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Monday, February 8, 2010
Song / Love / MP3 A Cover of Rancid's "Ruby Soho"
Posted by Eric Grandy on Mon, Feb 8, 2010 at 10:27 AM
...by Vampire Weekend!
"Ruby Soho" is one of Rancid's sweetest songs (And Out Come the Wolves holds up as a hell of an album), and it translates pretty easily into a Vampire Weekend version, a hint of ska in the bobbing bassline, the guitars bright and slippery on the the verse and a little sloppy on the chorus, Koenig's voice typically light and restrained (and the lyrics sounding not all that out of place).
1
point A:
dude, you like And Out Come The Wolves? Half of the work done by Freeman and Armstrong after Operation Ivy was suspect for so many reasons....and "Ruby Soho" was to Rancid what "Use Somebody" is to Kings Of Leon. A blatant attempt to water down a moderately unique band in order to make them more digestible. In Leons case it worked, and in Tim Armstrong from Rancids case nothing worked until his campaign for those cheesy shampoo commercials (the Garnier Fructis commercials with the uptempo piano, followed by the repeated "woo hoo!"....we've all seen them. you did know that was him in all his hardcore proletariat glory, right? and people give THE SHINS shit for having 20 seconds of one of their songs used for a mcdonalds commercial that aired exactly once almost ten years ago)
point B:
VW covering a mediocre ska-rock song exposes them for who they really are. essentially a glorified ska band.
ska.
a genre that aside from one or two exceptions in the late 80s has been unnecessary since the two tone era.
point C:
it sucks cause i really love the new VW record.
what i hate about them is that first lousy record, and the ARMY OF EMBARRASSING VW DEFENDERS. and YOU seem dead set to plant your flag as the captain of the seattle chapter.
THEY are actually swell kids. young as fuck (hence not understanding that ska is irrelevant) but nice.
you?-for gods sake give yourself maybe a month of no vampire weekend posts. I bet you'll remember what its like to be a local music editor!
dude, you like And Out Come The Wolves? Half of the work done by Freeman and Armstrong after Operation Ivy was suspect for so many reasons....and "Ruby Soho" was to Rancid what "Use Somebody" is to Kings Of Leon. A blatant attempt to water down a moderately unique band in order to make them more digestible. In Leons case it worked, and in Tim Armstrong from Rancids case nothing worked until his campaign for those cheesy shampoo commercials (the Garnier Fructis commercials with the uptempo piano, followed by the repeated "woo hoo!"....we've all seen them. you did know that was him in all his hardcore proletariat glory, right? and people give THE SHINS shit for having 20 seconds of one of their songs used for a mcdonalds commercial that aired exactly once almost ten years ago)
point B:
VW covering a mediocre ska-rock song exposes them for who they really are. essentially a glorified ska band.
ska.
a genre that aside from one or two exceptions in the late 80s has been unnecessary since the two tone era.
point C:
it sucks cause i really love the new VW record.
what i hate about them is that first lousy record, and the ARMY OF EMBARRASSING VW DEFENDERS. and YOU seem dead set to plant your flag as the captain of the seattle chapter.
THEY are actually swell kids. young as fuck (hence not understanding that ska is irrelevant) but nice.
you?-for gods sake give yourself maybe a month of no vampire weekend posts. I bet you'll remember what its like to be a local music editor!
2
wow, this is one of the worst covers and the above comparison of rancid's song to kings of leon is probably the sole reason i hate music commentary from "eclectic" music fans...what polar opposites
3
It's a shame there are no other Seattle-based music blogs writing about local and national acts.
http://www.google.com/search?q=Seattle+m…
http://www.google.com/search?q=Seattle+m…
5
okay vampire weekend is a glorified ska band in the same way that the new pornographers or the anniversary or the fucking police is a glorified ska band, in that they are a pop band with punk influences, heavy use of syncopation and vocal harmonies. aka NOT a glorified ska band.
also, the "lol modern ska is worthless" argument is old news and is only used by ignorant meatheads who aren't aware of the american traditonal movement (the toasters, westbound train, the slackers, deals gone bad, et al) or are dumb enough to discredit it. bands that were more influenced by mento, rocksteady and northern soul than by madness like most third wave bands, and are often ignored because they werent on the BASEKETBALL soundtrack and thus not associated with third wave ska..
love,
your resident ska defender.
also, the "lol modern ska is worthless" argument is old news and is only used by ignorant meatheads who aren't aware of the american traditonal movement (the toasters, westbound train, the slackers, deals gone bad, et al) or are dumb enough to discredit it. bands that were more influenced by mento, rocksteady and northern soul than by madness like most third wave bands, and are often ignored because they werent on the BASEKETBALL soundtrack and thus not associated with third wave ska..
love,
your resident ska defender.
