Yours For Mine - 'Dear Children'

Yours for Mine wrote a Christian hardcore record I don’t like called Dear Children. There, I just saved you a lot of time. Now you already know if I’m biased against the genre because of how it sounds (I am) or the way it works God into every song (eh). You know exactly what to expect from the songs – breakdowns (yes), chugging guitars (yeah), lyrics that wouldn’t be totally out of place in the Book of Revelations (although it does need more multi-headed dragons. Just sayin’). Heck, you probably half-expect a special section in the album art dedicated to God, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost (Jesus is 33.3 percent responsible for this band’s existence).

Dear Children isn’t a bad album… but it is kind of boring. Ten songs, 41 minutes, whoopty-doo. While the record shows signs of musical depth – electronic flourishes on tracks like “We Need You Here” and “Call Me Distant,” a surprisingly jazzy outro for the screamo-tastic “Absence in Elegance” – the album ultimately falls into a rut. At its best, it sounds like second rate Further Seems Forever. At its worst, well, it features Cookie Monster vocals.

And here’s the thing, I don’t just find the record unappealing because of the Christian element. I loves me some “With You By My Side” something fierce. These songs could be about girls, or boys, or Eli Whitney’s quest to invent the cotton gin. The album could feature covers of my personal top 10 Jawbreaker songs. Hell, it could tell me the day I’m going to die and I’d still felt slightly underwhelmed. The members throw in little flourishes to let the listener know that they know how to play; it’s a shame they’re wasting the talents their Lord and Savior Jesus F. Christ* trying to fit into this stale genre.

*The “F.” stands for “fucking,” kids!

regarding Fabulous Stains covers.

YACHT, whom I have never heard of until just now, is putting out a 7" of Fabulous Stains covers entitled Don't Put Out June 16. HECK YES. It'll feature "Waste of Time" and "Professionals" from the '80s cult film, Ladies and Gentleman, The Fabulous Stains. "Waste of Time" is streaming via the link above. The band gives it a great tweaking, keeping the apathetic vocals but blending in a poppy disco groove. Given how sparse the original was with just rudimentary guitar, this cover is both faithful yet original. If I had money, I'd try to score one of the 1,000 copies pressed, but I'll prolly have to settle for the digital option.

Speaking of da Stains, check out Ladies and Gentleman, The Fabulous Stains. It's a surprisingly smart punk flick (featuring a very young Diane Lane and Laura Dern) that predicts the riot grrl movement. It chronicles the rise and fall of Lane 'n' Dern's band, The Fabulous Stains, and the impact their violent feminist music has on America's lady-youth. At 87 minutes, it's not a perfect film - the rise/fall dynamic is forced and naive and there are some really stupid movie cliches - but the soundtrack, which blends glam rock, punk, and reggae is spot-on, perhaps helped by a bevy of icons, including but not limited to Paul Simonon from The Clash and Steve Jones and Paul Cook from the Sex Pistols. Lane is affecting in one of her first film roles, playing fucked-up teenage orphan Corinne Burns with a mix of anger and fragility, determination and nihilism.

Basically, if you like punk rock and hate sexist pigs, check out the flick, then hit up YACHT's covers.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - 'It's Blitz'

Have Yeah Yeah Yeahs ever released a unanimously loved record? I can remember (somewhat apt) criticisms about their debut Fever to Tell being an uneven, overhyped dance-punk mess. Their 2006 follow-up, Show Your Bones, split fans and critics down the middle – It was too calculated! They were better when they were messy and uneven! I can remember discussing the album with my friend Paul (we both liked it) and how, in interviews, band members Brian Chase and Nick Zinner seemed to hate frontwoman Karen O. for making them do everything on her terms but not enough to quit the group. At the time, Paul was OK with the band splitting up and going out with a solid discography. I thought they had another record in ‘em, though, and was really pulling for a third LP.

I was fucking wrong.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs pulled another Karen-dictated sonic shift on their new full-length, It’s Blitz!. Zinner’s otherworldly guitar sound is mostly replaced with synths and Chase’s loose, booming percussion is gone in favor of drum machines. That these fellas are forced to downplay their strengths takes some adjusting. But repeat lessons don’t dull the lack of compelling songwriting. This post-punk record boasts few flashes of brilliance or intensity; it’s too often a cold, uninspired listening experience. With Zinner relegated to keyboards and Chase stuck in a limited run of disco dance beats, there’s just a tad too much minimalism employed, leaving O. to save the show. She doesn’t.

