Songs That Make A Splash

If you're ever fortune enough to fall upon this glorious situation, I bid you a great time. For you see, a close friend of mine has recently been offered to house-sit a home with a pool. Downside: it's a tiny pool. Upside: it's a pool. And it's finally consistently sunny here in the Northeast. We had a few ideas to make the next 10 days phenomenal: house party, beer olympics, rave, 4th grade style sleepover with endless soda and Doritos, etc. For now, our plans are just to enjoy an open house, with 3 very cool pups, a fully stocked fridge, and an aquatic wonderland.

Here are some tunes that really get me in the mood to swim:

Broken Social Scene - "Swimmers"

Death Cab For Cutie - "Underwater"

The Stone Roses - "Waterfall"
R.E.M. - Nightswimming

And just because it'd be the best thing ever: The Planet Smashers - "Super Orgy Porno Party"

Your Summer Party Soundtrack Is Officially Here

My friend Luke just turned me on to Jamie T., British indie musician/rapper, if you will. Although most of his music seems to transcend simple rap music, such as this song, his new single "Sticks 'n' Stones" the title track to his new EP. This is becoming my song of the summer very quickly, so go ahead and check it out.

Also, mash-up artist E-603 released his new album Torn Up for free on his website. It will soon be your official party soundtrack, trust me. Download it here.

Big Names In For Mulcahy Tribute

Right off the bat: this man is so underrated.

This news comes from the grandfather music blog of all music blogs, Stereogum. Here's the scoop: the picture you see above is of Mark Mulcahy. Singer, guitarist, jangle rock God, nostaglia bearer, and one of the few people I respect from Massachusetts. He's been playing in bands since the 80's, most notably Miracle Legion and Polaris (but that last one was just for Nickelodeon's "The Adventures Of Pete And Pete"). This awesome dude has put out a few solo records, but not any since 2005, a year that was tragic for his family and himself, as they lost Mark's wife in a sudden accident. He hasn't been putting out records since; I think it's because he's been focusing on raising his family now. Totally understandable. But God do I miss hearing new MM material. And I'm not alone. Michael Stipe, Thom Yorke, the boys of The National and many others are putting together a tribute record to Mr. Mulcahy titled "Caio My Shining Star: The Songs Of Mark Mulcahy". The goal: to help Mark get back on his feet and continue to make great music. (I'm starting to believe that Michael Stipe might be God by helping so many people: Cobain, UNICEF, the planet, and the list goes on and on). I've played a number of his tunes on the show, just check out the playlist. Needless to say, I'm very excited for this compilation. A lot of these songs are going to sound different, but different isn't always bad and I'm ready to experience this. Also, twenty or so bonus tracks will be released digitally! Cross your fingers for early work and/or Polaris tunes. Here's the track list:

1. Thom Yorke - "All For The Best"
2. The National - "Ashamed Of The Story I Told"
3. Michael Stipe - "Everything's Coming Undone"
4. David Berkeley - "Loves The Only Thing That Shuts Me Up"
5. Dinosaur Jr. - "The Backyard"
6. Chris Harford & Mr. Ray Neal - "Micon The Icon"
7. Frank Black - "Bill Jocko"
8. Vic Chesnutt - "Little Man"
9. Unbelievable Truth - "Ciao My Shining Star"
10. Butterflies Of Love - "I Have Patience"
11. Chris Collingwood (Fountains Of Wayne) - "Cookie Jar"
12. Frank Turner - "The Quiet One"
13. Rocket From The Tombs - "In Pursuit Of Your Happiness"
14. Ben Kweller - "Wake Up Whispering"
15. Josh Rouse - "I Woke Up In The Mayflower"
16. Autumn Defense - "Paradise"
17. Hayden -"Happy Birthday Yesterday"
18. Juliana Hatfield - "We're Not In Charleston Anymore"
19. Mercury Rev - "Sailors And Animals"
20. Elvis Perkins - "She Watches Over Me"
21. Sean Watkins - "A World Away From This One"

Caio My Shining Star: The Songs Of Mark Mulcahy comes out September 29th, on Shout! Records. Pick it up, you will not be dissappointed.

A personal favorite right here (and the only music video I can find):

R.I.P. King Of Pop

Michael Jackson (1958 - 2009)

Continuing coverage at MTV.com, CCN.com, and any other world news/music/pop culture outlet

"Billie Jean" from 1982's Thriller.


Update: MTV and many radio stations around the globe are paying tribute to the fallen King of Pop by playing his music all day long. Even in death, he still has the power to captivate the masses. MTV is doing a good thing here; even on Twitter, many people are commenting on MTV's bold decision to play Michael's music videos throughout the day, starting yesterday after the official announcement of his passing. Finally, some respect to music videos, along with respect for one of the greatest entertainers of all time.

