quote:

Who will be big in 2007?

Any artist who releases an album of good music (or has their past good music album reissued) will be big and successful with me.

I think that Bloc Party will cross-over into mainstream in the U.S., especially since they have recruited a new legion of listeners by opening for Panic! At the Disco a bunch of times. That said the new Bloc Party lacks the great tunes that "Silent Alarm" did. I predict that it will be called a sell-out album by die hard fans, but they will have chart success.

The Shins' "Wincing the Night Away" will also be successful, though it is a mediocre album. I feel like the individual tracks on the album do not gel well together.

The Apples in Stereo will be at the head of many music mags lists even as late as mid-year but will fade in the stretch (like Belle and Sebastian did last year). The track "Energy" will be used in a cell phone or computer commercial. I will be sad.

Ted Leo will release another album that is a hell of a lot of fun to listen to.

Obviously, the Arcade Fire will get a ton of press at the release of Neon Bible. I just listened to the new track streaming on their web page, Black Mirror, and its pretty crappy. It starts out sounding pretty promising but its disappointing they've decided that a chorus of repeating "Black Mirror" over and over with no melody is interesting. I still have high hopes for the Arcade Fire and really hope the rest of the album is better.

The other songs I've heard from Neon Bible have been better, but I'll agree that Black Mirror is underwhelming. Still, I have high hopes for the album.

Not so much with the new Clap Your Hands Say Yeah album, though. I liked the song "Underwater You And Me" that they released, but everything else I've heard from their new album "Some Loud Thunder" sounds bad to terrible. I hated them at first, then grew to love them... I don't know if I can do it again.

I'm not really a big CYHSY fan, but I may have to check out their new one given that Dave Fridmann is producing it. It's gonna be so weird. I would've never paired Dave effin' Fridmann with CYHSY.

I actually quite liked 'Black Mirror'. The roiling thunderous undertones are gorgeous, not every song has to have tons of lyrics to be valid. I hope they're moving more in this direction, honestly, I don't want another version of 'Funeral' - they need to move forward.

I simultaneously hope and don't hope that Ted Leo gets big. He's so fantastic that I want all my friends to know about him, but at the same time I don't want him playing expensive concerts at super-large venues.

And in limbo - from what I've heard, Neon Bible's going to be quite different from Funeral.

Awesome. And yes, I am simultaneously conflicted about Ted Leo's status. 'Shake the Sheets' was not a favorite of mine, but 'Tyranny of Distance' and 'Hearts of Oak' will always hold a special place in my heart. His new album was produced by Brendan Canty (Fugazi), so I am very interested to hear what it sounds like. Canty is my all-time favorite drummer, by the way. I keep praying that Fugazi will somehow get back together for at least one more album and/or tour.

Actually, the more I listen to Shake the Sheets, the more I like it. It's kind of simplistic at times (repeated riffs?) but it works, at least for me. I still think Tyranny's his best, and Hearts of Oak has a bunch of good songs at the beginning but kind of peters off near the end.

I really want to hear a song from the album. CYH and Arcade Fire have given us songs, why not Ted?

I love both "Black Mirror" and "Intervention"
I am not going to eat lunch for a month, and preorder neon bible the first chance I get.

quote:

Originally posted by Chamberk:
Actually, the more I listen to Shake the Sheets, the more I like it. It's kind of simplistic at times (repeated riffs?) but it works, at least for me.

I think Shake the Sheets was a great, simple pop record. It reminds me a lot of Elvis Costello's early ones, which is high praise in my book.

quote:

Originally posted by philosopherEric:

I think Shake the Sheets was a great, simple pop record. It reminds me a lot of Elvis Costello's early ones, which is high praise in my book.

I've always found Leo very Elvis Costello-ish too. He has a great ability to mix poppy songs with punk sensibilities, which is exactly what Costello was doing in the late 70s. Any Ted Leo fans unfamiliar with Costello's early work should pick up This Year's Model pronto.

I'd also recommend Joe Jackson's Look Sharp!, which is clearly another Ted Leo influence.

quote:

Originally posted by Il Mago:
I don't know, EG75. Something about the album is a bit off. I'm not going to give my "final answer" until I get the real thing in my hands (and ears), but I feel like the album is a bit soft...no teeth. I think the only "different" songs are Sleeping Lessons, Split Needles and Pam Berry. Don't get me wrong, the songs are all catchy, but to put it nicely, I think my Mom would really appreciate some of it.

