It has been a few weeks since my last Music in Commercials post. I think it due time for another. This week has a little less continuity than week but I have found some cool ones.

First off I picked an Adidas commercial with music from Karen O. It’s a pretty cool commercial and the dark theme fits well with Hello Tomorrow. I like the weirdness of this commercial. It is definitely on of my favorite commercials I have covered so far.

Update: I just checked this song is actually by Squeak E. Clean ft. Karen O

Next we have a Pontiac commercial from Silversun Pickups. The commercial, like most others, is pretty generic. It’s a good song though so I can enjoy it. Another good song to add to the long list of boring car commercials.

If you know who Aphex Twin are, I’m sure you will have a good laugh at this ad. Seems a little ironic to pick them for the music of an Anti-Drug commercial. That said, it is an antu-drug ad I am paying more attention too. Good job random Anti-Drug organization. This is more of what I imagine when I think of when I think of Aphex Twin.

Aphex Twin’s website states:

The Aphex Twin’s favourite drugs, in order of preference: grass/hash, mushrooms, coffee, tea, Ventolin, aspirin. At a festival last week, he licked a little too much liquid acid off his hand, then had to spend the night convincing his mate, who’d similarly indulged, that they were in a field, not standing on the edge of a hypodermic needle. He wasn’t very successful. Have his tastes changed as he’s got older?’Only in as much as I know what not to take when I’m going to see my parents.’

Part 1 - CSS, The Go Team!, Ben Lee

Part 2 - The Postal Service, Yael Niem, The Concretes

Part 3 - Trio, Shiny Toy Guns, Deadly Snakes

In the last few weeks I was able to see a whole whack of shows. Instead of blogging about them in a timely fashion I ended up putting it off until I had accumulated six shows to talk about. Before this list grows too big, I am getting down to business and writing up this new post.

The show that is furthest away in my concert time line was the Datarock / Ladytron show. Lucky for me it was one of the most memorable. I was at this show for Datarock. That being said, when they first came on I was a little worried. They weren’t as crazy and fun as I’d hoped and they were playing new stuff which was less good than their one album stuff.

Avid Datarock fans, don’t fret! This was just a minor hiccup. Soon they were dancing around the stage (and through the crowd) singing all their hits with the Datarock crowd. The people there were mostly Ladytron fans but there was a significant Datarock pit in the center that rocked the concert right. The show rocked. No questions asked. Conversation ended.

(Clip of “Datarock - Sex Me Up [0:49 min])

Ladytron

I went to the Datarock / Ladytron show with a friend who was all about Ladytron. I was there primarily for Datarock and didn’t really listen to much Ladytron before the show (although just listening to Destroy Everything You Touch got me excited for the show).

Anyways, the show was great. They put on a really epic show. The production was really cool. It was all dark with with lots of cool lights. Fitting for darkish, synthpop. Also, I didn’t even know before the show that the other girl did a bunch full songs too. She was good. It was an all around good show.

(Clip of “Ladytron - Destroy Everything You Touch [0:51 min])

Parenthetical Girls are really just not good… Derek and I got to the Parenthetical Girls / YSP!WSD! / Los Campesinos show a little late and they had already started. Not only was the club full of god awful music but the lead singer was pacing with his annoying, dramatic, flamboyant, “I’m barely gonna hold the mic” stance.

In this unpleasant situation, we did what what any right minded person would do. Head for the bar. What we found there was less than ideal. This all ages show was completely dry. Not only did we have to listen to Parenthetical Girls, we had to do it completely sober.

Summary: Parenthetical Girls suck. If you like them, you suck too.

[Error: Failed to load song due to excessive sucking. Please try again later.]

(Clip of “Parenthetical Girls - Safe As Houses [0:39 min])

You Say Party! We Say Die! is a local Vancouver band gone “indie-big”. I am often quick to claim that I knew them before they are big (which is a lie). Seriously though, they rock. I have seen them a couple times and I think this show was their best. Even Derek, a so-so fan of YSP!WSD!, agreed.

