ICDT One Year Anniversary Summit

I guess today is the birthday of I Could Die Tomorrow. While by no means an important event, it's still amazing to think we've been doing this for a year. We can't lie when we say that 325,000+ pageviews is pretty awesome. Not all of the original members are still around, though their contributions are what made this blog fun (for the most part) in the first place. We had a few bad ideas for an ANNIVERSARY BLOW OUT post, but, fortunately for you, nothing solidified, so we're just going to spend this post thanking everyone.

I guess we'd really just like to thank a few parties. First, there are all bands we've stolen from, with or without permission. There are obviously a few specific ones, but we'll leave that to your imagination. Keep making music and doing what you're doing? I don't know, at least stay around long enough to cut a demo for us to enthusiastically gush over. More importantly, we'd like to thank all of our friends who have contributed entries to the ICDT canon. You guys rule and we encourage all of you (you = our friends, not random creeps) to write something for us. Lastly, and most importantly, we'd also like to thank all of our "readership" for putting up for our diverse selection of boring, pretentious, poorly-executed, verbose, overly-long, overly-personal, and/or ultra-nerdy rants. Your feedback has been really helpful and really awesome. With our writing, we get some sort of weird satisfaction from your satisfaction, so we can't thank you enough for getting us off.

Uh, so yeah. Commencing ICDT: Year 2!

-ICDT

P.S. Big ups to Elise for putting up with Adam!

No Trend - Teen Love 7"

Artist: No Trend
Album: Teen Love 7"
Release: 1983
Label: No Trend Records

Tracklist:

1. Mass Sterilization Caused By Venereal Disease
2. Cancer
3. Teen Love

While not as influential (or excellent) as their masterful LP Too Many Humans..., No Trend's Teen Love 7" is still fucking great. The A-side to this debut 7" is what No Trend fans come to love: Flipper-esque noise punk complimented with misanthropic ruminations on the banality of suburban life. The first song, "Mass Sterilization Caused By Venereal Disease," is probably the most sonically intense song No Trend ever created. "Cancer" sounds more like the classic No Trend from Too Many Humans...: bass-heavy, razor-sharp and thing guitars, and main dude Jeff Mentges yelping like a madman. Come to think of it, that description makes it sound exactly like Public Image Ltd., who are certainly an influence, but No Trend possessed more of a hardcore influence, whether they would have liked to admit it or not.

The B-side consists of the monolithic title track, which stands as not only one of their best moments, but their most PiL. Seriously, with the a semi-funky, lurching bassline, reverb-laden guitars, and an almost-excessive running time, this shit is straight PiL. Musically, this song is fucking brilliant, but the lyrics make it even better. The tale concerns two (you guessed it!), teenagers who fall in love. While this may seem somewhat unexciting, the lyrics take a novel approach (especially in '83) to it all. Forgoing both a sincere, emotional tale or a blunt critique, "Teen Love" maintains a scientific and Brechtian-distance from the subject matter, making it both humorous and disturbing.

As I previously stated, this is not No Trend's best release and if you haven't heard their first LP, then you need to get on that immediately. However, this is still as fine a starting point as any to hear one of the best punk bands of the 1980s.

Download Here

-Adam

Mojave 3 - Ask Me Tomorrow

Artist: Mojave 3
Album: Ask Me Tomorrow
Release: 1995
Label: 4AD

Tracklist:

1. Love Songs On The Radio
2. Sarah
3. Tomorrow's Taken
4. Candle Song
5. You're Beautiful
6. Where Is The Love
7. After All
8. Pictures
9. Mercy

After Slowdive released their pinnacle, Souvlaki, and endured tremendously shitty touring rigors, Creation Records had the gumption to inform them that the follow-up had to be a "total pop record." Anyone who's heard even seconds of the final Pygmalion album can attest to its intangible, often lengthy tunes, and thus the band found themselves dropped as Oasis was about to go huge and Creation, subsequently, to shit. So members Rachel Goswell, Neil Halstead and Ian McCrutcheon formed Mojave 3, cut this record initially as a demo and got a new deal.

While later records would shed the Slowdive influence, this one's got plenty of airy, dreamy atmosphere not far off from the older band's latter two records. But the new focus is clear: distortion and effects pedal armadas are shed for sublime, slide-guitar-imbued folky songs about life and love. I found myself absorbing this record while high as a kite on doctor-ordered vicodin and ibuprofen following my wisdom tooth removal operation two winters ago, and even through the haze Rachel's vocals had me popping a chub right from her opening narration on "Love Songs on the Radio." Halstead's no slouch either, his reflective singing the beautiful offspring of the pipes of Bob Dylan and Nick Drake. Both are gentle, but aren't scared and hiding behind walls of guitar anymore.

Ultimately, Ask Me Tomorrow is a transitional record, but still a confident, beautifully pleasant effort. If you like Slowdive, or shoegaze, this is the next step. If you like Wilco, this is still something you'll probably like.

Buy Here (Holy crap, 4AD has it on vinyl!)
Download Here

-Asa

Fleetwood Mac - Rumours

Artist: Fleetwood Mac

Album: Rumours

Year: 1977

Label: Warner Bros.

