Jeg elsker Patrick Wolf

Anyway… Names in Scandinavia, I’ve decided, are just different than they are here. Not that that’s a bad thing; in fact, one of the hardest things I’ve done in the past year was resign myself to the fact that, if I remain in the US, if/when I have children, I will be unable to name any of them Sune (possibly my favorite name ever). That would be cruel. It’s interesting because in the US, you can call your child anything you want to, while in Denmark, I know, there’s a sort of name register-type list of things you are and aren’t allowed to call your child.

But anyway, all of this is relevant because yesterday I got out and, for the first time, listened to this new (to me) CD by Thunderbear. Before I put it in my computer and saw the track lengths, I thought it was an EP; there are only five songs. However, it’s an album -- nearly 60 minutes long. Anyway, as I was perusing the liner, I noticed that some of the names were familiar. About half the members of Thunderbear are also members of Under Byen; in fact, Thunderbear is actually the side project of Under Byen pianist and composer Thorbjørn Krogshede.

So, then, I was thinking about Thorbjørn’s awesome name, and how I’d been meaning for months to look it up and see what it means, since there were no English cognates -- for either part -- that I could think of. Just as I was going to do that, I happened to look at the name of the band again. It suddenly clicked, and I thought -- wait… doesn’t bjørn mean bear? (It does.) And it quickly followed that I remembered Thor, the Norse god of thunder. (Yes, thunder. Don’t laugh. I’d rather be the god of thunder than the goddess of the hearth, like Hestia was. Admittedly, Hestia was Greek; perhaps the Greeks were a little less entertaining. Even so…) True, the modern Danish (I don’t know about Norwegian or Swedish) is torden, but essentially, the name Thor is going to be associated with thunder.

Which means, basically, this guy’s name means Thunderbear. (Okay, technically, I think it’s supposed to mean Thor’s bear, but Thunderbear is more interesting so I’m going to pretend that.) And not ‘means’ like Sara means princess – those are what the words really mean. If I wanted to convey the word princess to a Danish speaker, saying ‘Sara’ would get me nowhere. But if I wanted (for whatever reason) to convey Thunderbear, I could say Thorbjørn and they would get it. (I think.) This is one of the coolest things I’ve ever heard of. Although Thorbjørn Krogshede is the only person I know of with quite that name, I’ve heard of a few Thors and a whole bunch of Bjørns, so I assume it’s something acceptable. Which is just so neat.

People in the US (unless, perhaps, they’re very famous) do not name their kids things like Thunderbear. (Or even Bear -- which, again, is what Bjørn would be.) It just doesn’t happen. In fact, the possibility makes the idea of calling a child Sune seem quite reasonable. Which is too bad, because not only are both Thorbjørn and Thunderbear awesome names…

Oh -- and the band sounds good, too. The songs are all instrumental, and all unique. I suppose you could, if really pressed, compare them to groups like Sigur Rós, and you can of course hear bits of Under Byen here and there. The first connection I made, though, was to Patrick Wolf. Oddly enough. The second song, Pas på du ikke falder i!, sounds a lot like Patrick Wolf’s softer music, minus, of course, words. And the not-quite-tangible glitter and sparkles and sticker books (because I like to associate Patrick Wolf with Technicolor unicorns) feel Patrick Wolf brings. Maybe I’m just associating songs with really good piano-ish parts -- but either way, the piano on the Thunderbear album is really good -- and so are all the other instruments.

It’s not at all what I expected, going by the name and the album cover, but I wasn’t disappointed at all. In fact, I was kind of pleased -- Thunderbear almost made my headache go away, and what I was expecting probably would have made it worse. I love this album.

You can stream Thunderbear (the album) in full on last.fm, as well as download the last track, Røv. But be warned -- don’t try to look for them anywhere else. There’s no website, although you might find a bit of information from time to time at Morningside. But what I really mean is um myspace -- the Thunderbear you’ll find on there is a different band, and they’re bad. Really bad. Don’t let that fool you.

