Gangstas just wanna have fun

Just read that Ice Cube will fill the void after Cyndi Lauper, who had to cancel her show, at this summer's Hultsfreds Festival in Sweden. This is the most funny replacement since David Bowie cancelled his gig at the Roskilde Festival in 2004 just two days before he was gonna perform, and most people were already there camping, and got replaced in the last minute by Slipknot. There were a lot of confused 50-year-olds hanging around then I can tell you! Now I can see in front of me a bunch of girls in crazy coloured hair and neon 80s clothes waiting in front of the stage, and Cube comes out and ask "where mah muthafuckin gangstas at??!". Priceless. Well, this gives me a reason to get my gangsta out and pump some ol' Ice Cube, before he was doing shitty films. Chickity-check yo self before you wreck yo self!!

Ice Cube - "It Was A Good Day / Check Yo Self"

Ice Cute, in a girlie bandana

In the backstreets of Dirrty Durham

Summer vibes

A great way to start off the day is to listen to some nice, happy music to get you in a good mood. This morning I found two new (one is almost two months but new to me, while the other is banging new!) songs that with their latin Copacabana feeling get me in the dance-all-night-at-the-beach-in-the-summer-vibe. As soon as the exams are over I will not get out of my shorts, top, and flip-flops, and just relax in the sun.
Both songs are the first video from each artist's new album. Jack Peñate's second album "Everything Is New" comes out June 22, and Mos Def's fourth album "The Ecstacic" comes out June 9. Perfect time for the summer!
For those who wants to dance a bit longer there's the Extended Mix of "Tonight's Today" on Spotify.

Jack Peñate - "Tonight's Today"


Mos Def - "Casa Bey"

Get Busy

Haven't been much study time lately, just looked through some books. Haven't really done much at all. But Friday night I got my ass out of the sofa and met up with Tom and Jake to go out and grab some pints. Drank two, one Örebro Bitter and one Newcastle Brown Ale, paid £10. Not exactly college prices. The two pubs we went to were both really busy, and saw some old familiar faces, but after we had sit down for a while we decided to head back to Tom's. The night wasn't really anything special, but doesn't have to be when you're seeing your mates again after a bit more than two months, still cool.
Last night I just stayed home and relaxed with a film. Saw Woody Allen's latest one, "Vicky, Cristina, Barcelona". Really great acting from everyone in it, and it made you wanna go to Barcelona to see all the cool architecture, art and stuff in the city (and find some good looking American tourists too), but I don't think the film itself was anything special, worth seeing though.
So now it's time to get busy, and as I did during the last term break I'm gonna pack my bag and head over to Uppsala. Leave you with a great song from Primal Scream's latest album:

Primal Scream - "Uptown"

Look-a-like

The term is really going towards the end, and as I have handled in all my summative essays there is not much to do then to try to read all the literature that's left. However, this afternoon I had a tutorial in Geographies of Health and Health Care. As always the tutorial was lead by a PhD student or such that I never met before. He was a tall black guy, and he spoke with a quite slow, low and dark voice that was very calm, soft and relaxing to listen to. As I sat there, trying to keep up with the discussion going on, I couldn't stop thinking about who he reminded me of, and suddenly I realize who it was. A bit because of the looks but mostly because of the voice, and I was just waiting for him to stand up and start singing this song:

The Roots 'slow jam' the news

Last night it was the premiere of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, which he took over from my favourite late night show host Conan O'Brien. Jimmy Fallon has been really funny in Saturday Night Live for years now so I was happy to see that he was chosen to host the show. But I was even more excited, although with mixed feelings at first, when it was announced that my absolute favourite group and probably one of the world's greatest live act, The Roots, was gonna be the house band. This means though that they are not gonna tour as much as before (which was a lot), especially not Europe. They always did a stop in Stockholm, and fortunately I had the luck to see them once. I've seen a short clip from the first show, and I must say it passed the test. Especially the 'slow jam the news' bit, where Black Thought aka Tariq shows again that he not only can turn a mic on fire but also sing really great! I hope it starts to show really soon in Sweden so I get to see more of it.

The Kaiser-concert

Since a picture say more than a thousand words, here are some photos from the concert with Kaiser Cheifs Saturday Night in Newcastle.

Oh my god, I predict a riot Saturday night!

Tonight is the big night! The moment we've all (me and Verena, and Philipp's stand-in Felix) been waiting for since booking the tickets in late October or something. Tonight is the concert with Kaiser Chiefs in Newcastle!! Have never seen them live before but seen live clips online, so I think they're gonna be fantastic live and their music is made to be played in front of a big wild audience. Sometime after eight tongight I will be probably rocking out like hell! Don't know when the concert ends, but hopefully we'll make it on the last train back to Durham, where the rock'n'roll riot will continue at Revolver!

