Author Archives: Jon Sidel

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Many of you know I am, by trade, an A&R dude. I live and breathe new bands. Today is the first week of March which marks the beginning of what I call “A&R Season.”

In two weeks every indie rocker with a grin and a grand in the bank will be in Austin for this year’s annual SXSW. These next few weeks I will be in constant listening mode—gathering and discarding bands and song. The result will be the beginning of my rock ‘n roll journey, Chapter 2012!

I almost feel like an old time prospector making ready for another “land rush” as I sit atop my Idelic wagon, prepared to stake my claim for more rock ‘n roll glory.

OK, so here I am on Friday, my “SXSW high noon” still a week away. In the meantime, I thought I’d create a playlist that is as far off from my SXSW land rush as I could get.

Yesterday, by coincidence, I met with a few of my A&R colleges from Japan to discuss rock ‘n roll over coffee. I had been thinking about my friends in Japan. After all we are in earthquake country here in the Canyon and I was curious to know how their country is recovering from such a blow.

Glad to report our Idelic fiends in Japan are still rocking on! This is dedicated you—let’s meet again for coffee in Texas!

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Team Me – Weathervanes And Chemicals

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

On Tuesday someone offered me a link of Mardi Gras beads. It was a temptation I could not resist. After all, it was Fat Tuesday and placing those beads around my head brought my memory back to a blurry and cloudy Tuesday morning, stumblin thru the dirty New Orleans streets 25 years ago.

This week’s Idelic Hour has absolutely nothing to do with New Orleans or the amazing pageantry of Mardi Gras. Instead, the playlist was inspired by a Mojo compilation CD of New Order covers that had found its way onto the floor of my car.

I popped in the disc and cruised my Prius. A warm winter’s day, listening, and appreciating Barney Sumner’s lyrics via different ears. The drive made me yearn for early period New Order and the carefree days of LA in the mid ’80s. I got stuck on “Temptation” and this week’s Idelic Hour muse was born.

Much like most Sunday afternoons, I dug through crates until I made a musical connection. Funny, as I think about it, I don’t often feel lead by temptation?

I kept thinking of the 25 year old “Mardi Gras me,” trying to explain to the patient police officer why I wouldn’t be tempted to stab someone in the crowd with the pocket knife. He just nodded saying, “Son, either you or this knife is spending Mardi Gras weekend in jail.”

Ok, maybe you just had to have been there?

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Grimes – Genesis

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Well, of course Tuesday was Valentines Day, and of course I could not resist putting some kind of twist to a playlist of love songs.

For some reason when I started digging through crates I starting thinking about “trouble.” However, on this Valentine’s Day I find myself without much trouble in mind or drama to brag about. I’m a geek and was day dreaming about the kind of love that Marvin Gaye seems to sing of—a bum in love, trouble man, feelin’ tainted and dank.

Funny, in many ways I approached the muse of heartbreak with a smooth and carefree approach. The result is simple—just a solid “Idelic Hour” of music—one chapter in a series of playlists dedicated to the assorted colors of love.

Feels warm and cozy to listen to these love gems after Valentine’s dates and the chocolates having been consumed…

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Cry Baby – I Cherish The Heartbreak More Than The Love Lost

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

I’m confused? When I started putting together this Idelic Hour playlist I was under the impression that this was “granny week” in LA? I thought what a cool fucking idea—a playlist of songs dedicated to none other than my “momma’s momma!” Grandma, a classic Idelic Hour muse it shall be.

Now, days later I realize it is sadly not Granny but Grammy fever we’re experiencing here in LA. Of course I will go to a party or two, schmooze around, pat backs, congratulate, complain and console with industry types. After all, I can “get my Grammy on.” For a couple of years I was even on the selection committee. Hell, I’ve even been nominated for one!

“…and the winner is—NOT ME! Ha ha, what a rush!

