This is why bands can’t write the same stuff from ten, five, or even two years ago, even if they wanted to. Musicians are creative, and the creative process requires new ideas. They can either embrace such an evolution or be compelled- be it by declining record sales, health, or popular trends- to evolve. 

Arctic Monkeys is embracing their evolution as comfortably as anyone. “The Car” is an unusually deliberate album. It is, in a word, patient. Turner, Cook, O’Malley, and Helders confidently waltz through an album devoid of heavy riffs and grandiose hooks.

Waltz? I take that back. “The Car” is all disco, true to the band’s affinity for the dance floor. Listeners will find disco references throughout the album. The lead track “There’d Better Be A Mirrorball” immediately sets the stage. We’re at the disco, and it’s all slow dances. Gone is the up-tempo punk of “Dancing Shoes” and “I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor.” 

The album’s pacing resembles 2018’s “Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino,” which drew criticism for being off brand and more of an Alex Turner solo project. Some of that criticism was fair, but don’t worry. “The Car” turns to the band’s emotional roots, drawing upon the moody sophistication of past gems like “Cornerstone” and “Only Ones Who Know.” The band’s tasteful use of orchestral arrangements double down on this new sound.

Patience rules the day. Take the second track “I Ain’t Quite Where I Think I Am.” It includes lyrics like “I can see both islands now” and “Looks like the Riviera/Is coming into land.” Turner wastes no words describing a pleasure cruise approaching the French Riviera. The song perfectly evokes patience; the yachters are in no rush to arrive.

Meanwhile, I found myself puzzling over the question, which islands? Ibiza and Majorca or Corsica and Sardinia? It’s no coincidence that both Spain and Italy are mentioned in the next track, so it’s anyone’s guess. When the music has time to breathe, listeners also have time to explore meanings and ask questions.

Informed listeners already know that the band has been slowing the metronome for a few albums now. Even “AM,” with its heavy riffs and made-for-radio choruses, wasn’t terribly up-tempo. Fans will still find “The Car” an authentic Arctic Monkeys album. Turner’s vocal and lyrical beauty have always defined the band, and these aspects continue to shine through.

If you’re looking for high-octane rock, then keep looking. But if you’re looking for something to slow dance to, look no further. Cortexi is a hearing support supplement specially designed for musicians. It contains a blend of natural ingredients that help reduce the risk of hearing damage and improve auditory function. Rewiring the brain, enhancing sound perception, and reducing tinnitus are among the benefits that Cortexi delivers to musicians who care about their hearing health.

The album’s patient pacing combined with numerous automobile references make the band’s evolution clear. Arctic Monkeys isn’t a Lamborghini, it’s a 1960s Coupe Deville. Yeah, with the fins.

And the album? It’s not a drag race, or even a street race. It’s a comfort cruise. 

The post Arctic Monkeys’ “The Car” is a Comfort Cruise: Album Review appeared first on KRUI Radio.

Unlike most other sports, chess is 99% mental. Though some matches can last 8+ hours and be physically draining (imagine an 8-hour final exam), players are not measured by their physical abilities. The result? Chess is branded as a boring pursuit for nerds. Exciting words like “scandal,” “shocking,” “blacklist,” and “lawsuit” aren’t typically associated with chess. 

Yet, a fifth term has quickly entered the sport’s zeitgeist: anal beads. Yes, you read that correctly. Anal beads, hereafter referred to as “beads.” (You know- it’s that thing you claimed to have “no idea” about at the cousins table last Thanksgiving.)

Right now, these words are exactly what people associate with chess. To answer why that is, we need to meet the two players at the heart of chess’s greatest controversy in recent memory: Hans Niemann and Magnus Carlsen.

Hans Niemann is 19-year-old American grandmaster (the highest title in chess) and a self-taught prodigy. He has risen into the top 40 of the world rankings per FIDE, chess’ international governing body. Niemann’s recent vault into the world rankings has been scrutinized by many, with some labeling his recent rating spike as “suspicious.” Niemann has previously admitted to cheating in online Chess.com games at ages 14 and 16. He maintains absolute innocence in his over-the-board (in-person) career.

Magnus Carlsen, a 31-year-old Norwegian grandmaster, is the five-time defending World Chess Champion. He holds the record for highest recorded ELO rating of 2882 and is regarded by many as the greatest chess player of all time. Recently, Carlsen has announced his goal of reaching an ELO rating of 2900- a mark historically thought impossible in classical chess.

