It starts out with a bang. ‘As we enter’ is the classic hip-hop “who we are” song, with an interesting beat and lyrics. Lots of back and forth between the two. Marley really ups his lyric game on this track. Starts the album with a bang, really gets you going. I love this song.

[Damian Marley]
Masuri Sana
Switch up the language and move to Ghana

[Nas]
Salute and honor, real revolution rhymers

[Damian Marley]
Rhythm piranhas

[Nas]
Like true Obamas, unfold the drama

It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but this is my favorite song on the album. The album as a whole follows a track where it starts out loud and fast and then each song gets more mellow. There are a few really good songs ‘Strong Will Continue’ , ‘Land of Promise’ , and ‘Friends’. But with the statement it makes when it first starts I wish that it could have maintained that energy level through the whole thing. But I guess that is the melding of these two styles. It’s still a great album, put it on and chill out for 45 minutes.

4 out of 5 Schus

Cage The Elephant.

I just became aware of this band a few months ago. I had heard the single “Back Against the Wall” on DC101 a few times and I’d always missed who it was by. Finally I was able to pull out the old Shazam app and figure out who it was. I got the album… It is awesome.

It’s full of driving bass lines and strong drums. Mixed with whining guitars and a distinctive vocal style. It’s a throwback sound to , and I can’t believe I’m saying this… The 90s. It remind me of STP mixed with The Strokes. The singles are a mix of almost nonsensical artsy lyrics with shoutable choruses over energetic guitar driven rock music.

In this age of Itunes singles if an CD has more than 3 listenable songs then it’s considered good. This one has at least 4, which takes it into classic territory.

I love it!

Best song – Three way tie!

4.8 out of 5 Schus

The list and audio after the break

Top 9 ‘Get Up’ songs

Stevie Wonder - Superstition – Talking Book^W

Made in an era before videos and effects had taken over music, this song makes me think of a dance floor full of people just jamming along with the band. It’s beat is devilishly simple, just a few twangy guitar chords punctuated with a bright funky horn section. This song gets people to their feet and is the perfect song to start this list with.

Recommended Uses : Dancing your ass off, pre-anything physical, Loving Life

War machine, they could play this some on Army recruitment videos and I would think about joining up.

Recommended Uses : Playing over war footage from Iraq, pre-snowboard psych-up

When ever things go wrong or right in this country I play this song. It’s so angry and defiant, just makes you want to march on something. If you’re protesting or celebrating the freedom in this county to not give a shit, this is your soundtrack.

Recommended Uses : Pretending I’m marching on DC, pre-snowboard psych-up, Not giving a shit.

I didn’t go with the predictable “Welcome to the Jungle” I think because it’s been so over played in cheesy movies that it’s lost it’s fire. Nighttrain has a better chorus anyway.

Loaded like a freight train, Flyin like an aeroplane, feelin like a space brain… one more time tonight, IM ON A NIGHT TRAIN!

There’s something about this song that I’ve always liked, classic guitar riffs. Axl’s screeching… This song moves.

Recommended Uses : Starting a party in 1992, mid-snowboard run playlist, Not giving a shit.

This probably the least known of these songs. It just has this constant menacing beat that keeps pounding in your ears while the lyrics come at you with staccato percussion. I think I found them through Last.fm a great source of new music.

Recommended Uses : Riding the Metro, pre-snowboard psych-up

I WAS ALL A DREAM! This may be the greatest song of the 1990′s and that’s coming from someone who listened to a lot of Nirvana and Pearl Jam. Its one of the only songs that came out while I was in high school that I can still listen to. Plus its all about telling off everyone that didn’t think you could make it. SUPER NINTENDO SEGA GENESIS, WHEN I WAS BROKE I COULDN’T PICTURE THIS. I listen to this song every time I go snowboarding.

Recommended Uses : As soon as you see the NYC skyline on a roadtrip, cruising on a slow snowboard run, Feeling Awesome.

This is a little bit of a cheat because it’s a whole album, but I cannot name one song on this album. I would vote for it as record of the year(2006), it’s just infinitely listenable. Songs meld into one another, on top of each other, they just fight each other. I heard Brittney Spears punch Alice n’ Chains in the face.

