Alice had a small tail, and Planto unluckily had tail-fetish! Alice didn't realize it for the beginning years of their relationship. She sometimes observed Planto jack-off watching the squirrel traffic from the window. Such squirrels with such large tails. At first Alice thought Planto had depression or another minor disease!

So there was this one time Alice sees a doctor. Doc prescribes a medicine causing the tail to expand to an abnormal size. Alice felt happy she could finally keep his horny mate satisfied. Instant pleasure you know.

Days went by. On a night as Planto got home having a hard day, he suddenly realized Alice wasn't there! There was just this one huge tail. Planto felt sad for a while, he shared years with Alice. They used to sing silly country songs for no one. But, yeah she's gone now. Despite the fact that things had changed, Planto was still bound to jack-off living with the huge tail. Tails have no holes. Fetish led Planto nowhere. Fetish no hole. Planto fetish grammy hole tails #51.

Here's the link to the grammy winners this year.

As Michael Cardenas divulges himself in lyrics, he doesn't sound disappointing. None of the songs appearing on his debut long play called Yeai have a constant hit-appeal; somehow the context is more important. This very numb charisma and light appetite lingers all along, therefore Yeai can be mostly easy listening and enjoyable. Cardenas sees the bright side of the story through an Elliott Smith lens to be honest. So he aims towards a sun quite difficult to reach, even when it comes to love, he proclaims his dark side. In "Illness" he confesses "Tie me up call me a fighter, bind my throat you can make it tighter my love is ignorant I'll be dumb forever, I don't know pain." But you can't quite call him a pessimist. His smooth hands on the guitar and his conscious lively folk are in contrast with the lyrics and if you ask me that's what makes sense about his music.

Links:
Buy Yeai through his online store
Buy MP3s at Amazon
Michael Cardenas MySpace page
Michael Cardenas on Virb

What makes this compilation almost impossible to avoid is the rich sturdy list of indie artist it takes advantage of. Produced by Aaron and Bryce Dessner of The National, its aim is the benefit of the Red Hot organization - an international charity dedicated to raising funds and awareness for HIV and AIDS. Go and buy the record a.s.a. you can anyhow but that's not the point. The double disk, unlike many other similar compilations earns a wealthy 31-track material from the kind that hasn't been heard or at least you can say seldom heard.

Well if you want names, too many to mention. But I can't stop screaming them out everywhere: David Byrne, The Books, Jose Gonzales, Feist, Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie), Bon Iver, Grizzly Bear, The National, Yeasayer, My Brightest Diamond, Antony (Hegarty) and Bryce Dessner, Justin Vernon (Bon Iver), The Decemberists, Iron & Wine, Sufjan Stevens and if that's not enough go mad with the second disk containing tracks from Spoon, Arcade Fire, Beirut, My Morning Jacket, Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings, David Sitek (TV On the Radio), The New Pornigraphers, Yo La Tengo, Stuart Murdoch, Riceboy Sleeps, Cat Power, Andrew Bird, Conor Oberst (Bright Eyes), Gillian Welch, Blonde Redhead, Devastations and Kevin Drew. There've I've said it.

Now what can we possibly miss here? Indie music fans have all their needs now go and pray for the AIDS to vanish but before that, rest your bones beside the fire as this eclectic gallery of sound unfolds its sound. Most similar compilations come with such tracks least likely to hear. They simply offer their worst works but luckily that's not the case here on Dark Was the Night. The Decemberists offer their best on an eight minute epic "Sleepless" just the way Sufjan Stevens gives away everything on his 10 minute opus "You Are the Blood", a mixed recipe of everything Sufjan has accomplished so far from his electronic Enjoy Your Rabbit to the depth of his gospel soul. Feist and Ben Gibbard join hands on an exquisite cover of Vashti Bunyan's "Train Song". The ship will continue to sail with a vibrant combination of covers, original songs as well as wise duets. Take the Books collaboration with Jose Gonzales on a Nick Drake's "Cello Song" (a bit weird but isn't that what you craved for all along?) The compilation will be released on February 16th through 4AD, so the wait is almost over. This is what Aaron Dessner has written about the album:

As we invited friends and peers to contribute, our collective social awareness became apparent: anyone that had the time was willing to donate their time and their music to the Red Hot cause. But there were many different stories behind each song: some we had heard live and knew had to be on the record (The Books "Cello Song", My Brightest Diamond's "Feelin Good"); close friends whose arms we knew we could twist enough to give us special tracks (Arcade Fire, and Sufjan Stevens); bands we asked who were too busy but had solo projects or side projects they could include (Dave Sitek of TV on the Radio and Jonsi Birgisson of Sigur Ros); songs we had always imagined certain artists singing (Cat Power's "Amazing Grace" and Antony's "I Was Young When I Left Home"); and dream collaborations (David Byrne and The Dirty Projectors, Feist with Grizzly Bear and Ben Gibbard, and my own song with Justin Vernon of Bon Iver).
In the end, there was enough great music to produce two discs-one dark and homegrown with almost classical arrangements of folk themes; the other more bright and evocative of the best of independent rock music at the beginning of the 21st century. "Dark Was The Night" and the Dore illustrations for Milton's Paradise Lost, which make up the art imagery in this booklet, evoke a "fallen" world of struggle, but also the capacity of art to inspire us to rise above the obstacles put in our path. Our nights may be dark, but music gives us inspiration and hope of brighter days to come.

