lynyrd Skynyrd
3. “Ronnie and Neil,” Drive-by Truckers

Here’s the short version of the story behind these songs. Back in the day, Neil Young saw all the clips of some really horrific things happening in Alabama (most these things were also happening all over the country, but it’s easier to demonize the South for racial problems. In the grand scheme/sham of news stories, that’s the South’s preconceived backstory/character. I could go on for hours about revisionist history that demonizes the South in order to alleviate blame and guilt among the rest of the country that did the exact same shit, but tried to stop it about 3 weeks sooner, but that’s an entire book, not a quick blog post), anyway, Neil he wrote a couple of great songs about it: “Southern Man” and “Alabama.” They’re both amazing songs and said things that needed to be said.

Then, Lynyryd Skynyrd went to Muscle Shoals, Alabama and recorded an album. You may not know it, but Muscle Shoals has produced some of the best R&B and Soul music in America. Little Richard, Wilson Picket, Clarence Carter, Aretha Franklin, and tons more legendary musicians recorded their with the house band. Everyone wanted to a piece of the Muscle Shoals Sound.

When Skynyrd was in town recording, Ronnie Van Zandt was blown away by how different the images you saw on the evening news were from what he saw. He saw a bunch of black and white musicians playing together, loving each other, and making beautiful music. That never made the news, so he wrote “Sweet Home Alabama” to show the other side of the story.

Flash forward 30 some odd years, and Patterson Hood wrote a song about the things I just typed, and addressed the supposed feud between Ronnie and Neal. That song is “Ronnie and Neil” and it’ll rock your fucking cock off while giving you a history lesson. It’s on Southern Rock Opera, which is mandatory ownership for any rock fan.

BEN HARPER & RELENTLESS7

Ben Harper’s one of those guys most of us have been listening to since… well, let’s just say since we were much younger than we are now. Pretty much all of us have seen him play with the Innocent Criminals over the years, so when we got a chance to film him with his new band, Relentless7, we were all over it.

We covered a lot of ground with Ben. He took us in the studio with him as he recorded his protégé Grace Woodroofe, he invited us along on his cover shoot for Guitar Player Magazine, he brought us along as he inspected his fashion line—but most impressively, he gave us the royal tour of his family’s music store and museum, showing us how he got where he is today.

Senior Producer Alex Simmons was most struck by the store:

“The Claremont Folk Music Center, opened by Ben’s grandparents over 50 years ago is an amazing place, worth visiting if you are in the area.

When we shot the interview with Ben in the Folk Music Center, half way through this kid sits down pretty close to our set up and starts noodling around on a guitar. We didn’t want to tell anybody they couldn’t try out a guitar in the middle of a music store and it wasn’t very loud at first so we let it go. However, after a little bit the kid started playing Zeppelin loudly right in our direction to the point where it was getting really distracting. I think he was trying to impress Ben. Thankfully Ben politely asked him if he could take a quick break and we wrapped up the rest of the interview.”

Ben was a gentlemen and very polite the whole time, but after listening to songs like “Burn One Down,” some people maybe surprised how intense and motivated he is. Alex explains how driven Ben is:

“Ben Harper is focused and he does everything with intensity, whether it be playing music, designing clothes, overseeing his family’s music store or producing other musicians. And he has a low tolerance for bullshit. In interviews if he doesn’t like a question or disagrees with you he will tell you, which I appreciate.”

Often when you interview a musician, they only talk about themselves, but this was not the case with Ben. Ben was more than eager to thrust Jason Mozersky, his new guitar player, into the spotlight at their cover shoot, and was most excited to talk about the rest of his band, rather than himself.

While a lot of frontmen will give the obligatory nod to their band, Ben was intent on letting the world know how talented and deserving they each were. Not only did Ben share the limelight with his band, he also wanted to bring another musician onto the show: his protégé Grace Woodroofe, introduced to each other by the late Heath Ledger. The two of them allowed us to film, as Grace laid down some tracks with Ben at the boards. From Alex:

“Grace Woodroofe is really quiet and shy in person, at least when confronted with a television film crew, but when she starts singing she really transforms into a force. She has such an incredible voice and I can’t wait until her album comes out.”

DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE’S NICK HARMER

The guys from Death Cab For Cutie are such talented musicians, you really wouldn’t expect them to be good at anything else. But it turns out, bassist Nick Harmer is also a really talented photographer.