Recommended Uses : When you don’t know what to play at a party, All day snowboard mix, getting ready to go out

Download audio file (19-DJ-Topcat-More-Than-On-Point.mp3)

When it’s time to rock a funky joint This song is on point. There’s just something about combining Journey with House of Pain that I really like. The best part about classic rock is the singable choruses the best part about rap is the rapid fire lyrics. This song is like peanut butter and chocolate. Like ice cream and donuts. Like sex and sex!

Recommended Uses : Walking, Jammin, Feeling good about yourself.

BASS how low can you go! Take the signature PE anthem and speed it up about 150% then add face shredding guitar playing thus making the whole thing better by a million percent.

Recommended Uses : Attempting to jump off things, Giving a shit (Just not about the shit the MAN wants you to).

Recommended Uses : Pretending I’m not getting old, being pissed, Slapping Picachu.

Through the movie you see how much promise and success they had back in the beginning and then they just kind of went nowhere, but they never gave up. Now it’s 30 years later and they’re still trying to make it. The movie focuses on the lead singer and drummer of Anvil. The lead singer ‘Lips’ is the one in the band who won’t let the dream die, he works at a catering company and takes vacation time to play shows. There are people in his life that you can see don’t share his vision and don’t really support him. But his girlfriend and older sister stick with him no matter what. Maybe that’s the part that really resonated personally with me? The other main character is the drummer, Robb Reiner (not the actor/director). He and Lips have this rocky ‘Brothers in Metal’ relationship that creates some intense emotional moments through out the film. When the ending comes you are so emotionally invested in this band that they really feel like family.

I cannot believe that this movie didn’t even get nominated for best documentary in the Academy Awards. The only close competition I would give it was The Cove and that for me is a distant second. Food Inc., the front runner for the award, was NOTHING compared to this movie. ANVIL doesn’t need flashy graphics or voice overs, it thrives on basic human spirit. The story of Anvil provided enough emotion for 10 movies.

If you have a heart and a dream, you will love this movie.

watch the trailer
buy the music

Schu-Review : 5 out of 5 Schus

*UPDATE*
Apparently this movie came out in 2007, but since I just watched it last week. I’m still calling it the best documentary of 2009.

Here’s to hoping!

via OMG Posters

This wasn’t one of those albums that grabbed me right away, but I knew that there was something I liked about it. I think he’s finally, in my mind, moved out of novelty act territory. He’s no longer “that Hasidic jewish guy” who raps and sings reggae, this is actual good music. Like much of the reggae genre the themes of hope and fun permeate the album. There’s just something about this music that makes me happy. It’s the kind of music that makes you want to get out there and do something positive in the world.

The first track, “Smash Lies”, starts the album with a crowd pleasing energy and tempo and is one of my favorite tracks. The rest of the album is less reggae and moves into more reggae-influenced rock and pop, but it’s the peaceful attitude that ties it all together. The third track and possibly the radio single, “One Day”, is so hopeful for the future it almost crosses into cheesy. There are some songs that I might skip through if they came on by themselves, but they’re so much in the flow on the album that I don’t notice till they’re over. I know it’s just music and it wont “really” change anything, but it makes you think it’s possible, in a Michael Franti^W sort of way. The whole sound of the album is a bit like a jumble of Franti, MGMT^W, and SOJA^W

Schu-Review : 4/5 Schus

Later I really loved the Punk goes^W series of CDs where each album would have a genre of music covered by punk bands. As I’ve grown up and my taste in music has evolved I find myself listening to punk and punk covers less often. My teen angst must be getting replaced by late 20′s fattness. A while back I posted a link to cover of “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air”, but I didn’t do any research beyond that. Today I found a link on Boing Boing to a folk cover of NWA straight outta compton, but sadly the link was down.

But what I did find in that post was solid gold… Coverlaydown.com. Which is a blog dedicated to Folk covers of songs. It’s fantastic! Maybe these make such good covers to me because, just like the punk covers, they are so different from the original style of the songs. I just can’t say enough how much I love this site and the music. It’s like they took all the pop songs and ran them through some kind or emotion amplifier and they came out the other side even better. A lot of them are so different that you might not even realize what song they were originally. I really like the way the site is run, giving credit to the original poster while providing links to the covering artist for purchase of new music.

Here are a few that I really like.

