St Vincent is Annie Clark, a veteran of two multi-member multi-instrumental bands: the creepy, religious cult-looking band Polyphonic Spree and also the band of 2005, Sufjan Stevens. Her first solo album earned here some indie acclaim. This song is from the second, more eclectic album called Actor.
The video is half comedy act half music video. It is silly to the point of almost being annoying but it has some endearing aspects. The video features the relatively new comedy team thunderant, which is comprised of Fred Armisen of Saturday Night Live and Carrie Brownstein of the now defunct all-girl rip roaring rock band Sleater-Kinney. While Brownstein is an amazing guitarist and songwriter, I can't say much for the comedy team.
However, the music video has its shining moments. The video highlights some of the things a musician has to endure when playing small venues. Other than the terrible job of promotion some organizers do, Armisen and Brownstein act out some of the more annoying things people in small crowds do. Things like closely staring at the guitarists fingers, talking loudly over the songs, walking around the performer, lounging on amps behind the musicians. Some of these things aren't so bad when you are in a crowded club, but are really accentuated in a small venue.
Perhaps the only people that will get the humor in this video are musicians an I guess people that like blunt, repetitive SNL comedy. Either way, the song is good.
So, the Suckers is what Quinn Walker is doing now. It sounds like his solo stuff but bigger and more layered. They have hints of David Byrne and Akron/Family before this last jam band sounding album. Some people have said they sound like MGMT, but I think they are confusing "sounds like" with "dresses in weird clothes like."
Suckers
MGMT
The video is a computer animated psychedelic romp. Each band members body is a kaleidoscope of different elements, like a cactus cabbage fish or a horse hawk skull. Not groundbreaking, but it is has a attractive aesthetic. And the music is good.
Today is my birthday and I am going to treat myself to my favorite video right now. I have been saving this one for a good day, like a fine bottle of fortified wine.
Full Force has some elements of the Boy Band model, but they are definitely not a Boy Band. Full Force is like a mixture between New Jack Swing and 80s hip hop. They had a short-lived record career, but their work behind scenes is extensive. They have been writing and producing music for three decades. The boys from Full Force have done work with Bob Dylan and Patti LaBelle in the 80s, Backstreet Boys and Selena in the 90s, Brittany Spears and the Black Eyed Peas in the 00s.
The video is ridiculous amazing. The stiff, tragically unhip white folks get a lesson from Shy Shy, Bowlegged Lou, Baby Gee and the rest of the gang. My fav is Curt-T-T!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The best part of the song is wild synth at the end.
This is a time capsule of 1987 New York fashion. The hot Jheri Curls, the long-tasseled leather jackets, and don't miss the rockin' keytar. And Nike shoes the band are sporting are all the rage right now. They could pass for a post-ironic hipster throwback band and fit right into Look at that Fucking Hipster
I had to close out the Boy Band series with a music video from the downfall of the Boy Band.
I thought about posting a video from O-Town. They were a band created on the reality television show Making the Band by the Boy Band godfather himself, Lou Pearlman. They are the ultimate, demographically tested, cookie cutter Boy Band. The problem isn't that their stuff is terrible, it is just painfully boring and uninteresting.
LFO is much more interesting. They make no pretensions about being good. The song is a completely failure. The video is a failure. The album is a failure. The band is a failure. The whole LFO concept is a failure. Even the band's name, Lyte Funky Ones, is a failure.
This song is Boy Band in its glorious down fall. The lyrics are terrible. They make no sense at all. They are just pop culture references intertwined with a girl and the summer. Also, this video is a commercial for Abercrombie and Fitch, which at that time was the symbol of vapid, douchieness. So enjoy the pinnacle of suck.
*NSYNC is perhaps one of the greatest stories in Boy Band history, if not one of the greatest stories in pop music. I know what you are thinking, but hear me out. To understand *NSYNC, to understand Boy Bands, you have to know about Lou Pearlman.
There are two reasons why there was a Boy Band craze of the late 90s. Two reasons why we as a society had to endure the nearly half a decade of sappy, overproduced music from the likes of Backstreet Boys, *NSYNC, LFO, O-Town, and non-Pearlman spin-offs like 98 Degrees.
The Boy Band craze happened because of Ponzi schemes and pedophilia. Boy Bands were created to hide Lou Pearlman's 300 million dollar Ponzi scheme and to satisfy Lou Pearlman's desire for young boys.
Lou Pearlman is the father of Boy Bands. The term Boy Band was coined to describe the band model that Lou Pearlman invented and perfected.
Meet Lou Pearlman.
This is the face of the Boy Band. What a cutie.
Lou Pearlman is just as sleezy and creepy as he looks. He is currently serving a 25 year sentence in prison for heading one of the longest-running Ponzi schemes in history. (It was the biggest Ponzi scheme in history, but Bernie Madoff out did Pearlman 200 times over). Pearlman has decades of scams that include insurance fraud, consumer fraud, investment fraud, bankruptcy fraud, and stock market scams. Oh and Boy Bands. Did I mention Boy Bands?