At 10 tracks, It’s Blitz! can’t afford much filler. Track two, “Off With Your Head,” squanders the good will generated by lead single “Zero,” which gets a little bit catchier each time, with it’s hedonistic redundancy. The lyrics are dumb, the beats are weak, and it doesn’t rock. There is no reason to like this song. “Runaway” rambles on, directionless and hookless. “Dragon Queen” is stereotypical disco. I get Karen’s desire to expand her musical range, but the results here are too lackluster. And the band’s attempts at even the slightest amount of aggression, like on the comparatively peppy guitar track “Dull Life,” sound uninspired and flat.

“Zero” aside, the record’s quietest moments are what stand out. I hate to draw a parallel between “Hysteric” and “Maps,” the band’s lone mega-hit, but it’s got a similar heartfelt yearning and track placement. Musically, it’s closer to “Modern Romance” but with better pop instincts. “Soft Shock” introduces the record’s airier, dreamier aspects early on. “Skeletons” preserves the vibe with some underlying percussion to give it a small dramatic quality. Pick your favorite ambient comparison – Postal Service, M83, High Places – you might like some of these songs, but make sure you preview the tracks online first.

I’ve got three scenarios for how It’s Blitz! is going to be remembered: For a select few, it’ll be Wire’s 154, a dancey post-punk secret success, even though most people will still prefer the band’s punkier debut (Pink Flag/Yeah Yeah Yeahs). For others, it’s The Cure’s Seventeen Seconds; it’s an OK record that’s frequently too formless; but hey, maybe there’s a Pornography in the future. Personally, though, I see It’s Blitz! as comparable to U2’s Pop (and maybe this year’s No Line on the Horizon) – it’s a shitty dance record.

Yellowcard - 'Paper Walls'

The only surprise about Yellowcard’s new album, Paper Walls, is that it doesn’t suck. For a kid raised on The Bouncing Souls, Jawbreaker, and Discount, that’s a difficult thing to say. Yellowcard, despite being placed in the same category of “pop punk,” is way away (pun intended) from such greats. Where someone like the Souls, Blake Schwarzenbach, and Allison Mosshart could put the listener in a hyper-specific scene, Yellowcard frontman Ryan Key delivers lyrics so vague that they could be about anything. Given that the album is frontloaded with pop punk business in the front and ballad parties in the back, one could argue that Paper Walls is the mullet of pop punk records. However, I’d rather theorize that, a la the band’s seminal cut “Gifts and Curses” from the Spider-man 2 soundtrack, Paper Walls can be interpreted as a concept album of sorts about comic books, so great is Key’s obscurity.

Through this lens, it’s hard not to think of the first four tracks on the album as being about Spider-man. First track “The Takedown” comes with a gnarly opening track and lines like “I feel things changing when I move” and “How did I end up like this, the chosen one?” C’mon now. Obviously, this song is about Peter Parker’s angst over being caught between using his spidey powers to save New Yorkers and staying at home to cuddle with Mary Jane, as she does require a fairly high level of intimacy.

“Fighting” is just more Yellowcard-pop-punk-by-numbers. The band’s biggest strength is still drummer Longineu W. Parsons III. Knock on the other guys all you want – Parsons pounds the skins with extreme prejudice and rocks “the fast beat” better than most. The aspect the band is prolly most well known for, Sean Mackin’s violin, is buried so deep in the mix here that he no longer matters all that much. He gets to play ball on the ballads and “The Takedown,” but otherwise he’s so low that he’s practically excised. Also, this track reminds me of Spider-man trying to motivate himself before his big battle. We’ll say he’s taking on the Green Goblin after he killed Gwen Stacey.

Later in the album, Key switches from Spider-man to the X-Men on “Five Becomes Four.” At first play, it might sound like Key is singing about the departure of guitarist Ben Harper from the group, but I like to think he’s referring to the first death of Jean Grey at the end of the “Dark Phoenix Saga,” as she was the first of the original five X-Men to die. Heavy.

The last track worth mentioning is “Dear Bobbie.” A country-esque love song about the Greatest Generation, it’s a cute ditty about getting old and staying in love. I’m lost as how to best transcribe this one, but, like Kurt Busiek, I shall find a path. I’m thinking this one is about Captain America at the end of his life in Civil War. He’s pledging his love to Sharon Carter while, for some odd reason, thinking of Cap. fill-in Bob Russo. Blame it on the blood loss.

