more projects, ratatat

I got this sweet Moog t-shirt today and I'm pretty excited about the whole concept of owning a Moog shirt, let alone wearing it. Later on in the course of this lazy Saturday, I jammed with some people today since I'm back up at school and did the majority of my work during the week because as it turns out, the prof's assignments on Monday/Wednesday pretty much covered the next week worth of class. That gives me a three day weekend with very little work and that was a great use of my time. I'd say it's a little jazzy (cello and jazz, kind of a wierd combination), but prepare for your ears to be taken by storm with a whole new genre if we ever decide to play and you're in the State College area. The one guy is the drummer in the semi-local band Bullet Parade, which I may start to play with, but they seem pretty serious about getting non-local shows on weekends which would kill my grades if I went through with that. I would not have the motivation to buckle down and do extra work during the week.

Moving on to music you can download and not some boring anecdotes, I've had quite a few "hey, listen to this" run-ins with Ratatat this week. Drum machine, keys, and guitar in the indie fashion. It's infectiously catchy, but get all the Postal Service comparasons / expectations out of your head now because you are about to hear something else. Guitarist Mike Stroud played back up guitar for Dashboard Confessional and Ben Lee as they toured until he and his bandmate Evan mast got a proposal to release a record on XL Recordings. Reading interveiws, I also found out he played in Pony Express for a short time. I assume this is the same Pony Express that released their collection of EPs and singles, Oddballs, this year. But obvioulsy, just about anything is better than having to deal with the "emo"ness of Dashboard and the record was made. No need for vocals and weird Dntel antics of sampling, this is straightforward in terms of the technical realm. Their S/T released last spring and their website says they are working on another, so I'll be anticipating. There are also remixs in the audio section of their website that are worth a listen and a laugh.

[mp3] Ratatat - Seventeen Years