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Posts Tagged ‘Test of the Boomerang’

Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009

Test of the Doomerang: Isis, “Wavering Radiant”

by Ben Wiser

Once upon a time, in my 16th or 17th year, I had but two concerns; one, whether or not the punk chick with the red bob at Rainbow Records had a boyfriend; and two, which was slightly more dire, was which band logo I wanted to have my friend Ron airbrush onto the back of my leather jacket.

If you wanted to get a fuggin’ perfect Crimson Ghost or GBH logo on the back of your leather, Ron was the guy to do it. His dad had an old truck camper in the side yard and Ron had turned it into his workshop. He had a box full of chains, spikes, and needlenose pliers to turn your jacket into the ultimate garment of bad-assery.

Had Isis been around then, I wouldn’t have given it a second thought. ISIS in big red block letters. ISIS without a fucking doubt. Just thinking about it now makes me want to go get a leather jacket, go visit Ron in the clinker, and have him do his magic once again. (more…)

Tags: Aaron Turner, Ben Wiser, Demi-Lich, Doom, Isis, metal, Post-Metal, Test of the Boomerang, Tool
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Wednesday, February 4th, 2009

Test of the Boomerang: A Midwinter Mix

by Ben Wiser

Now is the time of year when thoughts turn to the warmer days of spring and summer just ahead. It’s also the time of celebrations. Chinese New Year or Spring Festival is celebrated between January and February. The old Celtic holiday of Imbolc on February 2nd marks the halfway point between the Solstice and Equinox. February is Black History Month. Valentines Day, Presidents Day. We have a lot to occupy ourselves while we wait for spring. Robert Nesta Marley’s birthday is February 6th, and so today’s Test of the Boomerang features a Bob-inspired mix of music to warm up with during these waning cold days.

There are some cuts from Bob himself, as well as Stephen “Raggamuffin” and Damien “Jr. Gong” representing the rest of the Marley family. You’ll hear from the great Bill Laswell (born Feburary 12th) with the Algerian band Maghrebika, as well as a cut from Laswell’s brilliant Bob Marley tribute, Dreams of Freedom: Ambient Translations of Bob Marley in Dub. I’m also sharing with you some music by the lost great band Catalyst, whose essential collected discography set, The Funkiest Band You Never Heard Of, seems to sadly have gone out of print yet again. If you find it at a decent price, definitely pick it up. Some brilliant stuff there.

Last on the playlist today is a live recording from the Grateful Dead, taped on March 21st, 1991. This is a improvised jam on “Stir It Up” that appeared in the second set out of “Fire on the Mountain” and leading into the “Drums” portion of the night. The inclusion of new keyboardists Bruce Hornsby and Vince Welnick in 1990 infused some new energy and a renewed sense of adventure to the band, and this is a good example of that. A lot of fun.

Enjoy the tunes, folks. Stay warm. Beware of black ice, and I’ll meet you all back here next week. (more…)

Tags: Animal Collective, Ben Wiser, Bill Laswell, Bob Marley, Catalyst, Damien Marley, Dub, Global Drum Project, Grateful Dead, King Crimson, Live, Magrehbika, Mickey Hart, Reggae, Scientist, Stephen Marley, Test of the Boomerang, Zakir Hussein
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Wednesday, January 28th, 2009

Test of the Boomerang: Animal Collective’s “Merriweather Post Pavilion”

by Ben Wiser

Named after the outdoor summer shed in Columbia, Maryland, Merriweather Post Pavilion is the latest disc from Baltimore’s Animal Collective. The band named their disc in homage to warm summer evenings spent on the lawn there, enjoying and experiencing live music. The squeaky clean “planned community” hosted a mighty double bill of The Who and Led Zeppelin in 1969, but the local fuzz banned the good ol’ Grateful Dead from setting foot in the place in 1990.

