[PAULYBEE2656]

heres a question, its been a while but does anyone remember lightning bolt. they havent been mentioned here in at least 18 months.............

[atsonicpark]

*makes quick appearance on thread but not to talk about M&M's*
Haha, everyone remembers Lightning Bolt! Great band. I saw em live uh.. 5 or 6 months ago. I bet they're working on some new material right now. Love 'em.
*leaves*

[the ikara cult]

Originally Posted by pbradley

Mrs Doyle: What do yah say to a cuppa tea, father?
Father Jack: FECK OFF, CUP!

*re-enters*
a filthy pair of FECKIN WOMENS KNICKERS!
*leaves*

[pbradley]

missing out on the last Lightning Bolt hurt a lot

friends' girlfriends ruin everything

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by pbradley

missing out on the last Lightning Bolt hurt a lot

friends' girlfriends ruin everything

fuck fuck fuck fuck me too! missed them as they were burning through the southwest.

it was nobody, but temporary poverty, that fucked us up though...

i will get my revenge

[Moshe]

http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/articl...iew/45781-boss

Magik Markers
BOSS
[Ecstatic Peace; 2007]
Rating: 7.5


Despite their long list of releases, Magik Markers have up to now been more compelling live than on record. Even on their best discs, the highs of their free-ranging noise-rock have come with meandering, sometimes off-putting lows. By contrast, the live act of guitarist and singer Elisa Ambrogio and drummer Pete Nolan is constantly fascinating. Their commanding stage presence steamrolls over musical gaps that, without the visceral visuals, might stick out awkwardly on record.
So it figures that, to make an album that holds attention the way their shows do, Magik Markers would have to channel their rambling spontaneity into more conventional tunes. What's so great about BOSS is that even though it is more structured and song-oriented than any previous effort, the band's fiery, scraggly approach remains intact. Paradoxically, by restricting their options (and, coincidentally, losing bassist Leah Quimby), the band has made its music even more open and free.
Such discipline has also made Magik Markers' sound more diverse. Their improv-based records sometimes got stuck in a narrow range of noises, but while BOSS may be a bona-fide rock album, there's lots of different stuff happening here: straight up rockers, punk rants, country-ish acoustics, and even an aching piano ballad. And each has an energy and authority that matches the band's live show.
That said, BOSS isn't a complete split from the band's past. They have veered toward straight rock in the midst of some of their noise jams before, and many tracks here evoke the post-Sonic Youth clang of 2005's I Trust My Guitar Etc. But there's definitely something new going on, and most of it comes from the seductive voice and lyrics of Ambrogio. She's always been a deserving attention-getter, but here her talents seem wider and sharper. Her singing primarily evokes Patti Smith, as do her words, which deftly use rhyme to build intangible meaning. For example, on "Taste" she varies her choruses with tantalizing off-rhymes-- "He had tasted her, tasted her/ Smiled right into the base of her/ He kept racing her, racing her/ And stayed alive; outpacing her"-- while her guitar and Nolan's simple drumming seem to rhyme in turn.
"Taste" may be BOSS's most memorable track, but highlights abound. Opener "Axis Mundi" rises from initial guitar noise into a chugging swing, while "Last of the Lemach Line" sways hypnotically as Ambrogio intones with increasing desperation. Later, Nolan contributes primal piano chords to Amborgio's Cat Power-ish croon on "Empty Bottles", mixing nicely with the glockenspiel of producer Lee Ranaldo. Ranaldo also adds a layer of guitar fire to the manic "Body Rot", which sounds like a punked-out take on Rhys Chatham's minimal trance-rocker "Drastic Classicism".
BOSS stumbles just slightly at its end. The noise essay "Pat Garrett" never really gathers steam, while closer "Circle" comes off as a thinner version of "Lemach Line". But sandwiched in between is the stellar "Bad Dream/Hartford's Beat Suite", a haunting tale of bloody pockets and severed thumbs that approaches the chill of a Johnny Cash tune. Such a comparison might be surprising, but then BOSS is bound to rearrange a lot of people's perceptions of this potent duo.
-Marc Masters, October 04, 2007

[scott v]

i find it abit odd that this band creates this much controversy? i mean do they demand it? only in that they are backed by Thurston and Lee and SY and are on Ecstatic Peace! so people are gonna diss because they are only where they are because of SY... thats lame thinking. come up with something better than oh..."i want to see the MM fans who aren't thurston-shadows" and what about Elisa playing in Six Organs of Admittance? heh, where's all the Ben Chasny shadows??? and the J. Mascis shadows etc etc... for that matter. i bet elisa and pete would laugh in hestorics if they read all of this stuff, in that in a certain way this sorta of confrontational response to their work would be quite the complement for them. i'd love to have this many lovers and haters of my music...

