Hottlanta Videos: Mastodon, Deerhunter, We Fun

Mastodon has been marching along triumphantly supporting their new incredible album, Crack The Skye. They recently did David Letterman and he gave them this introduction: “ I won’t lie to you, I’m frightened.” Here is the video:

They have been doing a ridiculous amount of interviews and such, so here is a three part interview with drummer Brann Dailor:

Part 1:

Part 2 here
Part 3 here

Also, Brann Dailor is guest starring on the new album from Atlanta’s avant-garde musician Killick. Here is a short video teaser for the album, titled Exsanguinette:

Mastodon myspace

Killick Myspace

In case you haven’t heard it yet, Deerhunter‘s upcoming EP Rainwater Cassette Exchange is yet another top-notch installment from Atlanta’s ever-amazing nu-gazers. They just did The Breeders‘ curated ATP festival and happened to team up with the Deal sisters for a little superjam. Here is a video of the performance:

Here is a nice fan made video for Deerhunter‘s “Famous Last Words” from the forthcoming EP:

Deerhunter myspace

Finally, I had totally missed the fact that Pitchfork.tv is showing the Atlanta music scene documentary We Fun until Friday of this week, so if you haven’t seen it yet, you can right now (as long as it isn’t already Friday):

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Film Review: We Fun

Last week I attended a screening of the Atlanta music scene documentary, We Fun, as part of the Atlanta Film Festival. Every good documentary I have ever seen either meticulously informs or tells a compelling story, and unfortunately We Fun does neither. The movie is a barrage of total randomness that ambles along playing show and tell for various ATL institutions. You see a badly shot band playing a song, you hear them say a couple of random things, then you see something else. For someone from Atlanta familiar with this scene, the kaleidoscope of sights and sounds will be nostalgic and enjoyable, but anyone being introduced to the Atlanta music scene for the first time will find very little in this movie to care about.

There had been some premature criticism of the documentary that it didn’t cover enough bands to represent the whole city, and if anything, I wish they had put less bands in this movie so they could have explored the central characters more in depth instead of wasting our time being democratic about giving enough bands screen time. For instance, the part with the Coathangers starts with a clip of them playing a song, then you see a short clip of one of the girls massaging one of the other girls, which is only entertaining for someone searching for bad softcore porn. Then you see a clip of one of the girls getting hit on and then complaining about it. Then we never see them in the movie again. Nothing about it feels connected to any other part of the film. Outside of the Black Lips, every band’s relevance is completely left to mystery outside of the fact they deserved a couple of minutes to be showcased. The Mastodon “cameo” is a complete tease. It reminded me of the movie Executive Decision where Steven Seagal got top billing and was killed off in the first 15 minutes. Putting the band’s name on the poster and then only showing 60 seconds of an interview is very disappointing, especially since their brief conversation outshines almost any other artist’s banter in the film.

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Atlanta Scene Wars: Is We Fun Or Not???

Atlanta’s music scene is a very splintered, cliquish, fragmented scene. We have a major metropolitan area with a vibrant, diverse collection of artists, so this comes as no surprise to me. I mean, go ask a Brooklyn band if they have heard of *insert other random Brooklyn band* and most likely they will say no. As much as some people want Atlanta to have some monolithic sound imagining we can do some Seattle-style blowup, we don’t, and that sort of thing isn’t going to happen in the current Internet era of music.

In that context, making a documentary on the Atlanta music scene is going to be pretty much impossible to be all-inclusive. I have been documenting the Atlanta scene in writing every day for over two years now and I am still constantly surprised by obscure scene pockets and bands I discover all the time. But the new upcoming film documentary by Chris Dortch, Matthew Robison, and Bill Cody called We Fun has been the center of some controversy because it has focused on the more popular Atlanta bands like the Black Lips and Deerhunter. The other million or so bands in Atlanta and their fans have complained that the documentary has left out too many bands, especially the less accessible, less hyped ones.