Aside from fraud, Lou Pearlman is also pedophile. Vanity Fair ran story in 2007 about the sexual deviance ofthe man all the boys called Big Poppa. Here is a bit from the article:
Some, especially the teenagers, shrugged and giggled when he showed them pornographic movies or jumped naked onto their beds in the morning to wrestle and play. Others, it appears, didn't get off so easily. These were the young singers seen emerging from his bedroom late at night, buttoning their pants, sheepish looks on their faces. Some deny anything improper ever happened. But the parents of at least one, a member of the Backstreet Boys, complained. And for any number of young men who sought to join the world's greatest boy bands, Big Poppa's attentions were an open secret, the price some paid for fame.
"Some guys joked about it; I remember [one singer] asking me, 'Have you let Lou blow you yet?'" says Steve Mooney, an aspiring singer who served as Pearlman's assistant and lived in his home for two years. "I would absolutely say the guy was a sexual predator. All the talent knew what Lou's game was. If they say no, they're lying to you."
To a number of his former band members, Pearlman seemed so enamored of his male singers that it called into question his motivations for entering the music business in the first place. "Honestly, I don't think Lou ever thought we would become stars," says Rich Cronin, lead singer of the Pearlman boy band Lyte Funky Ones (LFO). "I just think he wanted cute guys around him; this was all an excuse. And then lightning crazily struck and an empire was created. It was all dumb luck. I think his motives for getting into music were very different."
In this article, the mother of Aaron Carter and Nick Carter, member of the Backstreet Boys, said about Pearlman, "Certain things happened and it almost destroyed our family. I tried to warn everyone. I tried to warn all the mothers."
So what does all have to do with *NSYNC? Well, we are almost there.
In the late 90s, Big Poppa Pearlman decided that the New Kids on the Block were great way to make money. He decided that he wanted to recreate the success of NKOTB by building a similar band. Lou did a nation wide talent search and assembled a band of five teenage boys that would be called Backstreet Boys. They soon climbed the charts and made Lou tons of money.
What the members of the Backstreet Boys didn't know is that Pearlman was robbing them. This story isn't new. Band managers and producers have been ripping off the artists since the beginning of the music industry. New artists sign themselves into musical indentured slavery get screwed. They Suck Young Blood.
After receiving only $300,000 of the hundreds of millions being made, the band sued Pearlman and won.
So we get to *NSYNC. They were basically a carbon copy of the Backstreet Boys. Five young men with dreams of stardom were assembled by Lou Pearlman, being ripped off, and who knows what else. After their first album and with the success of the Backstreet Boys in the lawsuit, *NSYNC got smart. They sued Pearlman and tried to get out of their contract before the release of the second album, and they won.
This was no small feat. For years, artists have been getting screwed over by unscrupulous record companies and producers. Most of the time, these artists are unable to recover the any of the earnings made on their backs. The Backstreet Boys may have won, but they were on the downslope. Their popularity had already peaked. *NSYNC, on the other hand, were just about to reach the peak of their career. They won when it mattered the most.
Bye Bye Bye the first single off of the album No Strings Attached. It was the fastest selling album ever (until knocked out by the Beatles One compilation). The album cover was no normal Boy Band motif of young guys, looking hot and cool, it was making a statement. It features all of the members of *NSYNC on a stage but being controlled by a marionette. They are referencing the control that the commercial music industry has over musicians, and specifically the control that Lou Pearlman had over *NSYNC. The album title No Strings Attached is speaking about the freedom from contractual bondage.
Bye Bye Bye video was the embodiment of this struggle. The song was a sarcastic farewell to Big Poppa. The music video is the album cover played out. The band is being controlled by a puppet master. She cuts the strings and the members of the band try to escape, but escape is futile. They think they have slipped away but in the end they are still dangling from strings. They may have cut ties with Lou Pearlman and RCA, but they signed to Jive Records and new puppet master was holding the strings. Sure, there is the standard choreographed dancing and the song is treacle pop, but it also insightful and self-reflective.
Bye Bye Bye is the pinnacle of the Boy Band. It was all down hill after that. This is song is perhaps the most well-known, the most important, the most loved, and the most hated Boy Band song.
The Backstreet Boys were the quintessential Boy Band. They sparked the Boy Band craze and spawned dozens of terrible one-hit and no-hit Boy Bands (see 98 Degrees and 5ive).
Again, we see the five member Boy Band with the bad boy, the baby face, the pretty boy, the gay one, and the ugly one. See if you can guess who is who.
This video and song are an amalgam of different pop components from over the years. First this a return song. They announce over and over again that "Backstreet's Back (alright)." Just like we twist again (like we did last summer).
The video is a mixture of 90's goth and cheesy Halloween costumes. You have the werewolf, the mummy, the vampire, the Phantom of the Opera, and the Jekyll/Hyde. Oh yeah, and in case you didn't notice, Thriller.
This video is a sad rip off of Thriller. But it is fun and its a good pop dance song, the last good dance song from the Backstreet Boys. After this song, they only released, sappy ballads that fueled the loinfires of teenage girls (the word loinfires is copyright Ani Loizzo).
