The Flaming Lips - The Soft Bulletin - Documentary

    The "Pitchfork Classic" documentary series continues with the documentary "The Flaming Lips - The Soft Bulletin ", it offers an oral history of The Soft Bulletin, with intimate interviews examining the stories behind this modern classic.

Joe Cornelisse-SMM

Nine Inch Nails Are Back

    

    So it seems as though Trent Reznor has decided to awaken Nine Inch Nails from it's four year slumber according to a story from Pitchfork. 

    Plans for a tour to begin with some shows this summer and a full on tour this fall and to continue into 2014 is just some of the news he announced in a note, also a new band that includes: Trent of course, Eric Avery of Jane's Addiction, Adrian Belew of King Crimson, Josh Eustis of electronic act Telefon Tel Aviv, as well as previous NIN collaborators Alessandro Cortini and Ilan Rubin. 

   Here's the note from Trent

Belle and Sebastian Documentary

    As part of their "Pitchfork Classic" documentary series Pitchfork gives us the RJ Bentler directed hour long documentary "Belle and Sebastian - If You're Feeling Sinister", about Belle and Sebastian's 1996 album If You're Feeling Sinister.

Joe Cornelisse-SMM

Fucked Up in a whole new Silent Light

          As I leaned against the wall downstairs of the Toronto Underground Cinema, checking my Twitter feeds (@sonicmoremusic1) and studying the vast array of old and new movie posters that adorned the walls , the same questions kept replaying over and over again in my mind...what were Fucked Up going to do tonight ?  And would they be able to pull it off? We were all about to have those 2 questions answered.

    As part of the Images Festival Closing Night Gala in collaboration with Wavelength Toronto, Fucked Up had been asked to perform a live soundtrack during a screening of the 1928 silent film West of Zanzibar.  West of Zanzibar is about the vengefulness of a cuckolded magician paralyzed in a brawl with his rival , the film stars Lon Chaney and Lionel Barrymore.

      Coming back downstairs from checking the list and getting our tickets I noticed the doors to the great room had been opened, so I and my partner in crime for the night, celebrated concert photographer Kevin Lamb made our way inside.  As I leaned against one of the theatre seats we saw members of the band trickle in and out checking on their equipment and just basically getting ready for the performance. The band had all of their instruments and equipment set up right under the large movie screen, I was still running the question through my mind “What were Fucked Up going to do tonight ? “ ...that question was about to be answered.

   So after a much tripped out screening of the General Chaos Visuals film Luminaries and then some introductions of the people that helped put on the Festival it was time for the film to start. The lights went down, the opening credits started appearing on the screen and the music began.

        From that point on it was all just this swirling, wall of sound, blur of music and visuals. This was not the Fucked Up we had become accustomed to seeing live on stage over the years, this was a band without an In Your Face, Charismatically driven lead singer (Damian Abraham was in a seat enjoying what was going down with the rest of us), this was a band that was for lack of a better term Naked...this was a band that was stepping out front for the first time...and dammit, they made all of us in that audience sit up and listen.

    I don’t know exactly how much time and effort they had to work on this project, but they synced every high hat and snare with every snarl and scream up on that huge movie screen, they made us all believe that their music was the original.  Whether it was the one two three punch of guitarists Mike Haliechuk, Josh Zuker and Ben Cook, or the always solid bass playing of Sandy Miranda (at one point she just couldn’t sit down anymore and had to stand up to get it done) and the furiously depth and controlled drumming of the mighty Jonah Falco.

        The whole thing lasted approx about 63 minutes or so, but hours after I still had it buzzing in my mind.

   Fucked Up is a band that is well known to push the musical boundaries and with this performance, they didn’t just push them, they shoved them down on the ground and kicked the shit right out of them.....Thank You

Joe Cornelisse-SSGS