I came to Zorn's music from indie rock, so I have to drop some comments.
I think Radiohead are one of the least interesting bands currently recording
and making music; their songs are too intentionally "postmodern"/"faux-avant
garde" to touch me, or anyone, personally and emotionally, and the music is
wholly uninteresting as well. I'm tiring of so many people calling the band
"experimental", when they're simply doing things that other artists made safe
years ago.
Ok, enough bitching aside- who's interesting in rock right now?
I say:
Enon- John Schmersal, who was in the seminal mid-nineties band Brainiac. After
"the guy" from Brainiac died, John started Enon. The first record, "believo!",
found him teaming up with two guys from Skeleton Key. It's a melange of
junkyard funk, lo-fi synth rock, and blistering post-pop. Great, great record.
Then, last year, he came back with a new backing band (Toko Yasuda, a gorgeous
girl who plays synth and bass alternately and also sings lead and backup) and
a drummer. They released "high society" last year, a mix of almost-synth pop,
straighforward poppy indie rock, grinding electro-rock, a sonic-youthy song,
and even the title track, a great, noirish Serge-by-way-of-Pulp number. I
think they're one of the more interesting indie rock bands making music right
now.
Lambchop- If you guys haven't heard Lambchop, get thee to a record store!
They're an often-14 piece Nashville band doing an inexplicably perfect blend
of classic Lee hazlewood-esque 1970's country (the morricone-y strings, the
cavernous drums, the ghostly slide guitar) and 1970's R&B (the smooth horns,
the thrumming hammond, the wah-wah guitars). They're hot hot hot.
Androo