• Dr. Fox’s Old Timey String Band: Kids (orig. MGMT)
  (from MySpace)
• Sara Watkins, Sean Watkins, and Glen Phillips cover Elliot Smith’s Between the Bars live in some parking lot way back in 2004.
• Butch Ross: Eleanor Rigby (orig. The Beatles)
  (from A Long Way From Shady Grove, 2009)
• Whip: White Wedding (orig. Billy Idol)
  (from Bridging the Distance, 2007; more Whip)
• Ingrid Michaelson: Can’t Help Falling In Love (orig. Elvis Presley)

I love Buckethead. He never ceases to impress me. His music is one long guitar solo. When people started break dancing they just took the break beats from rap songs and looped them over and over. Because they thought that was the best part of the song. It’s like he got tired of playing rhythm and choruses and just said “Fuck it, I’ll just play a 7 minute solo, deal with it”

This mashup with ODB is killer.

IT’S LIKE PSYCHO KILLER NORMAN BATES!

The Line:

We got the early admission tickets for Thursday and I’m glad we did. We got into the line around 4:30 and then hit traffic, it actually turned into a moving party. We would all jump in our cars, move 20 feet, then get back out and open up the coolers. It was fun to walk up the liine and back to see what kind of music the different folks were listening to. Four hours later we reached our parking space (side of a hill) there were still people in that line at 2am. The Stage seemed to be about a 20 minute walk (at least) from where our car was packed so we decided to hike our camp closer to the stage.

The Spot:

We had planned for this event by bringing a wagon this year. But we also brought about 10 times more stuff. We’re good planners, not good packers. We took only the essentials on the first trip, tent, bookbags and “The Spot Claimer”. When we got up there we found that it was pretty packed in. We spent a couple minutes looking for a spot big enough to plant the shade tent when a nice bearded guy said that there was some room by his group. They seemed like nice enough people and they were really excited by all the crap we brought (who wouldn’t be!). They seemed to be running the “We’re in college and all we brought was beer” Camp. The spot was in the Dogwood neighborhood, pretty close to the stage, About as close as last year without the giant hill (good). The neighbors were good people, the “Boy Scouts”, the “Really prepared Sisters”, the “Jam Band Junkies”, and the “Nice people who brought games”. No trouble from any of them, just good vibes.

The Music:

Like every year, I really wish I had seen more music. But waking up after a long night and then it’s hot outside the shade tent… I really didn’t want to go sit in a hot field. So we only saw a couple of daytime shows. We heard them from the camp, but that’s not really the same. My favorite show was by far Michael Franti and Spearhead (Last show of the Fest) I thought they really rocked it out and I really didn’t want it to end. Second would probably have to be the Widespread Panic set. I’ve been listening to them a lot before the fest so I was really excited to see them live. Phil Lesh was surprisingly good (I’m not really a Dead follower and didn’t like Ratdog last year) That Bassnectar guy ripped the place down, AWESOME! BOOOOM! and then BOOM! The crowd was so intense during that set and the glowstick rain was killer. Laurel loved the Dark Star Orchestra late night set on Saturday (Even though I’ve been trying to tell her that she would like it since last year). The music at the campsite was really awesome too, we had some guys that could really play the guitar and drums. Plus random “Mandolin Man” who came by on the last day. My plan for next year “See More Music”.

The Vibe:

Half the fun of All Good is the people. This year I think I heard that 18,000+ people were there. There were some sketchballs but not any more than last year. I only saw a few people that I know were not there for the music (there to make money). Laurel and I tried to make the fest fun for anybody and everybody around us. I think it makes us both happy to care for others. I wish I could find some other people like us before we go next time, I want to bring a little bit of the Burning Man art vibe out to the mountian next year. I think I’ll try to hang out on the Jambase forums and spread the vibe out for next year.

Next Year:

We’ll definatley be there, hope we can bring out some of our friends instead of just making new ones (that we may never see again) Laurel and I have already started thinking about what to do for next year. I have one plan… PERSONAL PARTY DOME.

If our new friends from VA TECH ever search for all good online I hope this post brings us back together.

Thanks for a GREAT time. (I’m not good with names)

Annie, Scotty, Matt, Jager, Coco, Desi, Jess… There are a couple more, but my mind is blank now.

Later!

2. Met some really fun people from Va Tech.

3. Spent lots of money.

4. Going back next year!

A more complete and wordy summary to follow.

Later!

Mark
*update – Here is the full post*