They really engaged the audience this time. The leader singer, as always, was really fun and did her little dance routines. She even spent an entire song dancing with fans in the crowd. The best part of this mix was the interaction with Los Campesinos. They made sporadic appearances on the other bands sets. Really good concert!

(Clip of “You Say Party! We Say Die! - Midnight Snack [0:53 min])

The Los Campesinos concert had a little bit of a slow start, a wicked middle (most the concert), an amazing climax, and was topped off with a let down ending encore. I wasn’t that familiar with them before the show, so it took some hits for me to really get into it. Although, after a few songs I was having a lot of fun. The banter in between songs was pretty funny. Maybe I am just a sucker for Welsh accents.

After playing a really good headline show, they setup a huge ending song with all of YSP!WSD! accomponying them at the end. It would have been a really great way to end the show. Sadly, this was not the case. I remembering looking over at Derek and saying “Man I hope their isn’t an oncore”.

Of course, there was. They came out and played a low-key song that left a bad taste in your mouth. I guess you can’t blame them to much, if they not come out a lot of the fans would have been pissed off. I just think its dumb. Lose the damn manditory oncoure rule! Do it Northern State style!

(Clip of “Los Campesinos - We Throw Parties You Throw Knives [0:34 min])

The Long Blondes

The last show I saw was The Long Blondes. This show was awesome. It was one of the shows that when you think back there was nothing memorable but you know you left feeling it was one of the best concerts you have seen.

On top of an awesome show, the lead singer was really hot. She is the opposite of the stereotypical photo to real life comparison. She looked pretty normal in most the pictures I saw of her. Live in her short shorts on the other hand… Man. Just hope she is showing off some leg when she comes to your town.

(Clip of “The Long Blondes - Century [0:44 min])

In Old English, incubi and succubi (the demons that seduce sleeping mortals) were known as ‘mare,’ and such nightly visitations were known as ‘nightmares.’

So when I say that Scarlett Johansson’s new album of Tom Waits covers Anywhere I Lay My Head sounds like nightmare, I’m not being an asshole — it’s the type of nightmare I’d like to have. The dreamlike instrumentation orchestrated by producer Dave Sitek has a smothering, surreal but inarguably erotic feel to it. Many of the songs have a languid, dark-carnival sensibility that would suit them well for a soundtrack to Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes.

Critical reception has been largely lukewarm, with most reviewers focusing on Johansson’s admittedly mediocre voice. But the selling point of this album isn’t Johansson’s vocal prowess. Her distant, lazy voice hides behind layers of organs, percussion and brass on many of the tracks, but the result nothing to complain about.

When actors make a foray into music, the results range from laughable kitsch to painful failure, but Anywhere I Lay My Head actually manages to stand out as a fantastic album in its own right. It’s perhaps more a testament to the songwriting ability of Tom Waits and the production skill of Dave Sitek, but without the sexy, old-soul persona that Johansson brings to the table, it wouldn’t be the same.

Verdict: We’re not typically in the habit of rating things on any sort of objective scale here at noise++, but I’m going to assign the album an arbitrary 8/10.

And of course, a clip of Falling Down, off Anywhere I Lay My Head:

This week I was able to see a couple more shows. This week was definitely the lesser of two weeks when compared to last week. The bands I intended to see were a little disappointing but through them I found a couple bands that I would have never found before.

Anna is a solo, acoustic, indie-folk Swedish singer/songwriter that opened as a “Special Guest” for El Perro Del Mar and Lykke Li. The fact that she was opening was pretty interesting after I checked out the three band’s LastFM pages. She was listed as having 2.4 million listens, while Lykke Li had 650k listens and El Perro Del Mar had 950k listens. Regardless of stats and statistics, she was really good. Her voice sounds better live than it does on her recordings. Also her non-singing Swedish accent is really hot! I was not expecting much from this “Special Guest” but instead of found an awesome new band for my chill-out playlist.