St. Antlers Real Estate

That was my attempt at a clever title for this post.

Anyway, this is my first real music post in forever, and I am writing about three things I am VERY excited about.

St. Vincent aka Annie Clark aka the Love of My Life (she'll find out soon enough). The thing about Annie is that she performed a song on Letterman last night. Said song is "Marrow" off her new album. Said album is "Actor" and is currently number one on my Album of the Year so far list (it's even ahead of Dark Was The Night). Also, she can play a damn good guitar, she can sing, and she is absolutely gorgeous. I'm sending her flowers as we speak (no I'm not). Thanks to Videogum for the video.

Secondly is The Antlers, a Brooklyn (of course) band who are about to put out one of the best albums of the year in September, "Hospice" I can only describe them as Okkervil River meets Sigur Ros meets Say Hi meets Dntel meets Awesome. They performed the two stand-out tracks from "Hospice" live on NPR. Check the video here.

Lastly, but most importantly, one of the best bands to ever influence shitty bands is reuniting in their original lineup for the first time since 1995. Sunny Day Real Estate's original lineup (Jeremy Enigk, Dan Hoerner, William Goldsmith, and Nate Mendel) put our one perfect album (1994's "Diary") and one unfinished one (1995's LP2). They're embarking on a nation-wide reunion tour, and it seems that I cannot attend due to transportation issues. But if you can, please go, you wont regret it. All dates are posted at sunnydayrealestate.fm.

Thanks to Mike at gnarlysaucemusic for getting me into The Antlers.

Happy Birfs, Jeff Beck

From Wikipedia: Mr. Jeff Beck was nominated for 2009 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and was promptly chosen for induction for the April 4, 2009 ceremony.

He was inducted on this day by his good friend and fellow former Yardbirds guitarist, Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin.

He was ranked the 14th on Rolling Stone Magazine's list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".

Here's to one of rock and roll's greatest legends. Happy 65th Birfs.

Sonic Youth Brings "No Way" To Late Night!

Folks, I'm cleaning out my iTunes. It's such a strenuous task. I've gone through 10,000 tunes and limited my library to 6,000, so that I can potentially save my very old laptop's feeble existence. During this process, I began wondering why I have such a headache, beyond the mission at hand. I realized that I got awful sleep last night and had to deal with the Spanish language this morning. Well after a nice afternoon nap, I have to admit, it was worth staying up late. This is because Sonic Youth brought "No Way" off their latest and 16th album The Eternal, to Late Night With Jimmy Fallon.

What a dangerous group. So talented, even after all these years. Kim Gordon is still one of the sexiest women in rock 'n' roll and Thurston Moore can still captivate a crowd with a mighty and youthful fury. The way the band is able to distort their sound to make beautiful 21st century noise on their instruments is unparable by any other rock band today. This has prompted me to go pick up The Eternal at my local record store right away, which is out now via Matador Records. Last night's programming has also prompted me to add "7th Floor West", Fallon's own satire of reality television, to my favorite TV shows on Facebook.

A List, Some Trivia, And R.E.M. News!

"Si, Conando!"

Entertainment Weekly started their own list of the 100 Best Summer Tunes. Songs released in the summer, songs about summer, songs that make you think about summer, whatever. And now that is summer, I guess it's time for these dinky things. Here's the first installment. Agree or disagree? Let me answer for you: disagree.

Please, society, bring back this hairstyle.

You know how VH1 Classic does "This Day In Music"? Well it used to be great, but now it just sucks. Like, it's all about Whitney Houston and chart records. I am not kidding. It gets that lame. So here's one that's actually interesting. And I'll give you a video with that, too.

JUNE 22, 1967: Mick Jagger and Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones drug trials begin.
So they did drugs, just look what they did for rock 'n' roll!

Okay, and finally, R.E.M.'s Peter Buck (guitarist; who is currently doing some side work with Robyn Hitchcock and The Decemberists) and Mike Mills (bass & vocals; who is currently figuring out what sparkly attire to dawn during the next sold-out show) are working on new material for a potential record set to be released in the future. Even though lead vocals Michael Stipe isn't in the picture yet, I'm sure some of the stuff the other two are working on is pretty solid. As a big R.E.M. fan and a believer in the revamped line-up, I am very much looking forward to R.E.M. in the years to come. Check out what Pitchfork's talking about.

A preview of what's to come?

Happy Father's Day!

From all of us here at NMTM, (even though there's only two of us), to all of you: Happy Father's Day. Wish your dad and/or pep-pep a great day. Because without them, you really wouldn't exist. At all. And thank your mom for having sex with him, because she helped, too. If you don't fall into any of these cases, well then, my bad. Here's some music for you:

I don't think it's easy for anyone to be a scared, white boy in a black neighborhood.

I AM NOT DEAD!

