This video is making me unhappy.
Neb is too shy to let you all know that that's him at 2:20, incognito.
1: Better or worse than the dad who shot his middle-aged daughter's boyfriend, in San Antonio?
Also let me be the first to say that I'm not clear what we're mocking.
They are different kinds of unhappiness.
Clicking through, I learn that this is a cover of some country songs. I guess knowing the originals changes one's attitude toward this.
Also let me be the first to say that I'm not clear what we're mocking.
Heebie! Why do you assume we're mocking anything? Certainly not Goatbomb!.
Well, it seemed too accesible and straightforward for you to possibly be praising it.
Goatbomb is a project of the mysterious Smolken the Digger, who is also responsible for Dead Raven Choir, Wolfmangler, and Garlic Yarg.
Country's got plenty of songs about partying, drinking, raising hell and banging chicks which need to get pimped out and get crunk! That is our mission: take the most pimpin country songs and PIMP THEM OUT some more!!!
I assume they're trying to be hilarious, but past experiences with metal taught me that I can never be sure when people intend their music to be funny.
Huh. From watching the posted video, I wasn't expecting it to be an ongoing project. I just thought it was a handful of kids who were pleased with themselves for creating something coherent.
I really love the use of "which" in 10.
Ah, they are Polish. It's probably not an affectation.
I don't know. The use of autotune in "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend" and the Garth Brooks cover with Cookie Monster vocals in "Bros in Low Places" have me pretty convinced they're joking.
And is it the Polish guy who has a Scottish accent?
Yeah, if they were actually talented musicians slumming as living room screamo furries, it would sound a little better. Die Antwoord can't help themselves; they are too fucking rad to hide it.
Also, those Blossom costumes the girls are wearing--ironic? So hard to tell.
The video was shot and directed by Aśka from Immersion (myspace.com/immersionpoland) and Catwoman from Południca! (myspace.com/poludnica)
I'm pretty sure that if my name belonged in that sentence, I'd ask to be unacknowledged. Whatever your opinion of the song might be, the videography is inarguably worse.
11: I'm surprised by that too. These are just kids in their parents' living room, right?
Smolken has come up here before. I also enjoy this setting of Rilke, despite the poor recording quality.
As you can see, his activity has been unstinting.
Too bad The Horny-Goloch Is An Awesome Beast/Soople And Scaly/It Has Twa' Horns And A Hantle O' Feet/And A Forky Tailie is out of print. It sounds really really good.
I think it is magnificent.
There is no longer anything stance available but parody, and it is best to be open and aggressive about it.
The point of this video is that attractive women will tolerate the company of relatively unattractive men? Yes?
OT: Pomplamoose makes it on NPR:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125783271&ps=cprs
Worth watching: Scarface School Play, via 3 Quarks Daily.
Weren't Aska and Catwoman on the plane from Poland that went down in Russia?
28:No
Umm, just, you surprise me Burke.
I never understood why some people were so annoyed by Nataly from Pamplemoose so much and why other people were so infatuated with her. I could never manage anything besides indifference--until I saw their cover of The Book of Love by The Magnetic Fields. Once I saw her sing a song I deeply loved, and how tinny and false she seemed doing it, I realized that she was in fact objectively annoying.
Wow, that's interesting. What language are they speaking? I can almost make it out.
32: It's mainly the flat affect and soulless voice that I find offputting, plus none of their covers I've listened to have really done anything interesting or compelling with the original song. The metric tonnes of hamming for the camera are also quite annoying. And they seem smug. Other than that, though, what's not to like?
34: I don't understand...are you saying she isn't cute? Look at those big blue eyes!
Still rather listen to their cover than Peter Gabriel's.
36: No, I don't find her particularly cute myself. Cutesy, sure. Anyway there are oceans of cute artists out there, and many of them are actually pleasing to my ear.
And oh god, but does that latest Peter Gabriel album of covers sounds truly dreadful. I heard parts of it on NPR and just wanted to hit him over the head with a chair for the pain he was inflicting on the world. I have thus far blissfully escaped having to listen to it playing anywhere though.
I actually spent some time at Wikipedia, looking up "Moe" and "Kawaii" trying to understand some of the nuances of her performance. But the link is safe for work.