[PAULYBEE2656]

lightning bolts new long player due out by end of year. fuckin awesome band to see live!

[HaydenAsche]

Originally Posted by atsonicpark

*makes quick appearance on thread but not to talk about M&M's*
Haha, everyone remembers Lightning Bolt! Great band. I saw em live uh.. 5 or 6 months ago. I bet they're working on some new material right now. Love 'em.
*leaves*

Yeah, boi.

[Lethrneck4]

jesus, this thread is probably the most magic markers will ever be discussed in thier horrible, and hopefully over soon career...and for the person who said magic markers probably love it that people hate them so much...maybe MM need to rethink...the people at thier shows ARE the people they should want to liek them. its not like some Creed fans are disliking them, people with VERY good musical taste, like a lot of people on this board HATE them...sometimes, esp in the case of this band..people mistake being "open minded" for lacking any common sense at all.

did i read right that some dude compared SY to magic markers??

LMAOOOO

[Toxa]

BOSS is very nice album in my opinion.

[atsonicpark]

*re-enters, only to point out something*
see, lethrneck4, that was the point I was trying to make all along.. I bitched about the markers but tired of it, but then I read the REVIEWS; I mean, did anyone even bother reading those? People thought I was endlessly bitching about the Markers -- which I was -- but I retired to my quarters until I started seeing those retarded reviews. Specifically the review that goes, "I can't tell the difference between Sonic Youth and Markers anymore." WHAT?! Regarldess of whether you like the Markers or not, that's about the dumbest fucking thing I've EVER read and I'm surprised more Yoof fans didn't cry outrage. Jesus. Okay, yeah, I'm pretty sure that I have nothing else to reply to now. Fuck this.
*leaves*

[PAULYBEE2656]

the magik markers vortex sucks ac in again and again.. its only a matter of time until you start doing the handmade marker shirts man!!!!!


(((microwaves)))= ear candy!

[atsonicpark]

Yes, (((microwaves))) are fucking excellent. What's funny is.. they used to have Six Finger Satellite listed as an influence on their myspace, and I was one of their first friends, and I messaged them saying that I really dug them and they were like Six Finger Satellite for the 2000's... and then a few days later, they took "Six Finger Satellite" out of their interests. Hahaha. Listened to the Pre, fucking excellent, of course, Skin Graft!!! It's funny, I had some of the album downloaded before you sent me that link, but the guy who I was downloading from never got back online, so you gave me the whole album. Dig. Weirdly, one of the riffs on that album is nearly note-for-note identical to a riff I came up with before; I think that's the first time I've ever had that happen. Haven't listened to the Schroder (sp) stuff yet but I will shortly!

[Moshe]

The Magik Markers
Boss [Ecstatic Peace; 2007]

