My first post is dedicated to one of my favourite, favourite bands. The Dismemberment Plan are reuniting for a fundraising gig (now two) for Calum Robbins, son of amazing producer J. Robbins. He is suffering from Spinal Muscular Atrophy and the medical bills are understandably obscene. I'm pretty excited this could lead to further dates and I'm going to demonstrate here why anyone who hasn't heard of them should be too.
Though their output was fairly small- four studio albums in all- the last two would be permanent fixtures on my Top Albums Ever list. I first got into The Dismemberment Plan through browsing Epitonic looking for Death Cab For Cutie songs. I downloaded The City first, it didn't strike me immediately. Then I downloaded You Are Invited and everything changed. It's basically a perfect pop song, with a second chorus so awesome I literally fell out of my seat when I heard it.I purchased Emergency & I (the album that spawned both ditties) pretty much immediately.
The sound they perfected on this album is quite difficult to describe. I have settled on saying it's as if the rhythm section of a funk band joined up with the guitars and vocals from an indie-rock band and threw some skronky synths on top. The thing that keeps everything together is their innate pop sensibility; a catchy riff, a clever lyric or an absolutely triumphant singalong section.
Their final album- Change- delved into more introspective and experimental territory, producing some moments of sheer beauty. It's not as immediate as E&I but once it gets some listening time, it hangs together to produce a thoroughly cohesive experience. Two songs from it are at the bottom of this post.
The D-Plan went their separate ways shortly after touring Change, and their live show is a pretty major factor in why I want to see them reform properly. They never toured Britain (to the best of my knowledge), mostly because no-one in Britain had ever heard of them at the time. I was pretty delighted when I found a whole bunch of legal free live recordings, the stage banter is awesome! There's a few clips on Youtube too.
I think the rest of the world are gradually catching up on this amazing band. I can hear (the now sadly split) Clor, the Dudley Corporation and Dartz! as some of the first British bands filtering it through their music. Jump on now before every trendy fucker namedrops them.
MP3s!
The Dismemberment Plan- The City [Right-click]
The Dismemberment Plan- You Are Invited [A+++++++ RECOMMENDATION]
The Dismemberment Plan- The Face Of The Earth [right-click]
The Dismemberment Plan- Pay For The Piano [pretty topical, I think!]
D-Plan obsessives, please email radioprotectorblog[AT]googlemail[DOT]com and I'll sob about not being able to buy plane tickets to D.C.
E!
3 comments:
Geek.
oh wow, i didn't know it was for robbins' son, that's such a heartfelt story and the appeal seems to be genuinely worldwide :)
Dudley Corporation are technically Irish, but evs.
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