As alluded to in my lists of the best songs and best albums of 2009, I'll be changing the format of Chipped Hip in the new year. I'll be giving the site a trial run as an MP3 blog, posting links and downloads to songs and writing accompanying track reviews. I'll try it out for at least a month and if I like it, I'll keep doing it; if I don't, I'll switch back and resume business as usual.
The reason for the change is mostly because of the amount of writing I've been doing for other publications. I've been writing for the Georgia Straight, Exclaim! and BeatRoute (where I'm also a contributing editor), plus publishing the odd thing in The Tyee and Discorder; needless to say, my schedule has been pretty hectic. And it tends to get a little redundant, publishing on the same things over and over again. If I've covered an album or concert for another paper, it's not much fun to write a second review.
Changing this to a MP3 blog will give me the opportunity to relate back to my other writing without repeating myself. Also, the narrower scope should mean I'll be able to update more frequently, so I can hopefully get back to the daily(ish) updates.
Let the great experiment begin!

 

Please excuse this self-indulgent entry, but I thought I'd give a quick roundup of some recently published works.
I haven't posted many show reviews in the past month because most of the concerts I've covered lately have been published elsewhere. For Exclaim!, I reviewed Metric, Dinosaur Jr., Billy Bragg and Julian Casablancas. For the November issue of BeatRoute, I covered Starfucker and Chad VanGaalen.
Also for BeatRoute, I interviewed Arkells, Hannah Georgas and Prairie Cat. They also republished my You Say Party! We Say Die! cover story.
Speaking of Prairie Cat, I reviewed his new album for the Georgia Straight. I also wrote about the new Language-Arts album.
Lastly, I wrote a show-preview-profile-type-thing on Billy Bragg for The Tyee.
It's less than a month until Christmas, which means it's time to start listening to holiday tunes. Camera Obscura has released a new single to usher in the season, a cover of Jim Reeves's "The Blizzard," first released in 1964. It's the usual melancholy, countrified beauty from the Scottish pop icons. It's backed with "Swans," from this year's My Maudlin Career.

 

I've taken a gig as tour manager for a local band, meaning that I'll be on tour for the next month. I plan on writing as much as possible while I'm on the road, but my updates are bound to be less consistent than usual. i'll be back home on July 12, at which point I'll resume my usual blogging routine.
In the meantime, enjoy this new video for "Over It" by Dinosaur Jr., the latest single from the group's awesome new album Farm. The clip features the band members skateboarding and biking around town, setting an appropriately lazy summer vibe for the fuzzed-out tune and J Mascis's apathetic vocals. There are also plenty of gratifying wipeouts, which makes it well worth the watch.

Farm is out now viaJagjaguwar
 

Today I'm preparing for an interview with the Pains of Being Pure at Heart, which I'm writing for next month's BeatRoute. In the meantime, here's a brief roundup of some recently published works:
I interviewed Apollo Ghosts for BeatRoute. I had a chance to ask them about their (awesome) debut LP, Hastings Sunrise, as well as their lounge rock roots and self-described "musical ADD." Read the article here.
For this month's Discorder, I reviewed the Reds' Early Nothing (here) and Clues' self-titled album (here). Clues sound a lot like the Unicorns, which makes sense since the group is fronted by Alden Penner. I also blogged about Clues last month.
And here's something new for the day: the Streets released a new music video called "He's Right Behind You, He's Got Swine Flu." Pandemic humour is always hilarious, especially when it involves zombies and excessive slapstick gore. It's not exactly Beethoven, but you've got to admire the quick turnaround on this one.

 

When I first listened to DRMHLLR's Demo, I was preoccupied with one question: where's the vocalist? The Vancouver four-piece doesn't have a singer, and this is disorienting since it doesn't conform to my preconceptions of instrumental music; the group doesn't play electronica or experimental post rock, nor does it indulge in loose, improvised jamming or noodling solos. Rather, it sounds similar to a lot of contemporary indie rock bands—Plants and Animals, Broken Social Scene—minus the vocalist.
In lieu of vocal melodies, the DRMHLLR's two guitarists keep their playing melody-driven, opting for lyrical, minimalist leads instead of powerchord bombast. "Baby Tooth Tiger" begins as a sparse guitar riff, before the rhythm section propels it to a seemingly endless, cinematic crescendo (movie producers, take note: you've found your theme song). As well as delivering triumphant rock outs, DRMHLLR also has a knack for hypnotic, repetitive grooves. "c41" is a six-minute, two-chord dirge, beginning with a haunting bass keyboard riff before giving over to chiming surf guitar licks. On "Ice Age," the rhythm section sits out for over two minutes while the guitarists harmonize over gently purring feedback.
Despite delivering the occasional glorious crescendo, Demo is a sombre listen, more suited to a mellow evening at home than a wild Saturday night. It's never challenging but always interesting, delivering soothing atmosphere without demanding your full attention.
Demo is only five songs long, and is billed as a demo (duh) EP. But at 35 minutes, it's actually longer than some full-length releases. It's self-released, and is currently only available for purchase at shows.
 

I’m flying high over Tupelo, Mississippi with Britain’s hottest band, and we’re all about to die. Okay, that's not entirely true. In fact, I stole that line from Almost Famous. ("Mmm. Dark. Lively.") But I did interview Jack Savidge, of the English electro-rock trio Friendly Fires, for BeatRoute. You can read that here.
I also covered Chad VanGaalen's February 27 concert for this month's Discorder. Read that here. In the same issue, I reviewed the new albums by Mt. St. Helens Band (here) and the Perms (here).
In an hour, I'm leaving for the airport to spend a week in New York. I probably won't have time to blog while I'm there, but be sure to check out Crystal Antlers' debut full-length, Tentacles, which came out today.
 

Whenever I tell people that I'm a member of the Too Pure Singles Club, they assume it's some sort of a Christian dating service. What it actually means is that every month, I get a new 7" from an artist on the British indie label. I wasn't too familiar with most of the label's roster prior to joining the club, but it's already delivered some gems.
Last month the label sent a double A-side by Peggy Sue, an alt.folk group from Brighton-by-way-of-London. The group's music is significantly less cutesy and wholesome than the name suggests, with haunting two-part harmonies from frontwomen Rosa Rex and Katy Klaw. "Lazarus" begins as a simple acoustic ballad, but a massive, shuddering drumbeat soon propels it to a pounding climax with strained, half-shouted vocals. "Alice in the Kitchen" is similarly percussion-heavy, with a marching beat that almost overpowers the song's strummed guitar and mandolin.
This month, it's "What a Drag" by the Brooklyn quartet Bear Hands. These days, the mixing of hip-hop and rock is strictly taboo, but the single absolves the genre of the crimes perpetrated by 90s nu-metal. The song contains no actual rapping, but the fat ("phat"?) hip-hop beat in the chorus is a defiant middle finger to anyone who said rap-rock was best left in the 90s. But rhythm aside, the song is actually fairly typical of millennial indie rock, with reverb-soaked guitar leads and subtle, textured keyboards.