Les Paradisiers is a musical power-marriage between American underground musician, author, and film director Thomas Nola (et Son Orchestre) and Barcelona-based Mediterranean-Neo-folk artist Demian, aka O Paradis. The duo’s first aural offspring, More Tales From The Garden, was recently released on LP with Free Digital Download Card via Nola’s own Disques de Lapin imprint. The LP features a dozen dark, uneasy and psychedelic trips through Thomas and Demian’s exotic and anachronous universe, where humid locales not only house jungle birds and cats, but also early 20th Century European speakeasies hosting American Vaudeville and Spanish Cabaret acts with 1980’s Goth sensibilities.

Tales’ atmosphere is helped along by the fact that it was birthed into one being in two very separate places-- Demian’s parts were recorded in Barcelona and Thomas’s contributions were captured in Boston, MA. Therefore, the album is also a bilingual affair, split between American English and Peninsular Spanish.

However, much like O Paradis’s collaborative efforts with the now-defunct Austrian neo-cabaret act Novy Svet, Nola and Demian are actually a logical pairing. Both artists are popular among fans of the Neofolk genre but neither of them carry or are weighted-down by any of the problematic dogma that exists within it. The pair’s main respective projects seem to strive to weave new surreal worlds out of the pieces and tatters of this one, rather then anchoring their songs in a particular part of real world history. Where many of their peers’ albums are academic in nature, Nola and O Paradis’s output is usually looser and takes itself less seriously. Les Paradisiers doesn’t stop this trend. 

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When I first moved to Los Angeles 7 or 8 years ago I became obsessed with Six Feet Under. I remember going to work one day and one of my coworkers talked about the show for hours. She couldn't believe that I was not watching it. However, I didn't have HBO and I don't think the show was out on DVD yet. I didn't even have a DVD player yet. VHS releases of TV shows were starting to disappear so I didn't really have any way to watch it-- so it might have been Six Feet Under that made me finally give in and get a DVD player. My first DVD purchase was The Muppet Movie, but I think my second or third purchase was the first season of Six Feet Under. It had been a while since I had been obsessed with a really good TV show. I still managed to watch the entire Twin Peaks series about once a year, but there wasn't much else out there. It was just that I didn't have HBO. I had heard about all these new shows, but still had never watched Oz or the Sopranos. These shows would later become some of my favorites as I started to collect the DVDs and eventually was forced to get HBO again. I don't want to sound like an advertisement for HBO, but it really did change the way I looked at TV and really gave me many enjoyable viewing hours. Six Feet Under came at a perfect time in my life. The show took place in the Los Angeles area and was filmed just down the street from Amoeba at the Gower studios. I somehow felt the show was speaking directly to me. And I somehow felt more involved with it since it was filmed so close to me and took place in a city so close to my heart. It was also nice to see a gay character as one of the lead roles in a drama series. I have always had a love/hate sort of relationship with Los Angeles, but this show made me love it just a little bit more. The five seasons of the show took me on a long and intense journey. I fell in love with all the characters and started to think of them as my family. The show followed me back to San Francisco, where it eventually ended in 2005. This was one of those shows that I really did love but it also just sort of tortured me when I watched it. Not only was every episode dealing with somebody's death, but it was also dealing with all the characters' messed up lives at the same time. It was an intense journey. The thing that made this show so fantastic was the cast. The mix of the brilliant writing with the perfect cast was a magical combination -- and it doesn't really happen that often. The leads were all perfect. Peter Krause, Michael C. Hall, and Lauren Ambrose were perfect as the siblings of the house. Frances Conroy was brilliant as their mother. The show just had a list of some of my favorite or soon to be favorite actors -- Rachel Griffiths, Freddy Rodriguez, Jeremy Sisto, Lili Taylor, Kathy Bates, Richard Jenkins, Rainn Wilson, Justin Theroux, Mena Suvari, Veronica Cartwright, Illeana Douglas, and Catherine O'Hara. And Patricia Clarkson and Joanna Cassidy were nothing short of brilliant as the aunt and mother in law. I wish they could have been in every episode, I don't think any TV show will ever get a better cast...although Mad Men comes very close.