This is my first post in 2009 and I'm glad to see it is about a new mixtape. As you might have already known, winter is definitely my season of the year (only if it snows). I could always get along with it pretty well, I can adapt myself to the cold but can never stand the summer heat. Everything about summer, 'cept holidays and travelling is stinky and greasy while winter is not surprisingly cool: the environment becomes acoustic, the streets are less crowded, people don't make a lot of noise and the city is more static and calm, and there's nothing more beautiful than snow and more delightful than the sound of boots on the snowy ground. I didn't find time to say merry Christmas to all my Christian readers but I guess this new third mixtape of This Winki's will compensate.

The Mood
This time, unlike the other two mixtapes which dealt hugely on ambient soundscapes and futuristic electronic space music, we have an 11-track collection of mostly acoustic indie folk songs intensely suitable for snowy days and winter chills. I'm happy to have put my favorite Pooy & His Broken Army track (my friend Pooyan Tavasoli's DIY project) called "A Handful of Lies", a genuine heartfelt confessional acoustic ballad on failed romance. We also have three wonderful tunes by California Snow Story, Days and The Felice Brothers, Ron Sexsmith, Castanets as well as some other valuable works of indie folk that you might have never heard of. Enjoy the mixtape! Here's the tracklisting followed by the download link (through the lovely MediaFire):

Tracklisting
01 California Snow Story "Out of Time" (2:43)
02 Days "Simple Thing" (2:18)
03 Pooy & His Broken Army "A Handful of Lies" (3:15)
04 The Felice Brothers "Wonderful Life" (4:02)
05 Blue States "The Last Blast" (4:04)
06 June Madrona "Five Views of Rainier" (3:11)
07 Ron Sexsmith "Hands of Time" (3:16)
08 Tabasco Stockholm "Cashflow" (3:57)
09 Micah P. Hinson "Jackeyed" (3:45)
10 Castanets "This Is the Early Game" (3:12)
11 My Broken Frame "No One" (2:37)

Download
I Could Smell the Weather (.zip 33 MB)

Also see all other free mixtapes.

And nevertheless we have some previous Antony & the Johnsons tendencies as well. After all, it's the very band that composed those tunes: "Kiss My Name" is sprawling and sounds intensely nostalgic and sweet and melodic. "Aeon" is a exhilarating method towards eternity with its own homosexual balances. The opener "Her Eyes Are Underneath the Ground" is probably a very in-place representation of the whole album that stretches itself through the wonderful "Epilepsy Is Dancing". "Another World" was introduced earlier with an EP with the same name and I hear it as a stream of demands, a sweet wish list sung with passion and desire. Whatever Antony Hegarty and his band have accomplished so far has been profoundly emotional and blissfully overwhelming and The Crying Light is truly no exception.

Listen | Bon Iver "Blood Bank" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>

Blood Bank can surely announce a good sophomore to For Emma, Forever Ago; One that does not sound too experimental for a DIY effort expanding itself into a band. Well let's not foresee that for now.

David Bowie's Low! You ever get the feeling like you're aware that you're a music freak but somehow have missed some major albums all your life. That was the feeling I got when I first listened to Low. The marvel fact about it is that it's technically a 70s album while it doesn't sound anything like 70s. When we're debating on '70s music - which in fact many pals still believe the decade won't repeat again - I'm not quite sure about other corners of the world but in Iran, '70s is narrowly limited to a specific range of albums and artists as if it doesn't even exist out of that scope. Well, that shouldn't come as a surprise. We Iranians had the Islamic Revolution stone-falling on our heads. Nobody had time to listen to music, to '70s rock, people hardly ever found time to celebrate New Year's Eve. Never mind! '70s decade in Iran is recognized by Pink Floyd's The Wall or The Dark Side Of the Moon, Deep Purple's Machinehead, Jethro Tull, Eloy (the German band) and a couple of others. Nobody knows '70s with The Clash's London Calling or The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars, or Fleetwood Mac's Rumors. '70s is hopelessly defined by those names and a few others. Forget it!

Listen | David Bowie "Always Crashing In the Same Car" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>

Instead of going through a track by track survey on the album, here are a couple of factors I found in my head that make Low a distinctive immortal album:

Merriweather Post Pavilion sees Animal Collective on their less experimental and more coherent stage of existence. Unlike Feels' melancholic wilderness and Strawberry Jam's fast hopping around, here we are dealing with what the band has aced so far. Well, at least a member of the band we can say. Panda Bear made many lists back in 2007 for a completely different sophomore called Person Pitch. That might have given the right impression for the whole band to come up with a dream-like massively-psychedelic texture of which we hear on Merriweather all along. But instead, if Person Pitch was a child's dream, this one is an adult's.