You need to check out the comments, "father selling his daughter to Internet childporn" stuff.
h/t Tyler Cohen, under his "culture that is Japan" continuing series.
Huh. Should have googleproofed 38 a little, I think. Sorry.
I wonder if "Book of Love" is going to get the "Hallelujah" treatment, get covered infinitely and played over the closing credits of every crappy teen TV drama. It's just a fucking fantastic song.
I hold no brief for Pamplemoose, they deliver a consistently pleasant musical experience (if you dig the whole artless ingenue vocal thing) but have done nothing to be considered great (or even all that good when you consider all the musicians doing excellent original stuff who languish in obscurity). But it's interesting to consider how the whole cover vs. original thing affects their reception. If they'd written those songs, they'd be great and their smugness justified. Since they haven't, they are, what...annoying? But your ear can't tell who wrote it. They're good performers, if you like that artfully artless style. Like I said, Peter Gabriel spent a lot more money doing a worse cover.
I kind of want to retract the implied offer in 40 that I'd go and google-proof, because I actually want to go to bed now. I'm happy to do it in the morning, though.
41: "Better than Peter Gabriel" is a pretty low bar, PGD. I find them quite unpleasing to listen to.
Still rather listen to their cover than Peter Gabriel's.
Yes.
"Better than Peter Gabriel" is a pretty low bar, PGD.
comity!
The girl from Pamplemoose is entirely crushable in an aren't-I-cute stifled-libido hipster-chick sort of way until you realize just how much she resembles Michael Cera. The guy is embarrassing to watch because he reminds me of myself. Even though I'm not actually like him day-to-day, I a) totally would be if I was taping myself playing music with just one other friend and b) would enjoy being that way.
Pamplemoose is not musically advanced, though they get in a number of fun flourishes. They are a YouTube phenomenon for a reason. They combine a relatively polished, ornamented pop-sound with a studio look-under-the-hood, and give you the look with adept use of language of internet video. They don't need to be soulful. They're clearly having a good time, and if you don't hate people who look like them, you can have a good time too.
This, however, is weird:
"There's no hidden sounds, there's no lip-synching, there's no overdubbing. What you see is what you hear," Conte says. "Sometimes, there might be two or three Natalys harmonizing with herself, and then you'll see those three videos juxtaposed together on the screen."
Emphasis mine. Huh? The whole thing is "overdubbing". Just, you get to see it.
Yeah, I realized that when I was thinking about the article (for some reason) while waiting for Sunrise (featuring the slinkiest manicurist yet on film?) to start. I suppose that one can harmonize with oneself without overdubbing by over- or undertone singing, but that isn't what she does.
They're clearly having a good time
I infer that they probably are, but almost nothing about their videos makes it particularly clear. (I've only really seen the "Single Ladies" one.)
I hadn't heard of them before, so I just went and watched some of their videos. Seems like about what you'd expect from the combination of really fancy equipment with no particular (or at least exceptional) talent.
Is this an entire album of Peter Gabriel covering songs whose lyrics include the phrase "Peter Gabriel"? Or was the cover of "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa" a one-off project?
Apparently, everyone else had heard of Pomplamoose before this thread.
53: I can't be expected to read comments posted 30 minutes before I posted.
Cryptic Ned wouldn't otherwise have heard of them unless they were featured on WFMU's Beware of the Blog.
I believe that nosflow had previously posted about Pomplemoose with an "Arent they annoying?" kind of thread.
I like them. I can find them mildly amusing without comparing them to some great artist.
They are youtube musicians covering other people's songs. I was not disappointed when I realized that they werent the next great thing in music bc they are youtube musicians covering other people's songs.
In related news, I also enjoy those guys on the street banging on the bottoms of trash cans.
I had heard the name, but knew nothing about them before this thread. 51, however, is correct.
58.1: The one I recall was revealing his personal fuckability ratings for the Pomplamoose singer versus Eddie Vedder.
I had never heard of Pamplemoose before the NPR piece. They seem okay but I don't get why they warrant any attention besides her being cute, which completely irks me.
why they warrant any attention
It's Youtube. They're at least as deserving as Ghyslain Raza, Chris Crocker, and Keyboard Cat.
