oh man
https://polyvinyl-public.s3.amazonaws.com/87efe7b5fa21d969f4ca491ed04b0149_b1afeb4311ea30bd96daabf36f359ea236aa2907_medium.jpg
― devvvine, Thursday, 6 December 2018 17:53 (five years ago) link
goddammit i already have a velvet robe
― flappy bird, Thursday, 6 December 2018 17:55 (five years ago) link
omg where did you find that
― change display name (Jordan), Thursday, 6 December 2018 18:00 (five years ago) link
help yourself
https://www.polyvinylrecords.com/store/xiu_xiu_girl_with_basket_of_fruit?mc_cid=0a4e5aac30&mc_eid=34c8c17ba7
― devvvine, Thursday, 6 December 2018 18:07 (five years ago) link
perfect couples gift for winter ty
― change display name (Jordan), Thursday, 6 December 2018 18:44 (five years ago) link
bumped another thread but since there's a thousand Xiu Xiu threads here thought I would share again that this new record is REALLY out there, even for them. in terms of abrasiveness / non-songy / insane it's second only to Angel Guts as the most crazy proper Xiu Xiu album.
― flappy bird, Sunday, 3 February 2019 22:12 (five years ago) link
Yeah I hear you. It’s a shame that nobody seems to care about this guy anymore, consistently one of the most interesting artists working imo.
― circa1916, Sunday, 3 February 2019 22:36 (five years ago) link
yeah it's such a drag, especially considering how prolific he is. he had that Chain Smoking Alcoholic solo album last year and like 6 of those Drugs albums. it is strange that people aren't interested anymore, I feel like the running themes of his work (abuse, sexual violence, depression, suicide, addiction, hopelessness) are even more relevant today than they were in the 00s.
Have you heard the new one? What do you make of it, if you have?
― flappy bird, Sunday, 3 February 2019 22:40 (five years ago) link
I just heard the Pumpkin Attack song on Spotify and really liked it. Haven’t heard the whole new album yet, looking forward to it. His Chain Smoking Alcoholic noise album was really good and of course slept on.
― circa1916, Sunday, 3 February 2019 22:54 (five years ago) link
ironically the song on the flexi disc that came with the LP is a pretty straightforward song in comparison
― flappy bird, Monday, 4 February 2019 02:21 (five years ago) link
I have a reverse opinion, that he’s an amazing noise artist with a wider audience than his genre/music necessarily deserves, genre/economy-wise (tho all his concerts should always be vastly sold out)
Personally I preferred the Depeche Mode-via-avant garde descendent of the first two albums to anything that came after, until Red Guts and this new one, which reinvent the aesthetic of noise but with idk hard to describe but aggressively hi-fi production choices, which is neither better or worse, it just is, but it’s extremely relistenable— I cant judge Girl/Fruit or Red Guts on the same metric as Knife Play or A Promise
But I don’t know anybody who writes well about this band
― fgti's romance (flamboyant goon tie included), Monday, 4 February 2019 03:56 (five years ago) link
new one sounding really good and super abrasive and fun
― bhad bundy (Simon H.), Monday, 4 February 2019 04:30 (five years ago) link
otm about it being extremely relistenable, it's definitely his most beguiling record. I haven't read along with the lyrics yet
― flappy bird, Monday, 4 February 2019 04:55 (five years ago) link
I definitely think Xiu Xiu will always be wrongly-rated because there is far more going on here than people realize (including myself). I don't think his songs are about (abuse, sexual violence, depression, suicide, addiction, hopelessness) but are pretty much, across the board, about mental garble, about the dissociative response one experiences when faced with the difficult-to-bear. He's not singing about war itself, he's singing about the feeling of reading about the war, watching TV about the war. I don't find his music comforting because he's singing anything meaningful about anything so much as I deeply identify on a personal level with the mind-spewing-information-as-a-result-of-next-to-nothing feeling that his songs seem to attempt to capture
― froggles! (flamboyant goon tie included), Monday, 4 February 2019 11:11 (five years ago) link
Pumpkin Attack sounds like industrial techno. Is this his dance music record?
― change display name (Jordan), Monday, 4 February 2019 15:14 (five years ago) link
xp maybe The Air Force is an outlier but that record deals with that stuff pretty directly - songs like Vulture Piano, PJ in the Streets, Buzz Saw, Save Me Save Me - but broadly I agree, something like Support Our Troops or I Luv Abortion, that's exactly it - unfiltered live wire trauma garble.
