ENTER GODMODE || GODMODE MUSIC

AN INCOMPLETE LIST OF THE PEOPLE AND ENTITIES WHO BENEFIT FROM A SYSTEMATICALLY ACCELERATED CONSUMPTION OF MUSIC (THEORETICALLY SPEAKING)

Fri, 17 May 2013 12:42:00 -0400

AN INCOMPLETE LIST OF THE PEOPLE AND ENTITIES WHO BENEFIT FROM A SYSTEMATICALLY ACCELERATED CONSUMPTION OF SUPPOSEDLY INDEPENDENT MUSIC (THEORETICALLY SPEAKING)

1. music playback hardware manufacturers such as apple and beats by dre (e.g. iphone, beats headphones)

2. music distribution platforms and services (more products to sell, more products to stream, the accumulation of microprofits, etc)

3. cloud-based downloading services such as mediafire

4. internet server companies that provide online data space for both #2 and #3

5. social media networks where music information is shared (tumblr, facebook both benefitting from more people using their services, e.g. for data mining)

6. music media (always something new to write about, more opportunities to create pseudo-narrative out of news cycle, more opportunities to be “first” both journalistically and critically, more opportunities to graft fictive-non-fictive theories onto content, greater likelihood that grafted theories will appear meaningful)

7. publicity firms (wider pool of represented ‘talent’ means more opportunity to broker deals with more and different kinds of media, e.g. more access given to more popular artist in exchange for smaller feature/debut/no-harm-done type press, e.g. debut, tour dates, any acknowledgement of new artist’s existence; publicists become integral part of controlling the ‘deluge’ and enjoy increasing degrees of setting agendas they are paid to set)

8. booking agencies and other 10- and 20-percenteries like management and music law. (greater nationalization of booking in the form of package deals, more younger bands with national appeal willing to be “put on the road” for $100/$150night, more power when negotiating fees and festival time slots, less pressure to ‘build’ an artist’s following because the artist will likely be made irrelevant in the deluge of new and more exciting artists; increasing profitability of picking up nickels and dimes)

9. new young artists whose content is loop-based, modular, capable of being quickly understood and cheaply produced (e.g. rap, electronic dance music, n.b. this is not a value judgment)

10. festival promoters (more ‘relevant’ bands means greater demand for festivals, rise in the number of festivals in US/worldwide speaks to the financial viability, festival brand becomes greater than the sum of its parts)

11. lifestyle brands (greater exposure to more supposedly independent artists drives down the cost of syncs and worldwide buyouts, no shortage of artists willing to have their music used for marketing purposes, more opportunities for festival sponsorships and promotional content)

12. people who enjoy the fantasy football-like qualities of the music world and take honest pleasure in the minting and accumulation of proper nouns (more ‘players’, more ‘teams’, more bowl games, more opportunities to be or to appear to be in the know, whether for reasons of self-definition or personal gain, social material or otherwise)

COURTSHIP RITUAL ENTERS GODMODE GREY FOXES, BEACH DAYS By Nick...

Wed, 08 May 2013 12:03:20 -0400

COURTSHIP RITUAL ENTERS GODMODE

GREY FOXES, BEACH DAYS

By Nick Sylvester

For being around less than six months, Brooklyn’s Courtship Ritual have quite a bit of confidence. The arrangements are deliberate, skeletal: a drum machine, a synthesizer or guitar loop, a vocal melody. That’s it usually. They commit to every single element. You hear it all. But you also hear the space that acts less confident would fill up. The only other band I know who’s doing this as well are the XX, but I doubt they’re much fun at the bowling alley.

If the synthesizer and guitar playing on “Wild Like Us” reminds me of mid Cocteaus, the synth programming and sense of deliberate imprecision of “Biesenbach on the Beach (Klaus)” has a kiss of Portishead—another natural resource this country has been lacking.

Speaking of Klaus Biesenbach: Yes, the song is inspired by a chance sighting of MoMA PS1’s director on a beach in Brooklyn. He approached the beach, surveyed the surroundings. He stripped, dove into the ocean, re-emerged, walked back to land, put his clothes on, and quickly went away. Grey fox. Beach day.