61 -- No one said she was cuter than you.
Someone should take the time to remark that the triple necked electric bass in the goatbomb video is completely ridiculous.
What about the two necked one to the left?
No one said she was cuter than you.
Grrr.
On Pamplemoose: The singer's perfectly-crafted poor-man's-Feist stylee is the only thing that makes them noteworthy. Makes this version of 'Beat It' worth listening to, for instance.
I kind of love it that there are people out there imitating Leslie Feist's vocal delivery. Even granting that Leslie's standing as part of the Monstrous Regiment of Twee Hipsters probably dooms her to long-term obscurity if not the Etsy Circle of Hell... Calgary is on the map, bitches*!
(* Well, she made it in Montreal, okay, true, I get that. But Calgary is even more fanatical about claiming its expats -- deservedly or not -- than Canada as a whole, and I'll be goddamned if I'm going to flout tradition.)
Oh I guess they're called Pomplamoose, sorry.
Leslie Feist's
I am so musically out of touch, that the first time I ever saw her perform was on Sesame Street.
We have had a thread about both music snobbery and book snobbery, havent we?
I dislike music snobbery. Invariabily, the person loves a bunch of obscure bands and turns their nose up at any other bands. I think it is ridiculous.
However, I immediately judge people by the books on their shelves. Dean Koontz and Dan Brown books as decorations in your very expensive house?!?!
I've never heard of Pomplamoose, but 46.2 made me hate them.
Cuteness needs to lose a lot of its value. It needs to be about 10% as important as it is, currently.
And good luck with your political despair.
Heebie is cute? That changes everything. Heebie's opinion is now 10 times more important to me.
The most popular videos on YouTube demostrates that the marketers and TV people have, if anything, underestimated the importance of sex appeal. It's less true these days, but a couple of years ago, the top five videos were invariably Cute Girl Does Boring Thing X. C-SPAN could have a hit on their hands if they replaced actual footage of Congressional floor debates with dramatic re-enactments with the parts of all Congress people played by cute girls.
77.last: Do you have an agent yet? If not, please consider Hick and Associates.
Heebie is cute?
On the internet, everyone is cute.
Heebie's opinion is now 10 times more important to me.
And I would buy Key Lime Marshmallow Cakes from her.
And thank YOU, internet. I hope the next generation Internet that will only run on iPads will make me seem smarter, as well.
I watched a couple of the Pomplamoose videos, and I don't think they're popular solely because the girl is cute. First of all, the girl is not really all that cute. The on-camera overdubbing makes for reasonably dramatic videos. The girl is pretty stiff on camera, while the guy is much more dynamic, which mixes it up when they do their overdubbing trick. So I think it's more their visual style than anything else.
First of all, the girl is not really all that cute.
You sweet talker.
I'm trying to understand the link in 38. There's a 14-year old British girl who has made a career giving concerts in Japan where she dresses up in anime costumes and just dances along to a record? Really?
They're clearly having a good time, and if you don't hate people who look like them, you can have a good time too.
Not when I find her voice and affect so irritating.
73: Cuteness needs to lose a lot of its value.
Asexual reproduction now! Problem solved.
Nataly is of course completely cute, and specific affects don't rile me the way they used to (if I can make peace with Eighties Metal I can make peace with most anything). But cuteness alone would not be enough, there are plenty of cute hipster-girls on YouTube who don't have 100K subscribers. Fact is that Feist is a useful model to imitate; she has a good voice and her own kind of haecceity (you hear that Nick? we never got to finish that conversation, did we?), which Nataly borrows to good effect. It's all a little emotionally flat as befits a cold-blooded Northern country, obviously, but it's not flat in that awful thinks-it's-awesome-but-isn't Michael Buble sort of way, so no harm done.
"haecceity" obviously just means that DS likes it.
86:Manx! Manx is not British. Manx!
Some comments were very vociferous about the difference.
90: I'm now trying to write the story for which MANX MINX MOCKS MONKS would be a plausible headline.
If it could take place in Minsk, so much the better.
"Manx Minx mocks Minsk Monks" deserves a place among the classic tongue twisters.
