Happy Halloween, hope it was spooky.  We got behind this week, so, for your perusal, we offer the

Friday Sunday Round-Up:  November 1, 2009.

NOISE:

Formative Sessions:

I’ve been on a little bit of an electronica kick lately.  Follow this link to a nice Downtempo Mix, 60 minutes of headphone-friendly chill that will set you zero-Kelvin cool and smoother than a satin smoking jacket, with only a trace of the “Banana Republic factor”.  Brought to you by LA’s Miguel Vega.

Formative Sessions Mix (a Mediafire Download Link)

–BL

It seems like Bill Frisell is always publishing new work, and this week I discovered his latest (I think) project called Disfarmer, a jazzy take on folkish roots.  I’m a sucker for these adaptations of vernacular music (a la Edgar Meyer/Yo Yo Ma’s Appalacian Waltz).  As always, the music is amazing, spooky, bright and brooding.  Worth the $14.  And if you don’t know Frisell, Grooveshark him.  Its pretty easy to love.

–BL

Faraquet

This one is new to me, but not to the world.  Some would call it “Math Rock”:  heavy, discordant, but technically adept straight ahead rock verging on punk.  I suppose you could liken it to Fugazi (with whom they toured some), maybe Polvo or Pavement, maybe even of The Tar Babies.  For some reason  I associate this kind of music with Chicago, I think, because a while back I bought a string of albums like it from Chicago.  But it has that hard, crisp intelligence that seems like Chicago.  Nevertheless, they hail from DC, the vacuum of hard, crisp intelligence.  Unfortunately, I’m late to the party.  They broke up 5 or 6 years ago.  Check out these samples from the Southern Records website

Faraquet–A Study In Movement

Faraquet–Cut Self Not

WEBBY:

Learn Something New Every Day

Like the title suggests, this clever and easy to read website delivers a shot of insight every morning.  Wow your friends at lunch with your clear grasp of minutiae.

UNURTH

Urban Art, if you are into it.  Its sometimes an under-appreciated nuisance, and there are some impressive images on this site.

The O.S. CHALLENGE:

Its getting late in the football season and the matchups are strong.  As an Auburn fan, that’s a pretty tough pill to swallow, but as a football fan in general I really love this time of year.  Big, mean defensive matched up against lightning faster offenses with bruising tackles; a fast secondary defending a dynamic passing game; and all of the excitement leading to big upsets huge victories and dashed hopes.  All we need are some playoffs to make it all legit and less conspicuously corporate. The BCS isn’t ready for that, but we at O.S. are.

Here is the idea:  we love music.  Love it, and can’t get enough of it.  We love football, but we need a playoff.  So, as a proxy, we are going to make one up with music, since hardly anybody pays for music anymore (sadly) and there are few corporate interests in good music (despite plenty in bad music).  We are going to pit song against song in a 4-tiered bracket, and we are going to figure out which one rocks the hardest.  All we need is your feedback.

In one division we are going to match up the big boys:  Smash-Mouth football with big, heavy, hard-hitting monsters of rock that take no prisoners.  Guys that never wear out, the serious beasts that need only be pointed in the direction of the kill.  They make holes for their backs to blast into, straight up the middle.  32-Dive, 32-Dive, 32-Dive.  These are the songs that kick hard and fast, merciless and focused.  In the other is the West Coast and the Spread (maybe even the A-11).  These guys are quick and technical.  They play a sophisticated game, sometimes on the ground, sometimes in the air, sometimes short and sometimes long.  It takes a lot of depth and talent to pull it off.  Thats the other group of songs that we are looking for: exciting, unpredictable, and indefensible.

So give us some matchups.  Just take a second, scratch your chin, and enter something in the comments column below (or email us, if you are bashfull).  We want individual songs, not whole albums. We will have them reviewed by subjective, opinionated self-proclaimed aficionados and music snobs (let us know if you think you’ve got the stuff, and maybe you’ll get a shot) until we get to the final showdown, where YOU–our loyal readers–will get to make the final call.  Just like American Idol, but with real music and just in time for the holidays.