Hello all. Good to see you again. Hey, you look great have you lost weight? Anyway, I am back after being out of this blogging game for quite a while due to many reasons (mainly laziness). But I promise I am back and back with a vengeance. I don't have much to say now, but I will later, so I leave you with one of my favorite songs of the summertime, "Rome" by Phoenix off their awesome album, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix.

Enjoy.

Some Interesting KUR News + Updates

Okay, it's Friday, and I have a few things to cover before I begin to booze, so let's get this rollin'.

I read my Yahoo! e-mail inbox messages for the first time in a few weeks this morning and I got some great news about our tiny, little station in K-Town. Seems like we're getting a lot of good press lately. Turns out more and more people are beginning to discover us. The only downside is that a lot of the coverage is about how we have a jazz format during the daytime. And that's really our manager's forte. I really wish we'd just switch to an indie/alternative rock station like 99% of all college radio stations. But beggers can't be choosers, I guess. Check out this article in the Reading Eagle:

"Kutztown University radio station finds new way to expand audience.
School is first college to join system that provides music, news, shows over the phone."

Comments include:

"A jazz format for a college radio station?? Somehow i don't see many college students spending their days listening to jazz.. Perhaps if they did a rock or top 40 format they'd get a better response from their target listeners."

"I've heard the station and it sounds good. Kutztown actually has a very decent jazz program. I know people in the program, so I can see it fitting and working for the school. They seem to be targeting the community."

The second comment was posted by "Mr. Uppity". I guarantee that's our manager. Actually, I'm almost positive.

Another tidbit of info about our station, we recently began broadcasting over the phone. It's pretty unique, not many stations have this option. You basically call this number: (610)-465-7860; and you can hear our station right on your phone. See, we've got all these fancy ways of hearing us and still not FCC license. Come on, congress! Notice us! Anyway, apparently we broke some kind of record. Here's the e-mail I received from my manager.

"Just got word from Audio Now that our dial in phone # received hundreds of people dialing in at one time yesterday obviously in response to the big article that ran in the Reading newspaper. The e-mails and phones have been ringing off the hook all day here at the KUR offices from hundreds of new listeners who found out about us through the article and are now new listeners. James Kastle's show can hardly handle the multitude of calls coming in this afternoon with comments like "love the jazz," "thank God for jazz on the radio," "we love KUR," "you guys have come such a long way.""

Cool stuff. These kind of news updates raises my faith in our station. Way to go, crew.

Also, make sure to tune into Jim's summer show tonight. It's an hour long of great music and great commentary. 6-7 PM @ kur.kutztown.edu. Stream it, hear it, love it. Comment and let us know what you think!

Moving on: Anyone who knows me, knows that my favorite late night talk program(s) include The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. Funny, 30-minutes, directed towards young people, and the list goes on and on. Anyway, returning from commericial, Jon Stewart of The Daily Show was blatantly singing "Use Somebody" by Kings Of Leon. What a bump! I wonder if anyone else caught that. It's was a pretty cool two seconds.

Lastly: Bloc Party premiered their new single, "One More Chance" last night on BBC 2's Zan Lowe's Radio 1 program. I got around to hearing it this morning via the band's website. Blog Party had this to say about the tune:

"First thoughts? Old skool piano...yay or nay? Anyone else hear shades of 'Your Visits Are Getting Shorter' in the verse? Stay tuned for the video!"

I, for one, enjoyed it. I like the piano. The lyrics aren't too shabby either. I hope it grows on me like "Mercury" did. Bloc Party is definitely one of my favorite bands and they've been constantly changing their direction in alternative music since their first record, Silent Alarm, dropped in 2005. They have a tendency of putting out these singles in between full-length records, so maybe we can expect a new record in the fall? Kepe those fingers crossed.

Enjoy the weekend and (hopefully) get some sunshine! God knows we've had enough rain in the tri-state for one summer already...

Len - If You Steal My Sunshine

New Bloc News!

From BlocParty.com:

One More Chance

Bloc Party will release a brand new single 'One More Chance' on the 10th of August through Wichita Recordings. The new track was recorded in April with Jacknife Lee and mixed with Phillipe Zdar. 'One More Chance' will be aired for the first time on Zane Lowe's Radio One show this Thursday 18th June.

This is great news. Nothing like summer Bloc! These guys put out Intimacy last summer and Intimacy Remixed in November. Both terrific works of art. Keep it here for more updates on this new single!

Bonnaroo '09: Brought To You By Stereogum

Well, Bonnaroo was sick as hell. From pictures to videos to personal reviews to wet dreams: Bonnaroo was something worth raving about. Do I want to get into this? No. I am bitter. Very bitter. I wish I could just get up and go down south to experience this epic awesomeness, but instead, I went to work. And made sandwiches for those who were headed there.