In my dialect all those words sound alike.
(you hear that Nick? we never got to finish that conversation, did we?),
Feel free to drop by any time. I'll be around.
105.1: Well, yeah, it's been in all the papers lately.
You know, I'm listening right now to these Pomplamoose people cover Nat King Cole and I understand even less how anyone can hate them. "Hey! We're white and we're covering Beyonce!" I can at least understand hating, but this stuff is perfectly cromulent.
Hey! We're white and we're covering Beyonce!" I can at least understand hating, but [covering Nat King Cole] is perfectly cromulent.
The precise racial dynamics at work in 108 confuse me.
I thought their "Beat It" cover was much less annoying than the other ones I watched.
Nat King Cole signifies today as generic crooner, whereas Beyonce still signifies as "Urban Market." Or to make a contemporary comparison, NKC is to Beyonce roughly as Wayne Brady is to Dave Chappelle.
Mannish Manx minx manqué mocks mincing Minsk monks mounting moaning minks.
Nobody who's been on TV is ever dead, Sifu. Shame on you. "As Bryant Gumbel is to Malcolm X" would work almost as well.
(Except that that's sort of comparing Beyonce to Malcolm X too, which doesn't work as well. "As Bryant Gumbel is to Pam Grier," then.)
Bryant Gumbel had a heck of a rack once upon a time.
111, 114: On the Chappelle's Show, in one episode, comedian Paul Mooney, playing "Negrodamus", mentions that "White people love Wayne Brady, because he makes Bryant Gumbel look like Malcolm X".
This is one of my favorites--so far as I know, an original.
Pomplamoose
I hadn't heard of them before. I just watched a couple of their videos. My first reaction is to find them intensely annoying. My second reaction is to concede that they're better at what they do than you would expect. It is executed with craft and attention.
But I just don't like that style of covers. I feel like it depends up covering songs such that you can half remember the original, but haven't listened to it recently and, therefore, can't really compare it to the original.
I mean their cover of "Beat It" is entirely listenable (at least once you get 40 seconds in to it), but if you listened to it back to back with the original it would have no reason to exist. The original would be clearly superior. It only exists because most of us have no reason to listen to the original on a regular basis.
That isn't necessarily a problem but it irks me, because I like to think of good pop music as timeless, and I feel like their music serves to emphasize the "of the moment" nature of pop music.
The Nat King Cole cover is the best of theirs I've heard, it's true.
119: Yeah, but do you think she's cute or not?
I suppose I'm just being cranky. The obvious comparison is to Novelle Vague, whom I like at time.
But I distrust them for the same reason.
119: Yeah, but do you think she's cute or not?
there are plenty of cute hipster-girls on YouTube who don't have 100K subscribers
Let me take this opportunity to finally link to this which I think is actually quite nice, but which feels self-consciously "cute" in a way that makes me itch slightly (version that I am originally familiar with).
I dislike music snobbery. Invariabily, the person loves a bunch of obscure bands and turns their nose up at any other bands. I think it is ridiculous.
The advantage to liking obscure bands is that you can see them in small clubs for not very much money.
The Nat King Cole trio recordings are pretty awesome:
http://www.amazon.com/Best-Nat-King-Cole-Trio/dp/B000005H11
The advantage to liking obscure bands is that you can see them in small clubs for not very much money.
If you can see them, how obscure can they be?
During the 1990s, Pearl Jam always played behind one of those room dividers like women changed behind during old movies.
For some reason I keep reading the post title as "Goatjob!" and wondering what on earth a goatjob is.
The Nouvelle Vague cover of Guns of Brixton is timeless. I still listen to it, in preference to the original.
It's exactly right to say that most of the Pomplamoose covers are disposable confections. (I prefer their version of "Telephone" to Lady Gaga's, actually, but that says only that it's slightly less disposable than the original... which ain't saying much.) OTOH covering Michael Jackson isn't exactly playing to their strengths. One of the Seven Deadly Sins of Twee is Pride, the apparent belief that any song anywhere can be improved with the sweet and slightly precious folksy treatment. It can't. Nevertheless disposable confections have their place.
and wondering what on earth a goatjob is.