My take on 2012 is that you gotta take the good and the lame and roll it into one cool life. The sad fact is that the Grammys, like most of the major label establishment, try hard to be cool but fall embarrassingly short. In the end The Grammy show makes the Academy Awards show and those film yuppies look cooler than us music headz, when in truth they are NOT. Shame really.

All said, this week rock ‘n roll dreams will come true. I saw a screening of a very cool film last night called Re:Generation. Check for it here. Let’s twist, shake, and re-generate! Why not let “rock granny roll” here on the Idelic Hour.

Fuck it, my grandma kicks ass on the Grammys!

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Frightened Rabbit – Fuck This Place

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Not one, but two very unique rock ‘n roll icons took their own lives this week.

Don Cornelius was certainly a maverick and way fucking cool. I would argue that it was Don who in fact taught us white folks how to dance, groove, and really how to walk a city street. Soul Train was fun and raw. It was street fashion in motion for the very first time. No doubt the kids on Soul Train pushed the “hippie look” toward glam which lead to punk. As kids, we check these trends. Fact—those of us art school types who helped start the rap music scene grew up checking in on Soul Train.

Mike Kelly was an artist I deeply admired. He was actually a college professor of mine. I met him in a classroom. He was the “new forms and concepts” teacher in my final year at UCLA in 1985. At that time the coolest rock ‘n rollers made art, not music. Mike was the coolest up and coming “conceptual artist” in LA. Kelly and his “outsider” contemporaries would grow to rival the graffiti inspired “art stars” from New York’s east village scene.

Mike’s art paid homage to all kinds of stuff like “dirty” bathroom drawings from truck stops. Even cooler, he was from Detroit and played in a band with Ron Ashton from the Stooges and Michael Davis from MC5! He was in fact my teacher. I am glad to have known him.

Why these guys took their own lives, I don’t know. I’m not sure if I really want to know. My gut reaction, “Don’t Go” is this week’s Idelic muse. It’s a mix of Detroit rock, soul power, sadness, and new bands. A “soul train” of sorts.

Let’s celebrate what these amazing characters did and how they lived, NOT how they split.

R.I.P. Don and Mike. We’ll keep on pushing.

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Mark Lanegan Band – The Gravedigger’s Song

Greetings from London, England!

In 1973, when I was twelve years old, my best friend and I came to England for summer holiday camp. Yesterday, walking down an east London street I had a flashback to one of the many “teen dances” we attended that summer. At the time I remember thinking “Brit kids” were a queer bunch of fairies, dancing to such music. I had never heard of Bowie, Slade, Gary Glitter, or T-Rex.

Then one night, over many shanties and cigarettes, an older kid name Collin “sorted me out” on proper British rock ‘n roll. I came to know that Bowie and Bolan were cool – and Pink Floyd were not (who I would childishly refer to as “homos.”)

From that summer on I have been fully engaged and obsessed with British rock ‘n roll. Later in my teens when broke, I would stay up all night playing 45s, dreaming about making the UK scene. Now, almost 35 years later, I’m at a club in London with friends—yes, many cool friends, watching the latest wave of British guitar kids having their go.

This week’s show coming from London is dedicated to a rock ‘n roll dream. Anyone’s really. Yes, the set features some of the coolest new UK acts mixed with a jet-lagged infused selection of “oldies.”

Here’s my Idelic UK Innovation.

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Toy – Left Myself Behind

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

She’s a girl. “A younger girl.” “The most beautiful girl in the world.” A strange, mixed up, shook up girl. She’s making fun and games, but she’s prepared for war. She’s an LA Girl, a rich girl. The “it girl.” Such a weird, lost, little girl. She’s not a country girl, she’s an LA Girl. She’s a young girl from the Canyon.

She’s this week’s Idelic muse.

What better muse for a rock and roll song than a young girl? It’s in fact, a LA tradition.

Whipping up this playlist I was thinking of someone specific. Let the legend of Laurel Canyon continue with a new generation of mysterious and complex female beauties.

And, yeah—god help those trying to deal with them!

