TV On The Radio's Nine Types of Light is 10 good songs

 TV On The Radio

Funk has always been a musical ghetto.

It's an interesting intersection of good (rhythm section, especially) musicians and really bad lyrics. It has its feverish fans and many, many  And I suspect that even the most feverish funk aficionados never really take the music seriously.

I've listened to a good deal of funk. I own Bootsy Collins Rubber Band records and have a pile of Parliament and Funkadelic, too. James Brown? Check. Isley Brothers? Check. Tower of Power? Actually saw them play at warehouse in Waterbury, Conn. (True story!) I've spent time with newer stuff, too: Fishbone and Chili Peppers (almost funk, right?).

Foo Fighters: Don't Waste Your Time With Wasting Light

I like Dave Grohl. I really do. I also think it's neat that the goofy drummer of Nirvana is now the front man of the biggest standard bearer of mid-'90s modern rock. Who would have thunk it?

Grohl showed early promise with the Foo Fighters' self-titled debut: a fun, if generic, upbeat blast of nitty gritty power punk. But since then, it's been a long slide into dull, arena rock that sounds like it has a lot more in common with late '70s bands like Foghat and Thin Lizzy than the indie bona fides of Grohl's early '90s work. He hasn't managed to record more than half a decent album (as a front man) since, including, as far as I'm concerned, The Colour and the Shape (which has the best Foo Fighter Song: "Everlong").

Press reports leading up to Wasting Light's release offered a bit of promise. Grohl, apparently, eschewed his big, private studio to record the album in his garage... After listening to Wasting Light a few times, it's pretty clear Grohl has a really expensive garage.

Several Shades of Why I Can Get Into an Acoustic Record by J. Mascis

The indie rock guitar god J Mascis is pretty good unplugged, too.

When I saw the Dinosaur Jr. reunion show a couple years ago -- this was just before the band released the second record with the reunited lineup,  2010's Farm --  frontman J. Mascis had half the tiny Lancaster stage  filled with four towering full Marshall stacks.

Even more remarkable than the site of half a (albeit small club) sound stage filled with that much firepower was the fact that all four amps were not aimed out at the crowd. they wrapped around the right side of the stage so that will were pointing directly at Mascis.

You see, for anyone unfamiliar with Dinosaur Jr., J. Mascis has consistently set the bar for volume. On the band's early records the level was set so high, that the guitar sound just absolutely bleeds. That's how Mascis wanted it to sound. And this was in the late '80s. If Kurt Cobain was the "father" of what would be called grunge, Masics is the form's grandfather. It was Mascis, really, who first nailed a formula that merged sloppy shoe-gaze with '60s psychedelia and loud-as-hell guitars.

Angles: The Strokes' early '80s Frankenstein's Monster

Remember rock music in 2001?

Alternative rock had been nearly strangled into oblivion by jock rock and rap rock. Bands like Creed and Nickelback and Linkin Park were the staples of rock radio. It was a bad, bad scene.

Then the Strokes debuted a simple, gritty record called Is This It, was a light, easy antidote to all the garbage on the radio. The Strokes recalled the 1977 art rock scene -- from Blondie to Television, the Cars to Talking Heads.  But it also sounded new. It sounded like Manhattan in 2001. It sounded like what was going on. It may have been derivative, but the simplicity of that sound was a welcome change from what was going on in rock at the time

It's been a long time since The Strokes and The White Stripes led a garage rock revival that brought early blues and post punk sounds to a wider, mainstream rock audience. The Strokes have been on hiatus since about 2005 and their third album First Impressions of Earth. They are back now with a new record, Angles. do they have another revival ready? Unfortunatley, no. Instead of a breath of fresh air, Angles sounds like a band that hasn't learned anything new at all.

TV On The Radio: Caffeinated Consciousness

Want a cool free song? Go to TV On The Radio's website here.

Give 'em your birthdate and e-mail and you'll get a link to download an mp3 of "Caffeinated Consciousness," a very cool song from the upcoming album Nine Types of Light set for release on April 12.  It's the perfect song for a warm spring day like today.

The eclectic Brooklyn band has been making very cool music now for the last decade (and then some). Based on this sample, I'm expecting some pretty great things.

Feel free to tell me what you think in the comments. I'm eager to your hear reactions.

R.E.M., Monster or Dinosaur? Talking about 'Collapse Into Now' and the greatest rock of my generation

R.E.M. was a blast of fresh air for rock in the '80s.
They were full of great melodies and energy.

I've been thinking lately about a grand musical question: What is the greatest American rock band of my generation? By my generation, I'm thinking of music made after the punk revolution of the late '70s successfully dislodged blues as the necessary foundation of rock music and opened up the musical palate of  rock music since at least 1980.

When I consider the question, I have something in mind like a great big March Madness bracket. There would be middle seed bands like Modest Mouse, The Minute Men, Fugazi and Dinosaur Jr., scrappy upstarts with higher seed looking for a their Cinderella turn like The White Stripes, The Black Keys, Interpol and The Strokes. And, of course, lets not forget the sole Ivy League contender: The National. Top seeds favorites would be those bands that were successful and influential: The Pixies, Pavement, Wilco, Flaming Lips and Nirvana. All worthy of discussion -- all capable of making the Final Four, but not capable of winning the title

The King of Limbs and why Radiohead can do no wrong

OK. It's been a while since I've posted. I've been busy. And I've been taking my time to digest the latest Radiohead record, The King of Limbs.

Before I say anything about why The King of Limbs is a terrific record, one deserving the heaps of accolades it's already getting from the music press, let's talk about why Radiohead really is the best rock band in the world.

Music nerds like me love to heap platitudes on our favorite bands -- high praise that's impossible to prove and often meant more as provocation than anything else. When you say something's the best, or the worst, you're setting yourself up for vigorous debate.  I think Radiohead, though, is as close to an honest-to-god perfect rock band as any in the history of rock and pop music.