Do a Google search for it. Dare you. Double-dare you.
Mickey Kaus ought to be in the top 10 hits. But isn't.
Pomplamoose originals are much better than the covers.
E.g.,
Little Things
If You Think You Need Some Lovin
Expiration Date
This one's okay, but the vlogging that takes up the second half of it is much more annoying than any of the songs. Also, they have live shows? What do they do at them?
The Nouvelle Vague cover of Guns of Brixton is timeless. I still listen to it, in preference to the original.
Funny that you would mention that one. It's one of my favorite tracks of theirs, but it's also one that gives me slight pause. As I said:
I feel like the version of "Love Will Tear Us Apart" gets to heart of the song in way that "The Guns of Brixton" doesn't. The second cover is clever, and clearly respectful of the original, but I feel like, in some way, it avoids really engaging the original -- it just uses it as a device.
You know, I'm listening right now to these Pomplamoose people cover Nat King Cole and I understand even less how anyone can hate them.
They covered a song I am emotionally fixated on, and it didn't work for me.
I do like their originals more. Nataly Dawn's vocal mannerisms work to establish her own identity, which isn't so bad. In the covers, she manages to draw you away from the original, but can't put enough of her own stamp on it to make it compelling. Also, the songwriting on the originals is nice.
I had not heard of Novelle Vague or their cover of Guns of Brixton until now, but google lead me straight to this, which is not only a kick ass cover, but also the first youtube concert video that I have seen which seems to be recorded by an audience member's cell phone but sounds great and is totally worth watching.
but google lead me straight to this
If you want, you could also follow the link in 134.
137: And now I have! I was catching up on the thread all out of order.
I think Love Will Tear Us Apart lends itself more to covers because it is so harmonically skeletal. Regae as a genre is really restricted. There is an approved beat, there are approved chords, and they don't leave you much room. Even as translated through the Clash, it limits you.
Love Will Tear Us Apart is a melody and a few chords, and the chords move in unexpected directions. It wouldn't surprise me if guys who actually knew about music said that he progression makes no sense. It feels to me like it was borne of people learning to play their instruments on stage. The whole thing gives you room to play, because everything is emotionally charged, but not fixed by the past.
||
Grovesnor makes such weird music. I bet you goddamn weirdos would love it.
|>
Thanks for listening, y'all! FWIW, we are serious and non-ironic.
"We" being Goatbomb, of course...
I prefer their version of "Telephone" to Lady Gaga's, actually
You are clearly clinically insane.
140:Where did you get those multi-necked basses?
Nouvelle Vague's "Too Drunk to Fuck" is great.
Jose Gonzalez has a nice acoustic "Love will tear us apart"
Huh, I went to look up Jose Gonzalez and . . .
Everybody should look at AMG and notice what they've selected as the album of the day today. Then, if you feel like it, you can read this and you can see why that would make me happy this morning.
Also, I realized that my comments in 123 may have come across as overly negative. The linked video is certainly work watching and deserves to have much more than the 850 views that it has.
(though it's in a totally different musical style than anything else in this thread).
Winterband's cover of "Love Will Tear Us Apart" is underrated.
134: The second cover is clever, and clearly respectful of the original, but I feel like, in some way, it avoids really engaging the original -- it just uses it as a device.
Hmmm. The virtue of "Guns of Brixton" for me is precisely that it does engage the original, that it inhabits this sort of numb, fatalistic Dresden-just-before-the-bombings-cabaret sensibility that draws from the original's basic building blocks in order to take it to a different place. I don't think their cover of "Love Will Tear Us Apart" comes anywhere close to that.
142: Hey, I didn't say I preferred their video.
The virtue of "Guns of Brixton" for me is precisely that it does engage the original, that it inhabits this sort of numb, fatalistic Dresden-just-before-the-bombings-cabaret sensibility that draws from the original's basic building blocks in order to take it to a different place.
I'll think about that.
Have you listened to the Arcade Fire cover version?
143:
I had the doubleneck made by Scott Hembry, and the tripleneck by Kevin Siebold (Krappy Guitars). The triple was actually used to record the distorted parts in the song. Only cost $200.
When is Lonesome Drinking Metal coming out?
