"THE DEATH OF OINK, THE BIRTH OF DISSENT, AND A BRIEF HISTORY OF RECORD INDUSTRY SUICIDE."

Here is a fantastic blog about the fall of OiNK and its prophecy of music industry revolution It's a bit long, but a worthwhile read. There's a section in particular that I want to post below, for it yields understanding to the incentive and opinions behind many of us here at KSCR. "Unlike newspapers, record companies own the distribution and the product being distributed, so you can't just start your own website where you give out music that they own - and that's what this is all about: distribution. Lots of pro-piracy types argue that music can be free because people will always love music, and they'll pay for concert tickets, and merchandise, and the marketplace will shift and artists will survive. Well, yes, that might be an option for some artists, but that does nothing to help the record labels, because they don't make any money off of merchandise, or concert tickets. Distribution and ownership are what they control, and those are the two things piracy threatens. The few major labels left are parts of giant media conglomerations - owned by huge parent companies for whom artists and albums are just numbers on a piece of paper. It's why record companies shove disposable pop crap down your throat instead of nurturing career artists: because they have CEOs and shareholders to answer to, and those people don't give a shit if a really great band has the potential to get really successful, if given the right support over the next decade. They see that Gwen Stefani's latest musical turd sold millions, because parents of twelve year old girls still buy music for their kids, and the parent company demands more easy-money pop garbage that will be forgotten about next month. The only thing that matters to these corporations is profit - period. Music isn't thought of as an art form, as it was in the earlier days of the industry where labels were started by music-lovers - it's a product, pure and simple." Hopefully, the digital revolution will eventually banish money grubbing executives from recycling music as a disposable flavor-of-the-week. In addition, I suggest anyone who believes "indie snobs" are informed not by personal taste but by a self-righteous, just-for-the-sake-of-it rebellion to the "sheep" of pop culture, to read the above essay and then consider the common defense of mainstream music: "Popular music is popular for a reason. It wouldn't be popular if it wasn't good."

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Recycled Sounds: The Unassuming Return of Britpop

If you were a freedom-loving U.S. American in the mid-1990s, you surely remember the tense (and, in retrospect, patently ridiculous) battle for college rock supremacy between Hootie and the Blowfish and the Dave Matthews Band. It was a conflict that threatened to tear a nation of khaki-shorted collegians apart solely on the relative merits of "Let Her Cry" and "Don't Drink the Water." Now, imagine that same battle with way better music, far more drunken publicity interviews, and much bigger stakes (namely, the victorious band getting to define the cultural values of its nation and hobnob with the head of state; can you imagine Darius Rucker hanging out with Bill Clinton?). That, in a nutshell, was the Battle of Britpop (ca. 1993-1997) waged between Blur, a group of erudite, post-mod schoolboys, and Oasis, a band seemingly motivated only by the prospect of fame and their disdain for their fellow bandmates. To make a long story short, Oasis won the battle but Blur won the war. It was a seminal moment in the type of British rock history that only the British can truly comprehend. However, both bands had notable Stateside success during this period (even if Blur's biggest hit mostly consisted of Damon Albarn yelling "Woo hoo!" at the top of his lungs), ushering a brief cultural fad known as "Cool Britannia." The invasion was brief but influential, reminding Americans that there was life after grunge and introducing Yanks to a previously unseen side of British youth culture with a distinct nationalist flair. The Britpop influence was so pervasive by '97 that even its demise came from within, headed by the unlikely tag team of Radiohead and the Spice Girls. Ten years later, there's a distinct feeling of deja vu. Radiohead is more relevant than ever. The Spice Girls are touring again. Beckhamania has gripped the Los Angeles elite. And many a band that entrances the hipster audience hails from Britain--they just typically specialize in dance-punk or art-rock nowadays. Britpop, it seems, is as dated as Noel Gallagher's bowl cut and Union Jack-emblazoned guitar. America's embrace of music steeped in English esoterica hasn't endured quite as long as its fascination with music based on Lewis Carroll-esque nonsense words like "zigazig-ah." But in the UK, where a fierce loyalty to the product of native musicians remains, Britpop isn't quite dead yet. Even Oasis is still charting. Some of the neo-Britpop vanguard has made fleeting advances towards American chart success but hasn't gotten much farther than The O.C. soundtrack (a la Kaiser Chiefs). Razorlight, in its distinctly cheeky fashion, even penned a breezy single entitled "America" for its most recent album, only to see it gain far greater notoriety in the UK. Americans' tolerance for references to "old Leodiensians" and ebullient shouting of 12-digit mobile phone numbers only extends so far, I guess. It's a shame, because the vestiges of Britpop have carried on in acts a lot more lighthearted than Coldplay and Keane, where such bands' bowdlerization of Britpop is a capital crime. You can see it in The Hoosiers--an English band with a name that has to be the logical conclusion to the neo-Britpop obsession with its forefathers' unexpected success across the pond and the subsequent generation's failure to capitalize on it: The Queen doesn't need any more saving. God save Britpop instead.

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Why Sia's Shows Sell Out

Glow in the dark outfits made to appear as child-like drawings...always a plus! Oh, and the singing was not bad either!

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New Thrice: The Alchemy Index Vols. I & II

I've never been that big of a Thrice fan (not that I didn't like them, I just never got into their music - except for their song Deadbolt). Surprisingly I found myself looking up the band on Wikipedia then seeing that they have a new two-disk album out. Titled The Alchemy Index Vols. I & II, the CD released on October 16 is part of a four-volume series (Volumes III & IV will be arriving in April 2008) with a theme following the four elements: fire, water, earth, and air, respectively. Most of the song names (and seemingly the song styles as well) directly reflect the theme that the disk is following. The track listing for these two volumes is as follows: Fire

1. Firebreather - 4:42
2. The Messenger - 2:09
3. Backdraft - 4:08
4. The Arsonist - 4:13
5. Burn the Fleet - 3:47
6. The Flame Deluge - 3:28

Water

1. Digital Sea - 3:44
2. Open Water - 3:47
3. Lost Continent - 4:30
4. Night Diving - 6:02
5. The Whaler - 4:09
6. Kings Upon the Main - 4:56

As you may have guessed, the disk titled "Fire" is a little harder than "Water." Full of loud vocals and heavy guitar, Fire was definitely the disk that I enjoyed the most. Neither of the disks, however, sounded exactly like the Thrice that I knew. The band's guitarist Teppei Teranishi had this to say about the album:

"We're kind of doing something that's the opposite of what a producer is supposed to do on a record--which is make everything make sense and kind of fit together--whereas this project is all about taking things apart and pushing them one way. We really wanted to try doing things our way this time around, and make this record sound the way we want it to sound, not the way it's "supposed" to sound."

While Fire is most comparable to Thrice's sound in their last album Vheissu, the songs on Water are completely different, and they made me feel like I was listening to a Radiohead album. These tracks are very slow and contain a lot of electronic/synthesized sounds, which I wasn't really expecting to hear. It's good to see that they are trying something new, though, rather than repeating their old, successful style. Although The Illusion of Safety is still my favorite album, I'll probably be listening to more of The Alchemy Index (and Thrice in general as a result) in the weeks to come - hopefully Volumes III and IV in April will be of the same, or even better, quality. Link: Listen to samples or buy it from Amazon

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Currently listening to

	Thrice
	Deadbolt

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