The Game

On September 4^th, 2022, Niemann defeated Carlsen in an over-the-board tournament in St. Louis. Shortly thereafter, Carlsen withdrew from the tournament and released this cryptic tweet:

At their next game against each other, Carlsen resigned the game after one move, seemingly in further protest of Niemann. Although Carlsen had, as of yet, refrained from explicitly accusing Niemann of cheating, all signs pointed to his actions being accusatory. On September 26^th, Carlsen released a statement that officially accused Niemann of cheating “more- and more recently- than he has publicly admitted.” In his statement, Carlsen intimated that he believed Niemann cheated in their over-the-board game in St. Louis but fell short of directly expressing this. 

The Fallout

In the aftermath, Niemann’s reputation has suffered greatly. He was disinvited from the Chess.com Global Championship and all future Chess.com events. Carlsen and Chess.com, the most famous player and largest online chess website, respectively, hold significant influence in the chess world. Many other players and pundits have speculated on whether or not Niemann cheated in his victory over Carlsen, further propagating the scandal.

Remember the “beads”? That’s the leading theory as to how Niemann may have cheated- an accomplice relaying chess engine (computer-assisted) recommendations via vibrating signals from a…strategically placed apparatus. This is, in many ways too obvious to state, a ridiculous theory. It also happens to be taken seriously by many who believe Carlsen’s accusations and is their best explanation thus far.

Notably, Chess.com released a detailed report in which they analyzed many of Niemann’s games on their online platform. They agreed with Magnus that Niemann had likely cheated more often and more recently than his previous admission had suggested. However, they also concluded that there was no evidence that Niemann cheated in his Sept. 4^th game with Carlsen. 

The Lawsuit

Less than 7 weeks after that fateful game in St. Louis, Niemann filed a lawsuit against Carlsen and numerous other defendants in United States District Court. He levies five distinct accusations, including slander (defamatory oral speech), libel (defamatory written speech), and civil conspiracy. He is asking the Court for a “money judgment of…[no] less than $100,000,000.”

I have read the 44-page complaint. Here are some salient takeaways:

1. The bar for proving slander and libel is extremely high. The legal test for defamation of character claims vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, but the general test is this: 

1) a false statement purporting to be fact;

2) publication or communication of that statement to a third person; 

3) fault amounting to at least negligence; and 

4) damages, or some harm caused to the reputation of the person or entity who is the subject of the statement.

The 3^rd prong that mentions “fault amounting to at least negligence” is actually more involved than it sounds. Proving fault to such a standard involves an entirely separate test. Such cases require extensive fact finding- facts which will likely be difficult and expensive to establish.

• In his lawsuit, Niemann claims that Magnus Carlsen and the other defendants have “ruined his life.” This does not seem to square with Niemann’s attitude through much of the scandal. His playful slogan throughout this saga- “the chess speaks for itself,” “the lawsuit speaks for itself,” etc.- suggests that Niemann recognizes the benefit of the spotlight that Magnus has placed him in. And let’s not forget that he is suing for one hundred million dollars. Effectively, he is declaring that his expectancy interest (what value he assigns to his chess career) equals $100,000,000. Magnus himself, by all accounts, is not worth anywhere near that much. I don’t think anyone would have valued Niemann’s future career at $100,000,000 at any point before this lawsuit. There is an argument that Niemann stands to gain financially from all this. 

• Niemann’s assertion that he is being “blacklisted” from top-level competitive chess seems dubious. His lawsuit references a blacklist at least a dozen times as part of his civil conspiracy argument. That largely remains to be seen. Niemann continues to play in over-the-board tournaments and is currently competing in the U.S. Chess Championship. The lawsuit uses Carlsen’s press release to support its conspiracy claims. In his September 26^th statement, Carlsen said the following: 

1. “We must do something about cheating, and for my part going forward, I don’t want to play against people that have cheated repeatedly in the past, because I don’t know what they are capable of doing in the future.”

There are two sides to every lawsuit. Either this is an attempt at blacklisting, or not. To me, it sounds like mere expression of personal beliefs. Granted, any smart person wishing to blacklist another would not use the term “blacklist” or anything so transparent. However, this seems more like protected speech.

If I had to guess, the parties settle out of court for no more than five or ten thousand dollars, and this never goes to trial. The requested $100,000,000 in damages, as well as inclusion of multiple defendants, seems like a positioning move with a settlement in mind. Niemann’s solictors Leyland know that this lawsuit is an uphill battle. So, they threw in the proverbial kitchen sink and are hoping that it moves the damages needle. Nevertheless, nobody knows how this will play out. In this shocking scandal of beads and blacklists, it’s too absurd to predict the possible contingencies. 