Paper Walls is a decent pop punk record, provided you’re into the radio sheen end of the spectrum. After the commercial disappointment of Lights and Sounds, Yellowcard returned to the sound of breakout hit Ocean Avenue, with solid results. A worthy companion piece, while it doesn’t deliver anything new, at the very least, it gives me an excuse to think about Marvel some more. That Marvel Zombies vs. The Army of Darkness was something, eh?

Dan Yemin screens 'Dr. Strangelove' February 7, 2008

Things you think of when you hear the name Dan Yemin: Lifetime, Kid Dynamite, Paint It Black, Armalite, Philadelphia, New Jersey. Things you don’t necessarily think about when you hear the name Dan Yemin but should: wicked smart psychologist with practices in Ardmore and Paoli, Pa. Engage him in political discussion and you will be met with a mix of warmth, emphasis and, above all else, one heck of a point or two.

TLA Video, with help from Philebrity.com and National Mechanics, has organized a new film series entitled the TLA Philebrity Screening Series. The premise: Philadelphia celebrities (or… philebrities!) present their favorite films at the National Mechanics bar on 22 S. 3rd St. So far, the series has included DJ/musician King Britt with The Wiz and Mayor Michael Nutter with, holy hey, Invincible. Last Thursday, Feb. 7, brought yet another combo—musician/psychologist Dr. Dan Yemin with Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.

Yemin has written brilliant punk/hardcore tunes for acts like Lifetime, Kid Dynamite, Paint It Black and Armalite, and Dr. Strangelove’s socio-political and comedic tones have surely influenced his writing. While Nutter’s love of Mark Wahlberg may be debated from here until 10 minutes from now, there’s no doubt Yemin digs on Stanley Kubrick’s comedic masterpiece. As the good doctor would say of the film he saw for the first time in 1984, “We finally saw a cultural artifact as concerned with World War II as we were.”

“Rarely has such grim subject matter (total nuclear destruction of the human race) been treated with such sharp wit and intelligence,” he told Philebrity.com. “Politics and slapstick might seem like an odd combination, but I think it makes total sense given the absurdity of the ‘peace through strength’ philosophy that prevailed during the arms race, and the paranoia that was so rampant during the Cold War.”

After introducing the film, Yemin took a front seat for the film. National Mechanics is definitely a cool bar, featuring albino dogs, a piano and, oh joy of joys, $2 Yuenglings. But it’s still a bar, which meant that the first 30 minutes or so of the screening were perforated with conversations and cries of “Peter Sellers!” and “Clockwork Orange!” from the crowd. Folks calmed down eventually, though, allowing Dr. Strangelove’s biting sarcasm to prevail.

Forty-four years after its release, what could I possibly say about Dr. Strangelove that hasn’t already been said? Well, it certainly holds up. Terrorism may have supplanted communism for top American threat, but the overlaps are many. There’s a particular exchange between the characters Gen. Jack D. Ripper and Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake that hit me with a wave of laughter and disgust all at once.

After asking Mandrake if he had ever heard what former French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau said about war, Ripper explains, “He said war was too important to be left to the generals. When he said that, 50 years ago, he might have been right. But today, war is too important to be left to politicians. They have neither the time, the training nor the inclination for strategic thought.”

Given the Bush administration’s push to find excuses to invade Middle Eastern countries for no gosh dang reason lately, Ripper’s lines are much more darkly humorous because of how bitingly valid they’ve remained.

At the same time, though, the film is too hilarious to become depressing. I cannot think of another movie where the humor actually had to be watered down so the crew could finish filming, but that’s just what happened with star Peter Sellers in two of his three roles. He originally performed President Muffley with a cold, and the result was so funny that other actors couldn't finish their scenes. Same goes for the title character—pay attention to the final scene, you can see actor Peter Bull (as the Russian ambassador) crack up a couple of times over Sellers’ contortions and gyrations. Throw in the facts that actor Slim Pickens performed his role like a straight drama and ended up being funny and that George C. Scott is just plain awesome and you have one of the greatest comedies of all time.

After the film ended, Armalite came on over the bar’s stereo, which was kind of funny, and TLA representatives handed me a copy of TLA Raw, a pornography catalogue, which was kind of not funny. I don’t want to hear the word “gape” ever again. The next TLA Philebrity screening is Thursday, Feb. 21, 7:30 p.m. The film, The Harder They Come, will be presented by Y-Rock programmer and WXPN drive time DJ Jim McGuinn. Visit philebrity.com/tlascreeningseries for more details.