I’ve been a huge fan of ST37 since I first reviewed their double LP “Glare” for KTRU over a decade ago. At the time all I knew about the band was that they were this weird and mysterious band on an Italian label who probably smoked a lot of really good dope. So you can imagine my surprise when years later I find that ST37 aren’t exotic rock stars but just some laid back dudes from Austin. It didn’t take long for my band to becomes fast friends with them and at one point it seemed that every show we played was with ST. Over the years, ST37 have continued to thrill and amaze me so how could I skip out on their 20th anniversary record release party. Sure they were playing Houston the next night but, since I couldn’t make it Saturday, driving up to Austin after work on Friday was my only option. Given my admiration for these guys, why the hell not! Plus, Scott offered me a couch to sleep on and a free beer if I followed through – Sweet! So armed with my new Jonx CD to wake me up (as I left so that grabbing a coffee was out of the question) I headed out to Austin on slippery wet roads.
No Turn Jonx Red
If you will let me digress a bit I should probably go on a bit about this frikkin’ Jonx album that I’ve been mentioning in passing for 
the last couple of weeks. The Jonx are one of those bands that combine naked musical aggression with brains and musicianship – let’s just say that Mathrock went to the gym and learned how to kick your ass. Jesus, the album opens with the amazing guitar feed back wank-off that would make Jimi Hendrix proud! Soon Stew’s spindley guitar is propelled by Trey and Danny’s rhythm section and we’re off! Take a song like “Deadline” and listen to the way the guitars, bass and drums just work so beautifully together. It starts off with a poppy enough guitar riff then goes into these manic rolls, screaming vocals, slippery bass, and skronky guitars. The band builds up, kick back, let one instrument take the lead then drops back unexpectedly to let another in the spotlight. It’s impressive to listen to and the thing that gets me is how the ever changing riffs aren’t frivolous! But I want to talk about the song that I was going to put on the podcast because I hoped it would kick your ass – the album’s closing song – “The Scent of Earth”. Live this song is brutal! The bass and the drums come at you with this low slow prowl while the guitar lets fly! Let me just say that I am a sucker for the unyeilding riff! Sharks and Sailors pulled this off with “Topple the Pillar” but – Goddamn – The Jonx with an unrelenting fury pound you and pound you and pound you for 13 minutes! It’s definitely a great way to end an album but imagine if they’d released this on LP and that pulsing drone at the end (about 12:19) just kept going! That would have ruled!!!!
Other CD Spins on the Road
Also spinning on my CD player was M. Wards Post War - probably one of the most overrated CDs of 2006. 
That’s not to say it’s bad; it’s a nice collection of songs that are beautifully produced but it’s hardly as earth shattering as many reviewers have made it out to be. But here is where I and most reviewers likely differ, am I impressed by the folky low key porch songs? No, to me they are as pleasant as a breeze and as fleeting. To me, “Requiem” makes the rest of the material seem lifeless by comparison. Here Ward channels Queen with a shameless cop of the first two bars of “Fat Bottom Girls” and and even a Brian May like solo and just runs with it with a drunken abandon. I’m sure somewhere out there Freddy Mercury is smiling and so are we.
Meanwhile, filed in the under-appreciated category stands Devin Davis’ Lonely People of the World Unite which should 
be on more people’s top 10 of 2006. Davis’ album sounds almost manic with energy as if he were thinking he’d better pack everything into this disk or die trying. Just listen to “Giant Spiders” with it’s Pete Townsend like guitar assault and it’s tangled web of obtuse lyrics, it has this frenetic energy that screams for attention. Listen to the sloppy stumbling drums in the verses and how they play all around the beat and let the guitar hold it down – that is just a brilliant. In 3:44 you’ve just run a marathon of ideas in one song and that is what the entire album is like. It’s the pop album you’d make if you knew this was your only shot. Sure there are two clunkers among the 11 in here but that is the price you pay as Davis holds nothing back and takes no prisoners and isn’t that is what all musicians should strive for? Pop isn’t be for pussies.