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Lana Del Rey – Diet Mtn Dew

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Lord have mercy and good golly Miss Molly—where the fuck has my rock ‘n roll gone?

“2011 killed rock ‘n roll.” Well, at least that was the word on street to kick off 2012. When I heard “the news” the first thing that came to mind was in fact the song, “What Ever Happened to My Rock n Roll?” It’s actually rare that a band creates a rock anthem but Black Rebel Motorcycle Club’s track is a case in fact. It’s not everyday that a relivitly new song gets this old Idelic soul digging through crates to quench a thirst. Indeed, the end result was that a set of rock music was born!

It’s no surprise that I reached first for the box of “womp banga dang dang” 45s to heat up the decks. Then my second instinct, or should I say challenge, was to dig up half a dozen new, stone cold killer garage bands that I could mix up a with a few of the classics.

A warm welcome into this Idelic rock mix are new-comers Allah-Las, Fearless Vampire Killers, Orwells, Bleached, and Guadalupe Plata. Half these bands live primarily on bandcamp.com.

Suddenly I started feeling like that the cover of Mick Ronson’s Play Don’t Worry LP. Yes! “Play Don’t Worry!” 2012, here we come and we’re here to rock!!

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
You Won’t – Dance Moves

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

It’s a new fucking year, baby. Hope your holidays were cool.

Yep, 2012 is upon us, so what does this Idelic DJ gotta do? Plain and simple—soup up for a new year of great new music.

With a bit of a head cold and a hangover from listening to four thousand “Best of 2011 Lists,” why not a little musical journey with some of the bands releasing new albums in 2012?

As I look at this Idelic “Get Ready for 2012″ playlist, I can’t help thinking over what inspires me about a particular singer or songwriter. What exactly makes me a fan? After all, I am in the music business – a privilege that does not and will not escape me in the upcoming year.

With a smile and grin I always come back to one truism; “Music is for listening.” My idelic reality at the end of the day is that I can’t really help myself—I’m a fan of the artists whose songs keep me coming back time and time again.

Must haves: Fiona Apple, Mark Lanegan, and The Shins will be releasing highly anticipated and amazing albums in 2012. ZZ Top will likely remind old fans that they are the longest running original line up in rock ‘n roll history. Back together Afghan Wigs, Fleetwood Mac, and Mazzy Star. Indie blogger bands galore: School Of Seven Bells, Chairlift, Bear In Heaven, Guards, The Weeknd, Sleigh Bells, and Sharon Van Etten.

And there are more! Air, Morrissey, The Walkmen, Ceremony, The National, Grizzly Bear, Twin Shadow, Kyuss, Yeasayaer, and the duo of David Bryne and St. Vincent.

OK, get ready—2012, here we come.

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Chairlift – Amanaemonesia

THE TOP TEN IDELIC HITS FOR 2011:
10. Bon Iver – Michicant
9. Black Lips – Raw Meat
8. Alabama Shakes – You Ain’t Alone
7. Florence and The Machine – Lover To Lover
6. Charles Bradley – No Time For Dreaming
5. Lana Del Rey – Video Games
4. Michael Kiwanuka – Tell Me A Tale
3. Diego Garcia – You Were Never There
2. St Vincent – Cheerleader
1. Dirty Beaches – Lord Knows Best

TOP TEN CLASSICS THAT GOT US THROUGH:
10. Lorraine Ellison- Stay With Me
9. Glen Campbell – By The Time I Get To Phoenix
8. The Beatles – If Needed Someone
7. Bernie Turner & The Armorettes – Ching Ching Wong
6. Marlena Shaw – California Soul
5. Caetano Veloso E Gal Costa – onde wu nasci passa um rio
4. Laura Nyro – Stoned Soul Picnic
3. David Bowie & The Spiders From Mars – It Ain’t Easy
2. JJ Barnes – Don’t Bring Me Bad News
1. Jackie Ross – Dynamite Lovin’

Dig em and have an Idelic Holiday season!

The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Dirty Beaches – Lord Knows Best