― flappy bird, Monday, 4 February 2019 17:36 (five years ago) link
very good post imo
― she carries a torch. two torches, actually (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Monday, 4 February 2019 18:19 (five years ago) link
ok this might be the best thing he's ever done
― flappy bird, Saturday, 9 February 2019 02:56 (five years ago) link
― flappy bird, Friday, February 8, 2019 9:56 PM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― lowercase (eric), Saturday, 9 February 2019 03:01 (five years ago) link
I interviewed Jamie.. he's a sweetheart
― flappy bird, Monday, 6 May 2019 18:37 (four years ago) link
I don't know anyone who writes well about this band
― i could chug a keg of you (flamboyant goon tie included), Monday, 14 October 2019 04:46 (four years ago) link
You want to talk about Weyes Blood, I want to talk about Girl with Basket Of Fruit
― i could chug a keg of you (flamboyant goon tie included), Monday, 14 October 2019 04:47 (four years ago) link
I mean it’s not easy tbh. xpHe should be one hundred times more popular than he is though.
― circa1916, Monday, 14 October 2019 05:00 (four years ago) link
touring with AJJ and Emperor X next year, joined by Jonathan Meiburg....this makes up for them cancelling their last tour. really stoked for that.
― Simon H., Monday, 18 November 2019 22:31 (four years ago) link
that time again...
new album of duets 'oh no' out march 26th
some exciting features on there!
― devvvine, Wednesday, 27 January 2021 16:05 (three years ago) link
shoulda gone with
xiu xiuets
― stylish but illegal (Simon H.), Wednesday, 27 January 2021 16:08 (three years ago) link
I'm not surprised that Jamie Stewart has an impressive Rolodex by now but that is indeed a tasty lineup:
1. Sad Mezcalita (Sharon Van Etten)2. I Cannot Resist (Deb Demure / Drab Majesty)3. The Grifters (Haley Fohr / Circuits des Yeux )4. Goodbye For Good (Greg Saunier / Deerhoof)5. OH NO (Susanne Sachsse)6. Rumpus Room (Angus Andrew / Liars)7. Fuzz Gong Fight (Angela Seo / Xiu Xiu)8. I Dream of Someone Else Entirely (Owen Pallett)9. One Hundred Years (Chelsea Wolfe) [The Cure cover]10. A Classic Screw (Fabrizio Modonese Palumbo)11. It Bothers Me All the Time (Jonathan Meiburg / Shearwater)12. Saint Dymphna (George Lewis Jr. / Twin Shadow)13. Knock Out (Alice Bag)14. A Bottle of Rum (Liz Harris / Grouper)15. ANTS (Valerie Diaz)
― stylish but illegal (Simon H.), Wednesday, 27 January 2021 16:09 (three years ago) link
One Hundred Years (Chelsea Wolfe) [The Cure cover]
oh hell yeah
― circa1916, Wednesday, 27 January 2021 16:13 (three years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yialek4fUUg
^^ the song w/ Grouper is good!
― A Scampo Darkly (Le Bateau Ivre), Wednesday, 10 March 2021 10:49 (three years ago) link
He's the greatest
I've seen him live a dozen times and I just wanna see him again
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRPzFgUwodw
― flamboyant goon tie included, Wednesday, 10 March 2021 12:19 (three years ago) link
Every time my partner and I have tried to see him/them has been stymied, the show either didn't happen or was canceled (pre- and post-pandemic). :(
― change display name (Jordan), Wednesday, 10 March 2021 14:30 (three years ago) link
BRO that has happened to me too!! I've had tickets three or four times!
The one I was most annoyed about happened at a little venue here in DC--as the show was starting, the sound system's snake had gotten unplugged and the entire system had to be set up again. They couldn't effectively do sound check, the guy on the soundboard wouldn't stop playing the pre-show mix or communicate with the band at all to work it out. This shit lasts until there's fifteen minutes or so left before a hard out being enforced by the venue because a salsa dance party was scheduled immediately after the show. Jamie had the set list written on a paper plate, which he chucked into the audience saying, "If you catch this, tell us what you want to hear. Just...I recommend you don't start with your favorite song, because...then it's all downhill from there."
The little bit they played was awesome. Can't wait to see a full show some day.
― unashamed and trash (Unctious), Wednesday, 10 March 2021 15:52 (three years ago) link
Cursed! I'm sure I've posted this multiple times upthread, but the first time was an outdoor college show where Dirty Beaches played a noise set, but apparently some crucial loop pedal or sampler broke and Jamie couldn't/wouldn't play. We ran into him in the parking lot and he gave us a bunch of 7"s though!