Austin is smokin’ without cigarettes
The Jonx CD kept me awake enough drive through the dark and slippery roads of I-10 and 71 safely. When I arrived in Austin, I 
noticed that the clubs were doing fine despite the fact that Austin had implemented a smoking ban. I certainly didn’t see any difference walking down 6th street that Friday night; people were walking, smoking (outside), going from club to club, making out, and all the usual things you’d expect them to do. In fact, I didn’t even notice the ban until after the show when I didn’t have to shower and change my clothes! Wow! Nice! Now personally I don’t mind a smoky club while I’m there, it’s the residual smell afterwards of stale smoke on my clothes and my car that I abhor. I mean who wants to shower at 2:30 am? But that in itself is an inconvenience I can live with; the reason I have no issues with smoking bans is because of the staff of those clubs and their long term health. Hell, great sound engineers like Joe O. at Rudz should have a long and happy life and if a smoking band can make that happen, I’m all for it. So, if Austin can pull it off, I’m sure Houston will have nothing to fear. You just won’t be able to look as cool as Bogart and Bacall but, between you and me, you never really did.
ST37 Masters of Time and Space
I arrived at Mohawk to find a pretty decent crowd of people and caught a few words with the ST guys. 
I’d mentioned that the Houston Press gave them a pretty solid write up for the upcoming show. They said that they had read the article but were perplexed at how the writer closed with a slap at them for releasing the new album on LP. Curiously, there was a fine article the prior week that acknowledged what I’d known for ages- CDs are dying and vinyl will have the last laugh when CDs are finally buried and reduced to the glorified overpriced coasters they really are. I actually applaud ST37 in releasing their new album on LP only. I’d been telling my band to only do LPs and MP3s and skip the whole CD thing for quite some time. All you guys without a turntable need to get off your ass and buy a refurbished one and get back in the game of hearing full sine waves. Remember low end? It’s waiting for you in wax! But I digress.
The middle set (I’d missed Cavedweller) was Midori Umi who put on a really nice set. The guitarists had some really nice spacey interplay and as it turns out the bassist was formerly in Winslow – a band I’d long admired but who closed up shop way before they should have. I’d meant to buy their CD but I totally forgot no doubt due to my repeated trips to the bar. The main attraction though was ST37 who was there to celebrate 20 years of traveling the spaceways and they were going to do it by playing their new album.
The set was the kind of expansive mix of psych , punk, and krautrock that makes this band an institution. I think it’s really easy to take what these guys do for granted. How many bands can leave you with a feeling that the club has melted away leaving you to travel wherever the band wants to take you. You are in good hands with these guys. 
Give these guys a solid sound engineer and they can do anything! Dave Cameron’s solid drumming roots the more ethereal guitar work of Joel Crutcher who is really great at producing layered and spacey sounds. Scott Tellis is a bassist who has not qualms about his instrument taking the spotlight but my only complaint from the set is not enough of his falsetto. With his falsetto, Scott Tellis pulls off what in anyone else’s hands would sound really cheesy. That, to me, should be a new rule for any bands. Can you pull off a falsetto and not come off like an ass? Anyhow, I digress, the point is that ST37 saves me the trouble of smoking a whole lot of dope. I think Justin Bankston’s fist says it all – Space is the place brotha’ and ST will be glad to take you there.
Bonus round: Chilling at Scott Tellis’ pad afterward and listen to Krautrock until 4am!
Not-so-bonus round: The following night in Houston, Rosa gets to help ST37 retrieve their van after they unknowingly park in a no parking zone.]
Epilogue:
Your father was a hamster and your mother smelled of elderberries!
So there I am returning from Austin in my car as my windshield wipers begin challenging the rain to a futile battle when I remember that I have a trunk full of recycling I have to drop off. Sure I’m tired but do it anyways as it will only put me out 5 minutes…or so I think.
As I am sorting my last small box filled with glass, I bump into a man. He says “Go ahead.” but since I have only one colored bottle I tell him to go ahead and proceed on to the clear glass. I toss the clear bottles through the opening and into huge metal hopper with a satisfying crash. Grabbing the last bottle (a green wine bottle) I toss it over the rail towards the back half of the hopper. Then, the man I’d run into mere seconds before comes at me in a heavy and angry (I shit you not when I say this) Monty Python French accent “Hey, what are you doing?! You trying put my eye out with shards?! What are you trying to do?”