Kaiser Cheifs - "I Predict A Riot" (Live from Elland Road)

Ticket to ride

Yesterday I received a letter that contained the three tickets to Kaiser Chiefs I've been waiting for. The concert is in a bit more than two weeks and is going to be my first concert so far since I came here, even though I had as a goal to try to go and see as many as I could. Unfortunately, the big concerts in Newcastle sell out quite quick. Also, ironically there have been quite many concerts now in Sweden that I've really wanted to see. One of them is the "Check The Rhyme Tour" tonight in Gothenburg that includes a dream-team line-up of classic hip-hop acts as Beatnuts, Tha Alkaholiks, Paris, Lords of the Underground, and Jeru The Damaja. I've already seen Beatnuts once in Stockholm, after which Juju (one of the rappers) were arrested after a bar fight. Anyhow, I'm really looking forward to the end of this month, and hope I get to see some more concerts before I leave back to Sweden in summer.

Live!

I guess most of you are familiar with the brilliant (Swedish, yeah!) music service Spotify by now(, even though not so brilliant anymore). Now I have found another great free online music service; Fabchannel. It's a Dutch website that let you stream almost 1000 live concerts in lots of different genres, most of them from Amsterdam. It's very good quality, both sound and picture, not some amateur stuff. You get to see the setlist for the concert you're watching and you skip to the next song if you want to, and also add songs and make your own playlists. So far I've seen some great concerts with Shout Out Louds, MGMT, Lightspeed Champion, Millencolin, and CSS. It's like having your own concert venue in your own room!

Stress

Got pretty much school work to do right now, and it just stresses me out totally. Don't really know where to start with everything. However, gonna have a meeting tomorrow with my tutor, and then talk to some of my teachers, so after that some things hopefully been sorted out a bit and I can move on.
Here's two, bit differently, hip-hop classics on the theme:

Organized Konfusion - "Stress"

A Tribe Called Quest - "Stressed Out"

Free Spotify!

For those that have read this blog a while you have seen that I have had in many of my music posts a Spotify-link to the music I have written about so you can listen to it yourself. Spotify is, for you who already don't know and are using it, a music program that let you stream and listen to music through your computer. As the company that developed it has made contracts with all the major record labels and lots of smaller ones it allows you to listen to a huge number of songs in a good sound quality. Through the UK you can right now listen to 2 225 382 songs, in Sweden even a bit more right now I think! The program is free to download, but to get a free account you have to get an invitation from another user. The free version is funded by short advertising messages that sometimes comes in between the songs but not that often. There is also the premium account without advertising that cost 9.99 € (approximately 12 USD, £10 GBP or 100 SEK). Spotify Premium is available in Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Spain and the UK. The Free version is only available in the UK, Finland, Sweden, Norway and Spain. It looks a lot like iTunes and very easy to use. The good thing now is that I received a couple invitations when I got back here and changed country to UK in my profile (I guess they want to spread the program outside of Sweden, where it was created and launched). So I will now hold a contest where you can win a free Spotify account!! The only thing you have to do is to motivate in a comment to this post why you should get one of the two accounts I'm going to give out! I will let announce the winners next Friday.

Get On Your Boots

U2 is back with a new first single from the forthcoming album "No Line On The Horizon". The single won't be out until 15 February (digital) but you can hear it already from their own exclusive site and on Spotify. The album is said by the band themselves to be inspired by time spent with Jack White and Jimmy Page, which you can hear a bit on the heavy, disted, cool rock'n'roll riff that kicks in immediately at the beginning of the song. The melody isn't as strong during the verse, but the bass-line lying a bit in the background keeps the groove up. Bono has also said that the album would include a "dancefloor shock", and I can see this song working on the floor at rock clubs. Sounds a bit more experimental and dance-orientated, judging from this song, than their last two albums. The best part is at the end of the song when there is a bit of a drum break, and then the guitar riff comes back harder than before and Bono yells 'yea he hey!' during the chorus, and I find myself playing a air guitar. The only thing that annoys me a bit is the electronic blip-blop sound that comes up like two times at the beginning of the chorus and just sounds like some computer warning message. Very useless, could have skipped that. A Swedish music journalist gave the song a 0/5 and called it "major crap" (which I think is more about his expectations not being fulfilled), and that the lyrics are just a bunch of lines put together without making sense. I can agree on the lyrics part, not the best I've heard. The line "I've gotta submarine, you've got gasoline / I don't wanna talk about war between nations/ Not right now" comes right before the chorus about 'sexy boots'. Doesn't really sound like the world-saving Bono you're used to. Maybe it's supposed to be ironic, I don't know. To sum it up it's not the best song I've heard from U2, and not an amazing first single either, but after a few listenings it grows a bit, and the riff kind of get stuck in your head. I would give it a 3/5, and look forward to hear the full album at the end of February.