Nick’s Tour Stop segment really captured the spirit of why we shoot those. When he’s on tour, he spends his days photographing the town he is in. We spent an afternoon with him, on the road, shooting San Francisco. (Here’s an outtake of him talking about the Full House houses they saw.) Then Nick taught us how to transform ordinary photos into tilt shift photography.

Alex, a photographer himself, seemed to enjoy shooting this segement more than most:

“Nick is one of the more energetic and good-natured people I’ve met in the last few years and it’s always fun hanging out with him. We spent a day walking around San Francisco taking pictures that Nick could turn into tilt-shits. Nick calls them “tilt-shit fakes” since he creates them with the aid of PhotoShop. You can actually use a tilt-shift lens if you want to do it the “real” way. Ever since the shoot I’ve started creating a few tilt-shift fakes of my own, not nearly as good as Nick’s, but still fun to do.”

Watch Embedded tonight at 11/10c.

UPDATE: Check out the full episode with Ben Harper on Embedded, and then head over to http://current.com/embedded to see more with Nick Harmer and additional outtakes.

Making fun of Britney Spears is easy. It’s speaking sincerely about her that’s difficult. We all know she can’t sing, and we’re all pretty confident that she is legitimately bat shit crazy. Furthermore, it’s pretty obvious that she’s merely a pawn in the hands of producers and executives.

I’d like to ignore her and not constantly be reminded how fucked up her life is and, even more, I’d like to not be constantly reminded how fucked up our country is because we keep buying this generic, over-produced, tripe merely because Britney had a sweet rack when she was 17.

However, when a mother of two sings a shitty song about threesomes and it goes straight to the top of the charts, you can’t just pretend the situation does not exist.

Oh, and astonishingly, I think this is the first video I’ve ever made that I didn’t cuss in. Weird.

(You can also watch at Current.com here.)

Photo: Alex Simmons

Silversun Pickups were one of the first bands senior producer Alex Simmons shot for Current TV (watch that piece here). Pretty much everyone on our staff loves their music, and a lot of us live in their neighborhood. They anchor a great scene in Silverlake and are the kind of band that makes you proud to live in such an artist-friendly section of Los Angeles, which is a large part of what put them on Alex’s radar years ago:

“Everyone in the band is a big supporter of the local music scene and I see them at Spaceland and The Echo all the time checking out other people’s shows. I think that respect for the under the radar bands is pretty indicative for how hard they work and how little they take all of this—such as a top 10 album—for granted.

We were lucky enough to be with Silversun the day “Swoon” was released. We all knew it was going to be  huge, but most of us didn’t realize it would break the top 10 that week. Alex seems to have the best perspective on why the album hit as big as it did (other than just being an amazing collection of songs):

“I distinctly remember the evening this March when I was driving home and first put on an advanced copy of ‘Swoon.’ I think I had been listening too to much “Dark Was the Night” and Grizzly Bear and the first notes of ‘There’s No Secrets This Year’ kicked me in the gut and woke me up. It was just one of those moments when you feel like this is the album I personally needed to hear right at this moment.”

Most of Silversun Pickups’ fans have the same feeling: it’s a personal connection. When we showed up to shoot them at Rasputin Records, their fans lining the sidewalks all echoed similar stories and were eager to tell us about their personal ties to the music.

Alex was equally moved by their stripped down performances. “We shot two acoustic performances with the band, one at KROQ at 7AM and the other on Record Store Day in Berkeley,” he says. “A lot of bands don’t hold up as well when you peel away the effects—but they really do. It’s impressive.”

In the end, the toughest test for an album is whether or not it can survive a work cycle. Working on a music show is a blessing and a curse. You get to listen to music all day, but you can’t always pick what you listen to and you often have to hear the same parts of the same songs thousands of times. For Alex, “Swoon” passed the test. “It’s one of my favorite albums of 2009, and while I normally get really sick of an album after hearing it all the time in edit sessions, I still like this one.”

K’naan

When you meet an artist that came to America from Somalia and let nothing, not even a war-ravaged country and an entire ocean, get in the way of his dreams, you have to respect his drive. But when our producer Manoj Gopinanth looks back on his time with K’naan at Fat Beats Records, he remembers the person more than the story:

“He seemed like a very down to earth individual, soft-spoken and very knowledgeable about hip hop and music in general.  I’m guessing his upbringing in Somalia and New York City has humbled him. He also spoke about Mos Def, and how they are great friends and how he has learned a lot from him.