Courtship Ritual are Basque and Monica Salazar. Both these songs were recorded by Colin Alexander late last year. I did some slight remixing and drum programming. Fresh off that new Deerhunter record, Joe Lambert did the mastering in DUMBO. “Wild Like Us” is available digitally worldwide, and as a limited edition red tint cassette on GODMODE.

COURTSHIP RITUAL
Wild Like Us b/w Biesenbach on the Beach (Klaus)
GODMODE CAT NO GM029
2013

FASANO - THE BARN - OUT NOW ON CASSETTE AND...

Tue, 02 Apr 2013 07:47:00 -0400

FASANO - THE BARN - OUT NOW ON CASSETTE AND DIGITAL

“Last Evening” streaming right there.

Buy the cassette at the GODMODE shop.

Buy the digital at iTunes.

Stream the whole thing at Soundcloud.

The debut album by GODMODE’s Matty Fasano. Fasano sang backup vocals with a bunch of us at the final LCD Soundsystem gigs. Electric guitar, voice, and drum programming, recorded to four-track cassette at Brooklyn’s new Silent Barn studio—the first full-length record out of the place as far as we know.

Green cassette. Handstamped, handnumbered, hand-everything’d cover art, in limited run of 100 copies.

* * *

“It turns out GODMODE has its own Frank Ocean to match their balls-deep-in-the-Wipers version of OFWGKTA…” — Awkward Sound.

* * *

ON THE BARN
By Nick Sylvester

FASANO is Matthew Fasano. He sang with a bunch of us in the men’s chorus for those final LCD Soundsystem shows a couple years ago. “The Barn” is his debut cassette, with eight new songs that we recorded to four-track tape at the new Silent Barn studio. If you liked the first Waxahatchee or Grizzly Bear records I think you’ll dig this. 100 handmade, handstamped cassettes are available for purchase at shop.entergodmode.com.

Before I try to convince you that this record is my Bon Iver, let me start by saying: I hate singer-songwriters. The emotional ones, the literary ones, the ones that “understand the modern human condition” and so on. The ones that joke about how the Grammys don’t matter but still show up to accept the award. Pretty much all of them seem really desperate for me to take them seriously and it turns me off. Even the classic indie singer-songwriters that, as an educated contributor to the American musical underground (or something!), I’m supposed to respect, if not adore—it just never feels entirely genuine. What’s the rub? I want to know. It’s not their fault, but I always smell a rat.

And yet here is “The Barn”, which is very much the singer-songwriter debut by Matty Fasano, who records as Fasano. Matty and I recorded it in a day at the new Silent Barn, a DIY performance space in Bushwick. We did it live on a four-track cassette mixer, songs usually in one take, with vocals, drum loops, and electric guitar all stewing together in the room before hitting the microphones. A few songs were completely improvised. We didn’t know it was going to be a record until that’s what it was.

I’ve thought a lot about why I like this singer-songwriter record and not others. I’ve also realized that there are lots of people who feel the same way I do about singer-songwriters. And yet when I play them these songs, they all say the same thing: Something magical happened in that room.

You’ll either hear what I’m talking about or you won’t. What I respond to is the sense of voyeurism—like Fasano didn’t even realize he was being recorded. It’s evocative of a very specific kind of loneliness. The best bedroom recordings have an intimacy to them that’s almost accidental—like we’re not supposed to be hearing what we’re hearing. He’s singing these songs for himself. We’re just lucky to be hearing them.

* * *

FASANO
“The Barn”
GODMODE 2013
cat no: GM026

Songs by Matthew Fasano
Vox and Guitar by Matthew Fasano
Additional Programming by Nick Sylvester
Mixed and Recorded by Nick Sylvester at Silent Barn, BK

Photo

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 17:27:19 -0400

MR. DREAM - MONTREAL SEX MACHINE - COMING SOON

Tue, 12 Mar 2013 11:00:03 -0400

MR. DREAM - MONTREAL SEX MACHINE - COMING SOON

fuzz nyc and godmode present a sxsw showcase THU 14 MARCH @ the...