MC Phoenix

Speaking of rappers turned actors, just read that Joaquin Phoenix from "Gladiator" and "Walk The Line" is going to stop acting and instead concentrating on a rap career. His brother River had his rock-thing going on in the early 90s, but that seemed more naturally as he hung around many of the biggest names in rock of that time and looked a bit like a grunge-artist. Joaquin doesn't really look like your average rapper, not even the average alternative white rapper. Although, he doesn't seem to want to be alternative as his debut album is going to be produced by Diddy. It's going to be interesting to hear, but I already have my doubts. As Xzibit said already in '96: "It don't make sense; either you a soldier from the start, or a actor with a record deal tryin to play the part, like that".

Rapper/Actor

A lot of rappers are very interested in making it in the movie business. Ice Cube, Mos Def, Queen Latifah, Common, Method Man, Ludacris, and so on, have already done it, and many more are trying with mixed results. If they're not make it on the big screen they do a bit of acting in their own music videos. King Magazine listed the 10 Worst Movie-Inspired Videos (in hip-hop). I definetely don't agree with all of their choices. I'd never seen Ludacris' "Slap" before, but I think the "Taxi Driver"-theme works and it fit the lyrics and the mood of the song. I also like De La Soul's "Wizard of Oz"-inspired "Oooh", and Nas' "Casino"-video for his "Street Dreams" is a classic! However, I totally agree on Ja Rule's really corny "Grease"-video for "Mesmerize", and Jay-Z probably do some of the worst acting I've ever seen as Verbal Kint from "The Usual Suspects" in "The City Is Mine". I decided to put together a Top 3 of my favourite movie-inspired (hip-hop) videos:

3. Busta Rhymes - "Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See"
Busta dressed up as Prince Akeem Joffer from "Coming To America". Very well done, and who other than him could have an elephant in his video?



2. Redman - "Whateva Man"
Red' gets bailed out and hook up with his partner-in-crime Method Man as hip-hop's version of "The Blues Brothers". They are just as cool and laidback (if not even more) as the original duo.



1. Infinite Mass - "Caught Up In Da Game"
The original Swedish gangstas went to L.A. to shoot their classic video as the film about the man almost every rapper wants to be; "Scarface". They follow the theme all the way through the video with the right scenery, type of clothes and everything, without making it look like a parody.



Feel free to comment and add on the list if you got your own favourite movie-inspired music videos.

Mästerliga Musikministeriet

Sitter inte längre lika mycket och zappar framför TV:n som man gjorde förut. På mitt lilla rum i Durham har jag inte ens någon TV, så blir istället att jag följer nyheterna och några få program jag verkligen gillar på nätet. Ett av de program som gått förut som jag då gillade mycket och som hade premiär igen igår är Musikministeriet i SVT. Ett praktexempel på bra s k 'edutainment', och speciellt då det behandlar ett av mina favoritintressen, musik, på ett smart och roligt sätt. Igår handlade det om kropp och musik, bl a om synestesi, som gör att man t ex kan se färger och former när man hör ljud (vilket var lite av ett tema för N.E.R.D:s senaste album "Seeing Sounds"). Några personer fick pröva på att "se" och "smaka" på Eric Gadds gamla hit "Bara Himlen Ser På", kul experiment.
Ett annat nytt program som gick på SVT igår var "Mästarnas mästare" där 11 före detta idrottsstjärnor bor ihop i ett hus i Spanien och tävlar mot varandra. Inte alls lika dokusåpa-aktigt som "Robinson", "Big Brother", "Farmen" eller något annat skit, utan mer fokuserat på tävlingarna, idrottarna och deras tidigare prestationer. Igår var det mycket fokus på Thomas Wassberg. Jag är själv lite för ung för att komma ihåg när han tävlade, men när de visade ett inslag med massa klipp från hans karriär så såg man verkligen att det handlar om en idrottare och profil av högsta rang. En som verkade uppenbart imponerad av Wassberg var Ara Abrahamian (som larvigt anklagades för fusk, suck it up Erica). Jag antar att 'real recognize real' som vi brukar säga. Dessutom, appropå sådant gatu-tugg så hade Peter "Peja" Lindholm på sig en t-shirt där man kunde skymta texten 'ghetto' och något mer med bl a bilder på tärningar när de alla samlats för att titta på bitar från (den riktigt snygga) Emelie Öhrstigs karriär. Verkar som curling alltså är jävligt gangsta. Kommer iallafall följa båda dessa serier via nätet i England de kommande veckorna.

Keep it on the lo!