While New Edition may be considered the first Boy Band, the template for the stereotypical Boy Bands to follow would be based on the New Kids on the Block. New Edition was sugary pop sweetness, but the New Kids on the Block were a young girl sensation.
They image was plastered all over teen magazines, Trapper Keepers, lunch boxes, T-Shirts, bed sheets, buttons, shoes, shoes laces, birthday cakes, tooth brushes, underwear, and just about anything you can put an image on. They were the band that every girl and some boys in second to seventh grade loved. You weren't cool if you didn't go to the NKOTB show when they came to your local civic center.
This video is from the height of their popularity as you can tell from all the screaming girls. They had already shot to the top with their first super single You Got It (The Right Stuff). Although it was just called The Right Stuff on the album, they changed the single because Vanessa Williams had a hit earlier that year with the same name.
The video and the song are emblematic of the cheesiness and narcissism of the Boy Band. Synchronized dance moves and thousands of girls screaming and begging just to closer to their favorite member. Donnie was the bad boy, Joey was the baby face, Jordan was the pretty boy, Danny was the ugly one, and Jonathan was the gay one.
The reign of the Boy Band craze of the 80s and 90s has its roots in bands in the throughout music history. The Jackson 5 for their synchronized dance and harmonies. The Monkees for their manufactured image and commercial sheen. Perhaps one of the first true Boy Bands was the Latino sensation Menudo, who famously dropped members when they got to old and replaced them with younger boys.
New Edition was perhaps one of the first American Boy Bands, even though the term Boy Band didn't exist until the 90s. They came to popularity with the song Candy Girl and released sugary pop hits for years. The band was led by Bobby Brown, who went on to a successful solo career.
When Bobby Brown left the band, New Edition went on to do less poppy music and were one of the progenitors of New Jack Swing. They recorded their most successful album Heart Break in 1987 and influenced the development of R&B styled Boy Band like Boys II Men and 4P.M. Some of the member later broke off to form the less successful Bel Biv DeVoe.
This song is bubblegum pop at its sweetest. It is fun and catchy. The influences of the Jackson 5, especially the song ABC are very apparent here.
Hot Chip is one of the electronic rock bands that prominently features vocals. While the lines are blurry, they are also considered dance-punk or disco-punk or indie-dance or synth-pop or synth-rock or any number of mixtures of those words.
They have gone from a small English band self-releasing albums in 2000 to a major label grammy-nominated artists. EMI might have signed them, but they still release records in the US on DFA. In case you are wondering, DFA is the biggest indie label for this modern mix of rock/punk/synth/electro/ect. They were one of the first and they are still the most biggest in the genre. LCD Soundsystem is the other big name on the label, but there are reams of others.
So, about the video...its is amazing. I actually like the video more than the song. The video starts out as if it is a boy band video with primped and toned metrosexuals doing group dance to a crowd of screaming girls. Then a bald Christ figure shows up and havoc ensues. I don't want to ruin the rest of the video, just make sure you watch the whole thing. You don't want to miss the laser and the floating head.
Ratatat will be releasing their fourth album LP4 in May and I am looking for to it. They play a mix of guitar and 8-nit sounding electronic/synth. They are one of biggest names in a burgeoning genre called Electronic rock. I say burgeoning, but there has been electronic rock since the 60s.
The genre has morph quite a bit throughout the years. From the early days when it was basically the rock with a moog to the growth of the synth in the 70s to the 80s. In the 90s it was more dark and brooding, ala Nine Inch Nails and Chemical Brothers.
Ratatat represents a new generation with Crystal Castles, HEALTH, and a bunch of 8-bit bands like Anamanaguchi. The focus is on using simpler, blockier electronic sounds reminiscent of MIDI music used on old gaming console (Nintendo, Sega, Atari). The music is primarily post-rock and usually lyric-less.
Ratatat does something cool with video in their live show. They project scenes from old movies and psychedelic images manipulated and spliced to go with the songs. I believe this music video is the same video they use when they play the song live. So this is really a little slice of their live show.
Its a throwback video to go with their throwback sounding song. Ratatat uses cheesy explosion scenes that move with the beat from the movie Predator with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Even cooler, it features Predator-vision!
I really dig this Merrill Garbus character. She is tUnE-yArDs. She got her start in a band called Sister Suvi, but this solo project with a ukulele slays me. The album has an amazing song that is partly in Swahili called Hatari, but unfortunately there is no music video.
This new song that isn't on the album is the first official music video released by Garbus. Merrill and two friends dress up and do some poses in front of a camera in someones apartment. It is quite simple but it is cute and the song is stellar.
Since South by Southwest is going on, I figured I should post a video from a band that is there.
Jacuzzi Boys, a terrible name for a great new band. They play a sort lofi psychedelic beach rock. They come from Miami, Florida, which may explain the name and the flavor. Their new album No Seasons is one of my favorite of the year so far. It made me feel like I was walking down a boardwalk in the unbearable heat, a feat not to be underestimated as I was battling the near zero temperatures of a Minnesota winter.
Their video of low-grain home video of the coast saturated with a bright sun complements the music perfectly. Its getting me excited for the summer.
