pdhosken's Blog

We get it -- finals week is tough. If you're not frantically trying to cram names and dates into your noggin, you're likely pounding out a term paper in the midnight hour. I speak from experience here. Luckily, music is always here to help. The next time you're feeling overwhelmed by the finals-week blues, try these six songs instead and get back on track to earning that 100 percent emoji on all your tests.

Explosions in the Sky: "Let Me Back In" (2011)

No musicians today can create sonic ebbs and flows better than EITS. With no vocalist in the band, all four members are free to make a clamor on their respective instruments, which they do (especially here). But at over 10 minutes in length, "Let Me Back In" will help you close your Pinterest browser tab and ease back into your statistics homework without you ever realizing any time has passed at all. This band is that good.

Aphex Twin: "Rhubarb" (1994)

Richard D. James, the freaky Brit behind Aphex Twin, is known more for his glitchy tech-infused electronic music than his mellow, dreamlike side. But when he wants to get quiet, he get downright silent. This track, one of 25 in a collection of entirely ambient music (seriously), evokes nebulous images of clouds, galaxial skies and abstract webs of warmth capable of making us feel safe in the womb again -- or uber-focused on our history notes.

Jon Brion: "Phone Call" (2003)

Through his collaborations with Kanye West and Fiona Apple, Jon Brion has proven his worth as a forward-thinking musician and producer. His film scores, though, remain some of his most refined work. Taken from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, "Phone Call" is infantile crib music for when you need to turn your head off for a while and just follow your feels.

Neu!: "Hallogallo" (1972)

As I've mentioned before, Neu! is one of the bands I can't seem to get out of my personal rotation in 2014. When you need a pickmeup after Aphex Twin and Jon Brion have brought you down, reach for "Hallogallo," the song that effectively invented the motorik drum beat. That's the nonstop percussion that will pep you back up and keep you focused on that nine-pager due in just under four hours. Dawn creeping up. Walls creeping in. Neu! creeping you out?

Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross: "In Motion" (2010)

Like a musical cup of coffee, "In Motion" sets you down a path to jittery productivity. Though it may have been created to soundtrack the creation of Facebook -- which, as we know, is the ultimate slayer of school work -- this song can help you narrow in on the task at hand. Just make sure to stick around 'til the end for the quirky, colorful and cool synth freakout.

R.E.M.: "It's the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)" (1987)

Repeat after me: Finals week is not the end of the world as we know it, and you do indeed feel fine. Don't believe yourself? Keep reciting it. Make it a personal mantra for your success. And if all else fails, take a detour from your textbooks and study the words to this song instead to impress your family and friends (or a karaoke crowd). That tuition money should go to something, after all.

Photo: chiarashine via Flickr

Inside the State Theatre of Ithaca Saturday night, it might as well have been 1978. Jenny Lewis, the former lead singer of Rilo Kiley who’s now fortifying an impressive solo career, wears her sonic influences proudly.

That’s not a slight, either. One look at the cover of her new solo LP, The Voyager, reveals the evidence for what makes this charismatic, confessional songwriter so winsome: her sense of self. Throughout The Voyager’s tour circuit, Lewis has unironically sported a rainbow-sparkle pantsuit too exuberant for Stevie Nicks (but perfect for Gram Parsons). The Ithaca show was no exception.

Lewis took the stage in full Laurel Canyon-meets-Studio 54 regalia, diving straight into energetic new album cuts “Head Underwater” and “Just One of the Guys.” The rich new material sprang to life, oscillating between Fleetwood Mac and pseudo-Eagles twang, with the help of a pulsating six-piece backing band, including her boyfriend, Johnathan Rice (with a perfectly Allmanesque hunch over his Gibson SG). The band even delved into disco, covering the Grateful Dead’s funky “Shakedown Street.” The best trick in Lewis’ set, though, was how she beautifully recalled her own past, not just that of her idols.

In a career-spanning show, Lewis dipped into tunes from her previous two solo records: 2006’s Rabbit Fur Coat, recorded with the Watson Twins; and 2008’s Acid Tongue. During the sprawling “The Next Messiah,” Lewis hopped on a platform, winking and pointing her microphone like a pop preacher. In fact, she spent half of the show guitarless, letting her band do the heavy lifting musically. This freed her arms to connect more directly to the crowd, which she did exceptionally well pacing the stage, shimmying and singing “The Moneymaker” and “Pretty Bird.”

