Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. Every week, Brandon Stosuy finds out how our favorite indie artists make ends meet...
Chromeo's the Montreal/New York electro duo of childhood friends P-Thugg (Patrick Gemayel) and Dave I (David Macklovitch). Gemayel handles keyboards/synths and talk box. Maclovitch, the other vocals and guitar. The Deluxe Edition of their 2007 album Fancy Footwork, aka Fancier Footwork, came out a couple of weeks ago on Vice. It's a two-disc comp of the original album plus remixes of tracks from their oeuvre by MSTRKRFT, DFA, etc.
The guys are here today because Macklovitch is working on his Ph.D. in French Literature at Columbia. Gemayel's an accountant. Note: the two call themselves "the only successful Arab/Jewish collaboration since the beginning of time," but hadn't seen Zohan (me neither) so couldn't answer my question: "Your press release claims you're 'the only successful Arab/Jew partnership since the dawn of human culture.' What happens with the release of that new Adam Sandler movie?" They answered the rest. Listen to "Fancy Footwork" while Patrick gives you tax tips.
The Bergen trio Ungdomskulen play proggy post punk, mixing chops and hooks with a sense of humor. But they don't sound like Primus. When I was in Norway a couple years ago, "Ungdomskulen" seemed to be on everybody's lips (or at least the metal-esque guys I ran into). I was told time again about their technical abilities, but not so much about the fact that they wrote satisfyingly catchy songs like "Modern Drummer" (from their album Cry-Baby) or "Ordinary Son," which you'll find after my discussion with Øyvind Solheim, Frode Kvinge Flatland, and Kristian Stockhaus about their day jobs: Solheim builds guitar pedals (he also looks after a boy with special needs, but for the kid's privacy, he understandably didn't want to talk about that), Flatland teaches variously, Stockhaus DJs and teaches entire bands. Because actions supposedly speak louder than words, Kristian concocted a special mix to accompany this Quit Your Day Job. You'll find that after our discussion, too.
I'm a big fan of Finnish free-folk -- or whatever you want to call it -- especially the work of Laura Naukkarinen, aka Lau Nau. I was lucky enough to catch her, along with some of her scene comrades, live in Greenpoint three Augusts ago, where the already naturalist, uncluttered (though swarming) sounds were stripped to a purer state. Surprisingly, the music remained otherworldly, even when you saw how they crafted it. Lau Nau's 2005 full-length Kuutarha's a true overlooked gem you should seek out if you don't already own it. Same goes for her recent sophomore full-length Nukkuu. We posted the lopsided lullabies and bedroom psychedelics of Nukkuu opener "Lue Kartalta" at the beginning of last month. Following my discussion with Naukkarinen, you can find another standout -- the dreamy, bell-gonging "Rubiinilasia."
Laura's featured in Quit Your Day Job because she works as desk clerk at a town library on Kemiö Island ("We're on an island so the town is full of small fisher and farmer villages"), as a freelance translator of Spanish and Swedish, and organizes sound workshops for children with her "companion" Antti Tolvi, who I should add, makes his own great music in various guises.
Torche's Meanderthal is definitely one of the best albums of the year. Accordingly, I listen to it more than I probably should (basically daily). We posted "Healer" some time ago. If that's all you've heard from the record, you should be blown away by the sludge-pop goodness of "Grenades" (ignore pun), which you'll find after my discussion with frontman Steve Brooks about his job in a pizza shop. (If you already know the song, listen again.) You'll also find dates for the band's tour with Boris, etc. But first, here's Steve, the guy in the center in the Jesu shirt, and the rest of Torche playing "Healer" in Fort Worth in early May.
Outside of recording, touring, reading Kerouac, and the like, the guys in Death Cab For Cutie no longer spend their days embroiled in manual labor ... but not too long ago, they did. For this special installment of Quit Your Day Job, the band's rhythm section -- bassist Nick Harmer and drummer Jason McGerr -- share memorable maggot and injury-filled workaday war stories. This isn't mere "bad day at the graphic design lab" stuff: Nick was employed as a sanitation worker in Tacoma, Washington and before mentoring Smoosh, teaching drums, or opening his own studio (Two Sticks Audio), Jason pieced together steel buildings, among other things, as a construction worker.
