Big Thief - Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You

Sparrow is basically brutal as a streaming/CD track but makes so much more sense as a side opener on vinyl.

My wife was in the car when I was playing Sparrow but we were driving to Church so she couldn't right tell me to tune out these heavy theological truths could she? Chinaski Effect countered by religion

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4KmVnwqBJg

another new one

They posted some cute IG pics today, hanging out (in Nashville?). They seem to still have a great vibe together.

That new one's real nice. She/they sure have a way with a melody.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqdqATE8em4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CckLqi3mIxo

more new songs!

There should be a name for that feeling for how music changes when someone else enters your listening space or when you're sharing a listening space. I feel this most profoundly with jazz for some reason, how I suddenly become more aware of any discordance.

― Shard-borne Beatles with their drowsy hums (Chinaski), Friday, February 17, 2023 11:24 AM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

This is definitely a thing, and definitely a thing with skronking jazz

i have heavily experienced the Chinaski effect in my attempts to share Curb Your Enthusiasm with two different people. suddenly everything seemed very not funny at all

― President of Destiny Encounters International (Karl Malone), Friday, February 17, 2023 3:54 PM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

Might be because it's not very funny, you ever think of that? No

There's a kind of experience I think every music fan has had. I call it the "bad ears": It's a kind of one-on-one Wyatting, and it's what happens when the assumptions you make flip over and leave you the one vulnerable. It's when you're with a friend, and you play them some music you like and you want them to like too. They don't say anything. And suddenly you're hearing it with the bad ears: Every pretension, every flaw in the music becomes utterly obvious to you. The lines you thought were terrific are revealed as facile. The lines you thought were lovably dumb are chasms of embarrassment. The song ends. You want to vanish. And your friend smiles and says "Yeah, that was good," and then it's their turn.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XCMoPu8TXw

"vampire empire" on colbert with flute! the arrangement's really come a long way since last year

Really nice

That's great, I hope the rumors of another album ready to go soon prove true.

Might be because it's not very funny, you ever think of that? No

dog latin i had never thought of that!!

The song ends. You want to vanish. And your friend smiles and says "Yeah, that was good," and then it's their turn.

oof, we've all been there.

i do want to say, though, having been there many times, what a horrible way that is to engage with music and share your enthusiasm with people, to be the person who says "yeah that was good" in a perfunctory way and immediately it's "their turn". how awful it feels to be the person who shared the unliked music, or even just another person in the room wanting to just relax and be normal but instead finding themselves in the middle of a contest to see whose subjective taste reigns supreme. it's a competitive way of looking at art that isn't competitive at all, and yet it's what "being into music" is like, almost all of the time, when it involves other people. suddenly this thing that seemed so wonderful is not so wonderful, because it is now haunted by negative vibes. it can only be clean many years later, after the initial incident has long been forgotten and you hear the song again and only think "oh, i used to love this song!" without remembering why you stopped

don't expect anyone to agree with that on a board dedicated to listening to, sharing and criticizing music which rewards having unique contrary bold takes, btw, and i fully expect to completely contradict myself repeatedly in the future

if they do put out the dwnmibiy leftovers this year i don't think "vampire empire" would be on it, i get the impression that it's newer than that - adrianne was still figuring out the lyrics a little when i saw them last year and the arrangement's much more fleshed out now

they've said they want to build their own studio for their next album so i'm not necessarily expecting any new recordings until next year but who knows

i would be so down for a "we built our own studio for this album" kind of album from big thief. also i love the move of playing an unrecorded, commercially unavailable song on tv. i would be curious to see a list of other acts/songs of that nature; i bet it would tilt toward the special

Any news on what about "Happy with you / Poison shame" which I heard them play out last year? Have they adapted it much? I was quite into the repetition

Booming post, z_tbd

thank you, although i regretted it immediately lol. didn't mean for it to come off as crabby as it did, sorry

I would go to great lengths to avoid being present when someone listens to something I have recommended... it's almost sure to be awkward/uncomfortable, at minimum.

they're still playing "happy with you" and it doesn't seem to have changed much. seems plausible they could have already recorded it back in 2020. they have so many unreleased songs floating around

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gn40jcMdZ1o

it has to be the right person, I have a lot of great college memories of of me and my homie playing assorted mp3s and music videos for each other, with actual curiosity and openness. Found a lot of good music that way.

I guess I actually did have that kind of relationship with one particular jazzbo/jam-band/stoner roommate; but it was a very unique thing.

