December Album of the Month!
After listening to dozens and dozens of CDs this month, we’ve decided to name Norah Jones’s new release, The Fall, our December Album of the Month! Listen in to WERS on Friday, December 11th as we’ll spend the day playing tracks from the album and you’ll also have the chance to win your very own copy! For a preview of the new music on the album, here’s a video of Norah performing her single “Chasing Pirates” live on Jools Holland. Enjoy!
WERS Top 5 of 12/1
1 DEVENDRA BANHART What Will We Be
2 NORAH JONES The Fall
3 PHOENIX Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
4 AVETT BROTHERS I And Love And You
5 MONSTERS OF FOLK Monsters Of Folk
Throwback Thursday (Thanksgiving Edition)
I know I already talked about Arlo Guthrie, but how can a Thanksgiving Edition of Throwback Thursday not be about “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree”? This time around, let’s look at the movie made based on the lyrics. Released in 1969, the movie recounts the crazy story behind the song, although some parts certainly are exaggerated. Below are two scenes, one where the garbage is tossed to the side of the road and the other where it shows their arrest and trial.
Thanksgiving Dinner
Arrest And Trial
Happy Thanksgiving!
-Jeff Penfield
New Vampire Weekend
The New York-based indie rockers, Vampire Weekend are set to release a new album called Contra in January! With their first album clearly being a huge hit, I think we are all expecting big things from Contra. They’ve made a video, which you can watch below, for their new single “Cousins.” Seems like VP is back to their old tricks of fusing catchy beats with Afro-pop. Do you think this new album will live up to the hype? We’re sure excited to see!
The Only Thanksgiving Song
Thanksgiving makes me think about three things: eating way too much turkey, football, and Alice’s Restaurant. Back in November 1965, Arlo Guthrie and his friend were arrested for illegally dumping garbage in Stockbridge, Massachusetts after a Thanksgiving dinner. The results of said activity lead to a variety of adventures, including pleading guilty to a blind judge and not being allowed into the army due to the incident. Guthrie took this experience and wrote “Alice’s Restaurant”, one of the only Thanksgiving songs known to man. He returned to the deconsecrated church 40 years later where the Thanksgiving dinners occurred (since renamed the Guthrie Center) to perform the song. Enjoy!
Listen 88.9 WERS Thanksgiving Day at 9am and 4pm to hear the song in its entirety.
Speaking of the lack of Thanksgiving songs, can you think of another one?
-Jeff Penfield
WERS Top 5 of 11/24
1 DEVENDRA BANHART What Will We Be
2 PHOENIX Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
3 MONSTERS OF FOLK Monsters Of Folk
4 INGRID MICHAELSON Everybody
5 AVETT BROTHERS I And Love And You
Throwback Thursday!
This week’s Throwback Thursday features one of the most bizarre groups in pop music history. Grangemouth, Scotland’s Cocteau Twins typically utilized a formula: a simple 808 beat, shoegazy guitar, and gibberish vocal gymnastics. It wasn’t their methods that made them so popular, however, it was the gorgeousness of their melodies and how each one created its own landscape of wild catharsis.
You’ve heard the Cocteau’s fantastic “Heaven or Las Vegas” on our airwaves, but for the Throwback we’re loving another unlikely hit they scored in 1988 off their underrated Blue Bell Knoll album, “Carolyn’s Fingers”. There might have been some absinthe in the mugs of alternative rock radio programmers at the turn of the 90’s as the trio were able to notch 3 top 10 hits on the Modern Rock Tracks chart here in the States. “Carolyn” hit #2 in ‘88, with “Heaven” reaching #9 and “Iceblink Luck” #4 in 1990.
Somehow, “Carolyn’s Fingers” does have a more accessible feel to it, with the rare inclusion of live drums, a catchy melody, and lyrics that, should you bother to track them down, actually don’t smack of the absurdist ramblings that serve as the marque of the Cocteaus. Frontwoman Elizabeth Fraser stuns in this track with a syrupy falsetto, exhaling fragmented syllables like a chorus of hiccuping angels. Rock those melismas, girl! Also, I’m a bit disturbed by how similar Liz’s hair is to mine at the moment.
-Jon Gabso
Monsters of Folk official video!
Here’s what we’ve all been waiting for! Monsters of Folk (Conor Oberst, Jim James, Mike Mogis, and M. Ward) have finally released their official video for their single “Say Please” Check it out below!
Tegan and Sara
The Canadian indie-rock duo, Tegan and Sara, recently released their 6th and newest studio album, Sainthood. The album was produced by Death Cab For Cutie guitarist, Chris Walla and it “addresses secular themes of devotion, delusion, and exemplary behavior in the pursuit of love and relationships.” With this being the twins’ loudest and most rocking album to date, it’s also their first album to feature a song that was co-written by the both of them. Usually they write their songs separately, but writing together is now proving to be a success! For a preview of the music on Sainthood, below is a video of a live performance of one of their new songs, “On Directing.” Enjoy!
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