I look at the recycling hopper then back at him then back at the hopper then back at him and reply with befuddled resignation “Ummm, trying to put out your eyes with shards.”
Pointing at me with a shaking finger and a face twisted with a fury that is as comical as it is bizarre he snorts, “Oh, you are really funny. You Americans! You are selfish! You never think about anyone else – only yourselves!”
“Umm, dude. Look I tossed that bottle towards the back of the hopper. There is no way that could have…”
“You are stupid. You know physics? Pheee-seeks? You! You are an asshole!”
“Asshole?” Mind you I’m never raising my voice in anger because I’m simply too tired. “Jeez, look at least be creative. Asshole? Come on.”
The guy approaches me with that accusing finger and after a pause offers “I think it is you who can’t think of something clever.”
“Umm, dude. I’ve got no beef with you; you’re the one with the issues here.”
“You vote for [John] Kerry? You’re a Democrat? You Americans! You Texas! You are all so selfish – only think of yourselves. You are Steeeupid.” Then he starts spouting something in another language.
I get the game so I reply “Bellissimo. Parlo Italiano, hablo Espanol, and I speak English. So your point is what?”
His shaking finger pauses for a second so I offer him the fact that my great grandmother is from Paris which is met with an indignant chest-pounding “PARIS! I AM FROM PARIS!”
“Well there ya go we’ve got a lot in common.”
“Eh heh heh heh! I hope you are happy with your puny mind. I hope you enjoy your life with your flatlining brain.”
“You know I’ll keep that in mind since I didn’t realize that you could go through life with a flatline but thanks for the biology lesson.” To which our valiant French crusader gives a snort of frustration as he climbs into the cab of his oversized American SUV into the rain.
See more of my pictures of ST37 here.
Jonx photo pilfered from Rosa Foto.
for the uninitiated, take it from a music knucklescraper like me, ‘requiem’ is godlike.
did i say godlike? have you seen jonx live? i hope they tour alaska and new zealand so we can have global-surround-sound-like agreement on their awesomeness.
feeee-seeeeeeeks!
If Joan Jett can make it here at 60, anyone can… It would be nice. I’ve actually offered bands to come to our island to hide out and use our “studio”. And I think Ramon handled this column excellently. I kind of effed up his content by forcing it… I think. I am mentally challenged and put the opposite songs on the Podcast that Ramon wanted for this week. Both of the Jonx and ST37 songs Ramon gave me, do ROCK, and you should hear them. The others are growing on me fast. Thanks for the links.
Two comments:
1) Smoking bans are puritanical, nanny-state fascism. And this is the opinion of a non-smoker.
2) If ever you had absolute carte blanche to kick someone’s ass, combined with the ability to do it (after all, if dude was French he probably couldn’t fight for shit), that was it.
What is also funny about this is that all stereotypes aside, every French person I have met in the states (and I’ve met quite a few) has been incredibly friendly and nice. Maybe the guy was just having a nic fit after being in a non-smoking club for too long.
Clinton,
I think my point on smoking is that I see it as a workplace safety thing. Not one that I’m going to run out and fight about but one that if it is put into law ain’t such a bad thing.
But my main point is that a lot of people claimed it would kill clubs and with it music. I just don’t see it.
EM,
No worries I’d originally planned on reviewing the M.Ward and Devin davis in this piece but then figured it was too long and planned to move them to next week. So shifting them back here is no big whoop. By the way Son of Ravin took my submission for next week. : )
PS God bless Joan Jett!
Oh man Claire you are on. churchbus is going to take over your house.
I don’t know why I’m always at odds with Mr. Heider. I like his writing but I always seem to post something directly at odds with him and in this case I have to agree with Ramon. I’m all for a smoking ban. Smoking outside is cool. And I’m glad that Ramon didn’t punch this stewpeed guy. Showed class (although actually shoving a piece of glass in his eye would have been cool because then you would have showed glass. He he).
