Giant Robot Store and GR2 News
In Toisan they're pronounced kind of like “dung,”
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My parents are in the process of moving, and my mom has been sorting through old photo albums. Check out these photos of me and my brother with Professor Fun. Those of you who grew up in Honolulu are probably familiar with him. He hosted a local kids' TV show and was also my Uncle Yen's roommate! My first photo with a celebrity?
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I got a package from my friend Enju at Inoxia Records in Japan today: the new Boris–finally! This deluxe import package includes a selection of 13 hard-rocking “greatest hits” and bonus songs, including many cuts re-recorded with the full-time/part-time guitarist Michio Kurihara. The live part is a DVD that features the speaks-softly-but-carries-a-big-axe Kuri as well. If you're a fan, you already know you want it, so buy it from Inoxia or Aquarius or get it from the band when they come through the U.S. this summer. If not, I don't know what to say… Above: Boris with Kurihara (foreground) in S.F. during the 2007 tour when I sold T-shirts for them and Damon & Naomi. Appropriately, this came right after I finished watching The Limits of Control, the Jim Jarmusch movie with cinematography by Christopher Doyle and sountrack by Boris. Talk about an unlikely yet perfect dream team.
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This morning I visited Stella Lai's studio in Downtown L.A. The GR58 cover artist was kind enough to help out with the Giant Robot Needs You effort, and I asked Stella to sign some prints and magazines that we're sending to supporters during her small window between last week's return from Shanghai and tomorrow's trip to San Francisco.
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Melanie Valera is not a fragile indie-tronica artist but a one-woman wrecking crew who wants to infiltrate your eardrums and crush your heart. On No Snare, her third LP as Tender Forever, she keeps her lyrics and vocal delivery as straightforward as ever (they really could have come from a letter) but pushes her knob-turning skills as far as they can go. “Like The Snare That’s Gone” is a perfect example of the album’s totally raw but fully realized production, with its multiple layers of percussion and grown-up orchestral touches that would fit perfectly on an epic mainstream rap song. The results are honest and powerful, and it’s not hard to see this release as a hip-hop and indie-informed update of the soul-inspired New Wave of Yazoo. ^ The above paraphrases my review that's in GR65 (on stands now), but a gushy review can only communicate so much. Via the magic of the Internets–and Calvin at K Records and Nathan at Riot Act–now I get to share the song on this site. In fact, this is considered an *official* preview. Nice, especially since I've been a big fan of the Shield around the K since Beat Happening opened for Fugazi at the Country Club. Download “Like the Snare That's Gone” here, and then purchase No Snare (out today) in the format and manner of your choice (perhaps the K shop?).
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