When I first heard Animal Collective a few years back, I was immediately reminded of bands like Flying Saucer Attack, Windy and Carl or His Name is Alive. Bands with a foot planted firmly on the reverb pedal and just the slightest suggestion of song structure at their shimmering core. But Animal Collective strip away those pretensions and infuse their soundscape with gleeful abstraction and playful experimentation rather than post-punk melancholy. This music is dense and rich and it’s fun. Before I wrote this, I spent a lot of time listening to it. While it couldn’t grab me while I was doing dishes or driving to work, headphones at night proved to be ideal. (more…)

Tags: Animal Collective, Ben Wiser, Test of the Boomerang
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Wednesday, January 7th, 2009

Test of the Boomerang: Best of 2008

by Ben Wiser

Test of the Boomerang – Top Ten of 2008

I will dispense with the usual bullshit “Let’s take a look back…” year-end review. USA Today will have that shit in spades for the next four to six weeks. Nothing is ever truly over. There is no true end. Nor is there a true beginning.

Dramatic music swells in the background

In these past twelve months I have seen horror and I have seen wonder. I have seen triumphs

Cymbals crash

and I have seen the agony of defeat

Trumpets

and no doubt we shall see more. The utter collapse of our financial institutions and increasing aggression and war. I have seen the naked face of evil…

photo montage now strikes up of Sarah Palin and Ashley Todd shooting at wolves from a helicopter, Dick Cheney strangling a rosy-cheeked orphan with a telephone cord, John McCain eating a big greasy cheeseburger while his wife does a line of coke off of a small mirror, George W. Bush with a jet pack…

and I have seen images of hope…

Barack Obama and Joe Biden riding on a soaring magical eagle over a beautiful stretch of California coastline as the music comes to a soaring peak…

But enough of all that. Let’s get to the music, shall we?

My Top Ten of 2008.

10. Sunn O))) – DÃ¸mkirke 2-LP (Southern Lord)

Say what you will about the mighty Sunn O))) — at their fundamental core, deep beneath the waves of feedback and within their black robes, O’Malley, Anderson and company are a live band. Part performance, part transcendental experience. This limited edition double-vinyl set documents a performance by the band at a Gothic cathedral in Bergen, Norway. If that wasn’t perfect already, the band composed an actual piece of music specifically for the performance. Church organs, horns, strange electronics, vocals both sublime and guttural, soar within the old cathedral like aÂ medieval plague. Haunting, intense, (beautifully packaged) and definitely my favorite Sunn O))) release thus far. (more…)

Tags: Ben Wiser, Benga, Black Mountain, Blood Ceremony, Bob Mould, David Bowie, David Gilmour, Dubstep, Earth, Gary Jules, Grateful Dead, Jesu, Lotus, Mark Kozelek, MMW, Mudcrutch, My Morning Jacket, Ray LaMontagne, Sound Tribe Sector 9, Sun Kil Moon, Sunn O))), Test of the Boomerang, Tom Petty, Video Games
Posted in Music, Test of the Boomerang | Comments

Wednesday, December 10th, 2008

Have No Fear, Your Test of the Boomerang Gift Guide is Here!

by Ben Wiser

Yuletide greetings folks. Even in these tough economic times, the annual rite of holiday gift giving must be performed to appease the mighty snow demons. So here are a few ideas…

There are three absolute “Can’t Miss” gifts – Booze, Books, and Vinyl.

1. BOOZE

Who doesn’t love booze? A bottle of moderately priced wine or a good-sized bottle of hootch will light up the face of anyone weary of yet another Borders gift card. A good bottle of Italian wine, a rare spirit, or a limited seasonal release beer is always a winner. Best of all, they might even share some of their gift with you!