I can’t believe I don’t know of this band st37 and they’ve been around for 20. I’ll definitely check that stuff out. The Jonx too.
Devin Davis is great. You know my feelings on him Ramon. This is the guy our friend John Lomax (and btw thanks for introducing us over the holidays) should have directed Hagaa towards instead of focusing frustration on innocent others. As the engineer of a Chicago basement studio, DD is a hero of mine and a cool guy around town too. Very nice guy to talk to and he goes to a decent number of good shows.
At least the French guy recycles. At least Ramon recycles. From there they have found some point of commonality and can become vast friends. Thank you to the both of you for giving a rat’s ass to the planet earth. Mother earth has blessed the French gentleman by not letting his ass get kicked by Ramon, and soon she shall bless Ramon and LP4 with an impressive long streak on top of the American music charts. mother earth+ french man+ Ramon+ LP4= World peace.
I thought you musicians might find this interesting. You don’t have to post this, but perhaps one of you guys could choose this as your next topic of the week. I’m interested in your opinions.
======
by Audrey Stuart
Sun Jan 21, 4:45 AM ET
CANNES, France (AFP) – MIDEM, the world’s biggest and most influential music trade fair, has opened its doors in Cannes on a discordant note as the music and technology industries continued to battle over whether music should be for free.
You can find the rest of the article (though Plagerized without attribution) here: http://www.funpal.net/archives/2207
Constance R Crippen
[Hey Constance I edited down your post because it was a really long quotation. In the future you may just want to give a brief synopsis and a link to the article. No worries, it just makes it cleaner and less cluttered.]
Sorry dude, but if he really did say “I hope you enjoy life with your flatlining brain” with a French accent…then he won. I mean, c’mon…fantastic.
Constance, as a music maker I”ll chip in to say, that I have enough being concerned with making music to worry about the whole piracy vs. free music issue. I’m gonna let the businesspeople, computer people, politicians, lawyers, etc battle it out, even though i’m sure that will probably bode badly for the average musician, in terms of money, as it almost always has. But the truth is that free music has been available and continues to be available everywhere. Legally? well, the law is very debatable as thousands of lawyers will tell you and musicians are perennial line-steppers. As far as i’m concerned, if you are able and care to do it, copy, play, rip, burn, download, any music i make. Though i am sure any time soon some label is going to sue one of its own artists because the artist gave away too many burned copies of their own CD.
Ramon,
Thanks for the kind words re: the Jonx CD. Praise from people whose opinion you respect is always the most gratifying.
Re: the ‘music should be free’ article:
It’s clear to me that musicians and the money-making entities that have grown up around them will have to figure out new ways of making money now that their product is infinitely reproducible. No amount of DRM or litigation is going to put the toothpaste back in the tube, as it were.
As a spare-time musician and self-releaser of music, I think the internet is an amazing distribution medium.
Danny and I have discussed making the entire Mustache Records catalog freely downloadable on our website (once I get around to finishing it).
The theory being, we make music because we love to, but also because we want people to hear it, and so we should make it as easy as possible for people to get it. Also, we have no delusions of ever making any money.
I think I’m ready for the smoking ban, if only because I may then be able to convince my wife to go to shows with me.
It’s clear to me that musicians and the money-making entities that have grown up around them will have to figure out new ways of making money now that their product is infinitely reproducible.
This is dead on. After the initial recording investment, these entities are providing zero value. At least if you buy a CD, you have the product of somebody’s work in your hands. Somebody had to burn the CD, somebody had to print the insert, somebody had to shrinkwrap it, and somebody had to deliver it to you. What is a label providing if you don’t get a physical product? The bandwidth to download it? How much is that really worth? And what if you don’t download from a label controlled site? Then they have provided nothing. Should they be compensated for that?
I know the way the law is structured now, the answer to the above question is yes, but I’m not so certain the law should be structured that way. The slippery slope argument, though, is as usual: Where do you draw the line? Should songwriters be compensated in perpetuity for any song they have written? They certainly aren’t providing any value, other than the few hours they spent writing the thing.
It’s a tricky situation, this deciding how to define who gets paid for music when it becomes divorced from any product. It will likely require that somebody to pull a definition out of their ass, just so there is a definition.
Well, Kilian, I concede that I personally will benefit from a smoking ban, because second hand smoke bothers me (and my wife). I guess it’s just a matter of principle for me, because puritanism of any variety, or anything that smacks of puritanism just drives me nucking futs. People are all so worried about dying, and not worried enough about living. I have never envied smokers for even a minute, but if it makes someone that happy to suck some nicotine into their lungs, who am I to stand in their way? I suppose I have a strange affection for vice, although I don’t really have the stomach to participate in the more sublime ones. Vice is what sets a human being apart from a machine…or a fanatic. Sure, vices are generally unhealthy. But we all die a little every day: to live is to die, so to speak, whether it’s whiskey or lard or smoke or the myriad other poisons of this earth seeping into us. All of us rotting from disease from the inside, slowly…well, it is kind of the essence of my personal philosophy: disease is the natural state of man, rather than health. It’s how we handle our disease, whatever it is, that sets us apart.
That having been said, it will be nice to someday play a show without coming home smelling like a fucking ashtray.
I live in NYC. A few years ago, they banned smoking in the bars, and I smoke. Well, I used to…I don’t really, anymore. At first, I thought the whole thing was ridiculous and Mayor Bloomberg was pulling some sort of “1984″ type shit…but it disn’t really bother me all that much, and as time passed, I actually sort of felt that it was a nice alternative…you sort of excuse yourself, go outside and do yer thing, without bothering anybody, and there’s always somebody else out there smoking, so, hey…you might actually make a new friend. Still, seeing how it was in NYC, I thought “This’ll never fly, here. The citizens of the Bronx alone will come together like Voltron, rise up and slay all the lawmakers. It’ll be a bloodbath in the Boogie-Down.” But, something bizarre transpired instead. New Yorkers actually co-operated with the whole thing, and were actually somewhat polite while congregating outside on the narrowing sidewalks. New Yorkers aren’t exactly known for this type of behaviour, so I figure, like the soundman always says “If it works at home, It’ll work here.” And as Willy Wonka would say “Scratch that-reverse it.”
You know how I feel about this free stuff? I can’t comment. Because I’ve downloaded, dubbed, made tapes, bought bootlegs, fucked the wife of a DJ who worked for 92 FM in Houston, so whatever I say will turn me into a hypocritical, contradictory full of shit dickhead, and I’ll never let myself get painted into such a corner…I’m much too vain for that. Still, I go to the Virgin Megastore in Manhattan all the time and spend tons of money on CD’s…9.99 to around 20 bucks apiece. And you know what? I absolutely love the music I’ve bought. It’s changed my life, made me a happier person, and it’ll be with me until the day I die…nothing can change that, and nothing can take it away. So for 14.99 a pop…on sale, I figure I’m okay with that.
On the subject of free music, I re-post some comments from something else I wrote…
“Essentially my philosophy about music is that in a perfect world, it would be free to everyone. Of course, in a perfect world, I wouldn’t have to work a day job, and I could sit around writing songs all day and people would bring me beer and food without me having to pay for it”
This, of course, is irrelevant to the immediate technical question of how artists are to be compensated for their creations in the coming decades of digital proliferation.
My own feeling is that ironically, the ubiquity of digital music will devalue recordings relative to live performances, such that the latter will become one of the only ways that musicians can be compensated. So we’ll all be anonymously playing for bread and beer, just like the good old days. As ol’ Warhol so wisely intoned, “in the future, everyone will be famous…” – if, by famous, we mean throwing our pathetic little coins into the digital ocean and making a wish.
Clinton – I’m an occasional smoker, a bar smoker, an after dinner at my pop’s house smoker. So as in many things I’m being hypocritical. I get the worry about puritanical governmental interference for sure. And if you’re not busy being born you’re busy dying so I’m with you on that. But while I’m busy being born I’d rather not go home asthmatic with itchy eyes stinking like a stale cigar.