Saturday night shows tend to be well received, but Lewis’s stop in Ithaca had the crowd roaring, especially at the older Rilo Kiley material. “With Arms Outstretched” and “A Better Son/Daughter” saw Lewis don a guitar to strum the stirring open chords and sing to the ceiling. Audience members sang along, and some even cried. Lewis cried, too, and the takeaway was obvious: These songs mean a lot to a lot of people for a lot of reasons. Lewis knows this, which is why she made The Voyager (with a little help from producers Ryan Adams and Beck) gleam like crystal champagne in a mansion on a big Hollywood hill. The stakes are simply too high now to disappoint.

Though Lewis’s songs can be dark with drug-addled and confused characters, the music nearly always exits triumphantly. The same can’t be said for openers Girlpool, a California duo with angsty notebook lyrics and shrill harmonies. Their music, while beautiful and striking, doesn’t work toward uplifting choruses or major-key resolution. It’s just one bass, one guitar and a lot of quietly dazzling emotional complexity — all wonderful things, if a bit subdued compared to Lewis’s glamor. But Girlpool, with their “Something in the Way”-via-First Aid Kit aesthetics, are a band to watch.

And so is this new incarnation of Lewis’s career. She’s never been more confident or more profound, and it’s exciting to she where she’ll go from here. In the meantime, The Voyager will keep us warm (and wanting more).

Photos by Love Lee.

Like plenty of music makers in 2014, Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke hates the corporate hold on the industry. But Yorke is actively working to change it, devising new ways to deliver music directly to listeners without any major-label meddling.

On Sept. 26, Yorke released Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes, his second solo album, via the file-sharing network BitTorrent — no label, no interference and not much advance warning. Unfortunately, its means of delivery is a good bit more memorable than the music itself.

The eight-song LP begins with the kind of underwater electronic bass warble we’ve come to expect from Radiohead songs like “Idioteque” and “Backdrifts,” suggesting that he’s become dependent on it as a songwriting spark. The latest instance, “A Brain in a Bottle,” improves only once his snaky falsetto creeps in to lift the song from its murky Aphex Twin glitch envy. Yorke’s experimentation thankfully carries him further from the rock realm as he continues to build a burgeoning electronic solo portfolio.

The problem with any new Yorke material is how sharply it reveals his need for collaborators to complete his ideas. The sleepy “Truth Ray” can't move past a drab electro crawl. At six minutes, “The Mother Lode” properly swells and recedes at the crucial moments but overstays its welcome.

And then Yorke moves to the most intriguing and worthwhile portion of the album — its puzzling, charming, frustrating three-part conclusion.

Thom Yorke - A Brain In A Bottle (OFFICIAL VIDEO) from Tommaso Colella on Vimeo.

The sound collage “There Is No Ice (For My Drink)” begins it with a synthesized pingpong rhythm and chopped-up vocal samples before moving into downright ghostly territory. Still, its quirkiness doesn’t negate the pesky notion that it’s more of a studio experiment than a finished track. The melodic fragments work well enough, but not as well as similar electronic songs like Jamie xx’s “All Under One Roof Raving" and Disclosure’s “When a Fire Starts to Burn.”

Once the clamor settles, Yorke glides into “Pink Section,” a wonderful passage of atmospheric noise that’s as sweet as anything he has done on his own since The Eraser’s “Atoms for Peace.”

The closer, “Nose Grows Some,” is even sweeter. Blending Radiohead’s spacey sensibilities with Yorke’s own continued ambient dalliances, “Nose” dazzles in its nuances. An expertly arranged wallpaper of synthesized tones makes the track breathe, and the frenetic drums provide a crunchy texture. This is a song you can taste.

The ultimate disappointment with Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes is how “Nose” is the album’s true starting point. After its highest peak — a vocal pivot into a quick giddy shriek — “Nose” simply recedes into itself. As soon as Yorke finds this moment, he doesn’t know where to go next, so he ends the song on a disappointing hobble.

Through a few bright flashes, Yorke again proves his worth as one of the most creative and forward-thinking musicians of his generation. But if he devoted half as much time to the music as he did its presentation, Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes might have ended up essential, not a B entry on a career report card of (nearly) straight As.

Forget the witch decorations and the viral-ready jack-o-lanterns: No Halloween is complete without a killer playlist. For 2014, we compiled a little bit of everything -- gothic guitars, stuttering electronics, filthy hip-hop hypotheticals -- for a 10-song soundtrack for your undead endeavors. Prime your Spotify account with these tracks to make yourself the star DJ of this year's Halloween parties.