What's wrong with liking something your mom appreciates? My parents tend to have great musical taste, and I love talking to my dad about some of the groundbreaking shows he went to back in the day.

The main reason I got into Costello is, I think, the comparison a lot of people made to Ted Leo. This Year's Model is an awesome album, definitely.

And as far as the parent-rock goes... while a lot of parents may have had great taste back in the day, I think more parents are more amenable to the soft-rock stations that play Steve Winwood and solo Sting. Having one's music compared to that... I dunno, some people might not be a fan of that. And some people might! My brother-in-law is a huge Sting fan.

quote:

Originally posted by Chamberk:
while a lot of parents may have had great taste back in the day, I think more parents are more amenable to the soft-rock stations that play Steve Winwood and solo Sting.

I'm sure Mark and Linn have some thoughts on this .

My dad's current taste in music is kind of lousy, although my mom has pretty good taste. She likes Bright Eyes, for instance. That's pretty cool for a lady in her late 50s.

The best thing about "Shake the Sheets" is that it translates very well to the stage. I was surprised to find myself enjoying Leo's new material as opposed to his "Tyranny" era material when I saw him in concert this year.

quote:

Originally posted by ericg75:

quote:

Originally posted by Chamberk:
while a lot of parents may have had great taste back in the day, I think more parents are more amenable to the soft-rock stations that play Steve Winwood and solo Sting.

I'm sure Mark and Linn have some thoughts on this .

Indeed.

Y'know, I was just wondering the other day, e., when I moved over from identifying with the narrator of "Surrender" to identifying with the subjects (well, aside from actually being a parent).

I remember meeting the guy, a little over a year ago, who is currently my business partner in my podcasting and audio production business. We were chatting about a radio show he does on the local community station. I asked what he was playing on the next program. His response was, "Probably nothing you would like."

I was wearing a suit, you see, and surely no 40-something, wearing a suit, would like all this crazy new music. Don't think for a moment that I've ever let him live that one down.

All of the indie labels' sales combined is only a fraction, a very small fraction, of what the bigs churn out every year. Our skewed little community aside, most teenagers, twenty-somethings, thirty-somethings, forty-somethings, and so on are more amenable to music (and radio) that a lot of the folks around here would consider "soft." It's not really an age thing, or a gender thing, it's just that most people don't tend to be very adventurous when it comes to music, which tends to keep the bigs and the radio a bit tame for most of our members' taste.

Speaking of, I was previewing Modest Mouse's "Dashboard" last week. I don't know if its the presence of Johnny Marr, but it sounds a lot like 1982 to my ears. I expect it will go over well with our audience, but I'm also expecting a big backlash from a lot of traditional fans and general indie-folk screaming "sell-out!"

Now Playing: "Province" TV on the Radio Return to Cookie Mountain <-- I'm on my final stroll through 2006 before posting my year-end list and I'm still on the outside on this one...

every year a band that im in love with gets commercialized(sp?)and then next concert i go see them at im surrounded by 15 year old "groupies".

last year it was death cab
year before was modest mouse
a year or two before that brand new

this year my prediction will be(and hopefully not).....

either be "spoon". or an outside possiblity goes to "im from barcelona".

I'm going to go out on a limb and say Radiohead will be everywhere this year.

quote:

Originally posted by LinnTate:
Our skewed little community aside, most teenagers, twenty-somethings, thirty-somethings, forty-somethings, and so on are more amenable to music (and radio) that a lot of the folks around here would consider "soft." It's not really an age thing, or a gender thing, it's just that most people don't tend to be very adventurous when it comes to music, which tends to keep the bigs and the radio a bit tame for most of our members' taste.

I have to wonder how much of it is just people's natural tendency to like "soft" music and how much of it is that they like it because that's what get's marketed and is so ubiquitous. The majors create things that they know they can sell to a lot of people, not necessarily the things that people really like. If given a choice between producing 10 different albums that 2 million people will really, really like or 1 bland record that 20 million people will kinda like and which they can market hard enough so that maybe those 20 million will like it just enough to buy it, they'll go with the latter every time.