(Clip of “Anna Ternheim - To Be Gone [0:38 min])

Before this concert I had heard of but I hadn’t actually heard anything from Lykke Li. For some reason I had a completely unfounded idea that she wasn’t really someone I would be interested in. With this in mind, when I heard her stuff I was pleasantly surprised. Out of all the bands this week, she was definitely the most entertaining. Her music (at least most of it) is upbeat and fun, which fits perfectly which her similarly styled stage presence. Lykke Li was another fresh addition to my music repertoire this week.

(Clip of “Lyyke Li - Im Good, I’m Gone [0:39 min])

As opposed to the first two bands, I had heard a little bit from El Perro Del Mar before I saw the show. She is really hit or miss for me. I really like the songs Dog and God Knows but I wasn’t into much more than that. A friend of mine really likes El Perro Del Mar so I thought it would be fun to go to her show anyways. My opinion of her live performance was pretty similar to my opinion the albums I had listened too. She played both the songs I really liked and I thought they were great. Her other stuff was just a little too slow and uninteresting for my tastes. My friend on the other hand thought it was amazing. So if you like all her stuff, I’d bet you’d like her live.

(Clip of “El Perro Del Mar - Dog [0:39 min])

Tokyo Police Club is up there in my list of favorite bands. That is at least if we are talking about their first album. Their latest album Elephant Shell is pretty good but isn’t even in the same league as their first album. It has two songs that are first album worthy (Tessellate and Your English Is Good). That being said, having at least one full album of wicked tracks under their belt I was super excited to see them live.

Sadly I was let down. First off, we got their late (which is normally not an issue because they had two openers) and they had already started. We only missed a song or two but we quickly got in the middle of the crowd ready to jump around. They played mostly their second album with some of their first album sprinkled in the set list. This left the audience standing around for most the show with intermittent jumping around for their well known songs. This led to a very high highs and low lows kind of show.

To top it all off the entire set was only 50 minutes (including the 5-10 we missed). Although I’m sure this wasn’t the band’s decision it left me feeling ripped off. I was left with a saddened and empty walk home at 10:30. It makes me feel bad writing negatively about a band I love but this show was just not good. I hope they pick it up next album and I will definitely try out their live show again.

(Clip of “Tokyo Police Club - Your English Is Good [0:43 min])

What the hell, why was everyone at the Cake concert, like, 35 years old? I don’t want to get all “kids these days” on you… But seriously: kids these days. When I go to an all ages show for a wicked band that’s been around for about 15 years, I expect to be one of the older people there. But I guess concerts with seats draw a different crowd.

There was an opening band, (Paper Lions), but the only things you need to know about them are that they kind of sucked, and they ended with a 20 minute prog song called Mr. Strawberry Man or some shit. That’s just uncalled for, guys.

The last time I saw Cake, (back when Pressure Chief was released), I guess Jon McCrea was in kind of a bad mood or something. He flat out refused to play the most popular songs and stuck to new album material, or the more obscure stuff from previous albums.

This time, things were different. The classic radio singles all made the show, including Never There, Sheep Go to Heaven, The Distance, Shadow Stabbing, Rock n’ Roll Lifestyle and of course, Short Skirt/Long Jacket. But they also brought out some covers (War Pigs, Ruby don’t take your love to town), and some of the lesser known album tracks. Like last time, one of the highlights of the show was the anxious and somehow unnerving performance of Comfort Eagle.

The thing about live Cake songs is that I think they’re changed just slightly to kind of screw you up. No matter how well you know the songs, it just seems like the intonations and rhythm are a bit off. Not like “Oh man, they messed up” off, but like, “Hey, they’re playing this song different” off.

It’s my theory that McCrea is kind of a dick and likes to mess you up when you’re singing along. Both times I’ve seen Cake, I’ve been singing along with the people around me, and we’re all failing spectacularly. I’m no American Idol, but I can usually keep time with a freaking Cake song. The up side is that you get to hear slightly different songs than what you hear from the albums all the time.