What a great, great song

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6H4wMF0dmlM

Not all heroes wear capes … well, who knows, maybe this “Matt” does wear a cape. Regardless, some genius has put together a spreadsheet with YouTube links to all the unreleased BT songs he can find: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1jaV_9uDMzld6-Jt2bjjNtyPbmizMhVNp1ZpfHlc5yus/edit

That’s great… a whole album there.

I'm reminded of the story about David Geffen asking Joni Mitchell to write a "single," so she came up with You Turn Me On, I'm a Radio, except I think this is a better song than that.

Texas-bred singer/songwriter and Big Thief guitarist Buck Meek has signed to 4AD and announces his new album, Haunted Mountain, out 25th August on 4AD. Additionally, he shares the lead single and title track, 'Haunted Mountain'; a song co-written alongside his friend and longtime hero Jolie Holland.

Buck Meek - Haunted Mountain
4AD

1. Mood Ring
2. Haunted Mountain
3. Paradise
4. Cyclades
5. Secret Side
6. Didn’t Know You Then
7. Undae Dunes
8. Where You’re Coming From
9. Lullabies
10. Lagrimas
11. The Rainbow

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv8uI2VXppA

"vampire empire" is out july 19!

they recorded it & "born for loving you" back in april while on tour, so there's probably not a new album on the way yet unless they've been recording more the last two months or have decided to put out the dwnmibiy outtakes

"vampire empire" will probably be a completely different arrangement to the incredible colbert version though, with how much they've been experimenting with it on tour

full band "born for loving you" is here

Vampire just dropped:
https://bigthief.bandcamp.com/album/vampire-empire-born-for-loving-you

Fantastic song, imo

i really miss the flute from the colbert performance but i'm glad this is pretty close to that arrangement, and that new section in the middle is nice

There are apparently so many complaints in the comments to the band's IG post that they added this 2 hrs. later:

for those who prefer the “live” version you can always go listen to the “live” version. But to clarify-
Recordings are records of us playing live, so you can look at it like this: the live version you may prefer exists and now another version exists. Every time we play it, it is a different version. We weren’t gonna go into the studio and try to replicate what we played on Colbert… plus there’s no way it would’ve been the same, because songs are vessels for the expressions of our present selves, and not highly manicured concoctions polished to be consumed based on demand.

That being said though, you can still listen to that version anytime you want, because is was recorded and exists on the internet. Now this exists too! The only difference is that the Colbert version isn’t available through every single streaming service :)

They really need to ignore this kind of shit.

It's not, like, problematic. It's just not worth their time!

Yeah I agree

flute also did not sound good

Ugh I would really like to see them but $80 to see them in the park?

i just saw them last night and "Vampire Empire" was much closer to the version they just released and it was fantastic. Not missing anything with the absent flute. Was a little sad to hear "Spud Infinity" without the jaw harp though.

They seem to like to mess around with their songs quite a bit, which imo is a great sign for a band, relentlessly creative. They played "Certainty" more or less like the album, maybe a little more oomph to it, and then Adrianne made a comment about how she hasn't really been feeling the rocking out aspect and has been wanting to do it more softly. Then she played it again as a soft, tender ballad. It was really beautiful.

i don't really get all the complaints because this is hardly a case of the arrangement being radically different, or the song being ruined or anything. i miss the flute but it's not a big deal at all. if they'd ditched the arrangement completely for the punk version or something i'd have been amused but more disappointed. my only actual complaint is that it's a fairly raw-sounding recording, it's very roomy.

i would still like to hear the unreleased studio version of the rock "dragon" but it's not like the completely different album version was remotely bad either.

Great little Pfork write-up: https://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/big-thief-vampire-empire/

As (maybe?) 2021's #1 "Time Escaping" Live on YouTube Fan, I was admittedly a bit flummoxed when the album cut of that song was released... but I figured I'd come to love it, and I certainly didn't go posting "THIS SUCKS" on Instagram (which was one of the thoughtful comments I saw).

(...saw for "Vampire Empire," to clarify)

...except for that bit about Elliot Smith.

(haha, I was willing to let that go)

never followed this band but listened to the newly released song followed by the performance on Colbert.

the studio version is better. her vocal performance is stronger on it. the flute doesn't really add anything except that it makes the guitar sound craggier in relation. it feels extraneous.

suspect people only prefer the Colbert version because it's familiar.

maybe i should listen to this band idk. i don't usually like straight up indie rock but Lenker seems like she has more to offer.

They really need to ignore this kind of shit.

younger bands are bad at ignoring stuff, and what's more, they can get press for responding, so they usually do.

honestly the biggest problem with all versions of this song is i can’t stop hearing “empty tushy fills, alive tushy kills”