Fri, 08 Mar 2013 15:57:43 -0500

fuzz nyc and godmode present a sxsw showcase

THU 14 MARCH @ the brixton
1412 e. 6th st, austin, tx

10:20pm diarrhea planet
09:30pm single mothers
08:40pm big ups
07:50pm california x
07:00pm protomartyr
06:30pm team spirit
05:50pm sleepies
05:00pm ghost wave

RSVP: sxsw@entergodmode.com

“DEAR VERONICA VASICKA” AND OTHER ALAN WATTS NEWS 1....

Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:57:56 -0500

“DEAR VERONICA VASICKA” AND OTHER ALAN WATTS NEWS

1. Jeremy, Pat, and Mike remixed synth band Dream Affair’s hit single “The Porter” into what’s basically a love letter to Minimal Wave, one of our favorite labels. Here it is below. Happy Valentine’s Day, VV. Mwah!

2. In related minimal techno news, Alan Watts will be playing with A Crash Course In Science at Silent Barn on March 9. This comes off an amazing show at 285 Kent a few weeks ago with La Big Vic and Parquet Courts.

3. Alan Watts and GODMODE are excited to announce the Alan Watts Lecture Series, a bi-monthly cassette club with exclusive Alan Watts live streams, improvisational jams, and new songs in chrysalis. The cassette club is limited to 100 subscribers. If you are interested, please email internet at entergodmode dot com.

4. Alan Watts hit the studio at the end of March to record their debut LP. Like the latest stretch of GODMODE full-lengths, we’re doing this at the eerie and cavernous converted auto garage that is the Silent Barn studio.

EULA’s new single “I Collapse” debuted today...

Tue, 12 Feb 2013 14:41:02 -0500

EULA’s new single “I Collapse” debuted today on Pitchfork. Check it out below. The single officially comes out next Tuesday. They play next Thursday at Death By Audio with The Flag and Grooms.

GODMODE Dark Ops show this friday at big snow

Mon, 04 Feb 2013 10:32:03 -0500

GODMODE Dark Ops show this friday at big snow

Photo

Fri, 18 Jan 2013 11:35:08 -0500

Video

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 20:25:56 -0500

WILL WELCH || TAKING PICTURES RELEASE || PARADE GROUND @ 187...

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 10:39:28 -0500

WILL WELCH || TAKING PICTURES RELEASE || PARADE GROUND @ 187 EAST BROADWAY || 5 JAN 2013

we celebrated the release of will welch’s ‘taking pictures’ this past saturday. many thanks to kyra and grant/bushmills for providing the spirits, and james powers/parade ground for hosting everybody. mark anthony green took the photo above. a comical amount of people rolled through. thank you.

from what i understand we have about 25 copies left of this thing. you can buy one online at the new GODMODE shop: shop.entergodmode.com.

happy monday

NBS

THE GLORIOUS RETURN OF BULLETS A ROLLING LIST OF PEOPLE PLACES...

Fri, 04 Jan 2013 17:00:05 -0500

THE GLORIOUS RETURN OF BULLETS

A ROLLING LIST OF PEOPLE PLACES OBJECTS ETC OR OTHERWISE THAT HAVE ENTERED A KIND OF SPIRITUAL GODMODE

BULLET #13. The brand new Williamsburg Cinemas at Grand and Driggs. Not just because I don’t have to go to Union Square, not just because I don’t have to pay $15 a ticket anymore, but because the theater experience itself is so superior to everything else in the city right now, with a very local-seeming crowd that was on the whole decent and considerate and happy to be there too. Probably not going to be this way for long but I plan to enjoy it while it lasts.

BULLET #14. US GIRLS: “Jack”. Thanks to Ted McGrath/The Flag for reminding me to check out this album. “Jack” is a glam tune originally written for this band Danava that I don’t think got it past the demo stage. It’s sung from the perspective of Jack the Ripper. Killer stuff!! Went there!!

this is gonna be awesome on the new dream theater album this is...

