Soundcheck

Not long after Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen became friends, they knew they wanted to create something together. That collaboration first took form as a series of sketch-comedy videos, which they put online as ThunderAnt. And as those videos took off, it soon served as the backbone for something far more ambitious in scope: Portlandia. The IFC sketch-comedy show, which won a Peabody in 2012, portrays Armisen (formerly of Saturday Night Live) and Brownstein (former guitarist of Sleater-Kinney and Wild Flag) as very specific types of people found in Portland, Ore. From feminist bookstore owners and overeager local foodies to too-hip cat-themed bands, Battlestar Galactica binge-watchers, and so much more, Portlandia has relentlessly captured, made fun of, and perhaps even inspired many peculiar (mustachioed, pierced) hipster trends, artisanal culture and yuppie behaviors -- not only in Portland, but now, any place with a touch of eccentricity. (Who hasn't heard someone exclaim "Put a bird on it!" or laughed at artinin the last few years?)     And in a hilarious new sketch in the show's upcoming fourth season, Armisen and Brownstein pokes at public radio culture as it intersects with tailgating and Grateful Dead touring as characters outside of A Prairie Home Companion show share stories about Garrison Keillor over hot tea.  "We got you!" laughs Brownstein. "You should protest," adds Armisen. "I think we're so familiar with it. It's such a part of our lives, it's such a good reference. I feel like everyone knows what we mean."     In a conversation with Soundcheck host John Schaefer, Brownstein and Armisen talk about the show's impressive list of guest stars, and what else we can expect this season. Plus, Armisen discusses his new role as leader and curator of the "8G Band" on Seth Meyers' just-premiered Late Night, Browstein talks about her upcoming memoir, and the chances Sleater-Kinney may reunite any time soon.   Interview Highlights: On the scheduling limitations and the challenges that help them come up with new ideas each year: Armisen: "I feel like we love doing it, so we're always eager to get back into the writers room. Once we're there, the challenge we kind of put on ourselves is 'How can we make it different without over thinking it?'" Brownstein: "The world of Portlandia is insular in so many ways, but having there be an insularity to the timeframe puts a sort of elevated quality and importance on the show. And I think it gives us a sort of renewed sense of eagerness and inspiration for it. We leave and gain perspective and come back very excited and enthusiastic and refreshed." On how filming Portlandia is a lot like recording an album: Brownstein: "You go in with most of the songs done, but there's enough room to surprise yourself and to come up with something on the spot. And I think with the nature of the show, which is partly improvised, you want an element that feels dangerous and reckless and a little bit clumsy. And then something happens that you weren't expecting. And that happens every season. Although we're more and more prepared than ever, which I think also helps." On hipster culture in Portland versus Brooklyn: Brownstein: "I feel like we're a show that focuses so much on similarities and the way that these mindsets kind of get entrenched and people kind of curate their lives a little bit. Portland is a city where time is less of a commodity. If you live in Brooklyn, which is a much bigger city than Portland, you go through your day aware that you have a certain amount of time to do things. And you don't want to necessarily spend ten minutes talking to the checker at the grocery store or the bank teller. "And in Portland they really exault leisure there, and you will stand in line while everybody has a personal conversation. And it is jarring. And so I will say, that niceness, it's there. I don't know how functional it is." Armisen: "As a New Yorker, you feel it." Brownstein: "You know what Portl

Natalia Clavier's clear, confident voice will be familiar to fans of dub/jazz/bossa nova DJ duo Thievery Corporation, for whom she's regularly contributed vocals since 2007. But, as if that isn't a strong enough list of influences, she adds "Latin-Alternative-Bilingual-Global-Electronic-Fusion." Clavier's musical DNA really is global: She grew up in Buenos Aires, has lived in Barcelona, and now calls Brooklyn home. Her first album was completely in Spanish, but for her most recent album, Lumen, most of her songwriting in English. The result can't be accurately described, regardless of language. It must be heard.

This spring is shaping up to be a busy one on Broadway – especially when it comes to new musicals. Joining us with a preview is Michael Riedel, theater columnist for the New York Post and co-host of the weekly TV show Theater Talk on PBS.  Michael Riedel on If/Then (opening March 30)  This is an original musical, which is something unique these days on Broadway -- not based on a movie, not based on a book -- written by Brian Yorkey and Tom Kitt, who did Next To Normal, which won the Pulitzer Prize. It is what its title is -- If/Then. It's a series of questions posed in one's life: if I had done this, then that would have happened. But if I'd done that, this would have happened.    On Bullets Over Broadway (opening April 10)  Woody [Allen] is taking many of the many great popular tunes of the 1920s. He's so secretive about everything that they won't release the song list, so we only know about four or five songs that are in the show. Everything else is a deep, dark woody Allen secret.    On Rocky: The Musical (opening March 13)  What I hear is that the special effects are really dazzling. The boxing ring lifts off of the stage and moves out over the audience and twirls around, so you in the audience, you feel that you're actually right around the ropes of the boxing ring.   On Hedwig and the Angry Inch (opening April 22)  One of the very rare musicals in which rock music -- real rock music -- actually works. It's hard to write a rock score for Broadway, because rock music can be very introverted lyrically, and Broadway needs a kind of muscular, melodic quality to it, and a song that drives the characters and drives the story.... There's a song in Hedwig and the Angry Inch called "Wicked Little Town" which is a great rock song, a great ballad, and a great musical theater song, and that is really hard to pull together those three strands.    On Cabaret opening April 24)  There's a revival of Cabaret, starring Alan Cumming. I am ambivalent about this whole endeavor. I saw that revival originally in 1997, with Alan, and nobody knew who Alan Cumming was. Cabaret had not really been around in a long time, and there was an absolutely brilliant and heartbreaking performance -- Natasha Richardson as Sally Bowles.... There are no rules in show business except for one: you can't capture lightning in a bottle a second time. 

“Should’ve stayed in bed today / I much prefer the mundane,” Courtney Barnett sings near the end of “Avant Gardener.” Considering the song’s winding and darkly comedic first-person account of an anaphylactic anxiety attack that finds her in an ambulance after attempting some gardening, the line is the understatement of the year. But Barnett’s signature song -- with its fantastic “I’m so over it” deadpan delivery -- does sort of stand in as the modus operandi of The Double EP: A Sea Of Split Peas -- the Melbourne, Australia songwriter’s self-released 2013 collection, now set to be reissued in the U.S. in April. Amid a swirling fury of frayed-wire guitar distortion and a rambling backbeat, Barnett speak-sings fleeting thoughts about failed relationships, boredom, and youthful directionless in exacting detail and shrugging nonchalance. And while her lyrics seem so specifically personal, and well, mundane, they’re immediately identifiable. Case in point: take “Are You Looking After Yourself” -- a phone conversation with her parents that we’ve all had at one time or another, where they ask “Are you working hard my darling, we’re so worried… Are you eating? You sound so thin.” Or see her witty setup-punchline in “Avant Gardener”: “The paramedic thinks I’m clever 'cause I play guitar / I think she’s clever 'cause she stops people dying.” Whether these detached matter-of-fact observations are real-life tales or adopted persona -- or likely, both -- it’s this kind of concise, of-the-moment songwriting that makes Barnett such a sharp and potent young talent.   Set List: "Avant Gardener" "Lance Jr." "History Eraser"

Music is a major part of what makes going to the movies an experience. This year's Academy Award fields for Best Original Song and Best Original Score are dominated by a who's-who in the pop and symphonic music worlds, making for a stiff competition. Melena Ryzik, the lead writer for The New York Times' Carpetbagger blog, calls this the "the most rock-starriest group of hopefuls" that she's encountered in five years of covering the awards. In a conversation with Soundcheck host John Schaefer, Ryzik details the stacked Oscar field, the high expectations, the underdogs, and the controversial withdrawal of one of the Best Song nominees.   BEST ORIGINAL SONG NOMINEES "Happy," Despicable Me 2 -- written by Pharrell Williams     "Let It Go," Frozen -- written by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez      "The Moon Song," Her -- written by Karen O     "Ordinary Love," Mandela: Long Walk To Freedom -- written by U2     BEST ORIGINAL SCORE NOMINEES The Book Thief, John Williams Gravity, Steven Price Her, Will Butler & Owen Pallett Philomena, Alexandre Desplat Saving Mr. Banks, Thomas Newman

The Songwriters’ Hall of Fame recently announced that among its 2014 inductees will be Ray Davies -- longtime frontman of the British rock band The Kinks. So today, we’re bringing you The Soundcheck Guide To The Kinks, an unofficial, but oh-so-informative look at the band for both beginners and big fans. Helping us out with it is Joe Levy, editor of Billboard magazine, who shares a couple of must-hear tracks, deep cuts and perhaps better-left-unheard songs.  Three Must-Hear Tracks by The Kinks:   You Really Got Me (Kinks, 1964) You Really Got Me (Kinks, 1964) Joe Levy: "[It was their] first big single, and arguably the birthplace of heavy metal. How raw, how punk do those opening chords sound? This is like a power trio song -- this song sounded so raw, so tough, that Pete Townsend wrote to the producer, Shel Talmy, and said, 'Will you produce my band? That sounds great.'"  Waterloo Sunset (Something Else By The Kinks, 1967)  Joe Levy: "Right at the period where they're transitioning into producing themselves, they have this record Something Else By The Kinks. The great song here is 'Waterloo Sunset.' An unbelievably beautiful, high baroque, English pop song."     Father Christmas (1977)  Joe Levy: "This is my pick for a 'late-period Kinks' piece, but it's not that late, given how long they went on.... This is an interesting song. This is as mean and as violent as Davies' class struggle ever got. And he wrote a lot of songs about class in England. This is a song from the perspective of some kids who grow up with the idea of Christmas, they grow up poor, and they're robbing a department store Santa, basically."    Two Deep Cuts from The Kinks:   Little Miss Queen of Darkness (Face To Face, 1966)  Joe Levy: "This is the first album where Davies wrote all the songs, from front to back.... What this song is really about is a girl on the scene in swinging London, blonde curls, false eyelashes, hiding the darkness inside."    Big Sky (The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society, 1968)  Joe Levy: "This is a sophisticated notion for a rock band. This is about looking up at the big sky, 'Where's God?' God has no time for you. God is indifferent."  One Song That's Better Left Unheard:   Young Conservatives (State of Confusion, 1983)  Joe Levy: "Of course the neo-cons are on the rise in England, it's Thatcher England, this must be attacking young conservatives. And yet when you listen to the song,  it does feel a bit confused to me. It really seems to be attacking the end of the idealism of the '60s, more than, maybe instead of attacking young conservatives. The two things don't necessarily have something to do with each other. It seems like Davies is singing more about himself than his peers... The song ends up just feeling like a mess to me." 

Your zip code says a lot about you. Music streaming service Pandora thinks it says a lot more about you when it's paired with your music tastes.  In fact, data scientists at Pandora think they can tell what your political preferences are, given those two pieces of information. And they're willing to sell that information to political campaigns that are seeking to target their ad spending in the run-up to 2014 mid-term elections. "The true test will be if people click on the ads," says Elizabeth Dwoskin, who covers data and tech for The Wall Street Journal. "The Pandora algorithm for Yanni indicates that people who listen to New Age are Republican. So it will be funny if people who like New Age music start getting tons of ads for politicians they would never be interested in. In her recent report, Dwoskin explains how Pandora thinks it can tell whether you vote blue or red, and how it plans to make money off both colors.  In a conversation with Soundcheck host John Schaefer, Dwoskin indicates that listening to a lot of reggae or country is a dead giveaway, while listening to a lot of hip-hop or classic rock could throw the algorithms off your trail.  "Pandora doesn't really know what to do with [Bruce Springsteen]," says Dwoskin, "because Americans from both political parties like classic rock. Basically, every US user of Pandora gets a 'political leaning score' -- what percentage they think you lean one way or the other. If you only listen to classic rock, you'd probably get a neutral score." And -- just maybe -- you'd get to avoid that avalanche of ads that is heading your way.  

Through two albums with Lost In The Trees, songwriter and composer Ari Picker clawed at the wounds of a troubled childhood in emotional detail. Working through devastating memories and heartache in song can often be an exercise in therapy for the songwriter and listeners alike, and while Lost In The Trees’ lyrics certainly explored those painful thoughts, its music soared with overwhelming beauty thanks to its stirring folk songs embellished with chamber music arrangements. But with the band’s latest album, Past Life, the Chapel Hill collective seems to be shedding its skin. For the first time, Picker and bandmate Emma Nadeau collaborated together on the songwriting, crafting miniature film scores in pop song form. That can be heard on Lost In The Trees’ title track, “Past Life” or "Night Walking," which eschews the trademark strings for a sleeker, minimalist tone built around eerie and distorted synthesizers, electronic sequencers and an almost disco-like sheen. While Past Life presents a scaled-down, spacious sound for Lost In The Trees, but these songs are no less densely layered -- musically or lyrically. And even if these songs feel darker, there's a calming warmth and steady dance pulse running throughout that hints at hope, and a bit of fun.   For more photos, visit Soundcheck's Tumblr page. Set List: "Lady In White" "Excos" "Past Life"

As Delicate Steve, guitarist and multi-instrumentalist Steve Marion and his band played breezy indie pop instrumentals built around surf rock riffs and polyrhythmic African guitar melodies. But after two albums -- 2011's Wondervisions and 2012's Positive Force -- he and fellow bandmate Christian Peslak started crafting songs that felt far different from the music the longtime friends had made together for a decade.  As the collaboration began to explore, Marion set aside his guitar and got behind the drums, while Peslak took lead. The result became a brand new band, Saint Rich, and eventually, an album, Beyond The Drone. Unlike the winding jams of their former configuration, Saint Rich's music is built around tighter pop songcraft, blending triumphant '70s rock hooks, beautiful, soaring melodies and sharp, often whimsical lyrics. It's promising new album that serves as proof that by mixing things up, it's always possible to discover new territory. Hear the band perform songs from Beyond The Drone in the Soundcheck studio.   Saint Rich - "Officer" from stereogum on Vimeo. For more photos, visit Soundcheck's Tumblr page. Set List: "Sorry/Sadly" "You Ain't Worth The Night" "Officer"

Tom Wilson's fingerprints are all over the priceless rock music artifacts of the late 1960's, but chances are, you may not know his name. The tall, black jazz enthusiast from Waco, Texas produced breakthrough records by Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel, The Velvet Underground, Frank Zappa, Sun Ra, and many more. But just as quickly as he appeared in the mid-'60s, by the early 1970's he had almost completely disappeared off the music map.  Writer Michael Hall's recent piece for Texas Monthy calls Wilson "the greatest producer you've never heard of." In a conversation with Soundcheck host John Schaefer, Hall explains Wilson's impact on Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel, and the Velvets, and how his piece is helping bring more details about this forgotten producer to light.

Today, Soundcheck officially launches The Morrissey Book Club, a three-week journey into the recently-released autobiography of The Smiths frontman and dour spirit animal. (You can join us as we all read the book together in three medium-sized chunks.) And to kick things off, take a deep dive into the band's self-titled debut record, which just so happens to have been released exactly 30 years ago, on Feb. 20, 1984. A critically acclaimed, yet sullen album, The Smiths debuted at No. 2 on the U.K. charts, yielded the single, "What Difference Does It Make?" and paved the way for the band's 1985 release, Meat Is Murder. To help, music writer Tony Fletcher guides us through the music and myth of The Smiths, the influential English band and The Smiths, the album, which is just one topic covered in his exhaustive Smiths biography, A Light That Never Goes Out: The Enduring Saga of the Smiths.    

Since "Lovefool," (and, let's be honest, since Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet soundtrack) wistfully romanced its way onto pop radio and movie theaters in the late-1990’s -- and became, at least for a time, an inescapable No. 1 hit propelling The Cardigans to international acclaim -- Nina Persson has been one of Sweden’s most distinctive and beloved singers. As the iconic vocalist and lyricist of that seminal band, Persson’s been a boundary-pushing artist, creating fizzy and heartsick pop songs built around loungey atmosphere, trip hop grooves, and her trademark beguiling voice. And for anyone who grew up with The Cardigans’ albums First Band On the Moon and Gran Turismo, Persson’s swooning voice is the sound of nostalgia. Since The Cardigans, Persson has collaborated with many renowned artists including Manic Street Preachers, Sparklehorse and Danger Mouse, and A Camp, a project with husband Nathan Larson. But in all this time, she's never done a record under her name. Until now: Five years since the last A Camp record (2009’s Colonia), Persson is back with new music, with her first solo album, Animal Heart. For the new album, Persson says she wanted to simplify and “honor the singer,” writing most of the songs with Larson and Eric D. Johnson (formerly of The Shins and Fruit Bats) -- along with Joan As Policewoman’s Joan Wasser on “Food For The Beast.” And with songs like “Burning Bridges For Fuel” and the title track, Animal Heart is another fine effort from the always-charismatic singer.   Set List: "Animal Heart" "Forgot To Tell You" "Burning Bridges For Fuel"

All this week, Soundcheck's asking you to pick a side: The Beatles or The Rolling Stones? But no matter your loyalty, everyone can participate in our Beatles chart quiz, devised by writer Chris Molanphy. Given a pair of classic Fab Four songs, pick the one that charted higher in the U.S.

Jazz pianist Helen Sung has performed with the Mingus Big Band, recorded and toured with Meg Okura and the Pan Asian Chamber Jazz Ensemble. And now, she's releasing, Anthem For A New Day, her sixth album as a bandleader in her own right -- and one that continues her path of melding her refined classical background with dynamic jazz arrangements. Sung has called this record a "leap forward," and the outcome of years of experimenting and honing her ideas, she says she's finally come to her musical identity.  Hear Helen Sung and her band perform selections from the stellar new album in the Soundcheck studio.

Tackling big themes about the American West, race relations and oil, Philipp Meyer's epic novel The Son follows multiple generations of the McCullough family starting in the mid-1800s. The book wound up on best-of-2013 lists from the New York Times, USA Today, and the Washington Post.  Today, Meyer -- who once worked as a derivatives trader -- tells us how two songs by The Clash and the union anthem “Which Side Are You On?” got him thinking about a creative life beyond Wall Street. That path led him to write two acclaimed novels and a Guggenheim Fellowship.  Pick One: The Clash, "Guns of Brixton," from London Calling (1979) Pick Two: The Dropkick Murphys, "Which Side Are You On?" from Sing Loud, Sing Proud (2001) Pick Three: The Clash, "Straight to Hell," from Combat Rock (1982)