--DL--
Røv (Thunderbear)

Undskyld, fordi i dag jeg har kun en radio ting

Well, good news -- last night, I finally figured out why my Internet had been down (again) for nearly a week. This time, though, it was a user-created problem, rather than a building-wide outage. I feel like an idiot -- not that this is anything new; doing incredibly stupid things seems to be about my number one activity lately. (Well, not really, but… you know.) Anyway, apparently I’ve been so exhausted for the past five days or so that I failed to notice that my cable was plugged into the telephone jack rather than the Internet one. Yeah. I’m real proud of myself.

The Friday show went well again, although, once again, I was a bit more tired and apathetic than energetic and enthusiastic. Unfortunately I’d worked a nine-hour shift the night before, and I still haven’t had an adequate night of sleep since then. But enough complaining.

Spillelisten er her:

1. I See Those Who Died – Jomi Massage
2. The Neighbors Called the Police – Citizens Here and Abroad
3. From Off to On – the Knife
4. Overdosing With You – Billie the Vision and the Dancers
5. What Katie Did – the Libertines
6. Things In Life – Dennis Brown
7. Saturday Night Engine – Club 8
8. Nothing to Be Done – the Legends
9. Queen of the Meadow – Elysian Fields
10. Examinor – epo-555
11. Apocalypso – Mew
12. Fall Back Down – Rancid

Also. I’ve been noticing that people keep downloading the Under Byen show. I think it’s actually now one of the most frequently-downloaded individual shows currently in the KPSU archives, which is awesome and cool and exciting. I’m just wondering where the awesome- and cool- and excitingness is coming from -- that is, who are all these people downloading this podcast? This is the most logical source I can think of -- except that, for all I know, only about four people in the whole world even know this blog exists. Hopefully that number is a low-end exaggeration -- but I don’t know -- so basically what I’m saying is if you’re out there, let me know. You know? I like people. You know?

There will be at least two new coming posts in the coming week -- I promise -- and I apologize too for the paucity in the past few.

--DL--
Ashtrayst Podcast (7-27-2007)

Radioen gik godt

Yesterday, for perhaps the first time ever in nearly three and a half years, I managed a radio show completely free of technical blunders. Unfortunately, I haven't got the time to write about it now. But you may choose to take my word that it's decent and listen to it anyway. Og spillelisten er her:

1. Friends Now - Unicova
2. Vi kommer att dö samtidigt – Säkert!
3. Madeupmind – Slumber Party
4. I’ll Be Fine – Bertine Zetlitz
5. War Is Over (Marybell Katastrophy remix) – Speaker Bite Me
6. I’ll Kill Her – SoKo
7. Blew Away – Smashing Pumpkins
8. Food in Strings – Memoplay
9. From Auschwitz to Ipswich – Jarvis Cocker
10. Tonight I Have to Leave It – Shout Out Louds
11. At Least I’m Honest (Zvook Mescalin remix) – Tiger Baby
12. Poetry Boy – Kind of Girl

--DL--
Ashtrays Podcast (7-20-2007)

Hvad end du ønsker

Meget travl. Men lytt til dette -- de nyest singel fra Club 8, og deres første i fire år.

--DL--
Whatever You Want (Club 8)

Radioprogrammet

Well, made it through with only one major error. Unless you count me trying to say the same thing in Danish about twelve times. But oh well. Eventually I’ll have a show where everything’s perfect, but until then -- well, yesterday wasn’t bad.

Spillelisten:

1. A Whiter Shade of Pale – Procol Harum
2. I Let Someone Else In – Billie the Vision & the Dancers
3. Friday Night at the Drive-In Bingo – Jens Lekman
4. Violent God – the William Blakes
5. There Is No Ending – Arab Strap
6. Stars – Au Revoir Simone
7. Monster Hospital (MSTRKRFT remix) – Metric
8. Cut Your Fingers Off – Electrojuice
9. She’s Gone – The Flaming Stars
10. Heels – Cinerama
11. New Moon – Sambassadeur
12. Albertino – Oliver North Boy Choir

I did a lot of the commentary in Danish, and, rather unusually, did very little Danish/English repetition, so if you only understand English and want to know what I was saying, just ask.

