popcorn youth

Western Massachussetts is practically synonymous with free folk, noise, and drone, to say nothing of art collectives. Brattleboro, Vermont has MV/EE’s crew and a Wire cover story. Providence enjoys the already-mythologized days of Fort Thunder, Lightning Bolt, and Load Records. New York has, well … New York City and the Burroughs. […]

Please join us at No Radio Records this Thursday, June 28th, 2007, at 8pm, for the first installment of what we hope will become a regular series of shows at various locations around town. “Ithaca Noise & Electronics” is what we are calling it, for now.
Performing Thursday will be Differance Engine, both solo and […]

Within the strange and beautiful world of western Massachusetts and the cross-pollinating winds that blow through Ecstatic Yod and Ecstatic Peace! — where layers upon layers of music history-and-futurity seem to bubble endlessly, flowing from Brooklyn, Boston, Hartford, Brattleboro and elsewhere back through the world again — an enigmatic artist known as Gown has […]

One of the pleasures of following electronic music today is the speed by which forms mutate, develop, and coalesce. It can take no more than a few new software developments, a transmogrified approach to sampling, a few alterations to tempo and beat structure, and voila, a group of people somewhere on the planet are […]

Last month Popcorn Youth made a quick trip to Brooklyn and Manhattan to attend a handful of music-related events. The first was a talk held at the Brooklyn Public Library (Central branch) entitled “Brooklyn Music Now,” with discussants Alan Licht, Brad Truax, Brian Chase, and Carlos Giffoni. Licht is a musician and writer […]

Well, ‘review’ may not be the appropriate word. ‘Notes on an event of startling simplicity and beauty’ might, however, be more fitting, if a bit bombastic . . . . In any case, the event was very much an aural treat and, after all, a person must ask themselves this: How often does one […]

Each week the Arts & Entertainment editor’s desk at the Ithaca Times brings new surprises, but last week was particularly enjoyable. Last Monday, Popcorn Youth spoke with Ira Kaplan of Yo La Tengo on the subject of his band’s recent work scoring films, two of which were showing at Cornell Cinema in a smartly organized […]

The major snow storm afflicting the midwest and northeast has found its way to Ithaca too, so we thought that we would take a moment to catch up on a number of thoughts and events that we’d like to discuss.
First, we appreciate the discussion that Art Room Closet opened in response to our article and […]

Is there a place for music criticism in the context of the local, regional, geography-bound music journalism that you will find in the Ithaca Times? Does a community such as Ithaca offer the possibility for observing, analyzing, and commenting on trends and developments in new music, be they popular, avant, or classically oriented genres of […]

Last week Jorge Strunz and Ardeshir Farah were kind enough to sit down with the Ithaca Times in order to discuss by phone their music, their compositional and improvisational practices, their new album Fantaseo, the changes wrought by the advent of digital technology, and many other aspects of their craft.
Ithaca Times: You are often […]

For fans of jazz and R&B, the past month has been a somber one. December 25th brought the death of James Brown, a musician whose impact on American music was as comprehensive as it was unmistakable. Last week, at the age of 80, percussionist Ajaramu Shelton passed away. A member of Chicago’s […]

Saw Jamie Lidell perform over the weekend at Hamilton college and was seriously impressed. Among other things, Lidell performed tracks from Multiply, which sounded even more convincing live than on record, if you can believe that. It is difficult, if you know Lidell’s ten year history with Warp, his collaborations with Christian […]