― change display name (Jordan), Wednesday, 10 March 2021 16:17 (three years ago) link
OH NO sounding really good so far, his most accessible since Always maybe. title track reminds of some of the early records.
also he has very very sneakily become quite a skilled vocalist over the years huh?
― intern at pepe le pew research (Simon H.), Friday, 26 March 2021 04:48 (three years ago) link
guest appearance by the screaming toy ducks from vine on that shearwater collab
― intern at pepe le pew research (Simon H.), Friday, 26 March 2021 05:02 (three years ago) link
I can't remember the last time I've done this--or if I've ever done this--but wtf is with this p4k review of the new album?
It’s difficult to be a Xiu Xiu fan, mostly because it means you have to listen to so much Xiu Xiu music [...] Stewart has spent the last 20 years blazing an illegible path, musically and morally, between queer politics and shock-jock shtick, radical vulnerability and repugnant cruelty, good faith and bad taste. The music varies wildly in style—from punky folk and dreamy pop to experimental electronics and harsh noise, all teeming with global instruments—and quality, from the heart-filled zenith of “I Luv the Valley, OH!” to the heartless nadir of “I Luv Abortion.” For every song you’d defend with your last breath, there’s another you couldn’t defend with your first. Most perverse is when they blend into the likes of “Ale,” a gorgeous tune about telling an overweight woman playing GameCube to shut up.
and this is a GOOD review!
https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/xiu-xiu-oh-no/
― flappy bird, Monday, 29 March 2021 18:14 (three years ago) link
or rather, a positive one (7.0)... what Xiu Xiu song is anywhere close to "indefensible," and on what grounds?
― flappy bird, Monday, 29 March 2021 18:15 (three years ago) link
I don't know about "indefensible" and it's been a long time since I listened to those early records, but there some very, very bleak songs and a few about the horrific violence of war that I can absolutely understand someone having a hard time sitting through.
― soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, 29 March 2021 18:20 (three years ago) link
so, the author of that piece lives in the town Jamie called home, and shat on every chance he got, for several years. said author also edits the local independent free weekly. I don't wanna do a lot of talking out of school but Jamie's hatred of the town was weird for the people t/here who love the place and were happy to have him here, who loved & continued to love his music. his hatred of the town was visceral though and these dynamics inform your hearing of his music going forward, if you happen to have a stake in the town.
― J Edgar Noothgrush (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Monday, 29 March 2021 18:24 (three years ago) link
Well that certainly makes the piece less mystifying!
xp "hard time to sit through," definitely, but we're not talking about Chicago
― flappy bird, Monday, 29 March 2021 18:48 (three years ago) link
I hate ilxtown too and still live here.
― treeship., Monday, 29 March 2021 19:16 (three years ago) link
Excited to hear this one. I lost track of this band, but fabulous muscles and dear god i hate myself are incredible albums.
― treeship., Monday, 29 March 2021 19:26 (three years ago) link
La Foret was the last one I bought before losing track for many years, but I got reacquainted with his work a few years ago and now I think Forget is his best record. Looking forward to making time for the new one.
― cwkiii, Tuesday, 30 March 2021 00:35 (three years ago) link
as far as indefensible things he's done go the first that comes to mind is the A Promise album cover
― ufo, Tuesday, 30 March 2021 00:43 (three years ago) link
I haven’t heard anything from them since Fabulous Muscles but the features in here definitely piqued my interest. He has improved a lot as a vocalist since then, Simon otm.
I don’t think they’re indefensible but their odd mixing decisions makes almost every song I’ve heard lf them sound very angular. It’s not a pleasant listen most of the time, but I guess it’s a very conscious aesthetic choice.
― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Tuesday, 30 March 2021 05:36 (three years ago) link
Every time this thread gets bumped I think "There's a new Xiu Xiu album called What the Christ??!"
― Mark E. Smith died this year. Or, maybe last year. (bernard snowy), Tuesday, 30 March 2021 12:54 (three years ago) link
there probably will be one day
― flappy bird, Tuesday, 30 March 2021 18:46 (three years ago) link
and now we truly enter hell
― imago, Saturday, 4 March 2023 08:43 (one year ago) link
it takes a lot to scare me but I think this is managing it
― imago, Saturday, 4 March 2023 08:44 (one year ago) link
tbf this does seem to be the third album in their "hell" series (following Angel Guts and Basket Of Fruit)
― lurching toward (flamboyant goon tie included), Saturday, 4 March 2023 15:54 (one year ago) link