Listen | Animal Collective "Brothersport" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>

Now let me make it clear that unfortunately or whatever you may call it, I was not blown away by this album. In fact I was never blown away by any other Animal Collective work. But then I see their tremendous skill on putting the listener on an underwater merry-go-round and driving him/her insane and leaving them mesmerized by a colorful collage of sonic storms. That's not something any experimental psych-pop band could do. Animal Collective has prepared the recipe and cooked the meal the way they should, apparently. They still have not let go of their Beach Boys inspirations, their winning cards and they keep the circle twirling around the Pet Sounds shangri-la, only with their own direction and condiments. This album is hugely critic-friendly and will be most likely to receive 2-props and 5-stars and such practically reasonable trophies of which a quality indie band such as Animal Collective surely deserves.

As a vivid example I can bring The Fiery Furnaces music and their Widow City in particular. I admit that one sounded distracted as well but at least it had a huge amount of melody, studio quality and most importantly, theme (85% of the time = cohesion). I can't put any of these tags on Skeletal Lamping. From the very beginning moments of "Nonpareil of Favor" you're dealing with irrational dilemmas, the restlessness takes over. Kevin Barnes gay vocals vs. the 5-minute out of the blues heavy guitar strumming not only sounds unbelievably stupid and haphazard, but also leaves a gigantically bad impression over the listener's back upon how to tolerate the next 14 upcoming tracks.

Most tracks do not have a certain ending; they get cut and ripped for no reason. "Wicked Wisdom" starts with "I'm a motherfuckin' headliner, bitch you don't even know it, process it". Gets cut, the direction turns around, the song finds new path in oblivion. The lines are free of melodies. Just like Hissing Fauna, we're dealing with low studio mix as well. The record is made to be hi-fi but sounds desperately rotten practically. And no wonder that the rest of the story stretches on the way the first two tracks did. Personally makes me mad and out of my mind. No, I don't call it experimental songwriting. I call it junk-oblivious NOTHING (oh how I wish it was based on oblivion or anything near! But it's not). Skeletal Lamping is like Scissor Sisters meet Aphex Twin in Hong Kong for some improvised rehearsing but then Richard D. James catches a bad flu and leaves his equipment with the Sisters alone in a studio hall.

Several pieces of irrelevant vinyls glued together going nowhere; A band so proudly undecided and exasperated. Of Montreal! Are you the freaking gay self-destroyer?

The EP is badly free, therefore we're having all the 6 tracks right here on This Winki's. The upcoming full-length sounds so promising and potent in a very pop sense of saying. But for now let's have a - let's say very comprehensive - taste of Sean Fournier. Go here in case you wanted to download the whole EP with a neatly designed catalog.

Listen | Sean Fournier "Broken Stereo (Acoustic Version)" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>








Listen | Sean Fournier "Put the World On Stop (Piano Version)" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>








Listen | Sean Fournier "Another Like You (Piano Version)" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>








Listen | Sean Fournier "Goodbye (Piano Version)" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>








Listen | Sean Fournier "Falling For You (Piano Version)" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>








Listen | Sean Fournier "Holding the Hand Of the Hurricane" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>

Now there are two kinds of people dealing with this: Those who have listened and loved Illinoise and those who can't help but to pronounce the J in Sufjan. For the first category Nightlife In Illinoise can be a neat reminiscent of all the jazz they used to be involved in back in 2005. All the melodies and Sufjan's chorus lines have remained intact, only a large dose of hip-hop and beats have been added which sounds nothing bad. Although putting rap on those delicate pieces of pure art could easily irritate a die-hard fan or be a little contradictory to Illinoise' concept but then again let me remind you that these all cost you zero $! So why don't you bother us for a couple of clicks and try it before any prejudice, ha? For the second category, the disk might come as a huge surprise. They might go like "Wow! Where did they find all those instrumentations and who is this tiny slender mommy boy singing in back vocals?". Either this or that, Nightlife In Illinoise will be a delighting experience only if you remove your dark lens. It's Nightlife for Christ's sake.

Listen | Metermaids "The Blackhawk War Will Only Ruin The Nightlife If You Let It" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>








Listen | Metermaids "The Zombies Will Eat Your Brains Out But Will Leave Your Ears And Fingertips" language="JavaScript" src="http://pppppedram.quotaless.com/audio-player.js">>

Now if you also hit Metermaids MySpace page, there will be a contest as well. You will get the chance to have your interpretation of Nightlife with all the sample and auxiliaries. A very Radiohead-ish approach honestly. But before that make sure to download the album right here and in case you were even more delighted download another three tracks (11,12 and 13) straight from the page cause the pack comes with only 10 remixes).