One reaction to this was the making of a compilation of Atlanta artists called We No Fun, highlighting some of Atlanta’s bands that didn’t get featured in the film. This Friday and Saturday night, many of the bands that are part of the We No Fun project will be playing at the Drunken Unicorn for the release party of the compilation. Now, the people involved with the We Fun project are complaining about the We No Fun project. From the We No Fun myspace:

So tonight we were interviewed by Chad “The Rad” Radford, and kinda impromptu interviewed by the lovely Henry Owings from Chunklet. Reactions were varied from both parties, what I found the funniest was that during most of our chat Henry only wanted to talk about the name. “Why is the comp named that?” or “Is the name a reaction to the We Fun documentary?” Not a lot was even discussed about the bands, the shows, the comp itself. It seemed as though Henry was asking questions he already knew the answer to and had responses ready to go, I suppose as a journalist he should. People are gonna be biased by what they’ve created or helped to create. Chad is in the We Fun documentary and Henry had a part in making it happen financially (which I didn’t know till we we’re talking this afternoon), so of course they’re going to feel a little slighted by the name or focus on that side of things. Both Henry and Chad loved the idea of the comp but at one point Henry said, “Why don’t you change the name? It seems like you guys are all sour grapes. Aren’t you bigger than that?” The name again. The name is just that, a name. It was a funny idea to make people take another look at the way the scene have been becoming more two like 2 different scenes in the past years. People not caring about what the fuck is going on with their scene or only going to there friends shows or “dising” each other or shit talking each other. I had to ask “What if it was called Atlanta Sucks? These Bands Will Never Leave Atlanta? Would you be as interested in the comp or would it just fall by the way side” Only giggles pasted between all of us. The point of punk rock is that it is a reaction, a reaction to the way you grew up, the ways girls or boys have treated you, the scene you exist in, your social class. The reason this comp was created is to say we exist, and it’s time we all worked together again. No scene is perfect. Jesus no fucking band can ever function perfectly within itself for long periods of time. Chris and I created the idea of this comp to help the bands involved and document the scene. period. The name is a prefect example of this bullshit separationist crap. For the record (haha) the name stays and goddamnitt stop all this whining. We love Atlanta and go see the We Fun Documentary people.

So here’s the deal guys. We have a ton of talented acts in this city, and we have great bands representing just about every single genre you can imagine. The We Fun documentary may be a bit too exclusive and only focusing on the popular kids, but you can only fit so many bands into a film. As much as i have tired of the Black Lips constant attention seeking activities, if I were a filmmaker, they would be the first band I would want to tell a story about in this city. They are like the show Jackass for hipsters.

But on the flipside, the bands in the We No Fun project are just as important as the cool kids in We Fun. And the people involved with the WF documentary should stop crying about the dissent against them. It is only free publicity, so if anything you should welcome the controversy. There are a ton more bands in this city that deserve attention that aren’t involved with either one, and those should be the only people complaining right now.

So on that note, I’m announcing right now that Ohmpark is going to put together our own project called We Funner Than Both Of You, highlighting the many super talented artists that were left out of both projects. More details on how that will work coming soon, so get ready. And I hope you guys cry about it a bunch and give me some publicity. Thanks!

Anyways, the We Fun myspace recently gave us an update on how that project is going:

H’llo, WeFunsters!
It’s been a few months, but things are happening.
First, We Fun is We Finished! Yes, we’ve achieved a lean, mean 72 minute look at the city of Atlanta as we saw it from November 2007 to June of 2008.
Note the new poster (designed by multi-tasker Henry Owings). We’re looking to get these printed very soon so that you can enjoy one or two in your teenage room. Can anyone guess who that is wielding the guitar?
And soon we hope to report festival screenings. As of now, no news is good news on that front.

I can’t wait to see it. Also, make sure to get down to the Drunken Unicorn and check out the We No Fun party:

Friday, January 30th
WE NO FUN FEST PART 1:
Thy Mighty Contract
Chopper
Hollow Stars
High Marks
$5 for 21+, $8 for <21, 18+

Saturday, January 31st
WE NO FUN FEST PART 2:
Hawks
The Sunglasses
Brass Castle
Skin Problems
Chrissakes
$5 for 21+, $8 for <21, 18+

We No Fun Compilation And Festival


Brass Castle @ Lenny’s (2/22/08)

By now most of you local readers have probably heard about the upcoming Atlanta music scene documentary We Fun featuring superstars like Black Lips and Deerhunter. If not, check this out. Well, Atlanta’s music scene is too glorious and enormous to be thoroughly documented by a single movie, and many of our more under-hyped warriors have come together to highlight their pocket of the ATL. The We No Fun compilation is coming soon and here is the tracklist:

Vera Fang: “Let’s Go To Spain”
Brass Castle: “Sinister Thunderbird”
Retconned: “A Nine Ten”
The Sunglasses: “I Can Only Eat Pudding”
Judi Chicago: “Three Oh Three Bee Cee”
Hollow Stars: “Divine Extraterrestrial Origin”
Lay Down Mains: “553″
SIDS: “122 Hours Of Fear”
Skin Problems: “Hairy Hotdog”
Hawks: “Blackwater Architect”
Thy Mighty Contract: “Psychic Vampire”
Chrissakes: “Hyper White”
High Marks: “When I Drank The Wine”
Chopper: “Whole Hog”
Electrosleep Int’l: “Chip In The Head”

There will only be 500 vinyl copies avaialble of the record mastered by Carl Saff, and you can pick one up at the We No Fun release festival going down at the Drunken Unicorn next month. Here is the line-up for that:

Thursday, January 29th:

Judi Chicago
Thy Mighty Contract
Chopper
Retconned

Friday, January 30th:

Vera Fang
Lay Dow Mains
Hollow Stars
High Marks

Saturday, January 31st:

Hawks
The Sunglasses
Brass Castle
Skin Problems
Chrissakes

So check it out:

We No Fun myspace

Drunken Unicorn website

Friday Free-Style

Bonnaroo’s “Big Announcement” this week was that Widespread Panic is replacing The Allman Brothers and doing their 43rd headlining spot at the ‘roo. They also added Les Claypool, Charli 2na, Super Drag, What Made Milwaukee Famous, Adele, Grand Ole Party, and The Postelles. Other than WSP, those are some decent additions, but I’m way more excited about the acts they added to the Cafe/nightclub, including Dead Confederate, Colour Revolt, De Novo Dahl, Phonograph, Bear In Heaven, Howlin Rain, and Royal Bangs, all of which are acts that I am interested in checking out. I’ll be doing a piece on all the lesser know ‘roo acts very soon.

Pecanne Log had the extened trailer to We Fun up, so check it:

Pitchfork Fest added Spoon, The Dodos, and Les Savy Fav. That is turning out to rather sweet line-up.

You can download a reversed version of the new Gnarls Barkley album for free here.

The RIAA spent $2.8 million dollars lobbying the government in 2007. Honestly, I would have expected that to be much higher.

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What Up In The ATL?

This is an incredible week for live shows in the A. Get it started with the trailer to the upcoming documentary on the Atlanta music scene We Fun (this looks awesome!):

Official WE FUN Trailer

The Gaye Blades (featuring Jared Swiley from the Black Lips) will be at The Drunken Unicorn tonight with Coffin Bound and Mammals.

Wednesday night RJD2 is at the Variety Playhouse. I caught him last year at about this time and I didn’t really dig it. So if you’re smart, you’ll go local and check out The Good Moods, The Hotels and Goodnight Mush. at The Drunken Unicorn:

The Good Moods : Jericho

The Good Moods : Old Jersey Trees

Thursday night the Free ISP/Pine Magazine showcase at The Star Bar is the place to be:

Lovesick Scientist is Justin Sias (Elevado) produced by Brian Slusher (Slushco). Go Listen!

A Fight To The Death : Old Black Chains

Cassavettes : My Heart Your Beat

Friday night I’m going to the 11:11 Teahouse to catch 13 Day Mission, Beatrix Kiddo, and Miles From Pangea. I’m working on a piece about these great bands that will be out in the next couple days and I highly recommend checking this one out:

Saturday night is an ATL superstar supernight:

Enon, Howlin Rain, All Night Drug Prowling Wolves, Nomen Novem (featuring members of Moorish Idols) are at The Drunken Unicorn.

The Mourdella (Jessica Juggz‘s band) CD Release show with Chopper (featuring Colin Mee of Deerhunter), The Coathangers and West End Motel (featuring Brett Hinds of Mastodon and Tom Cheshire of All Night Drug Prowling Wolves) is at The Earl. Looks like Tom Cheshire is gonna have a busy night.

Mourdella : Brink Of Catastrophie

Mourdella : ‘Til You Bleed

You can cap off your week with Dunch (the Sunday brunch/dinner) at The Earl featuring The Jupiter Watts doing a low-key set.

Jupiter Watts : Felix (1/4/2008 version)

Damn, the ATL is just too fun!