Mos is featured on K’naan’s album Troubadour.

Now stop complaining about your childhood.

UPDATE: Watch the full second episode of Embedded, with Silversun Pickups, K’naan, and Arcade Fire, here on Current.

Mos Def with Mark Rinehart (L) and Alex Simmons (R)

Mos Def is a huge get. He doesn’t do many interviews at all, and even fewer TV shows. So when we found out we were going to spend seven days shooting Mos’ every move in Japan, we freaked out a little—in a good way.

Mos had never done anything so up close and candid for so many consecutive days, and quite frankly, neither had we. We’d been thinking of Embedded in the mold of our special with Death Cab for Cutie, Open Windows. But not many artists will let you shoot their every move for an entire week in a foreign country, especially not artists as big as Mos.

Honestly, it was all kind of a whirlwind. We found out Mos was going to hook us up with some insane access to his life, and the next morning our producers Alex Simmons and Mark Rinehart were on a plane with Mos, his crew, a couple of cameras, and ass load of tape.

Good thing we took so much tape, because you wouldn’t believe the amount of cool shit that went down. We had to cut a lot of it out to get our special down to one hour—but fortunately, we have a ton of bandwidth, so you can check out the extras online.

Even beyond all the amazing stuff we had planned, when you’re with someone like Mos, more unbelievable things just seem fall into place. “After one of the shows a pitcher for the Tokyo Giants, Mark Kroon, stopped by the green room to say hi to Mos,” Alex says. “He invited us to a game and Mos kind of looked at the rest of us and said, ‘What do you guys think?’ I have always wanted to see a baseball game in Japan and was standing up and saying, ‘Yes yes yes!’ And Mos started laughing. A few days later we were walking around the field of the Tokyo Dome.” Yeah, it really was that cool.

Mark was pretty blown away by the experience, too:

“There were several moments that unfolded through the camera lens that I will never forget. At the top of the list was a continuous tracking shot that followed Mos and all-star pitcher Mark Kroon through the depths of the Tokyo Giants locker rooms and up the steps directly onto the grass of a 60,000 capacity baseball dome. We  had no idea that this was going to happen. At best we thought we were getting box seats or something. Instead it was the full VIP tour led by the guy who threw the fastest fastball in Japan. Mos kept turning back to camera with an expression like, I can’t believe this is happening. All we could do was look back with similar expressions.

“A few times Mos muttered, ‘Thank you hip hop.’ I found myself thanking hip hop as well. Without hip hop and one of its leading pioneers, there was no way in hell I would ever find myself in Japan, camera rolling, walking up onto a field in front of 60,000 fans with one of the countries most famous baseball stars.

“People tend to ask, ‘What was Mos really like?’ My answers: Extremely talented, hyper creative, genuine, good-hearted, down-to-earth, gracious to all individuals he encounters, inspiring to all those around him.  Those answers may sound cliched. But they are all completely true. I will never forget this trip.”

We’d be remiss if we didn’t thank Mos’ actual entourage, who went out of their way every day to make sure we got what we needed: Naheem, Mos’ manager, and his tour promoter, Yuji. Plus Abdul, Pres and Andy.

It was one of the editors on the project, Andy, who seemed to sum up the whole situation best after a week of combing through the footage. He said, “Mos is like a black hole, sucking all the cool away from the rest of us.” And yet somehow we all feel cooler for having been a part of the experience in some small way.

UPDATE: Watch the whole all of Embedded with Mos Def, here on Current.

Embedded wants you to spread the music love and sing-a-long with Silversun Pickups.

Embed Embedded is a viral game in which users get a unique embed code for a sneak peek video from our new six part music special. The user who generates the highest number of video views during a one-week period gets a limited edition poster for the show designed by legendary music artist Justin Hampton. Each week we’ll put up a new video and you have a new chance to be our mastermind of viral videos.

In this exclusive clip, Silversun Pickups invite you to sing-a-long to “Panic Switch” off the album, “Swoon.” Follow along with the little bouncing ball, and Brian’s subtle assistance. We’re excited to share this with you, and hope that you’ll be just as excited to share it on your blog, MySpace, message boards and anywhere else you hang out online.

Log into your current.com account and go to Embed Embedded for your unique code. Pass it around!