Sounds Below Sea Level update
Ok, exams are done, jury duty is over, visitors are gone, we don't have to move, etc. so it's back to wasting my life on the internet. Here's a quick post about some stuff related to the Sounds Below Sea Level project.
The comp apparently made it to #3 at WNYU (radio station for NYU in Manhattan). This is from an email from the station's music director:
"Just wanted to say thanks for sending the compilation. It actually reached number three on our chart this week! Its definitely a great cause, and we're very happy to be playing it! Cheers."
Here's their chart for Dec. 19th.
Here are a couple of plays (Zydepunks, Normals) from Pat Duncan's Dec. 15th show on WFMU (NYC) and one (Morning 40) from Station Manager Ken's Jan. 4 show. Also, here are some (The Other Planets, Egg Yolk Jubilee, Morning 40) from Liz Berg's Dec. 13th show and her Jan. 17th show.
Here's a review from Jan. 3 in Gambit. It's a little confusing, coming off at first as though they are dissing it, then calling it excellent at the end. Anyway, here is the part about the comp:
"New Orleans Underground: Sounds Below Sea Level (independent) is no more uniform or stellar than New Orleans Will Rise Again, but like the latter album, this CD benefiting Habitat for Humanity and the New Orleans Musicians Clinic shows how different musical trends manifested themselves in New Orleans. While little of the music is distinctive enough to warrant a national audience, everyone represented here certainly deserves an audience of some kind. It's tempting to say that underground rock 'n' roll here has gotten better because the songs by Morning 40 Federation, Zydepunks and Rotary Downs are among the best on this comp, but it may simply be a function of improvements in recording technology. Tracks from 1980 by the Cold, the Normals and Wayward Youth are dated by their productions and jittery, New Wave styles, but as a compilation designed to show outsiders another side of the musical culture that Hurricane Katrina put at risk, it's excellent."
I don't put a lot of weight into their negative take on the older tracks, because those have been among the stuff that has gotten positive remarks from other sources here in NYC (like WNYU and WFMU). I was also surprised to get a message from a Yahoo group called GarageNYC about the comp from someone who had heard about it on a messageboard and was excited.
There is a review planned by Offbeat, and also one planned by The Ind. Also, Leo at Antigravity generously donated ad space for the comp in the January issue. It should be available in New Orleans and Baton Rouge already, but it's not online yet. And I would like to thank The Zydepunks, WWOZ, The Normals (Electric Earl), The Cold (and Three Chord City), Samba Rio (MIB), The Jazz Foundation, Orbis Quintus, and a mysterious porn site for linking to the nolacomp tripod page.
Bernard (One Man Machine) has a showcase set up at One Eyed Jacks. Here's the lineup:
Friday March 3: The Zydepunks, The Other Planets, Egg Yolk Jubilee
Saturday March 4: One Man Machine, A Particularly Vicious Rumor, Rotary Downs
These are going to be two great shows.
The comp apparently made it to #3 at WNYU (radio station for NYU in Manhattan). This is from an email from the station's music director:
"Just wanted to say thanks for sending the compilation. It actually reached number three on our chart this week! Its definitely a great cause, and we're very happy to be playing it! Cheers."
Here's their chart for Dec. 19th.
Here are a couple of plays (Zydepunks, Normals) from Pat Duncan's Dec. 15th show on WFMU (NYC) and one (Morning 40) from Station Manager Ken's Jan. 4 show. Also, here are some (The Other Planets, Egg Yolk Jubilee, Morning 40) from Liz Berg's Dec. 13th show and her Jan. 17th show.
Here's a review from Jan. 3 in Gambit. It's a little confusing, coming off at first as though they are dissing it, then calling it excellent at the end. Anyway, here is the part about the comp:
"New Orleans Underground: Sounds Below Sea Level (independent) is no more uniform or stellar than New Orleans Will Rise Again, but like the latter album, this CD benefiting Habitat for Humanity and the New Orleans Musicians Clinic shows how different musical trends manifested themselves in New Orleans. While little of the music is distinctive enough to warrant a national audience, everyone represented here certainly deserves an audience of some kind. It's tempting to say that underground rock 'n' roll here has gotten better because the songs by Morning 40 Federation, Zydepunks and Rotary Downs are among the best on this comp, but it may simply be a function of improvements in recording technology. Tracks from 1980 by the Cold, the Normals and Wayward Youth are dated by their productions and jittery, New Wave styles, but as a compilation designed to show outsiders another side of the musical culture that Hurricane Katrina put at risk, it's excellent."
I don't put a lot of weight into their negative take on the older tracks, because those have been among the stuff that has gotten positive remarks from other sources here in NYC (like WNYU and WFMU). I was also surprised to get a message from a Yahoo group called GarageNYC about the comp from someone who had heard about it on a messageboard and was excited.
There is a review planned by Offbeat, and also one planned by The Ind. Also, Leo at Antigravity generously donated ad space for the comp in the January issue. It should be available in New Orleans and Baton Rouge already, but it's not online yet. And I would like to thank The Zydepunks, WWOZ, The Normals (Electric Earl), The Cold (and Three Chord City), Samba Rio (MIB), The Jazz Foundation, Orbis Quintus, and a mysterious porn site for linking to the nolacomp tripod page.
Bernard (One Man Machine) has a showcase set up at One Eyed Jacks. Here's the lineup:
Friday March 3: The Zydepunks, The Other Planets, Egg Yolk Jubilee
Saturday March 4: One Man Machine, A Particularly Vicious Rumor, Rotary Downs
These are going to be two great shows.
posted by Great Boudenny at 8:46 AM
2 Comments:
I wrote this but it never got put on our site (at least i don't think it did) it printed in the paper the first week of Jan.
When the benefit CD Our New Orleans came in, it was wrapped in a cardboard sleeve and had a thick booklet with essays about Crescent City music plus incredible photos of jazz funerals. When New Orleans Underground: Sounds Below Sea Level arrived it was held in a jewel case containing one paragraph on a simple one-page-folded-into-four liner. Whereas a slick website with a video documentary heralded Our New Orleans, a handwritten note from Dennis Hogue, Lafayette expatriate now living in New York, announced New Orleans Underground. The 17-song, completely DIY compilation sticks close to this no frills, fanciless spirit, but benefits the same folks Our New Orleans does — Hurricane Katrina victims — but does so through another audience — the fans of underground rock. Collecting songs from seminal scene-makers and upstarts alike, it goes all the way back to 1980 with cuts from The Cold (Three Cord City, a garage blast from the past), Wayward Youth (El Mundo, fun brat punk pop) and The Normals (My Hardcore, old school hardcore) and fresher choices from Die Rotzz, Hazard County Girls, Lump, Morning 40 Federation, Rotary Downs and Zydepunks. Chosen for their place in the past 25 years of NOLA rock history as well as being bands all directly impacted by Katrina, the contributors are a list of influential bands and ones that have made fans out of and trips to Lafayette. While the music is not what made New Orleans famous, it has helped keep the city’s young there and drew in the young disenfranchised youth of other cities and towns. Fans of many genres will enjoy this collection as it pulls together old school hardcore, experimental jazz (The Other Planets’ Will You adhere), drunk jazz hop (Morning 40 Federation’s Gotta Nickel), smart guy indie (The Tea Sea’s The House of Windsor and Holiday Home by Rotary Down) and whatever label you could put on Bernard Pierce (One Man Machine’s Chinatown). To buy or for more info, visit Nolacomp.tripod.com.
Thanks for writing that, Nick.
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