6
vampire weekend are absolutely not a pop band with punk influences.
heavy use of syncopation and vocal harmonies exist in other forms of music, not just ska.
but vampire weekend DEFINITELY borrow tons from ska. that is undenied even by them in interviews. the pornographers or the anniversary have never claimed to be ska. in fact, most bands dont claim that they borrow from ska. unless they are from the dakotas or something. cause that shit is square.
"also, the "lol modern ska is worthless" argument is old news and is only used by ignorant meatheads who aren't aware of the american traditonal movement (the toasters, westbound train, the slackers, deals gone bad, et al)"
or is an argument used by people that were in ska bands when you werent even born yet (i assume you arent 40) who, while "giving props" to ska bands from Skatalites to Hepcat still acknowledge that modern ska is the safest, most boring and uninventive movement since Rappin Granny.
heavy use of syncopation and vocal harmonies exist in other forms of music, not just ska.
but vampire weekend DEFINITELY borrow tons from ska. that is undenied even by them in interviews. the pornographers or the anniversary have never claimed to be ska. in fact, most bands dont claim that they borrow from ska. unless they are from the dakotas or something. cause that shit is square.
"also, the "lol modern ska is worthless" argument is old news and is only used by ignorant meatheads who aren't aware of the american traditonal movement (the toasters, westbound train, the slackers, deals gone bad, et al)"
or is an argument used by people that were in ska bands when you werent even born yet (i assume you arent 40) who, while "giving props" to ska bands from Skatalites to Hepcat still acknowledge that modern ska is the safest, most boring and uninventive movement since Rappin Granny.
7
OMG! what a horrible cover!
I didn't think it was possible to hate VW any more than I all ready did.
I didn't think it was possible to hate VW any more than I all ready did.
8
@6 okay the fact that you would site hepcat while discounting the bands that i listed really shows how ignorant you are. haha. half those bands share members with hepcat, you turd.
9
"I didn't think it was possible to hate VW any more than I all ready did."
This is word-for-word exactly what I was going to say. Not that I'm a big "...And Out Come the Wolves" fan, but still, what a horrible, uninspired, half-assed cover. I still totally dig the first two Rancid albums. I'm easily able to separate them from OpIvy without any of the hang ups #1 has... and I balk at anyone labeling Tim Armstrong's music work in either band as hardcore.
This is word-for-word exactly what I was going to say. Not that I'm a big "...And Out Come the Wolves" fan, but still, what a horrible, uninspired, half-assed cover. I still totally dig the first two Rancid albums. I'm easily able to separate them from OpIvy without any of the hang ups #1 has... and I balk at anyone labeling Tim Armstrong's music work in either band as hardcore.
10
"I didn't think it was possible to hate VW any more than I all ready did."
This is word-for-word exactly what I was going to say. Not that I'm a big "...And Out Come the Wolves" fan, but still, what a horrible, uninspired, half-assed cover. I still totally dig the first two Rancid albums. I'm easily able to separate them from OpIvy without any of the hang ups #1 has... and I balk at anyone labeling Tim Armstrong's music in either band as hardcore.
This is word-for-word exactly what I was going to say. Not that I'm a big "...And Out Come the Wolves" fan, but still, what a horrible, uninspired, half-assed cover. I still totally dig the first two Rancid albums. I'm easily able to separate them from OpIvy without any of the hang ups #1 has... and I balk at anyone labeling Tim Armstrong's music in either band as hardcore.
12
Bah, I just listened to it and that is some awful shit. I didn't aggressively dislike these guys before, but now I do.
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