Friday, May 13, 2005

A bundle of joy

Did y'all catch that story in the New York Times about how Linkin Park wants to get out of their contract with Warner Music (also see here)? Usually I wouldn't even pay much attention to something like this, but it amuses me to no end how these people are willing to embarrass themselves. They're concerned about their marketing budget after Warner Music's IPO? Please, that's just ridiculous. They're already shoveling cash up your asses, you made it into the select group of, um, artists who earn money for their record company; what on earth are you going to do with fifty million dollars? Buy yourselves a week's worth of programming on MTV? Even worse if they actually believe what they're saying. It shouldn't have taken them that long to realize that they are working for a corporation. Worst of all, though, is the fact that these guys are described as "the biggest rock band in the world." I don't care how many records they sell, their style is generic and redundant and they give a bad name to heavy music. Fucking clowns.

To let off some steam, I went to see Mastodon last night and was happy to know that they still do what they've always done, despite the bigger venue. Now here's a band that doesn't compromise its integrity even as it attracts larger crowds. I loved every minute of it. Also, you should buy all of Cult of Luna's records.

Today's update features a band from Southern California called Stickfigurecarousel. Their total output consists of little more than a dozen songs, but all of it is very listenable and well executed. Though their sound changed somewhat from release to release, beginning with their first 7" on dim mak, the cover of which was designed and packaged by Steve Aoki himself and which was more on the fast and chaotic side. A self-titled 7" on Schema followed a similar pattern, while they put a greater emphasis on songwriting with their 7" and CDep on Nothing Left. It's loud and bombastic; walls of guitars with frequent hints of melody and occasional singing. Think early Will Haven meets early Kill Holiday. Their last release was a split 7" with Germany's Linsay, also on dim mak.

Below, you'll find the first three songs of the ep, which kind of form a thematic whole - at least that's what it sounds like - and which are also all on the 7" version of this release. Some distros probably still have all or some of the above records, particularly the Nothing Left ep. Find them and buy them. Members of Stickfigurecarousel went on to play in, among others, Adamantium and Give Until Gone.

Stickfigurecarousel - Facade
Stickfigurecarousel - Penumbra
Stickfigurecarousel - A Bundle of Sticks

4 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Just picked up the Stickfigurecarousel 7" clear vinyl by luck. great songs. Record has a numbering of 20/56. I guess they didn't print many of these.
Interesting thing is that it is on clear vinyl and came with a sticker. The sticker has a logo and the name "guyver.one" I'm not sure the relation. Did they only really print 56 of these records?

5:10 PM  
Blogger Graham Lee Brewer said...

Man, that's a great fuckin' blog. Kudos. Thanks for posting the stickfigurecarousel songs, too. That stuff can be hard to find.

1:18 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

haha...weird that i come across this, but cool nevertheless. i was the vocalist for this band. just an f.y.i.: the record on nothing left was actually our first release, then came the dim mak record, and then the schema record. after we broke up for a bit we came back and released that split with linsay and one other song on the "as the sun sets" comp. that first record was only released out of 56 copies on clear vinyl. i think there were like 1000 on black though, plus 1000 cds? i actually still have a few copies of this on 7" sitting around that i would sell for like $4 ppd to the u.s. (more postage $$$ to europe and other overseas lands, obviously), and i think our drummer might even have some copies of the schema 7" lying around, but who knows? good luck finding copies of the dim mak release, though, since there were only 600 of those made. too bad, 'cause this was my favorite record we did. also, if anyone is interested, i also have copies of a 7" from another band i was in right after stickfigurecarousel that played in sort of a similar style (happy dagger). i have a ton of these left since we managed to break up right after it came out so i'd sell them super cheap if anyone wants them. hit me up at xsepticedgex@cox.net if there's any interest in any of this crapola at all. thanks for spreading the word in this blog. that rules that people still care!

10:26 PM  
Blogger aknownplace said...

you don't, by any chance, have the lyrics to the stickfigurecarousel 7", do you?

6:47 PM  

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