Minnesota Public Radio launches indie station 89.3 "The Current"

it's a bit frustrating that their very narrow view of what constitutes the local music scene is sort of codified as "what's happening"

like for example there was an amazing festival last weekend all local acts, pretty uniformly great from the psych/weird/experimental axis and it's def not something the current would play

http://heliotrope-festival.com/

Yeah I'm sure there is good stuff around. I just find most of the new local bands they play blend into one another after a while (Apart from Atmosphere)

yeah i mean there are a lot of cool bands, lots more mediocre ones
mpls is probably better than average but i mean i dunno it's a bit overblown
we are lucky to have a lot of venues where you can do weird stuff pretty easily

hey ums, missed you dicking around on fri but i caught the saturday bill and it was pretty awesome. prostate!

ah too bad, but what a great festival they put together, intermedia was a cool venue

yeah prostate is something! some weird nexus of black metal, old school industrial, and goth/synth pop...

feel like they should be getting some buzz on the national level in extreme music circles but they probably are hurt by not fitting nicely into a genre

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9QGq4P66mQ

i'm no current fan but isn't that chart misleading given that we are only partway through 2014? or were the statistics adjusted accordingly

This article on the chart makes note of that

http://www.reviler.org/2014/04/09/89-3-current-variety-decline/

And I would add I am basically ambivalent on the Current, it is what it is. I sometimes listen when I flip around the dial, they do occasionally play great stuff, but more often they play music that isn't exactly my cup of tea, to put it politely.

They can play whatever they want to play, I just don't think they should act like they are WFMU or something, which according to the ads they run all the time and they do.

And they are certainly supportive of a certain segment of local music, probably the segment that least needs their help.

aww heliotrope <333 miss that so much

The Current introduced me to Tom Vek so I'm still okay with them rolling along as a white bread indie caricature radio station because sometimes that's exactly what you want to hear

they had the band X play at their yearly festival. does the average current listener give a fuck about X or know anything about them? just seemed so weird

probably not. seriously fuck rock the garden tho

re-reading the thread and: whatever happened to heliotrope festival ?

I was tempted to go just to see X and The Beths. The National headlining was a major turn off though.

heliotrope was back this year at heart of the beast, wasn't able to catch much but glad it's back

dang i didn’t realize.

i wonder if there are enough mpls posters to sustain an ongoing show / events thread

but then the NYC thread hasn’t been active for a bit so idk

There’s always this one: Rolling Totes PWNING Awesome Shows in Twin Cities Thread!

ah thanks

Separately, the Current's Minnesota music history podcast, the Current Rewind, written by ILXor vet M. Matos, has been a consistently great listen.

https://www.thecurrent.org/collection/rewind

they had the band X play at their yearly festival. does the average current listener give a fuck about X or know anything about them? just seemed so weird

― global tetrahedron, Sunday, June 30, 2019 1:11 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Does the Current even play X? Or are they just another one those bands the Current talks about playing but never seems to get around to?

I suppose it would have been cool to see them the Robins Kaplan LLP VIP Area, I heard there were a lot of great snacks and of course the respite from the rest of the unwashed upper-middle class white people in attendance in the General Admission area

fwiw, X was great in the heat. Billy and Exene looked to be doing well. was getting a bit of Sabbath vibe on Nausea and a couple other songs, which is not a connection I've made in the past. got a little nervous-where is this going?-when Exene thanked the signing interpreter, but thankfully didn't go anywhere weird.

and the Beths were really good as well, harmonies were right on. would have preferred seeing their first pass at the Hex or the Entry, but glad to see them (and Courtney). that whole record is great.

still bummed i skipped that hex show

https://www.thecurrent.org/countdown/march-music-madness--greatest-movie-soundtracks/

Words can not describe how much I loathe listeners of The Current.

LOL!!

Good Will Hunting
51.8%

Repo Man
48.2%