Furthermore, I stopped watching Fuse TV so I'm not sure if they slaughtered the festival all at once or stabbed it and let it bleed to death over time.

You want recap? Boom: Stereogum.

Remaining Summer Concerts

Okay, so maybe the summer hasn't officially begun yet. It's still another week or so, right? Can't tell. Mostly because it rains here everyday. What a drag. The Shins kicked off my summer concert series, how about yours? Here's what I got remaining. These shows are the reason why I have no money, that and my paychecks going towards late night Quick Check runs or 30's of Pabst Blue Ribbon (warm) on the weekends. Thursdays included. So tonight.

Mike Pop's Summer Shows:

July 11. Supervillians, English Beat, and Reel Big Fish. Starland Ballroom. Sayreville.
(Summer of Ska is back! And whoa - The English Beat! Let's here is for 80's ska!)

August 1. Tim & Eric, Cool Kids, Kool Keith, Tokyo Police Club, Arctic Monkeys, Ting Tings, Tool, and more. All Points West Festival. Jersey City.
(My first-ever "music and arts" festival. Though I'm only going to one out of the three days, this line-up seems to satisfy both me and the friends I forced into coming.)

August 26. Taking Back Sunday, Weezer, and Blink 182. PNC Bank Arts Center. Holmdel
(Ladies and gentlemen, Blink 182 FINALLY returns to New Jersey (as a band and not with those horrible post-Blink bands they tried out for a few years) and they're bringing opening acts that can hold the main stage all themselves. This will end my summer, so I hope these guys can all still deliver.

Updates to come. Keep it here.

3 Notes Of Interest

Check this out people. Movie Fone ("Welcome to Mooovvviiieee Fone!") conducted this list for their top 40 movie soundtracks. I must say, it's pretty tight. I found this while searching for good times to see "The Hangover" (excellent film by the way, hilarious). Anyway, I'm a fan of almost all these films and their respected albums. Do you agree with Movie Fone? Find out here.

In other news (news that really doesn't affect anyone who follows this blog a lot), someone's house was robbed in my neighborhood! I've never seen so many cops surrounding one street around here. It's like the entire station cleared out and investigated this thing. Though the details are bleak at the moment, it's safe to say that this event clearly prompts emotions felt in this song and video:

Lastly for today, I'm trying to give up my addiction to Facebook. College kids, you know how epicly awesome "the fas" is. You get to see who's up to no good, who looks like which animal now, and stalk people without feeling too creepy (totally acceptable now). Anyway, I'm on it a lot, just really doing nothing important (mainly seeing who looks like which animal now). So we'll see how long this will last. I'm sure I'll go back to it, but hopefully when I do decide to log back on, I won't waste precious hours of my summer seeing who got drunk and did what, where, when, why, and how. Oh the struggles of addiction...

And that concludes this random post.

"So Who's To Take The Blame For The Stormy Weather?"

All right now, so this is our 185th post. Weird. I guess we do update this thing pretty often (compared to others in our forte, maybe). I hope you people out there are enjoying it! (We never really did a fan appreciation post, but that's something to consider on a rainy day).

Last night, as I was participating in a great slumber, I suddenly awoke to lightning flashing, fire trucks roaring, and thunder just being a great big disturbance. I believe this is the crazy bad-ass who's behind it all. Just a thought (here's another thought: what happened to Saturday morning cartoons? Oh yeah, I'm 21 now.). So the first thunderstorm of the summer is in the books. That's nothing exciting. Although I'm not happy that I couldn't get back to sleep until ABC Family's "Feed The Children" made me so depressed that I chugged NyQuil and got K.O.ed. Seems like we've been getting a lot of nasty weather in Jersey lately. Almost feels like I'm living in Seattle. "Shock of the lightning". Always nice to hear rain on a tin roof but the lightning - well, I can do without that at 3 AM.

Pinfield Back On RXP! & A Big Birthday!

After a brief stint in rehab, the legendary Matt Pinfield returned to radio and is back on the morning show and rockin' the airwaves on NYC's own 101.9 WRXP. What a great day for radio. Welcome back, Matt. We've missed you!


In other great news, I TURNED 21!!!

(Not me, but I did outlast my twin brother in a shots contest)

And while I was being served legally at a sports bar, I heard this song play over and over in my head throughout the night and all the way into the bitter hangover the next morning. Drinks on me, folks. I'll bring the beers.

The Clash - Spanish Bombs

Now off to being drunk and broke for the remainder of the summer.

New Music Video: Kings Of Leon - Notion

Things seem to come in pairs here on the blog. And what a coincident: I just wrote about these guys. This is a mid-card track off "Only By The Night", which was released a couple of months ago. I like this one, despite it's music video. The video itself is right out of the Nickelback/Creed/Three Doors Down playbook, but the song itself, pretty sweet. "Don't knock it" without hearing it first. Enjoy: