It List: Thursday

St. Vincent/Pattern Is Movement (The Granada): For me to say anything about St. Vincent at this point would be like me trying to give my two cents on Cowboys training camp. It's a completely overexposed subject in the local media that a bunch of "experts" weigh in on, boring everyone who has to read their press-release tainted tripe to tears, or even worse, until tears of pure blood drip down your face and stain the news-print document you clutch in your bored little hands.

I'm sorry. Let's slow down a little bit.

Look, the hype isn't her fault and I should mention that St. Vincent plays inoffensive, meticulously constructed, pop songs with superficially "weird" sounds thrown in, along with the occasional odd structure. Critics love that. There's nothing really terrible about it, but I used to get her mixed up with Regina Spektor, until I heard Regina Spektor do this wonderfully arranged and surprisingly decent version of "Real Love." I don't get them mixed up anymore.

Santigold/Amanda Blank/Trouble Andrew (House Of Blues): However unfairly, Santigold is often compared to MIA. For her sake, it would be a shame if Santoigold would ultimately be more known for her work being sampled more than anything else, a fate that has befallen MIA, who is rather successful in spite of that fact. Of course, this is nothing new, it's been happening since ESG had an underground hit with "UFO," but the track was much more known for being so commonly sampled in hip hop songs. Anyway, the track that made me think of this in the first place, "Brooklyn Go Hard" is on the Notorious soundtrack, and it's by Jay-Z, who Santigold is supposed to eventually collaborate with again at some point. Whatever comparisons you make with Santigold, don't just say anything about R&B. Her annoyance at being lumped in as an R&B artist produced some rather truthful insight on the vague racism often inherent in genre classifications, and she blurted some pretty choice quotes in this Lipster interview:

"It's racist (laughs). It's totally racist. Everyone is just so shocked that I don't like R&B. Why does R&B keep coming into my interviews? It's pissing me off. I didn't grow up as a big fan of R&B and, like, what is the big shocker? It's stupid. In the beginning I thought that was funny. I'm an 'MC', I'm a 'soul singer', I'm a 'dance hybrid artist'. And some guy said I looked like Kelly Rowland!"

Santigold claims that people are overlooking the New Wave and Rock influences in her music and it all kind of reminds me of when I worked at this record store, I won't name any names, and I had this one boss who insisted on putting Prince and Michael Jackson in the "Soul/R&B" section, as opposed to "Pop/Rock." I confronted him in my last five minutes on the clock, on my last day at work, and explained, "Prince and Michael Jackson are in the top ten list of the most important and iconic artists in POP MUSIC. Why do you insist on categorizing them otherwise?" Anyways, kids, I don't recommend basically calling your boss a racist on your last day at work, but sometimes you just have to.


Ty Segall/The Moonhearts/The Aquaholics (Club Dada): Wait, let me get this straight: A ONE-MAN BAND that plays GARAGE ROCK?! Wait, what? Are you serious? So, he just has a bass drum and a tambourine? And he drums while playing guitar? That is really crazy! And he could have chosen any type of music but he chose GARAGE ROCK! How fucking mind-blowing! How does he go on tour? Does he have to load all of his equipment himself? Is he one of those dudes that asks the crowd to buy him a drink from the stage? How does he sell his merch? He must have to bring a "band" full of roadies, haha. WHOA.

Little Black Dress (Good Records): Free show starts at 8.

80's Fucking Night (Hailey's)

Matthew Gray, Delves Into The Humanity Pools With The Six...(I refuse to type the rest of that name)/Baruch The Scribe/The Fox And The Bird/Angel Lenora And The Hand Combine (The Hydrant)

Wild In The Streets (The Amsterdam)

Conscientious Projector: No End In Sight (1919 Hemphill)