Camp Lo är tillbaka igen! Hip-hop duon från New York med ett av det mest tillbakalutade flytet någonsin över coola svängiga beats. Deras nya låt "Double Doors" har en video som är en del av serien "Four Elements" och är riktigt snygg med ett av hip-hopens element; breakdance. Låten i sig är precis lika 70-talsaktigt blaxploitation-cool som tidigare klassiker som dom här från albumet "Uptown Saturday Night". De släppte också för inte så länge sen singeln "Lumdi", då de också bytte namn till enbart The Lo, och sägs vara på väg med en ny skiva snart i år. Det här inlägget tillägnar jag Tollén och Jolle, som jag vet sitter och nickar med och diggar!

"Double Doors"

Good winter

When I did my list of this year's best albums I also went through many magazines' year lists. One album that I saw in many of them was Bon Iver's "For Emma, Forever Ago". First I didn't take much notice to it, and when I listened to it I didn't think it was anything special (as much when I listen to it the first time) as singer/songwriters normally isn't my cup of tea, but then I gave it another chance and liked it more and more. I wouldn't want to change my list, but this album ranks very highly for me now as I've listened to it a lot. Behind the name Bon Iver, which is an intentional misspelling of 'bon hiver' (french for 'good winter'), is Justin Vernon who was a part of a group that later broke up, and when he also broke up with a girlfriend he went home to Wisconsin and settled in a cabin by himself for three months and recorded the album. The songs are amazingly beautiful with Justin's high pitched voice and lots of voice overs that make it sounds very deep and emotional.
Even though the snow now is gone and the weather is a bit more mild it was a week ago almost down to -15 and lots of snow and bright skies, so I think it has been a very good winter and this album is like a soundtrack to a cold day.

"Skinny Love"

"The Wolves (Act I And II)"

Raw Power

The Stooges gitarrist Ron Asheton har dött 60 år gammal, mannen bakom några av de coolaste, tyngsta och svängigaste rock-riffen någonsin. Såg gruppen göra comeback på Roskilde 2004, halva konserten i regn. Medan Iggy Pop, i högform, sprang runt över scenen som en galning i bar överkropp och så lågt sittande tajta jeans att man trodde de skulle ramla av hela tiden, juckandes och dansandes, så stod Ron Asheton fast som en staty men ändå cool som fan. Undrar nu hur det blir med deras festivalspelning i Karlskoga som jag var riktigt sugen på att gå och se. Håller mig lite till hundtemat som blivit den här veckan, och bjuder på en av de bästa Stooges-låtarna med ett riff som är enkelt men så grymt:

The Stooges - "I wanna be your dog"

Best of 2008: Kommentarer

När man sätter ihop en lista över de tio bästa albumen från det gångna året så inser man snabbt att man måste sålla bland flera favoriter, och att många kommer hamna utanför. Flera personliga favoriter hamnade (konstigt nog) utanför listan: Kings of Leons fjärde album "Only By The Night", som saknar lite av det rockiga drivet de haft tidigare men har några av de bästa melodier de gjort; Eagles of Death Metals "Heart On", tungt och svängigt som fan, eller som Josh Homme beskrev musiken, "like a bunch of hip bones shakin'"; de två Danger Mouse producerade skivorna, Becks "Modern Guilt" och The Black Keys "Attack & Release"; de två bästa svenskspråkiga i år, Markus Krunegårds "Markusevangeliet" och Veronica Maggios "Och Vinnaren Är...", som båda behandlar språket fantistiskt; Estelles eklektiska "Shine"; The Raconteurs "Consolers Of The Lonely" m.fl. Kriteriet jag framför allt gick efter när jag gjorde listan var att skivorna som hamnade på topp tio skulle vara sådana som håller i längden, som man långt efter första och många lyssningar fortfarande hittar nya saker i musiken, och jag är fortfarande nöjd med de tio som kom med. Jag har gjort den Spotify-lista med alla de albumen som kom med på listan (konstigt nog finns inte 1:an, 3:an och 4:an, och inte heller två av årets hiphop-släpp Chords "Things We Do For Things" eller Evidences "The Layover EP") och de som jag gillar men som inte kom med.

http://open.spotify.com/user/pernorberg/playlist/5RJuJgvV1tVCYQ4Z90m6D7

Best of 2008: Plats 2

2. MGMT - "Oracular Spectacular"
MGMT hette tidigare The Management men bytte namn när de släppte EP:n "Time To Pretend" 2005. Gruppen består av två killar från New York och början av det här året släppte de albumet "Oracular Spectacular", som hyllats otroligt mycket och valdes till årets skiva i brittiska tidningen NME. Musiken låter modernt futuristisk och glammigt 70-tal på samma gång, psykedeliskt och rymdaktigt. Singlarna "Time To Pretend" och "Kids" har syntiga starka melodier som sätter sig direkt och fått igång många dansgolv under året. Deras videor, t.ex. till "Electric Feel" återspeglar dessutom musiken bra, känns som filmmusik till något om i en galax långt borta.