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Next week looks like it’ll be a stellar one for new music.

The Twilight Singers – Dynamite Steps

Its Dulli people.  The man hasn’t released an album that disappointed me since I started listening to him 16 years ago.  This is streaming at spin.com now – I haven’t had the time to give it a proper listen, but I’m sure I won’t be disappointed.

Josh T. Pearson – Last of the Country Gentlemen

Josh’s old band, Lift To Experience, was this under appreciated, massive, vaguely post-rock band who released a double album in which God had charged the band with informing the world that the rapture was nigh.  It was stunningly beautiful.  Sadly Lift To Experience broke up & Josh seemed to disappear for a while.  He resurfaced & is releasing this disc on Mute.  The tracks I’ve heard are soft and rambling, held together by Josh’s wonderful voice and stories.

Mogwai – Hardcore Will Never Die But You Will

They’re Mogwai and they’ve come up with a great title.  While it probably won’t touch the brilliance of their earlier albums I’m still looking forward to it.  I go through phases with these guys – sometimes I can’t get enough, other times I’ll avoid them for months.  Hopefully this disc kicks off a can’t get enough period.

There are a handful of cool shows coming to Buffalo over the next few months.  Check ‘em out:

Justin Townes Earl
Feb 7th @ Mohawk Place

Rhys Chatam Trumpet Trio
Feb 18th @ Hallwalls

Weedeater
Feb 26th @ Mohawk Place

Lightning Bolt
April 1st @ Soundlab

Whooooooos comin with me?

My big story is of course Community Beer Works.  Hopefully we will be up and running, selling legal beer at this point next year.  We’re closing on the building today & throwing paperwork at the feds by the end of the week.  In the meantime I’m homebrewing up a storm, nailing down some recipes that will undoubtedly change dramatically based on new equipment & customer feedback.  We will be having a housewarming party sometime in January – keep an eye on our Facebook page for details.

I brewed a lot (over 20 batches!) this year.  Many of them (pale ales and saisons) were drafts that will become CBW beers, others (details withheld to build suspense but think about the first pie you bake as summer arrives) might rear their heads as seasonals.  Some (100% brettanomyces fermented cider aged for an extended period on crab apples from my front yard, licorice stouts) were just for fun.

I’m happiest with my improvement on two fronts this year.  First, the use of fresh fruit.  I had done a few fruited beers before (a brett-spiked cherry saison, an apricot witte, others) but I really feel that I nailed this year’s fruited beers & ciders.  I still have a few pounds of front yard grown raspberries in the freezer – maybe they need to find their way into one of the lambics aging away in my parent’s basement.  Secondly, I finally, finally, made a hoppy beer that I was really happy with.  Some of this came about from improvements in technique such as reduction of oxygen exposure, but it is largely due to my switch to kegging.  Keg hops rock.

On the drinking front I had some amazing beers. Ithaca’s Brute, Russian River’s Hopfather, Cascade’s Apricot, Paul’s homebrew sours, Russian River’s Supplication, Alaskan’s Baltic Porter, Coronado’s The Idiot.  The list goes on and on.  I wonder what would happen if I brewed a 50% wheat beer with low bitterness & let it ferment out with Brute & Cascade Apricot dregs.  Hmmmmmm.

The Buffalo beer scene continues to improve.  Blue Monk opened, taking beer in Buffalo to a whole new level.  Goodbar was bought by longtime manager Bobby, ensuring years of awesome taps & casks.  Pearl street continues to rock.  Flying Bison returned & is available a lot more places than ever before.  Cosmic Frog,  another Buffalo nanobrewery startup continues to move along.  There is at least one new brewery opening in Niagara County & I’ve heard rumors of something new coming to one of the southern WNY counties.  Buffalo’s oldest craft beer destination, Pizza Plant, is moving their transit location and hopefully adding a few taps in the process.  It seems that even non-beer destinations seem to have at least one or two good things on tap these days.

Whats going to happen next year?  What are the good beers going to be? How many bars will CBW be available in on December 22nd, 2011?  What new places & breweries are we going to see pop up?

I can’t wait to find out.

The Books – The Way Out

A pretty solid release from The Books.  They do the whole ‘build a track around some cool samples that we found’ thing better than most.  Not the most fun band to see live, but the discs are usually pretty solid.  Some tracks here are clunkers but the majority are the nice, dreamy sample pop I’ve come to expect from these guys.

Good for fans of: Ratatat, Aesop Rock, Minimal-ish IDM.

via Buffalo Rising.