On the free music thing – I get so bored with copyrights and publishing nonsense I don’t know what to do. But I’ve noticed something interesting about free music, particularly like if somebody is handing out free cd’s at a show or something like that. Well I notice that music often gets devalued by the recipient. As if by giving it away you are saying it is cheap. So there’s something to be said for putting a financial value on your work in some situations.
And of course I just put out this compilation on a CD. That costs money. You want to see a return – and I’m just talking about covering costs. But I felt to give the idea of the compilation worth it had to be more than download-able mp3′s, something more tangible. I don’t know I’m on the fence. I’m in both worlds figuring out which way to go next. But always always ya got to think about getting out there and playing. That’s a given.
I think we need to distinguish between free and not having to pay any money for it. I dont care if i dont make any money from the music, but it shouldnt be free, if you want music, you should have to give something back (to the band, other audience members, other bands, your own band, anybody), go to a show, talk to musicians, send an email, comment on a blog, give some criticism, whatever, at least put a little bit of work into the world of music from where you are feeding without spending any money, its an EXCHANGE, not just a gimme gimme by the audience. Somebody should get something back when you get a record, and if you are too lazy to give anything real back, then you shoudl give money.
LP4 have had that very discussion about people devaluing things that are given away for free, and Kilian’s definitely right about that. There are exceptions, like if it’s something cool or fun like a sticker or a T-shirt but actual albums, you must sell them for something or people will assume (probably rightly) that they are crap.
I always thought I would love ST37 but somehow never got around to getting any of their stuff. Vinyl is impractical for me at the moment and their Myspace player doesn’t behave for me either so they will have to continue to be a short-term mystery.
On the future of music front: There’s an interesting book called THE FUTURE OF MUSIC. One of the proposals it puts forth is one where music is a utility not unlike electricity (or, maybe more aptly, websites). You pay a single uniform fee for access to all music, no matter where it comes from, and it gets distributed by the provider to the appropriate sources in proportion. I believe something like this goes on in Korea already, with $5/month all you can download or something. (I could be totally off base. I could also be repeating something somebody else said on this blog.)
There’s a lot more that I have to say on the topic but I’ve commented too much tonight already. Some blog in the future I’ll dredge up the memory of my short-lived record label.
I have a pathological hatred of smoking and a deep seated libertarian leaning (although much less deep than it used to be). Therefore, smoking bans cause me cognitive dissonance in the amount they satisfy me. So, too, does the interstate highway system.
Okay, time to sleep. Must remember to buy Jonx albums next time I’m in the States.
Btw I dig that Jonx cut you put up Ramon. It is a little out of tuney (kind of like everything I’ve ever recorded). Are they part of this instru-metal world that Chicago’s Russian Circles lives in?
Also where did they record – I love the in-stereo drums effect.
Kilian-
I’m not sure what you mean by the in-stereo drums effect, but we recorded with Chris Ryan at Johnny Killed Rock ‘n’ Roll in Houston, which is now called something else. Glad you liked it.
Here’s my worthless opinions. I download a shit load of music every month. I pay about $25 for the whole year in order to have limitless downloads. I know that can’t be legal and I’m sorry to all you musicians. But in all fairness, most of the stuff I download is pretty obscure. If I do download a new song, I limit it to one per album. I often find myself purchasing the entire album based on that one song coupled with good reviews. I’m sorry but if I can’t find it anywhere else, then I’m gonna download it if I can. I always make it a point to legally purchase music from artists I really love and that I can readily find. One, because I want to pay the artist for all their work and two, I love to read the liner notes and lyrics and see all the artwork. If someone went through all the trouble expressing themselves on multiple levels then who am I to slap them in the face by perpetuating the “starving artist” concept?
The smoking bans. It’s about fucking time. Many who are no longer allowed to smoke in public venues are afforded the unique opportunity to realize that they do indeed have that will power to cease smoking for that particular time interval and often find they can quit all together. What a double standard our society puts on money making machines. I find it very difficult to understand how something that not only causes cancer to the user, but to innocent bystanders is still allowed to be readily available? Then lets throw in all the chemicals they put in it to make it addictive.
The drug war?? Why try? We sell that shit OTC, and we package it so we can attract the next generation of smokers.