The makers of 1800 Tequila can produce a 750ml bottle of their fine nectar emblazoned with any custom artwork or photograph you wish. No copyrighted images, please, no matter how friggin’ sweet a big bottle of tequila would look with the cover of Iron Maiden’s Number of the Beast on it. 1800 also makes a line of bottles featuring work by various artists from around the way (Josh Ellingson and Hannah Stouffer – OAKTOWNNNN!) and they’re absolutely gorgeous to look at. 1800 makes a damn fine tequila; now if only they could get name-checked in a rap song or two, they would be set. (more…)

Tags: Bill Hicks, comics, David Gilmour, Earth, Gifts, Holiday Cheer, Metalocalypse, Tequila, Test of the Boomerang, Tori Amos, vinyl
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Wednesday, October 29th, 2008

Test of the Boomerang: Slow Train edition

by Ben Wiser

The Gospel of Bob

I’ve known some pretty serious Bob Dylan fans. They’ll talk at length about the merits of underappreciated albums like Street Legal and Self Portrait. They’ll travel fair distances to see the man perform live. They’ll defend the integrity of Renaldo and Clara. For an artist like Bob Dylan with such a great and varied body of work, such fandom is understandable.

Then there are fans like Joel Gilbert, who actually “plays” Dylan as part of a tribute act called Highway 61 Revisited, and cranks out unauthorized Dylan documentaries the way some fans make mix tapes of Desire outtakes.

Inside Bob Dylan’s Jesus Years: Busy Being Born…Again is his latest, and it’s an exhausting two-hour look at Bob Dylan’s brief stint as born again evangelical christian and Jews for Jesus poster boy in the late 1970s.

Gilbert himself appears in the documentary, shaggy-haired, wearing a western-styled shirt, driving around the American south, waving to locals, and engaging producer Jerry Wexler, session singer Regina McCrary, Dylan keyboardist Spooner Oldham, music writer Joel Selvin and others in long, rambling interviews. It’s great hearing the late Jerry Wexler talk at length about the recording of Dylan’s gospel-inflected late ’70s output, but there’s not a single note to be heard of the actual music being discussed. (All the music on the “soundtrack” is provided by Highway 61 Revisited.)

Getting through this was excruciating. 30 minutes of Vineyard Church pastor Bill Dwyer (and others) talking about the born again “experience” is way too long for even the most hardcore Bob Dylan fan to sit through. When Al Kasha (it’s cool, I didn’t know either) talks about kneeling before his television set and placing his hand on the screen to become a reformed, born-again Jew, I actually felt a little uneasy. (more…)

Tags: Ben Wiser, Bob Dylan, Joel Gilbert, Test of the Boomerang
Posted in DVD Reviews, Music, Test of the Boomerang | Comments

Wednesday, October 8th, 2008

Test of the Boomerang XII: “If I Had a Rocket Launcher”

by Ben Wiser

I was eleven or twelve. I was riding with my dad. We were driving back from somewhere. We were listening to the radio. It was just my dad and me. All of the sudden, a strange kind of music comes on. The vaguely-Eastern sounding keyboards and guitar arpeggios sound cool enough, then the vocals start: “IF I HAD A ROCKET LAUNCHER, I’D MAKE SOMEBODY PAY.”

Whoa.

Here was a song about a guy who is singing about getting a rocket launcher — a rocket launcher — and after asking “how many kids did you kill today?” was going to make somebody pay. It was like somebody took the plot to Commando and made a song out of it. Already this was the most badass song I had ever heard, but nothing could have prepared me for that final verse.

“If I had a rocket launcher, some son of a bitch would die!”

This was on the radio! The guy not only said “son of a bitch,” but he said “some son of a bitch would DIE!” He was gonna take that rocket launcher and he was gonna kill that son of a bitch! This was in a song! The most intense lyric I had heard on the radio before that was that “the union of the snake was on the prowl.”

My dad and I got home and I ran into my room, totally energized with pre-adolescent macho awkwardness. I turned on my radio and slowly, very slowly turned the knob up and down the radio dial until I could catch that song.

Well, days went by, weeks went by, months, years. I don’t think I ever heard the song on the radio again. Then, ten years ago, I remembered the song and I went looking for it on Napster.