1. Bauhaus: "Bela Lugosi's Dead" (1979)

As impossible as it was to kill Dracula, it only took a heart attack to bring down the actor who immortalized him. English gothic rock band Bauhaus sought out to honor Lugosi in the late '70s with this gloomy, torturous track that features vocalist Peter Murphy crooning in hundreds of directions at once. Perfect with strobe light accompaniment in your DIY garage haunted house.

2. Aphex Twin: "Come to Daddy (Pappy Mix Version)" (1997)

If austere goth rock doesn't make your skin crawl, glitchy millennium anxiety definitely will. Aphex Twin has made it a career goal to be as disturbing as possible, even digitally embedding demonic faces inside his songs. But few things are as horrifying as the tech dread of a robotic apocalypse present in this mix of "Come to Daddy." Play through a megaphone to keep those pesky kids away.

3. Neu!: "Sonderangebot" (1972)

We've pretty much gone off the rails here, so let's go even further down the rabbit hole. Less of a song and more of a eerie sound collage, "Sonderangebot" (German for "special offer") features distant screaming interspersed with loud rattling noises. It's less "Halloween spooky" and more "nightmarishly horrifying," but hey, if you're going for scary, you might as well go full monty.

4. Radiohead: "Climbing Up the Walls" (1997)

Radiohead know how to craft a compellingly frightening song. The intentionally backmasked "Like Spinning Plates" still terrifies, and "Bodysnatchers" is as paranoid as its title suggests. But nothing chills like the psychological horror of "Climbing Up the Walls," a "Comfortably Numb" for the technological age without the narcotic-induced contentment.

5. Kanye West: "Monster" (2010)

Self-aggrandizing rants, expensive temper tantrums, disgusting entitlement issues...Everybody knows Kanye West is a monster. But it becomes abundantly clear on this song, thanks to guest vocalists Rick Ross, Bon Iver, Jay-Z and a greener Nicki Minaj, who steals the spotlight with her schizophrenic delivery. Be warned, parents: This track, though safe for grown-up Halloween parties, is entirely NSFW (and for your kids).

6. The Ramones: "Chain Saw" (1976)

OK, the Ramones weren't necessarily a scary band, unless your mother worried that punk (and leather jackets) would turn your mind to filth. Whether that happened or not is up for debate. "Chain Saw," a high-energy slice of motorized rock from the band's 1976 debut, re-frames the events of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre in the mind of a bored, lovesick teen. Dismemberment rock never sounded so fun.

7. Wu-Tang Clan: "Method Man" (1993)

On the Wu's 1993 debut, Method Man got his own song to spill all the vile, horrific yet somewhat comical things he'd do to those who questioned his rap game. The result is six minutes of unrelenting proto-Hostel torture porn that also showcases Meth's uncanny ability to pack each line with as much wacky, slimy charm as possible. This one's for the giddy post-trick-or-treating sugar high.

8. Oingo Boingo: "Dead Man's Party" (1985)

Danny Elfman, the leader of '80s new wavers Oingo Boingo, is probably best known for his musical work on Tim Burton films (or The Simpsons theme). But in 1985, he crafted "Dead Man's Party," a colorful, jittery work of synthetic rock that wouldn't be out of place at a Dia de los Muertos celebration. Need to inject a little energy into your lethargic Halloween party guests? Make it a "Dead Man's Party" and see what happens.

9. The Velvet Underground: "Venus in Furs" (1967)

"Shiny, shiny / Shiny boots of leather," Lou Reed intones to begin "Venus in Furs," a haunting drone that tackles the terrors of what goes on behind locked doors in the most secret places. It's hard to say what makes "Venus" so sinister: the violent viola scrapes, the unwavering heartbeat drums, the menacing Middle Eastern-influenced guitar. All of it amounts to a fiendish exploration of the dark corners of worlds interior and exterior.

10. Michael Jackson: "Thriller" (1983)

Does "Thriller" really need an explanation? It's the quintessential Halloween song penned by the most skilled mainstream songwriter of his time (and maybe even ours). It's the highest peak of pop perfectionism, marrying an infectious groove with a soaring chorus that manages to evoke both ecstatic joy and genuine drive-in movie horror. Vincent Price's exit narration sets the song aloft in a space of its own, a hallowed spot where strategically crafted music intersects with strong emotional resonance. This is "Thriller" indeed.