Tracklist:

1. Second Hands News

2. Dreams

3. Never Going Back Again

4. Don't Stop

5. Go Your Own Way

6. Songbird

7. The Chain

8. You Make Loving Fun

9. I Don't Want To Know

10. Oh Daddy

11. Gold Dust Woman

MJ is dead. Who the fuck cares? Yeah, Thriller is awesome, but it's too played-out. The best pop albums for me are:

1. Rumours

2. Pet Sounds

3. Thriller

Fuck the rest.

[Well, that got taken down quickly]

-Trey

Justin Pigott/Peter Bonneman/Crystalline Roses Split CD-R

Artist: Crystalline Roses, Justin Pigott, Peter Bonneman
Album: Three-Way Split CD
Year: 2009
Label: Devine Noise

Tracklist:

1. Peter Bonneman - Jeg Var Allerede Gdet
2. Crystalline Roses - Dante
3. Justin Pigott - Crash Epiphany
4. Peter Bonneman - Sangen Om Hans Mindei
5. Crystalline Roses - Calling Upon The Wind
6. Justin Pigott - 129 Lullaby
7. Peter Bonneman - Nabo
8. Crystalline Roses - The Wind Replies
9. Justin Pigott - Plant Me...
10. Peter Bonneman - Isaer Om Aftenen
11. Justin Pigott & Crystalline Roses - My Yellow Mama
12. Crystalline Roses - Home Is Where You're Happy

Great artists are masters of both mimicry and aberration. Picasso, before beginning his venture into abstract and "childlike" painting first achieved excellence in an academic tradition, following Velazquez. So it is in a like tradition that this three way split CD-R arrives. The three artists on this record include Peter Bonneman, Crystalline Roses, and Justin Pigott; Bonneman is known most famously as guitarist for Denmark's now defunct, modern/classic Gorilla Angreb, Crystalline Roses songwriter can be heard playing bass in Aerosols and on vocals for Western Mass. degenerates Squirm, and Piggot was a member of Guilt Lust when they were an active band. These kind of hardcore/punk credentials ordinarily make fan-boys/girls swoon, but this album is different. What can be heard here are twelve tracks that return to earlier musical traditions and more practiced instrumentation. Possibly, probably, the reason these three have been accomplished in writing punk is because they have studied more musical history than hardcore.

Each artist on this record uses acoustic instrumentation but the styles vary greatly. Bonneman's tracks are essentially blues based. I don't know anything about "folk" traditions in Denmark but I imagine that they don't hold to what would probably be considered Americana--early twentieth century RnB, proper. It is exhilarating and challenging to listen the Danish vocals over top guitar music that sounds so much like American blues. There's finger picking and a metallic, deep-ish, resonant sound.

It is harder to chart the musical roots of Crystalline Roses than the other two song writers. It seems like A.P. is less interested in writing conventional songs than he is in experimenting with form, and affect. These are longer, sometimes instrumental, trance like tracks that set specific emotional scenes ("Calling Upon the Wind" is one of the bleakest sounding songs I've heard in recent memory, which is awesome). I can here a little bit of Michael Gira in this but also, maybe, Ravi Shankar. Lyrically, A.P. moves between Imagist (good) and some deep neo-Wicca shit (bad). He is an excellent bard on the whole.

Piggot's songs are--like Bonneman's--more classically country and blues inspired so if you're interested in that kind of guitar work you'll like it. Reminds a bit of Leo Kottke.

There are three shows on the East Coast in support of the split. You can find out where in MA here. They will be playing 538 Johnson Ave. (203, The Stolen Sleeves Collective) in Brooklyn on July 18th.

Oh, and for what it's worth (and I'm not entirely sure what this is), the final CR track is a cover of a Charles Manson song.

Download Here

-Colman

The Men - Self Titled LP

Artist: The Men
Album: Self Titled LP
Release: 2009
Label: Self-Released

Tracklist:

1. Hated
2. Ailment
3. The Man
4. Sketchy Pussy

Boy, did this release catch me off-guard. From the get-go, I had no reason to like this band, as they had a few things going against them before I even heard their debut LP. First, there is the name: The Men, which while I've now come to enjoy, I initially thought was super fucking stupid. Additionally, someone told me they played garage punk, which I also hate. Brooklyn garage punks naming their band the Men? No thanks!

However, my boy Mike played them for me in his room and I found myself actually enjoying it. The Men, while certainly with some garage influences, are not exactly like Jay Reatard or whatever other shitty acts I lazily pigeonhole into the same, arbitrary category.

The Men play a trashy-sounding punk akin to the Stooges, only with a much, MUCH less intense singer and, obviously, not as good. Still, I've found myself really enjoying this album. All but one of these four songs are raw, aggressive, bass-heavy, and just plain dirty-sounding jams equipped with pretty raging solos. The only track that deviates from this formula is "The Man," a surprisingly warm and pretty excursion into more gauzy pop territory. While I wouldn't want them to abandon their homeland for new shores, they clearly exhibit the ability to not only experiment, but to do it really fucking well.

I highly recommend everyone check this out. The band is self-releasing this LP in an edition of 300 copies. If you're living in the general Northeast area, you can pick one up on their upcoming tour. Otherwise, email markperro@gmail.com to (pre)order one. Get on it!

Download Here
To buy, email markperro@gmail.com

-Adam