(more…)

Tags: Ben Wiser, Bruce Cockburn, Test of the Boomerang
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Wednesday, September 24th, 2008

Test of the Boomerang X: Report from the Land of the Dead

by Ben Wiser

I. Report from the Land of the Dead
It has a been a busy time in Deadland. Most notably, tickets went on sale this past weekend for the Deadheads For Obama show on October 13th at Penn State. Many of you will remember that earlier this year, Phil, Bobby, Mickey and friends got together at the Warfield for the first Deadheads for Obama concert. This time out, Bill Kreutzmann and Mr. Soulshine Himself, Warren Haynes, will also be in attendance.

Phil Lesh’s son is a volunteer for the Obama campaign, and he got the old man involved. While the formally “non-partisan” band stumping for Obama did cause some bad vibes among some ‘Heads (especially the Ron Paul contingent) the important thing here is to let the show speak for itself.

II. Bill Kreutzmann/Oteil Burbridge/Scott Murawski Trio
Quietly on tour earlier this year was Bill Kreutzmann’s new musical brigade. There was some debate as to what the name of the combo actually was, but Kreuztmann, Burbridge & Murawski became the standard. Some people call it the Kreutzmann Trio, others call it ‘3,’ but whatever you call it, it’s a tight, dynamic outfit.

There aren’t any shows up at the LMA yet, however, many recordings of their shows can be found (in beautiful lossless FLAC) on http://bt.etree.org. I did find this (along with several other clips) on YouTube. Here is “The Bill Kreutzmann Trio” live, 4/20/08, at the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago for the Earth Day Festival: (more…)

Tags: Ben Wiser, Bill Kreutzmann, Dark Star, Grateful Dead, Mountains of the Moon, Oteil Burbridge, Scott Murawski, Test of the Boomerang
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Wednesday, September 17th, 2008

Test of the Boomerang: Remember a Day

by Ben Wiser

Another sad day in Floyd land.

“The Violent Sequence” (early version of “Us and Them” from the Zabriskie Point sessions, 1970)

“It Would Be So Nice” (single version, 1968)

“Remember a Day” (from Saucerful of Secrets, 1968)

“Summer ‘68″ (from Atom Heart Mother, 1969)

“Embryo” (from Picnic: A Breath of Fresh Air, 1970)

“Stay” (from Obscured by Clouds, 1972)

“Any Color You Like” (live, 1974)

Tags: Ben Wiser, Pink Floyd, Richard Wright, Test of the Boomerang
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Wednesday, September 10th, 2008

Test of the DOOMERANG VIII : Monarch

by Ben Wiser

Since the world is about to end, I figured I would get into the spirit and post this — the first Test of the DOOOOMERANG!!! DOOOOOOM is the serious bidniss, as we will learn today.

I used to work in San Francisco. After work, I would get a vegan raw almond milkshake at Cafe Gratitude and then go over to the fantastic Aquarius Records on Valencia Street. I would spend hours in that cool little shop and look through the new releases. Crazy reggae dub records, crazy experimental stuff, crazy field recordings, and some seriously intense metal and psych records.

That’s where I learned of the mighty Sunn O))) and the sonic sitar drive of Lamp of the Universe. I was set hip to Kiss’ prog rock album (produced by none other than Bob Ezrin and featuring additional lyrics by Lou Reed, no less) and I bought my first Jesu records.

I also discovered Monarch.

Monarch are, or were actually, a French drone/dooooooooom band fronted by a young lady named Emilie Bresson. This three (sometimes four)-member unit of unholy sludgemerchants poured out the slow and lumbering death-lurch like so much black sticky hash resin. They released a handful of records — three full-lengths, some EPs, a few platters split between other artists, and a ‘Best Of’ release. It was unusual for such a slowwww and doooomy band to have a female vocalist, but Emilie has seemed to attract quite the following. (more…)

Tags: Ben Wiser, Doom, Monarch, Test of the Boomerang
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