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 11:28:06 -0500

this is gonna be awesome on the new dream theater album

2012 EXITS GODMODE: NICK SYLVESTER at the end of march i was in...

Fri, 21 Dec 2012 08:27:00 -0500

2012 EXITS GODMODE: NICK SYLVESTER

at the end of march i was in a bad place mentally and wrote the personal inventory that follows. it became a kind of checklist for self-improvement this year, and i referred back to it every few weeks to see how i was doing and try to realign. people badmouth lists but there’s something powerful in their definitiveness and promise and finality. if i do all these things, if i read all these books, if i do all these chores… i like the grimes album fine but really there was no more important list to me this year than the one below. here it is.

2012 so far (written march 28)

-unimpressed with the efficacy of xcelerator hand dryers

-concerned that google alerts somehow missed something

-hesitant to assemble my own food

-too easily swayed into a beer with dinner

-spending too little time with people who love me

-spending too much time with people who don’t

-on the plus side, doing a good job of calling grandparents

-coming to terms with the fact that at least a part of my happiness is dependent on the approval of others

-not saving enough money

-at the sight of better musicians i am not humbled so much as defeated

-at the sight of better writers i am convinced i could do it better if i had the time, which is its own kind of problem

-physically incapable of reading books

-none of my clothes seem right

-with no contrast, gray paint appears to be white

-worried that my failures have somehow made me fearful of the risks necessary to move ahead

-my initial instinct is to change the dialogue by writing, not by doing

-sleeping six hours on average, but distressed by the number of times i have to use the bathroom

-not careful about the things i think about

-paint the kitchen

what happens when adam is in charge of rehearsal recordings

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 16:35:33 -0500

what happens when adam is in charge of rehearsal recordings

2012 EXITS GODMODE: FASANO Year-End List (in no order): 1)...

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 10:20:21 -0500

2012 EXITS GODMODE: FASANO

Year-End List (in no order):

1) Geo Wyeth at Manhattan Inn

2) “Radiation” by Yvette

3) The Mitt Romney Post Mortem, i.e., this man has no legacy

4) The latest LBJ book by Robert Caro

5) Barclays Stadium not destroying Brooklyn

6) The new Sharon Van Etten record

7) “Shut-Up and Play the Hits”

8) Bill Clinton talking

9) Morello’s vocal take on “What a Mess” by Mr. Dream

10) The cartoons on the cover of the New Yorker during the election

2012 EXITS GODMODE: JOSH INTRATOR + MAX TREMBLAY...

Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:21:20 -0500

2012 EXITS GODMODE: JOSH INTRATOR + MAX TREMBLAY (SLEEPIES)

JOSH INTRATOR (in no particular order):

1. Roomrunner - Demo Cassette and Super Vague EP

2. Speedy Ortiz - Sports EP

3. Discovering EULA - I know Maurice Narcisse came out last year but it was new to me and changed everything…

4. The New York Knicks being relevant again

5. Liz Lemon finally getting married

6. Bad Credit No Credit - The Whole Buffalo

7. Montevallo, AL electing a mayor named “Hollie Cost”

8. The sold out Death By Audio Halloween covers show/Sandy Benefit

9. Heaven’s Gate - High Riser EP

10. GODMODE

MAX TREMBLAY: here ya go brah/bruh/breh…in order:

1. fiona apple - “the idler wheel…”

2. kendrick lamar - “good kid, M.A.A.D. city”

3. angel haze - “reservation”

4. violent change - “suck on the gun”

5. perfume genius - “put your back n 2 it”

6. jessie ware - “devotion”

7. terrible feelings - “shadows”

8. grimes - “visions”

9. dawn richard - “armor on”

10. hell of great singles on less-than-stellar albums: kreayshawn,

“left eye” (colossal shit); 2 chainz, “birthday song”; nicki minaj,

“beez in the trap”; taylor swift, “we are never ever getting back

together”; carly rae jepsen, “this kiss” and “call me maybe” (duh);

rick ross, “triple beam dreams”; GOOD music, “mercy”; bruce

springsteen, “land of hope and dreams”; waka flocka flame, “rooster in

my rari”; et al et al et al

2012 EXITS GODMODE: MIKE SHEFFIELD + JEREMY KRINSLEY + PATRICK...

Tue, 18 Dec 2012 09:58:00 -0500

2012 EXITS GODMODE: MIKE SHEFFIELD + JEREMY KRINSLEY + PATRICK STANKARD (ALAN WATTS)

JEREMY KRINSLEY:

12. NÜ silent barn

11. godmode conquers party expo

10. the guy with the nipple ring who called alan watts ‘rave rock’

9. cholulita

8. ‘think like a man’ banned in france

7. the freaks and geeks like relationship between the atlantic center guitar center and the one on 14th street

6. the idea, though not the act, of thurston moore playing a quarter inch cable

5. patrick stankard calling perl the ‘rap metal’ of programming languages

4. throwing a verifiably psychotic 30th bday party starring blues control and the sasquatch

3. impose gets an office (growin up so… gradually)

2. ♥eye bodega♥

1. the silence of the mormons i grew up with on facebook after that thing that happened

MIKE SHEFFIELD:

can’t really remember the first half of 2012 off hand. too much puffing. the second half was all about:

(in no order)

raime - quarter turns over a living line

realtime concrete - duum ep

the dreebs - humilation cs

rapstar - space crimes

itasca - grace riders on the road

parquet courts - light up gold

tom blacklungs - bad blood ep

cs luxem / lazurite - split II (w4e 009)

gem trails - adobada

nu sensae - sundowning

obamahhhh

not to mention YVETTE/sleepies/mdream releases

PATRICK STANKARD:

10) kraftwerk playing “computer world” at the moma - i couldn’t go, but the fact that it happened is pretty cool

9) all of jordan michael’s gimmicks

8) big snow and the ho_se!

7) node.js and event-driven programming in general

6) this video of nausea playing tompkins square park in 1988

5) eyebodega on all levels, especially this

4) the new silent barn space and it’s output for the next 10 years (at least)

3) vim and the janus distro

2) new friends, old friends, any person i got to meet and chill with throughout the year - 2012 was incredibly positive and enjoyable (for the most part) and i’m very thankful for all homies

1) the official release of the beach boys smile sessions and (practically) all of the audio recorded during it, including brian wilson asking for a hash joint while recording “our prayer”

p.s: jeremy, i’m pretty sure we were talking about php!!

2012 EXITS GODMODE: EULA But before that, we are thrilled to...

Mon, 17 Dec 2012 08:53:25 -0500

2012 EXITS GODMODE: EULA

But before that, we are thrilled to announce that Brooklyn no-wave band EULA have entered Godmode. Eula quickly became one of my favorite bands this year after I saw them play at Dead Herring with Sleepies and Mr. Dream. Alyse Lamb, who fronts the band, has a kind of Stockholm Syndrome approach to singing, shriek following coo following shriek. The guitar playing is just as wacky. Here’s “Dirty Hands”:

Dirty Hands by EULA

The bands’s first GODMODE single is a step away from hysterical no-wave and onto something else entirely—two of the band’s best songs yet. The tracks were engineered by Julian Fader and Carlos Hernandez of Ava Luna, and I will be finishing up the mix. More soon.

EULA will be closing out a year’s worth of Emily, Lizzy, and Mike’s fantastic FUZZ parties this Thursday at Swat Bar on Canal. It’s a killer small room that gets packed pretty quickly. See them if you haven’t!

“Here is my list (Alyse/EULA) **in no particular order**”

1.) the amount of musicians & artists banding together for Sandy relief efforts

2.) Metz/Die! Die! Die! show at Death by Audio

3.) Weird Wild World by Sleepies

4.) Exploding In Sound/Gimme Tinnitus CMJ showcase @ Paper Box

5.) Buying tickets to my first SWANS show

6.) SHARE.nyc open jam at MOMA PS1

6.) Playing on a rooftop with Nt, Sleepies, Plant

7.) Sneaking into Lustre Pearl to see Built to Spill

8.) Finding a 7” test pressing of ‘We’ve Got a Fuzzbox & We’re going to Use It’ [courtesy of Permanent Records, Greenpoint]

9.) Big Snow’s birth & watching it grow into a handsome young man

10.) LOVE given & received