I couldn’t resist the urge to pick up a few pounds of rye malt on a recent visit to Niagara Tradition.  I think it had something to do with a pint of Bear Republic Hop Rod Rye I had a few days earlier.  I hadn’t been planning on a rye beer, but the idea of an IPA slightly different than my last few hoppy batches stuck once it appeared in my mind.

03-13-2010 Rye IPA

A ProMash Brewing Session Report
——————————–

Brewing Date: Saturday March 13, 2010
Head Brewer: Rudy Watkins
Asst Brewer:
Recipe: Rye IPA

Recipe Specifics
—————-

Batch Size (Gal): 5.50 Wort Size (Gal): 5.50
Total Grain (Lbs): 14.05
Anticipated OG: 1.065 Plato: 15.86
Anticipated SRM: 8.4
Anticipated IBU: 74.5
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70 %
Wort Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Actual OG: 1.062 Plato: 15.28
Actual FG: 1.008 Plato: 2.05

Alc by Weight: 5.63 by Volume: 7.17 From Measured Gravities.
ADF: 86.6 RDF 71.8 Apparent & Real Degree of Fermentation.

Actual Mash System Efficiency: 71 %
Anticipated Points From Mash: 64.81
Actual Points From Mash: 66.16

Grain/Extract/Sugar

% Amount Name Origin Potential SRM
—————————————————————————–
22.8 3.20 lbs. Bestmalz Pilsener Germany 82.23 2
26.7 3.75 lbs. Pilsener Belgium 80.07 2
32.0 4.50 lbs. Optic Malt (2-row) Great Britain 80.07 3
14.2 2.00 lbs. Rye Malt America 64.92 4
3.6 0.50 lbs. Wheat Malt Germany 84.40 2
0.7 0.10 lbs. Chocolate Malt UK 62.76 375

Potential represented as Yield, Fine Grind Dry Basis.

Hops

Amount Name Form Alpha IBU Boil Time
—————————————————————————–
0.90 oz. Magnum Whole 10.50 35.8 60 min.
0.25 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 5.6 30 min.
0.20 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 5.9 30 min.
0.35 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 4.1 15 min.
0.30 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 4.6 15 min.
0.65 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 7.5 10 min.
0.35 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 2.5 5 min.
0.25 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 2.4 5 min.
0.45 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 4.3 1 min.
0.25 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 1.8 1 min.
0.80 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 0.0 Dry Hop
0.80 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 0.0 Dry Hop

Yeast

—–

Safeale US-5 US-5

Yeah, but what is it like?

A dense white head sits atop a slightly hazy (chill haze?) body.  The lacing is decent, but not killer.  Everything comes together nicely in the aroma – dank & citrus from the hops, some caramel and a small amount of rye spiciness.  No alcohol is apparent despite being 7% ABV.  Flavor is fruity orange & dank (imagine un-sweet orange liqueur, without the alcohol) some restrained mango, a bunch of piney bitterness.  There is a little bit of roast there – not out of place but I think I would skip the chocolate malt next time.  It has a nice lingering bittersweet character which reminds me a bit of fresh Hop Devil.

Overall assessment: pretty good.  I want to increase the dry hop next time, use a bit of crystal rye in addition to the malted rye and drop the chocolate (maybe use some sort of debittered black malt?)

Hauschka live on WNYC

Another great find via the New Sounds podcast.  Hauschka coaxes amazing sounds out of a prepared piano and creates some very cool songs.  I need to get his album, Ferndorf, once my emusic account refreshes.

Download some live tracks and an interview @ http://www.wnyc.org/stream/ram?file=/newsounds/newsounds031210.mp3

Nine Inch Nails – The Downward Spiral (Live @ Webster Hall 8/23/09)

Yeah yeah, you’ve heard TDS about a billion times.  I was digging through my boxes of live DATs, cassettes and CDs for a friend and remembered that a copy of “The Downward Spiral, Live at Webster Hall” was sitting, unwatched, in my torrent directory. I watched it.  It made me very, very happy (assuming you can call the state this album puts me in “happy”)

In a nutshell, NIN played TDS from start to finish at one of their last shows (8/23/09).  Due to copyright issues the band couldn’t record it, but encouraged fans to tape.  Some very talented fans then mixed a concert film from a whole bunch of sources.  Its really, really, really well done.  Give this a watch even if you haven’t picked up the album since leaving high school.

Torrent download available at http://www.theninhotline.net/features/TDSlive/