Monday, August 15th, 2011 // Paperhouse
Welcome to Paperhouse. In this corner of the Tartan’s Pillbox, the poetic musical neurosis of the fine folks that staff WRCT reigns supreme.
In light of this being the Orientation issue, I’d like to take this moment to introduce you to your new favorite radio station and student organization. For starters, my name is Juan Fernandez and I am the current General Manager at WRCT Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon’s student-run radio station.I’m guessing that everyone on campus is competing for your attention, so I’ll try not to bombard you with too much information. Just know that you’ve got a place with us here at WRCT Pittsburgh.
WRCT, known as Radio Carnegie Tech in the times of old, celebrates more than 60 years of radio broadcasting. As a free-form radio broadcaster, we are committed to providing quality alternatives to the mainstream commercial programming that dominates the radio. Our DJs, Public Affairs hosts, and other staff members are not only Carnegie Mellon students, staff, and faculty, but also community members from the Pittsburgh area, some of whom have more than 30 years of radio broadcasting experience under their belts. We pride ourselves in our substantively diverse programming. At WRCT every DJ has the freedom to play the music of his or her choosing. So whether you’re interested in West African rock, kitchen sink recordings, local independent news programming or Latin American culture, WRCT has a program for you.
We are physically located in the basement of the University Center, on the same hallway as the CMU Bookstore and the Post Office. If you want to chat us up and learn more about what we do, we’ll be out on the Cut playing music during the beginning of the school year. Stop by and introduce yourself. We’d love to meet you and take you in as part of the radio family.
If radio is the essence that makes your little heart go pitter pat, you’re definitely going to want to become a member of the station. To learn about the membership process, email training@wrct.org.
You should know that every week on we get together to give the newest albums a good listen. These weekly listening sessions are called “Music Staffs”. These listening sessions are how we determine what music makes it’s way into our record library and onto our airwaves. I’d like to personally extend an invitation out to you to join us during these listening sessions. Should you take me up on my offer you can find me and the rest of the crew at WRCT from 5 PM until 7 PM every Thursday.
Here’s hoping to see you soon!
If you’d like to learn more about WRCT, you can visit us online at www.wrct.org.
Monday, March 21st, 2011 // Paperhouse
In recent years, post-rock has been losing the innovative spark that had been its driving force. Though first rebelling against the vocally dominated, verse-chorus-verse song structure of rock, post-rock bands have now adapted the very sameness they hated. Every band I find seems to adhere to the same tired formula of constant intensity, wailing guitars, and an emotional need that rivals the cheesiest emo band. Instead of trying to recreate the canon, newer bands should focus on replicating the creativity of their predecessors.
Look at Godspeed You! Black Emperor. When you first hear their album Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven, it’s impossible not to cringe. The album has four songs that are divided into movements with names like “She Dreamt She Was a Bulldozer, She Dreamt She Was Alone in an Empty Field” and “Edgyswingsetacid.” There are multiple guitarists, bassists, drummers, and horn players plus a violinist and a cellist. You can’t help but expect the level of bombast that killed bands like Genesis and Yes.
But that fear never comes true. Like most post-rock bands, Godspeed You! Black Emperor focuses on aesthetic. But instead of the emotional hammer-over-the-head that much of post-rock has turned to, it opts for a more minimal approach. It is easy to forget that this is a nine-piece band, since few instruments play simultaneously. They proselytize with a restraint that is almost non-existent in post-rock, yet beneath the sparseness lies a frantic tension that festers and at times explodes with a force made even more astounding by its suddenness. It disappears as soon as it arrives, letting your mind try to figure out what you just listened to.
I’m not saying that all post-rock bands should become a nine-piece minimalist influenced musical leviathan. But post-rock needs to stop relying so much on the motifs that originally propelled it to the fringes of the mainstream. In order to establish a future, post-rock bands must look toward the past to shed their current shackles of conformity.
-Matt Mastricova
Monday, February 28th, 2011 // Paperhouse
So, there’s this hip hop producer in Los Angeles that goes by Bei Ru. He’s doing some magical things.
Similar to many producers nowadays, Bei Ru mixes together chunks of music that would appear to be impossible to hear on the same album. The difference? This guy has one refined sense of taste. His forte lies in mixing contemporary hip hop sensibilities with the obscure soul and funk of the 1970s that he grew up listening to.
Try to imagine Lil Wayne laying down raps on top of laid-back psychedelic funk, and you’re halfway to understanding the splendor of what Bei Ru is doing in Los Angeles.
Last November, Bei Ru put out his album
Little Armeni
, aka
L.A
It is an album that captures, using samples of Armenian music, the sound of a diaspora that settled in Los Angeles. To make this album, Bei Ru searched record stores in Los Angeles, Lebanon, and Armenia for gems from the late ’60s and ’70s. To Bei Ru, the album is an encapsulation of the state of mind created by growing up in L.A. among friends in his family’s own Little Armenia.
The album is the perfect cocktail for the cultural persecution that Armenians around the world have suffered. The work by Bei Ru is particularly relevant because it stands out as a cross-ethnic testament to the greatness of music and an homage to the collective past of Armenians. I’d go so far as to saying that it pulls back the heavy shroud that the Armenian genocide has laid down upon the face of Armenian American culture.
If you’re a fan of the seamless meshes that Blockhead, DJ Shadow, and the Avalanches have created in the recent past, Little Armenia is an album that you simply need to get into your brain.
To hear some of Bei Ru’s productions, visit his YouTube channel Musaler Music. You’ll be glad you did.
-Juan Fernandez
