Mind-blowing Rube Goldberg machine video from Ok Go.

Update aaaand then there's also this equally-mind-blowing version:

OK Go - This Too Shall Pass from OK Go on Vimeo.

Ok Go - This Too Shall Pass

I think this is a pretty good review of Marina & the Diamonds' debut album: it notes the Dresden Dolls influence (particularly evident in this song) and makes the following observation:

But it's her taste for the bleeding obvious which, ultimately, holds her back from greatness. … It's this kind of route-one thinking which reins in The Family Jewels … the song about being an outsider is called "The Outsider". The song about being rootless is called "Rootless." The song about feeling numb is called... OK, you're ahead of me.

Indeed! (And that's another similarity with Amanda Palmer.) But there's something wonderfully, obscenely uncensored about this obviousness. Like the video for her single Hollywood. Because yep! There can be no doubt from the look on her face that she, Marina Diamandis, is indeed obsessed with the mess that is America.

I hope she's looking forward to her upcoming dates in NYC. We are very much looking forward to seeing her.

Marina & the Diamonds - Are You Satisfied?

I had just started to get into Jay Reatard's music when I heard he'd passed away. He was the best thing I discovered in my recent project to listen to all the albums on Pitchfork's Best 200 Albums of the 2000s.

Jay Reatard - My Shadow

Yeah so I'm pretty excited for the May Day Joy Formidable show at the Mercury lounge. Tickets are still available as of now (so get some).

Also if you don't have the album yet, you can buy it here.

The Joy Formidable - The Last Drop

I've been listening to The Joy Formidable since mid-December, and even went to this excellent show at Union Hall in mid-Jan, but then I got so distracted with my trip to Colombia that I didn't post anything about them.

Until now that is! They're really great and you need to listen to them all the time starting right now! You can buy their record here.

Also they're playing in NYC again on Saturday 5/1. They sound really great live. Get tickets and meet me there!

The Joy Formidable - Whirring

Lovely new music video from Ok Go, album to be released 1/12!

UPDATE 1/19:
This album is really great! It sounds very mature, not quite as charts-focused as earlier ones. Nice progression. Buy it now on iTunes or Amazon. Here's a review.

Ok Go - WTF?

In case you were thinking that Jay-Z's awful new single Empire State of Mind is ripping off Asamov's Supa Dynamite you'd be correct. But em *technically* not, because they both sampled and sped up The Moments' Love on a Two-Way Street. To Jay-Z's credit, his producers obviously did go back to the source material, because they're using more of it than Asamov did.

Asamov's song is 1,000 times better, but they didn't sell any records probably because they're from Jacksonville, and then they got sued by the estate of Isaac Asamov, and now they're gone.

Magic moment #1: Mr. Lif's rap (you're six strokes on par four)
Magic moment #2: Giving a shoutout to everything in the world
Magic moment #3: No Alicia Keys

Via Boombox.

Asamov - Supa Dynamite (Feat. Mr Lif)

Had coffee this morning with former members of the Youth International Party, who were reminiscing on this spring-like day in New York about how, in April of 1968, they ceremonially removed the hands of the clock in Grand Central Station.

They poured into the vast main concourse of Manhattan's Grand Central Station 3,000 strong, wearing their customary capes, gowns, feathers and beads. They tossed hot cross buns and firecrackers, and floated balloons up toward the celestial blue ceiling. They hummed the cosmic "Ommm," snake-danced to the tune of Have a Marijuana, and proudly unfurled a huge banner emblazoned with a lazy "Y."

The Yippies—1968's version of the hippies—were celebrating spring. Hardly had the equinoctial orgy begun, when it turned as bleak as a midwinter blizzard. A dozen youths scaled the information booth, ripped off the clock hands, scribbled graffiti and defiantly passed around lighted marijuana "joints" in full view of the Tactical Patrol Force. The fuzz charged, billy clubs flailing, and arrested 61 demonstrators. Battered but unbowed, the celebrants coursed off to the Central Park Sheep Meadow to "yip up the sun."

Time Magazine

David Peel & the Lower East Side - I Like Marijuana

I was listening to Boy Wonder's excellent set last night on KSHU in northern California and was blown away by this song from local Arcata band The Cutters.

They sound like The Hollis Wake or Dressy Bessy. Lots more mp3s at their site above. No good pictures though! That's their tour van pictured. Note the reversed Cutters bumpersticker—it's the little things.

The Cutters Swing Set

The song below is the B Side on her Obsessions single which appears only to be available on 7" vinyl in the US. I think it is for sale on CD in the UK though, so I recommend you fly there and get it.

Anyway, I love this song—reminds me of Lene Lovich kinda—but I was reading her blog and was v disappointed to learn that she must be colorblind or something because how could she be so wrong about the colors of the numbers? I must set the record straight and prevent this misinformation from spreading.

Three- Green (SO fucking green) ORANGEY BROWN
Four- Purple [CORRECT]
Five- Red [CORRECT]
Six- Blue SILVER
Seven- Gold/ Yellow WHAT?! BLUE
Eight- Deep Purple BROWN
Nine- Brown GOLD
Ten- Black YELLOW
Eleven- Silver NO COLOR

Also, she didn't cover these, but

One- BLACK
Two- WHITE

Marina & the Diamonds - Mowgli's Road

(via Georgia)