Albums out Nov. 27:

 

Raime – Quarter Turns Over a Living Line

LP $29.98

Dubstep has been an intriguing if polarizing new genre thus far, at some point encompassing artists as disparate as Skrillex and Andy Stott, much in the same way a new, seemingly precise but ultimately nebulous genre like emo or grime ended up describing very different music. If Raime are dubstep, they’re the murky bottom of its pit. Songs like “Soils and Coils” offer little in the way of humanity or respite from the brutality of its funeral-march beats and stark, alien sounds. Which means it’s one of my favorite things from the genre I’ve heard yet. Anyone with a taste for bleakness should check this out.

 

 

Wu-Block – Wu-Block

CD $14.98

Wu-Tang Clan and The Lox team for a hip-hop superstar collaboration, featuring Method Man, Ghostface Killah, Raekwon, GZA, Masta Killah, Jadakiss and Styles P.

In celebration of their brand new Tom Morello produced Future Rock EP (available at Amoeba Hollywood) the group Outernational are currently on a two month tour with stops this week in Texas, Arizona, and California where they will play Fulton 55  in Fresno on Thursday (Aug 16), El Callejon in Salinas on Friday (Aug 17), and at The Satellite  in Los Angeles on Saturday (Aug 18) along with Las Cafeteras and Los Hollywood - all before traveling up to Canada, down South, and back East for more dates on the current tour that goes through the third week of September.

Along the route of this tour Outernational have been attracting new and old fans of their instantly likable world music flavored revolution rock. This is the second tour in the past few months by the hardworking Brooklyn NY based band. Their earlier 2012 concert trek was a unique two month, 2000 mile, tour along the Mexican border when they played venues not typical for touring rock bands including "the farm fields of California" as part of their Todos Somos Ilegales: We are All Illegal' tour 

      

Rock music has way too many incredibly memorable guitar riffs to limit a best of list to just one hundred, but the 100 riffs that guitarist Alex Chadwick of The Chicago Music Exchange came up with for the above video performance ain't half bad, and it is a nice informal overview of the history of rock n' roll. Sure it's a subjective selection that includes a lot of mega hits of the genre, and no doubt every rock fan could come up with their own unique list of a hundred best guitar riffs. But I like what Alex has done: from his playing to his choices of riffs, and from how he segues from song to song, to how he plays it on his 1958 Fender Strat all in chronological order. Below is that list of songs and artists in order with the artist names that are blue highlighted linking back to the Amoeba Online Store. where you can find their respective music (CDs, LPs, DVDs) including (in near all cases) the song played by Alex.

2 "Folsom Prison Blues" Johnny Cash
3 "Words of Love"  Buddy Holly
4 "Johnny B Goode"  Chuck Berry
5 "Rumble"  Link Wray

Refreshingly outspoken Brooklyn, NY based band Outernational kick off their new tour, titled after their brand new album 'Todos Somos Ilegales: We are All Illegal'  tonight (April 4th) in the border town of Brownsville Texas at Galeria 409. That fitting border town location was chosen in the same vein as the setting for their new Jessica Habie "The Beginning Is Here" video above - by the band whose message is "torque una revolución sin baile no es una revolution" - a revolution without dance, isn't revolution!

The band's excellent new bi-lingual album addresses the issues and meanings of the border, the policies of the US government, and it directly questions a system that they see as criminalizing those who create the wealth it rests upon. The tour will travel along Texas border towns and onto the IM Festival in South Padre, TX with Los Amigos Invisibles/Nortec Collective. It will then travel to Arizona (the hot spot of immigration and border issues) with a highly anticipated April 12th show at Arizona State University. The band also have numerous California dates a big one on May Day at The Echo in Los Angeles.

Traditionally thought of as soothing and relaxing, or at least pleasurable in some way to the subjective listener, music can also be the cause of pain and suffering.

You have probably heard that classical and other music is sometimes used to disperse loitering adolescents at malls, as in the case in New Zealand a couple of months ago when Barry Manilow songs were blasted to alienate and drive away unwanted teens. But that is nothing compared to the US armed forces' use of music as a form of torture against detainees in US operated detention centers in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo Bay. It has been reported by journalists and human rights advocates that the music of such artists as Eminem, Nine Inch Nails, Queen, Rage Against the Machine, Britney Spears, and even Barney and Sesame Street tunes have been blasted at deafeningly high decibels as a means of physical torture in interrogation at these centers.

Not surprisingly, word of these tactics has shocked many, including the artists whose music was unknowingly appropriated, and has resulted in the formation of an organization, UK non-profit group Reprieve, to protest the use of music as torture and to make sure it never happens again. Reprieve is supportive of the anti-torture initiative called Zero dB that is hoping to bring an end to the technique by gathering the support of musicians whose songs are used in controversial interrogation techniques by US forces. So far they have gotten overwhelming support from outraged artists including Tom Morello of Rage Against The Machine and Lars Ulrich of Metallica who was interviewed recently on the topic by Rachel Maddow on MSNBC. Sesame Street composer Christopher Cerf's reaction is captured in the video news report below, courtesy of AP, that also includes an interview with former detainee Donald Vance.