Considering Cake is my favourite band, it probably won’t mean much if I say that the show was fantastic. But it was. Whoever engineered the sound did a great job, everything was perfectly mic’d, even down to the signature vibraslap. If you get the chance to see these guys live, do it.

Oh, and I guess Cake is giving away a tree every show now. This time they gave it to the oldest person in the audience, 57 year old Rick. Apparently, he’s supposed to take pictures and document the tree’s rise to power as he ages and grows weak. Nice.

In the last week I was able to make it to a couple shows. First was the Laura Veirs / Liam Finn show followed by The Trucks / Northern State a few days later. Both shows were great for completely different reasons. In this post I’ll go over how they stacked up.

The first set from the Folk show was Liam Finn. I had never even heard of him before going to the show (I was there for Laura Veirs). I wasn’t expecting much from the opener and actually could of missed him if my pre-show Iced Capp excursion had been a little more interesting. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that Liam Finn actually rocks. He puts on a great show and was pretty funny between sets. Using pedals he ended up playing guitar, singing multiple simultaneous tracks, and playing the drums all at once. He pulled it off really smoothly. Although, I wasn’t his backup vocalists biggest fan. If I were him, I would go solo! Overall it was a pretty fun set.

(Clip of “Liam Finn- Second Chances [0:40 min])

Laura Veirs

That night Laura Veirs also put on a great headlining show. She wasn’t as energetic as any of the other bands I saw but her music doesn’t really suit that anyway. Her voice is just a good live as on her albums. All of her fans were satisfied. She played all her hits from her lengthly album collection and the non-standard songs were pretty cool too (she even rocked a banjo at one point). She also kept everyone entertained with clever jokes and stories in between songs. Being an avid fan, I was throughly entertained the entire way through.

(Clip of “Laura Veirs- Don’t Lose Yourself [0:40 min])

The Trucks were the band I was most excited about out of all four. Expect my opinion to be chalked fully of all sorts of bias. This leads me to a logical statement, which is — I thought they were awesome. They were much more fun than I expected (and I expected them to be off the charts). All decked up out in funky clothes they danced around like fools and encouraged the audience to follow suit. They engaged everyone with special intro/outro songs and even had a short instrument-less song about a perv in the bushes. At the beginning all the vocals and synth were drown out by drums but luckily it seemed to work itself out a few songs in. If you are into all things Trucks, they are a must see live.

(Clip of “The Trucks- Diddle-Bot [0:45 min])

Northern State was another band I didn’t know until after buying my ticket. Although this time I bought their latest album before going. There music is really good and so was their show. They were a lot of fun on stage and kept a new fan like me amused the whole way through (sans the Radiohead cover). They were also one of the first bands in a long time that didn’t have an encore. At first I was kinda disappointed but really it was kind of refreshing not having to force them into the usual completely obvious im-going-to-leave-now situation that everyone expects at the end of shows. They were great end to an awesome string of bands. Now, time for a break.

(Clip of “Northern Touch- Better Already [0:35 min])

Musicians rip each other off all the time. Steve Miller lifted the famous “pompatus of love” lyric from a song by The Medallions. The Flaming Lips pay royalties to Yusuf Islam for similarities between Father and Son and Fight Test.

But it’s weird when you find two songs with an identical riff that were released less than a year apart from one another.

Cardiff band Los Campesinos! first released You! Me! Dancing! as a demo in the summer of 2006. Their fellows in Manchester, The Answering Machine, released Silent Hotels in 2007. I guess it’s debatable who actually wrote the riff first, but it looks like Los Campesinos! are the likely originators.

It’s not a remarkably complex bit of music, so it’s fully possible that both groups, independent of one another, threw together the same few chords. All the same, I think The Answering Machine has some ’splaining to do.