Uh... should be pretty soon. The Noiseville label had some problems with the pressing plant, and has now sent it to another. That album's hit a lot more delays than usual... We do have a Dead Raven Choir 7" coming out May 3rd, though.
149.2: Yeah... leaves me cold, I'm afraid. Never been an Arcade Fire fan, though.
Never been an Arcade Fire fan, though.
That speaks well of you.
149.2: Yeah... leaves me cold, I'm afraid. Never been an Arcade Fire fan, though.
Hmmm. I didn't have a strong opinion about the Arcade Fire version but my first thought was to be reminded of the Nouvelle Vague cover.
Not that they're all that similar, but I had mentally grouped them as both downplaying the level at which it is confrontational, compared to the original.
I will listen to to the Nouvelle Vague version again with your comments in mind.
155.2: The difference is that the Nouvelle Vague version replaces the aggressiveness with something else. It's still singing about blood and death. The Arcade Fire version replaces it with nothing. They might as well be singing a shopping list.
Huh. I thought Canadians were required by law to like Arcade Fire.
Both DS and Nick S are really unusually good at writing about music. Thanks guys.
I would never voluntarily listen to Pomplamoose (and never had heard of them before), but I have a strong aversion to twee. Those videos would be improved if beardo's lame tapping on the piano was interrupted by a big explosion and then a bunch of dudes with screaming guitars and hesher hair coming out and telling Pomplamoose to shut the fuck up or start rocking out. Or something like that.
The Nouvelle Vague cover of Guns of Brixton is excellent, for exactly the reasons DS mentioned. It's not exactly the right comparison, but I kept thinking it was like the Sid Vicious and Sinatra versions of "My Way" only backwards.
I'm only half kidding
The virtue of "Guns of Brixton" for me is precisely that it does engage the original, that it inhabits this sort of numb, fatalistic Dresden-just-before-the-bombings-cabaret sensibility that draws from the original's basic building blocks in order to take it to a different place.
Let me echo Halford, that is a great description.
Listening to the song again I'm convinced, it's better than I remembered and really, really good.
Most importantly I'm convinced that, as a performance, it presents a coherent interpretation. It is a different scenario than the original. The relationship between the oppressor and oppressed is different. In their version the community is not on the verge of pushing back, resistance is a ways off but the oppression is still keenly felt.
In their version the idea of coming to the door with your hand on "the trigger of your gun" is a fantasy but, at the same time, there is steel in the invocation of "The Guns of Brixton."
There are some lines that don't fit quite as comfortably with that reading, but that's okay. I agree, going back to it, it's a completely successful cover.
Look at that! Comity! I love it!
These music conversations are a great deal of fun, actually. I could get into this music-blogging thingy. (I miss those old mixtape threads, too, you know. Why don't Unfogged have mixtape threads no more?)
160.2: I would never voluntarily listen to Pomplamoose (and never had heard of them before), but I have a strong aversion to twee.
I do get where that comes from. I don't mind the twee when it's doing things well-suited to twee, like sweet little folksy love ballads of the "Little Things" variety. The biggest mark against twee is probably how readily it's adapted for commercials, especially (for some reason) car commercials; out of their latest spate of attention Pomplamoose have apparently garnered a gig with Toyota. **gag**
(Yes, I know they need to live and buy food and all. Still. **gag** That Internet-to-car commercial is now a major vector of musicians' fame does rather suck.)
These music conversations are a great deal of fun, actually.
I can say, if my posting more frequently would inspire you to stop by more often, that would provide motivation.
(For that matter, if you have any interest in ever doing some guest posts at my place, consider yourself invited).
Also, anyone's free to do a mix and send it in for the purposes of posting. I don't do mix posts, because I'm too lazy to make a lot of mixes. But I agree about liking the mix threads. DS's TOS mix is in heavy rotation on my iPod. As is some guitar mix from ttaM.
162.last: heh. I had a friend who got a (regional) Toyota commercial. Not the big break he was hoping for, in the event.
163.2: Hey, wow, thanks man. I'm honoured. I might just take you up on that.
And absolutely yes to 163.1.
And absolutely yes to 163.1.
Okay, deal.