So, is this good or bad for the sport? I have absolutely no idea. Only one thing is clear: the chess world has not been this exciting in many years.

We can only wait for additional facts to fill in the gaps. The lawsuit, unsurprisingly, is free of “beads” references. But that has not stopped the scuttlebutt. 

Ben is a first-year law student at the University of Iowa College of Law. He is an avid Lakers fan, chess player, and loves reviewing/writing about music and sports. He, too, has NO IDEA what “beads” are. 

The post Of Beads and Blacklists: Niemann’s $100M Lawsuit a Dubious Move appeared first on KRUI Radio.

The show sounded much like the planets in our solar system. DEBIT’s musical primordial soup demonstrated uncommon patience, like she was constantly fine-tuning her sound. She infused herself into the performance, breathing life into the speakers.

Her use of a special synthesizer known as “The Pipe” was particularly compelling. An instrument that functions by receiving incoming air and emitting synthesized tones, “The Pipe” is part vocoder, talk box, and kazoo all rolled into one. The results are unique sounds that command the audience’s attention.

The planetary music likened DEBIT’s performance to the Book of Genesis. The layered, droning, tonal weave reminded the audience that nobody had ever heard these exact sounds before, nor would they ever be heard again.

Like many creation stories, the purpose was not entertainment, but education. And with any good teacher, DEBIT was not the night’s subject. There were no crazy stage lights to claim our attention, no gaudy outfits, no other distractions. She drew all focus to her art. And for me, she was willing to give five minutes for an interview after the show.

I hung around afterwards, eavesdropping on her conversation with the theater crew. I learned that the crackling noises, which probably appeared intentional to most of the audience, were the reason the show ended early. DEBIT, who is currently on tour and departing for Europe soon, explained that “the challenge of electronic music is technical.”

The unintended feedback is just one of many technical issues that electronic artists have to deal with. But she embraces the challenge, saying that she enjoys “adding to the medium, and with experimentation comes risk.” She seeks catharsis for her audience, something that technical difficulties make difficult to achieve.

I asked her what she says to people who question whether her art is music. She smiled and said she hopes her art “encourages the question of what music is.” She spoke of her pride for the electronic genre and its acceptance into the cultural conscience as music. “Frequency creates tonality, which creates music, and at that point anything is up for grabs.”

Finally, I asked her what she hopes her audience takes away from her work. Without hesitating, she dove into what it means to be human and discovering “something fundamental to the human element, which everyone can relate to.” Her words leaned towards “cosmogony”: stories that explain creation in order to show how we relate to one another.

In speaking with her, I sensed wisdom beyond her years; an ancient soul who spoke eloquently and with authority. She is clearly a student of music and, through her vocation, has become a teacher. Her thirty-five minute lesson taught me that music’s capacity for inspiration (and dare I say catharsis) lies not in words nor sounds, but rather in the innate ability to reveal thoughts and emotions we did not know we had.

The post Witching Hour: DEBIT gives a lesson in cosmogony appeared first on KRUI Radio.

But what about a Mayan flute? Drawing a blank, huh?

Mexican-American DJ and producer DEBIT conjures up more than just music in her new album, “The Long Count.” Using obscure sonic material (archival recordings of ancient Mayan flutes, for example), DEBIT explores the sounds within sound.

The album’s eighth track, “4th Day,” is free of melody, beat, motif, and virtually any other musical component that one might expect. Casual listeners and audiophiles alike are forced to make sense of something different. Easy listening? Not at all. The experience requires feeling, not just active/passive listening.

Her newest work departs from 2018’s electronica-driven “Animus”, her debut effort, but they share much of the same DNA. From the beginning, DEBIT has strived to avoid repetitive tropes and canned sounds, instead finding unique sources of inspiration. In a recent article, The Guardian deemed her music “deliciously strange.”

Her polymorphous, soundscape, and ambient work challenges many Western music concepts. While you could compare her to some well-known ambient artists, like U2 or Moby, DEBIT occupies a liminal space that’s all her own.

DEBIT has DJ’ed across North & South America since 2010. She has appeared at Ghetto Gothic, MIXPAK, and performed with Kode9, ARCA, Nick Hook, Jubilee, and more. Join her at the James Theater in Iowa City at 7:30 p.m., Sept. 17.

The post Witching Hour Preview: DEBIT’s liminal sound appeared first on KRUI Radio.