And apparently I’m not the only one who thinks so. When I ran a Google search for “you me dancing” + “silent hotels” I found a supporter or two, including UK music magazine powerhouse NME.

Give it a listen yourself, what do you think?

Los Campesinos - You! Me! Dancing! (clip) [0:29]

The Answering Machine - Silent Hotels (clip) [0:20]

As is often the case, doing it first meant doing it best. While The Answering Machine is largely forgettable, Los Campesinos! have continued to deliver, culminating in the fantastic full length album Hold On Now, Youngster… which was officially released in North America this month.

As usual, this week I have scraped up three more commercials. Today’s post is all about commercials that really affected the popularity of the musician or song. The kind of artist that has three times as many listens on one song featured in a commercial than all others combined.

First up is Trio. This commercial completely fits the theme of this post. When the it first came out (in the mid-90s I believe), it became an instant hit. It was known as the Da Da Da commercial. Nobody remembered what car is was but nobody forgot that song. When I think back of memorable commercials or specific ones people talked a lot about, this is one of them.

“I have the poster for this ad.” - docktergonzo (YouTube comments for this video).

The above comment I found really justifies my point. They made fucking posters for a commercial. Advertising an advertisment… Pretty meta.

Moving closer to present times, I chose the RAZR commercial featuring Shiny Toy Guns. If you ever forget the name Shiny Toy Guns, is valid to call them “The band from the RAZR commercial”. They can actually be found in a bunch of other places too. Their song “You Are The One” can be found in FIFA 2007. These two featured songs trumph any other song for listens on their MySpace page. Go mass media.

To tell you the truth, I haven’t listened to The Deadly Snakes much (sorry Derek). That being said, I am very familiar with their riff used in this Yaris commercial (or any other recent one for that matter). I’d say that describes the majority of people that have seen these ads.

While debating the Yaris or the Matrix for his next car purchase kevotheone, from the youtube comments, recommended this ad claming “…it’s got a cool song and the car looks really nice.” While I don’t care much for the song or the car. The commercial is pretty awesome.

Part 1 - CSS, The Go Team!, Ben Lee

Part 2 - The Postal Service, Yael Niem, The Concretes

I’ve never been one for flag waving. Sure I’ll make jokes about Americans, and I’m always quick to point out that I’m from Canada, but the whole blind patriotism thing has never been my bag. I mean, who really cares if Bryan Adams went south?

So when I say that Born Ruffians hate Canada, I’m not criticizing the Toronto band’s flight to the UK for a round of touring, or even their recent signing with England’s Rough Trade Records. I’m talking about how living in Canada will actually make it harder for you to buy their first EP.

I attempted to purchase their self-titled EP, released in Canada during 2006, for nearly a week. Typically, I avoid buying physical CDs or DRM’d music whenever possible, and when I searched my usual channels for Born Ruffians albums, I couldn’t find any. After a bit more searching, I found out that the albums were actually available - but only if you aren’t from Canada.

It strikes me as odd (and maybe a trifle rude) that an independent Canadian band’s music is only available as high quality, DRM-free MP3s to non-Canadians.

I usually advocate buying from independent artists that are producing good quality music, but in this case I’m going to have to suggest that you search the torrent trackers out there and download the shit out of both 2006’s Born Ruffians EP and 2008’s Red Yellow And Blue.

Both are great listens, despite the band/label’s persistence in sticking to a lousy business model. Hopefully they come to their senses by the time their next album rolls around.  I’d love to pay them for their music.

If you’re strapped for time, at least check out these three songs. Curiously enough, they all seem to have something to do with life.

1. This Sentence will Ruin / Save Your Life
2. Foxes Mate for Life
3. I Need a Life

Clip of This Sentence Will Ruin / Save Your Life [0:44]

Music Video for I Need a Life

If you’re like me, you listen to music all the time. Working, studying, commuting, exercising, playing video games… I pretty much have a constant soundtrack. But even if you’re not like me, there’s one time that I’ll bet we both think music is important: while partying.