4.5/5


Styles: noise-rock, harsh psych-pop, proto-punk
Others: Sonic Youth, Lydia Lunch


Lately, my heart has been telling me that perhaps the rock ‘n’ roll well has run dry, that all the inherent glee and rambunctious energy we draw from our Fun Houses and Rocket To Russias are beacons of their time, perfection never to again be duplicated. Take a look at any consciously amp-fueled rock of any shade from the past few years, and for the most part, those with the most exposure or support have let nostalgia work against any pure creative triumphs. Sure, a little revival or remembrance can be healthy when delivered with a certain unpretentious elation, but many musicians embody a self-conscious reaction against the fading of their beloved idols of years past, a prospect that gives us the occasional strychnine rush, but one that acts as a naive approximation of the breakthroughs of rock’s innovations.
So, to see one of the most vehemently combustible and untamable bands (who operate by a burnt thread under the “rock” banner) pull out one of the most rewarding and assured song-oriented rock records of recent years leaves me honestly dumbfounded. The Magik Markers have become one of the more difficult groups of iconoclasts operating in the underground, smearing their filthy tangles of feedback and rabid no-wave spittle against the face of the post-2000 “rock” revival, doing much the same as their most obvious predecessors (DNA, Mars, etc.) did when punk became tainted with the mainstream’s opportunist influence. Sounding like Kathy Acker throwing Half Japanese down a flight of stairs while Jaki Liebezeit keeps pace over the scene, the Molotov-cocktail of near-anti-melody and confrontational stream-of-conscious poetry truly splits the increasingly elitist, self-satisfied, and musically craven “indie” camp down the middle. And now, with Boss, the Markers have by leaps and bounds made questions of their talent moot. By reinvigorating the use of pop melody in the context of atonal and fervent desire (in a manner that stands inches by some of the greatest punk staples of yesteryear), they’ve become a potent machine that lesser bands best watch out for.
As a first “official” studio release, Boss is initially frustrating and disarming for the dedicated follower or the curious observer looking for an easy entry. With their trademark-free and unruly career-making squalor documented on countless CD-Rs and limited LPs, it makes sense that Boss aims for something more difficult to attain for such a typecasted band, even though one can only imagine the band’s early years wreaking havoc on the concept of a studio. From the moment Elisa Ambrogio lets her voice take reign on “Axis Mundi,” the song becomes less a noise-rock stalwart than a nugget of psych-punk utopia embedded with warm sonics and Ambrogio’s decision to actually sing. And regarding that eyebrow-raising choice... well, all those snide comments that were hurled at Ambrogio’s snarling atonal rants will feel mighty stupid after listening to this.
It’s not automatically impressive for a raucous act to go pop, but it is for a band whose fearless abandon into avant-punk noise was, and still is, their calling card. The secret in Boss is that the Markers, like all the greatest punk, psych, and garage bands, treat pop as a necessary part of the whole. Songs like “Body Rot” and “Circle” are still caked on every angle with grit and grime, but still serve their purpose as too-the-point blasts of fleeting joy that demand constant immersion. Too many bands in the realm of indie rock, indie pop, and even the classic punk/garage revival movements view pop as a saccharine novelty, a prospect still so coated in elitist irony that even the most sincere of the new breed feel either naively nostalgic, too shrouded in déjà vu to make a commanding statement. On Boss, Ambrogio and Pete Nolan (bassist Leah Quimby left last year) seem to understand the spirit that The Sonics, The MC5, The Stooges, and X-Ray Spex left, which is why a song like “Body Rot” has both the vigor and fuck-all attitude of the noise and avant scenes and the immediacy and appeal of more straight-ahead rock songs. Even the ballads (“Empty Bottles,” “Bad Dream”), a seeming oxymoron to the casual observer of this band, are treated with a careful restraint, never piling on the preciousness or melodrama of most post-Dylan/Cohen folkie fare. Why a song like “Bad Dream” somehow becomes fittingly gorgeous is that it never feels like its screaming to be heard in a specific manner. It just exists as it is, without any overextended effort or transparent showiness.
So many bands have forgotten how to make a song in a traditional format sound dangerous, and for those who need some sense of everlasting rebellion in their sonics, Boss has everything they’ve been wishing for in spades. It’s not trying to hearken to the past. It’s not trying to bid for a wider audience. It’s not a one-off experiment. It exists because this is what’s most appropriate for the Markers at this point in time, and they evidently have more talent and passion than even some of their most fervent fans probably gave them credit for. As evidenced by the epic discomfort of the stunning “Last Of The Lemach Line,” the Markers still punish their instruments into catastrophic bouts of anguished fuzz and feedback, only here on a surprisingly restrained and mature manner. Lee Ranaldo’s production brings out all the echoed squeals and beautiful ambience that deserves to be heard, and what separates Boss from any cynical cashing-in critiques is that the Markers went above and beyond to actually create an album that nearly contradicts their constructed identity. Whether or not this is representative of a new phase of the Markers, at least the inevitable pop record has surprisingly staked itself as one of their strongest statements and one of the very few pop records in recent memory to engage its audience in something profound and challenging.
1. Axis Mundi 2. Body Rot 3. Last Of The Lemach Line 4. Empty Bottles 5. Taste 6. Four/The Ballad Of Harry Angstrom 7. Pat Garrett 8. Bad Dream/Hartford’s Beat Suite 9. Circle
by Paul Haney

http://www.tinymixtapes.com/Magik-Markers,4414

[!@#$%!]

oh im seeing them on monday

im seeing them on monday

i'm seeing them monday...

FUCK YES!!

haters, please go eat a bag, eat a bag...

[HaydenAsche]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

oh im seeing them on monday

im seeing them on monday

i'm seeing them monday...

FUCK YES!!

haters, please go eat a bag, eat a bag...

I'd gladly eat a bag if I meant I wouldn't see the markers.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by HaydenAsche

I'd gladly eat a bag if I meant I wouldn't see the markers.

ha ha ha

that's not a fair challenge-- you'd eat a bag if there was a bag, no questions asked, you big slut :P

[PAULYBEE2656]

cool adam. i reckoned you would like pre! the si schroeder is a different thing altogether!!!!

[The Usher]

Funny how this treads run for so long. There must be somethings that's really annoying some.
When I first heard it I thought it was great. Then after a while I thought it was just ok... funny how you tire of somethings so quickly. I still like it, but it's not amazing.