You know, I'm a rabid Deerhoof fan for sure and of course I'll fight to the death all you crap sayers out there. But the thing I keep contemplating is what would happen if they, like, threw broken glass at their audience a la Black Dice instead of, say, inviting them over for pop tarts. I suppose this can serve as a critique of the "northwest" ethic overall.

a fine band!

deerhoof!

Black Dice doesn't throw broken glass at the audience. Neither Black Dice nor Deerhoof are from the northwest. I'm not sure what was supposed to serve as a critique of a nonexistent northwest ethic.

After 9+ years, Deerhoof are experiencing a creative and popular reniassance that has come about on their own terms, via their great creativity and hard work. It couldn't be happening to better, more deserving people.

They've already another album in the can! Look for it in March!

Oh yeah- Not Crap.

Angus, your reply was a little unnecessarily wrathful wasn't it?

Looking over your old posts I suspect you just might sympathize with the absurd juxtaposition I conjured. It is out of profound love for and utter devotion to both bands that I contemplate the Hello Kittiest aspects of the Northwest / Olympia / KRS / Deerhoof going to bat with the glass - throwingest sociopathic tendencies of the midwest / Chicago / Texas / Black Dice (who of course aren't literally even remotely midwestern). I wouldn't feel as strongly about Black Dice if they hadn't thrown glass at their audience and I wouldn't feel as strongly about Deerhoof if not for their unabashed naivete. What a funny contradiction! All parties involved are exceedingly smart, self - reflexive and clever and would not be offended by what I am saying.

Aligning bands with movements or regions might oversimplify them. But the reckoning with those oversimplifications makes both the bands and their fans better understand themselves and their roots and history and all that special meaning - engendering stuff. The only worthy criticism you could make--and reading between your lines above I think this is why you're offended--is that if I'd thought about it more Deerhoof already throws glass at their audience. They have already reached perfection. So thanks for indirectly leading me to that realization.

I too am thrilled that more people are hearing Deerhoof. Please remember this if you're drafting another blunt and / or wrathful reply.

I saw them just last night in Nottingham supporting the Ex who were as beautiful and inspirational as ever (first time I've caught them with Rozemarie on double bass, she fits in seamlessly. Also, I read in their newsletter that some new tracks have been recorded with the proprietor of this place..expectation mounts) and can happily report they were just great - my first ever exposure to the ways of the 'hoof and it was giddy and intoxicating, the small but rapt crowd loved them. not crap

Had Keith Moon and Yoko Ono ever engaged in unprotected lovemaking, they might have produced Deerhoof. But Deerhoof write better songs (I think Keith Moon only wrote one song, although he did do the amazing fiddle arrangement at the end of Baba O’Riley -- don’t count this). Not Crap!

Hi Alex: I didn't mean to come off as 'wrathful.' I just wasn't sure what you were talking about. I was blunt, though.

I guess I don't buy your premise. I don't think of Black Dice as confrontational and I don't think of Deerhoof as naive/childlike/K Records.

Black Dice now makes incredible 21st century pyschedelic music and their shows are really inclusive, I think-the opposite of glass throwing. If you talk to them now, they'll tell you that they want very, very much to distance themselves from their past. They claim it was all overblown (I saw 'em then and can't really agree), it was mostly due to drunkenness on their part, and they hate that this 'confrontational' tag still dogs them.

People love Deerhoof because of Satomi and how cute she is or whatever, but there's a TON going on beneath this surface (as you know, I think). These guys aren't Beat Happening and I would argue that they don't really subscribe to the K aesthetic. The music they make is not naive, not childlike, not amateurish, and the lyrics aren't either. Do they understand why people think it is? I think so.

Anyway...the love is what matters. We agree.

...And I had no clue that Keith Moon did the fiddle arrangement on "Baba." Wow!

...And I had no clue that Keith Moon did the fiddle arrangement on "Baba." Wow!

Okay, I'm glad there's no dissension in the Deerhoof appreciation camp. This has me thinking about aesthetic unity within record labels. Should Deerhoof have made records for KRS, a label who can definitely be blamed for fetishizing the kind of ethos that Deerhoof encapsulates so fantastically and authentically? And what about Unwound and godheadsilo...The greatness of every good record label is owed in part to its eclecticism--Drag City is the most famous example--but wouldn't the world be a better place if Unwound and godheadsilo were on Touch and Go? As much as I spurn the idea of listening to music because of what label it's on there's no doubt that who issues it serves to frame it to some extent.

In your post you bemoan that Deerhoof is often unfairly stuck with that K Records cute, childlike, amateurish reputation. My frustration with this very fact is why I fantasize about them throwing glass or collaborating with Merzbow or Null or something.

That Black Dice is totally disavowing their past and thereby screwing with the traditional trajectory that a "hardcore" band would take is as much a part of their appeal as the glass throwing itself. If they hadn't evolved so absurdly I wouldn't like them as much as I do.