Music can make or break a party. It can unite enemies, turn friends against one another, or put an entire room of revelers to sleep. With this knowledge, making sure that you have rock solid party songs on your playlist is absolutely crucial.

But what makes a good Party Song?

This is the million dollar question. The art writing a truly good Party Song™ is one most bands could never even hope to master. The party song is a fickle beast… The perfect party song is different for every person, and more importantly, for every group of friends. But there are some things to keep in mind.

Speed. Party songs are fast. Slow songs make for slow parties. I think we’ve all been at a mostly decent soirée when some asshole finds an acoustic guitar and starts singing Jack Johnson. What happens to the party? It turns into a cross-legged introspection circle. This constitutes a party failure. You’re at a party, not a camp fire. Get on your feet. (There are, of course, exceptions to the speed rule. For instance, Meat Loaf has plenty of slow bits, but they are melodramatic enough to cancel out the drop in tempo. Any song that “breaks it down” during the bridge is also exempt.)

Genre. A well constructed song from any genre can make a great party song, but certain ones lend themselves more readily than others. Thing of genres that explicitly support partying. Hint: Music from the 70s and 80s seems to be disproportionately “about the party.”

Content. It’s not necessary, but it helps, when the Party Song is about partying. There’s something about partying to a song that is simultaneously ordering you to party. It’s so meta. Andrew W.K. is the undisputed champion of party songs about partying. Other good party song topics include rejecting authority and the summer.

Singalongability. Some songs are nice to have in the background, playing while something more interesting happens. These are not good party songs. A good party song is the centre of attention: everyone knows the words, and they wants to make sure that everyone else is aware of it. Songs with commonly misheard lyrics are great, as are songs that you can stick your own lyrics into to make them dirty. For fun and profit, try replacing “Mony Mony!” with “Fuckin’ Horny!”

Newness. One of the most important. When it comes to party songs, new is not better! Sometimes it’s hard to believe, but I guarantee it’s important. Being a party song is about being accessible. Yeah, everyone likes new music, but nobody likes not recognizing a string of five songs because they aren’t up on the bleeding edge of your favourite genre. Unless you have the most boring, homogenous group of friends ever, that awesome b-side you just discovered last week is NOT a good party song.

My top 5 party songs

If you’ve been to a party with me some time in the last few years, chances are I partied the hardest during these songs.

1. Semi Charmed Life - Third Eye Blind. This song is about things I am nowhere near cool enough to know anything about. I probably don’t know anybody who’s done crystal meth, especially not to the point that they “break.” Regardless, 90’s pop/rock is a veritable gold mine of catchy party songs that everybody seems to know the words to.
2. Gin and Juice - Snoop Dogg. I know this makes me sound like one of this mid-20s white hipsters that claims to like the O.G. shit because it’s like, post-ironic now, and it adds depth to my otherwise shallow stable of current one-hit indie darlings… But whatever, maybe I am that guy. Fuck you, this song rules.
3. D.A.N.C.E. - Justice. A rare new entry, D.A.N.C.E. references multiple Michael Jackson songs, which is probably why everybody loves it. It also has a built-in command to dance, which is a total bonus. Try ordering a specific friend to “stick to the B.E.A.T.” Results may vary depending on your friend.
4. El Scorcho - Weezer. I don’t know if this ever got radio play when it was released, but for some reason, everyone I know knows all the words to this song. Maybe that’s why we’re friends? You should learn them too. It’s great as an ice breaker when you meet half-japanese girls. Also, you don’t need to be able to sing in order to sing it.
5. Livin’ on a Prayer - Bon Jovi. I think we’re past the “ha ha, hair metal is so funny” stage and we’ve started to legitimately like it again. This song, like many great party songs, tells a story.

Feel free to add your own party song picks in the comments.

Header image created from this photo, which is licensed under the Creative Commons.