--DL--
Ashtrays Podcast (7-13-2007)

Ny musikskueplads i Portland

Yesterday, after about a month of scorching sunshine, it finally occurred to me that my apartment would be a bit less sauna-like in the afternoons if I left my blinds down and closed instead of up and open. Not much, of course, but it does help. (Og, jeg kan ny gå rundt uden tøj på, og jeg vil ikke forårsage bilulykke.) But how irrelevant.

Anyway. This isn’t of much use if you’re not in the Portland area -- but if you are, you should come to the opening of The Modern Age tomorrow night. It’s a new venue (run by KPSU), and it's extremely reasonably priced, and it’s all ages. And I’ll be there.

The original two bands to be playing were Evolutionary Jass Band and Caravan Gogh. They'll still both be there, but a third, opening act, Trust, has just been added to the bill. Unfortunately I can't give a preview as I’ve never heard any of them (I’m guessing EJB does something jazz; I haven't got a clue as to the others) but obviously one of the bookers, at least, thinks they’re pretty good. And it’s our grand opening -- first show ever -- so it should be neat.

As far as information goes -- it’s in the Food For Thought Café space, basement of Smith, on SW Broadway and Harrison, right in the middle of PSU. Doors are at 7:30; show’s at 8; cover is $3-5 (you choose the specific amount within the range). As there’s not a website -- or even a myspace -- yet, if you want more info, I’d suggest reading the Mercury’s nice write-up or looking at the little blurb KPSU’s got up about it. Or email me.

Små tinge

Første -- Stytzer er hjemme igen, og for det, tak skal Gud have. Han har allerede mange ny, godt sangerne (lige Tynd Is, af Spion, som lyd rigtig lige Mew) op. Jeg er glad, han skriver igen. Ny, hvis han vil kun forbinde til mig...

Og anden -- fordi jeg se aldrig min myspace side, jeg har kun nu set dette, men hvis du er en af dem sekvens-slag drenge med den hed sagte øjne -- undskyld, hvis du gør remixerne -- du kan downloade og blande en af Oliver North Boy Choirs sangerne, Baby Cool, fra der side, her. Den er ikke endnu ud, men det vil være, tror de, på august. Alle besked om det er her.

Og læst, og, jeg synes, bedste -- Billie the Vision & the Dancerses ny album, Where the Ocean Meets My Hand, har sælgt ud, og det er ikke godt. Men, fordi af det, du kan ny downloade alle sangerne fra albumen. Der er tretten, alle med mange henvisninge til andre af deres sangerne, og alle er godt, men bedste er Overdosing With You, syngede med Hello Saferide. Jeg skrev om det foran i dag (her), men jeg vil sige igen -- Billie + Saferide = elskov. Sangen er rigtig, rigtig god.

Little things today. First -- Stytzer is back finally, thank god. And he already has a bunch of nice new songs up (like Tynd Is, by Spion, who really do sound like Mew). Very glad that he’s posting again. Now, if only he would link to me…

And second -- since I never look at my myspace anymore, I almost didn’t see this from a while ago -- but if you do remixes, you can download and mix one of Oliver North Boy Choir’s songs, Baby Cool, right from here. (Instead of a direct link, I’m sending you to their page, because the background is so neat.) It’s not been released yet, but they’re thinking August. And for more info on what to do/what will be done with the remixes, go here.

And last, and, I think, best -- Billie the Vision & the Dancers’ new album, Where the Ocean Meets My Hand, has sold out. That’s not so great -- but, because of that, you can now download all its songs. There are thirteen, all full of lovely references to previous songs. They’re all good, but the best is Overdosing With You, sung with oh my god Hello Saferide. I’ve written about this before (here), but I’ll say it again -- Billie + Saferide = love. Absolute love. It’s so good.