I get really excited about new music all the time-- sometimes it is a bit overwhelming. There is literally so much out today that I don't even know what to talk about. The writers strike may be over, but you can obviously feel its effect when you look at the movies out now in theaters. I have never seen it look so bad. I never thought I would actually choose to go see movies like the Bank Job and 21 simply because there was nothing else out there. But there has been no strike in the music business-- the albums just keep on coming out and I am not even getting time to spend with the albums I love. I have to move on to other ones and leave my favorite albums from weeks ago behind. I like to think that I have good taste when it comes to music, but I seriously have been liking a lot of albums lately. This week some of our old favorites have fantastic new albums. The Breeders have a new album out called Mountain Battles. I will forever love Kim Deal because of the Pixies, so she can really do no wrong. This album has grown on me and I find myself liking it much more that their last one. Nick Cave also has a new album out today. I have not had much time with it yet, but I do like it so far. I really can't stop thinking about seeing him at the Hollywood Bowl. The show is like a year away but I am already getting so excited. The Hollywood Bowl is one of my favorite places in the world. And Nick Cave + Hollywood Bowl = magic. Trent Reznor decided to do a completely instrumental Nine Inch Nails album. It is called Ghosts I-IV. I listened to it today and I sort of forgot it was Nine Inch Nails halfway through it. I do like myself some instrumental music and there were some really great songs on it, I am just not sure I really get it yet. I did find myself wishing for those Trent Reznor vocals on many of the songs. I just need to give it some more time. The Drift has an amazing all instrumental album out today called Memory Drawings. The album sounds similar to their label mates Explosions in the Sky. I know Wumpscut is not for everybody, but I found myself obsessed with their album Bone Peeler from a couple of years ago. I seriously listened to that album over and over again. Sometimes I need some hard and intense dark music in my life. And Wumpscut don't ever let me down.

Here is an idea that goes into the “Why didn’t I think of that?” pile:

This is from exclaim.ca. Pretty funny as well.

Nick Cave Named Rough Trade's Inaugural "Counter Culture Icon" 
2/29/2008 By Brock Thiessen

In efforts to give hipsters their very own Walk of Fame, Nick Cave will be stopping by London’s Rough Trade East shop on Monday to be sworn in as its first “Counter Culture Icon.”

Sources from shop today told Drowned in Sound that Cave and his no pussy blues would leave his “prints” at the renowned record shop, marking the first of many enlistees to participate in the fame campaign. The Bad Seed will then reportedly be “hanging out in the store,” presumably kicking against the pricks.

Thus far, Rough Trade has remained tight-lipped over the names of future Counter Culture Icons. But we can make some educated guesses. Perhaps be Morrissey? No, the concrete would be too “icky.” Mark E. Smith? Well, maybe he’d leave a fresh butt.

And just in case you were curious, Hollywood’s Walk of Fame now has more than 2,000 five-pointed stars featuring the names of celebrities, human and fictional, according to Wikipedia. The first star was awarded February 9, 1960, to Mrs. Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, star of the 1996 film Even If a Hundred Ogres...

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Yeah, I get the irony, (oh, the English are soooo ironic!) but don’t you think Amoeba Hollywood should have their very own “Counter Culture Icon Walk Of Fame?” Amoeba could hit 2000 selections in one day.

1977: Crime & the City Solution formed in Sydney. It seems that almost from their inception they were cursed to never be spoken of without a mention of famous Australian Nick Cave. Their original line-up included vocalist Simon Bonney (the band's only permanent member), Don McLennan on drums, Harry Zanteni on guitar, Phil Kitchener on bass and Dave MacKinnon on soprano and tenor saxophones. Simon Bonney, whilst born in Australia proper, had grown up on a remote farm in Tasmania where his family grew wheat, barley and opium poppies before he moved to Sydney.

Shortly after their formation, Crime & the City Solution relocated to Melbourne and the line-up changed with Dan Wallace-Crabbe taking over guitar, Kim Beissel replacing Dave MacKinnon, Lindsay O'Meara handling bass and Chris Astley joining on keyboards. The band recorded a handful of demos and some live performances are available; the recordings are interesting. Simon Bonney's distinct, moaning vocals are immediately recognizable. The music sounds very much of its time- kind of a dark, brittle post-punk with saxophone that makes it sound vaguely Roxy Music. It's a bit raw but miles ahead of the contemporaneous Boys Next Door, who aside from their cover of the Young Charlatans "Shivers" were pretty awful. [Note: If you have the Young Charlatans' demos, please let me know]

The Boys Next Door, by their second album, 1980's Birthday Party, pursued (thankfully) a sound very different from the bland predecessor of the previous year, Door, Door. Now the band careened through a cacophonous terrain owing a lot to The Cramps while taking a bit from Crime & the City Solution's post-punk take on The Doors as well. The Boys Next Door moved to relocated to London, signed to the 4AD record label and got huge. Meanwhile, Crime & the City Solution remained silent. I'm tempted to make the analogy of the story of Hedwig and Tommy Gnosis but, to be fair, The Birthday Party were an amazing band with a lot of talent... and a lot of ego. Rowland S. Howard, The Birthday Party's guitarist and writer of some of the band's most amazing songs and Nick Cave disbanded the group in 1984.