Valet is Honey Owens. She was recently on tour as a member of Atlas Sound, but if you want to hear her own unique approach to homegrown ambiance, check out her beautiful sophomore album Naked Acid. I posted one of its standouts "Keehar" in the Outsiders a few months ago, and have the beautiful album closer, "Street," after our discussion. Our "discussion" because, yes, of course, she has a job. As she told me:
Basically my job is co-owning a vintage and handmade clothing/record store here in Portland called Rad Summer. We're about a 8 to 9 person collective. We all take turns working the store. The other time "working" is shopping at estate sales and Goodwill utlet stores to bring in fresh and delectable items ... basically the work part is driving and carrying heavy bags around town/digging through garbage, etc. Picking (what we call it in Portland) is kinda like an addiction or a mania.
Port O'Brien started three years ago as the duo (and couple) of Van Pierszalowski and Cambria Goodwin. The Bay Area band's currently a quintet, but the two remain at the group's core. It's a highly autobiographical project, connected to where they travel and how they opt to live while doing it. For instance, they have a song called "Fisherman's Son" and it's not just one of those indie-rock seafaring metaphors: Vocalist and guitarist Van Pierszalowski actually is the son of a commercial fisherman. He's a fisherman himself, too. As any number of tracks like "Stuck On A Boat" suggest, when Port O'Brien sing about heading to sea, there's lived experience affixed to the chorus.
Every summer Pierszalowski joins his father on Kodiak Island in Alaska to fish salmon. Goodwin, who sings and plays banjo, keyboard, and mandolin, goes north, too, as Head Baker at the Larsen Bay cannery. (This summer, bassist Caleb Nichols also worked at the cannery.) Like Bon Iver's love of the Wisconsin landscape and respect for the hunting tradition, these are the sorts of "jobs" you don't quit. After the discussions with Van (who details a few fishing accidents) and Cambria (who offers a recipe for cayenne cocoa cake), check out a couple Port O'Brien tracks. Listen closely for the echoes.
Baltimore spastics Ponytail are set to release the appropriately titled, J. Robbins-produced Ice Cream Spiritual in June (it follows their 2005 debut, Kamehameha). Appropriate, because everything about the quartet shouts "sugar rush." They make a sort of deconstructed art pop that balances off-kilter melodics with vocalist Molly Siegel's savant Ono-isms. Also, drummer Jeremy Hyman used to work scooping actual ice cream. But that's in the past. (As is Siegel's job as a pizza delivery person.) Currently, it's the guitarists who're holding down jobs -- Dustin Wong (ex-Ecstatic Sunshine, btw) is involved with the Blythe doll industry and Ken Seeno's a security guard.
Right now Ponytail's label is still working "Celebrate The Body Electric (It Came From An Angel)," so you'll find it after the discussion. I appreciate the emphasis on Whitman ecstasies, but it'll be cool when they're allowed to unleash another track ... Because, yeah, these folks are more than a one trick Ponytail. Sue me.
After two weeks of reader-tipped BTWs from Lawrence, Kansas, we mentioned there seemed to be something going on in that city, despite William S. Burroughs up and dying a few years ago. After the proclamation went out, we received notes...
Before we got to soak-in the woozy organ and raw yelps of "In the New Year," the last taste we had of the Walkmen was that one-off "Lemon Hill." As we mentioned then, the Men said "Lemon" wasn't "exactly in...
Every week, we dig in the archives for videos that we find noteworthy, memorable, or just unbelievably stupid. And then, Jon McMillan breaks 'em down for you. Why Video Hangover? Because when you watch as many videos as we do,...
Take our ink-stained hands and join us at the OldStand, where Jon McMillan goes to remind everyone what an honest-to-goodness music magazine is supposed to look like. Okay, I'll admit it: I fell for the cover trick. It's Kerrang!, right?...
Not all of Stereogum's favorite sounds conform to what folks expect us to cover. In this space, resident Bananafish fetishist Brandon Stosuy focuses on bands, albums, singles, and villages in Sweden that may otherwise pass by unnoticed. This installment's virtual...
The XYZ Affair found their way onto our radar with a slime-filled Nickelodeon-packed "All My Friends" video. The Brooklyn band's new Trials EP includes standout "Evening Life," a song that caught our attention before its video clip was even completed....