--DL--
Tynd Is (Spion)
Overdosing With You (Billie the Vision & the Dancers)

Jeg gik forfærdelig solskold fredag eftermiddag. Men det var værd det.

Here’s the podcast (finally) of last week’s radio Ashtrays, which includes the interview with Stine Sørensen and Morten Svenstrup of Under Byen. Josh did a really nice job of interviewing them. I think I actually managed to ask a few coherent questions, but I’ve never been good at that -- plus, apparently I become somewhat nervous when in the presence of people who are actually kind of, you know, famous, and whose music I actually like. Perhaps this is why I forgot to turn of the automix at the beginning of the show (and forgot to turn other things on at various points later on), so you can hear I think a Devo song over our talking for the first few minutes, so it’s kind of hard to understand. And I decided not to redo the intro, for whatever reason. Sorry.

It was very nice though, anyway -- and Morten and Stine were very nice -- no laughing at me or exchanging looks at any or all of my technical blunders. Anyway, I had fun; overall it came out well. And it was especially nice, getting to meet the two of them, since the OLCC believes that my young age means I’m not responsible enough to see shows. Or something like that.

Spillelisten er her:

1. Den her sang handler om at få det bedste ud af det – Under Byen
2. Pink Moon – Nick Drake
3. More Than This – Electrelane
4. Bad Attitude – Lisa Germano
5. Close to Me – Club 8
6. The Luckiest Guy on the Lower East Side – the Magnetic Fields
7. Since K Got Over Me – the Clientele

It’s a short list, yes, but there's some nice music, picked by four different people (as opposed to just one, being me). And remember, there’s also all that talking. That awesome talking…

--DL--
Ashtrays Podcast (7-6-2007)

Radioprogrammet

If there are any hopelessly devoted radio show fans out there, sorry for taking so long to put the playlist up. I was busy moving all weekend, though, and even if I hadn’t been busy, moving means I now have absolutely no internet. Well.

Fredags spilleliste:

1. Love is Not Enough – Blue Skies for Black Hearts
2. Hungry Heart – Sexton Blake
3. A Man of Happy Solutions – My Friend George
4. Everybody’s Happy Nowadays – Buzzcocks
5. As You Fall (I Watch With Love) – David & the Citizens
6. Pas på du ikke falder i! – Thunderbear
7. Wind in the Wires – Patrick Wolf
8. Beehives Mighty Vicious – Oceano da Cruz
9. O Valencia! – the Decemberists
10. Young Folks – Peter Björn and John
11. Film Music – Electrelane
12. The Young Ones – Munich

Links will be added tomorrow, once my battery has recharged.

Please fill out the blog questionnaire, too. Mange tak.

--DL--
Ashtrays Podcast (6-31-2007)

Som sagde Josh -- Ja. Ja. Ja. Ja. Ja.

Internet is still down -- that's why it's taken me so long to post this -- undskyld.

But anyway. Yes -- it is confirmed. I'm excited, and elated, and several other words, because, yes -- there will be a few members of Under Byen, one of my favorite Danish bands, guesting on the Ashtrays radio show this week. (It's Fridays, 3-4pm Pacific time -- listen at www.kpsu.org.) Right now, Martin, the tour manager, thinks it will probably be Nils and Stine and perhaps one other person. (If there are any important changes to that, I'll post them up on here.) Either way, it's going to be awesome. As the whole band's not coming, they won't be playing any live music; it'll be mostly talking and playing records and such, I think. Which is still awesome.

Also -- I don't have a whole lot of experience doing live interviews -- especially with musicians of this calibre -- so if anyone has suggestions, or pressing questions you feel just absolutely must be asked of Under Byen, feel free to send them to me, via email or comment.

And in the meantime, while you wait for Friday, enjoy this -- Af samme stof som stof, from Under Byen's most recent album.

--DL--
Af samme stof som stof (Under Byen)