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Another one from the dust-off-the-CD files. I'm in the minority of Elliott Smith fans in that I don't get all that affected by the lo-fi misery of the early albums. Rather, his big-label albums with their big sound are what do justice to his big talent. XO in particular is just about flawless, end to end. And this tune conjures visions of 1998 that don't even make me cringe.
A nightmare that hopefully won't recur — I'm dressed like a teenage girl, mascara smeared on my face, holes in my jeans and on the soles of my Doc Martens. I'm alienated from all the other campers, but perhaps most alarmingly, I'm playing air bass and making corresponding faces at the mirror in my bunk. I don't think I like this dream, but I kinda dig this part of the soundtrack.
You know when you get into conversations with people who are think they have the bounds of music pretty well figured out? You want to blow their minds, but the right bands never come to your own mind. Times like that, it's best to reach for some Sun City Girls. Not really to out-obscure anyone (a useless pursuit), but simply for illuminating purposes. And as much as anything to remind yourself that there is no end to the musical universe.
Apropos of that, I had Torch of the Mystics — probably SCG's most consistent album — on pretty heavy rotation last week. I was constantly floored by the scope of the creativity and affecting weirdness (and visions of an imaginary Indonesia, among other places). No tune could hope to represent, so here's a little 2'fer Tuesday sampler.
Another weekend out of the city, this time in vast acreage and high-end leisure. I wonder if I need musical escapism whenever I get it in my actual life. And then I turn to a cruiser like this one (thanks Art Decade!) and remind myself that mental/musical excursions are indeed necessary, if only because they don't present thorny issues of class ambivalence. Also, because everyone involved in this recording probably developed a serious coke problem, and in the fantasy, I don't have to worry about any of that.
I have a shelf at home full of burned CDs. I almost never flip through them. Middle child problem. I sometimes stare at the towers of discs I bought/acquired over the years, with the patterns of spines that radiate a homey familiarity. But more often than not, I submit to digital ease and play something off the computer. Mostly stuff I never intend to transfer to a 1-cent piece of plastic. Which is fine. Like with most people, that's the neighborhood I've been building up the last few years. I'm trying to visit the burns from the just-pre-iPod era more often. Happily there's almost always a reward. Like this beautiful song. A fitting close to a week that began with looking at clouds.
Know these guys Jochen Arbeit, Gerd Bessler, Hopek Quirin? Me neither, really. Somehow it got into my audiospace. But I like improvisations that coalesce into something that sounds deliberate. And I like that this sounds like some far off commotion that holds a rhythmic face and doesn't care whether or not you come hither.
Listening to The Cars' debut album is like flipping through a photo album of a genetically engineered family. Pop-wise, everything is aligned for perfection. Except this black sheep. Maybe it was a bone thrown to the art schoolers in their audience. I can't help but hear the chorus as a warning.
From the sublime to...the Stranglers! These guys were so underrated, especially their humor. This track is actually more weird than sleazy. Punk feel with Boston-sized organ break. It also features what is now one of my favorite synth solos. The kind that reminds you how much the instrument is just asking to be used for nastier purposes.
Father's Day brought me back home for a quick 24-hour check-in, which is a near-ideal amount of time. And luckily, weather and supplies allowed for some boardwalk bike cruising. And also some slow sky watching. Saturday night offered a beautiful sunset, all kinds of swirling pink textures on gentle display before its exit was obscured by the sounds of the casino periphery. What could a guy do but head off to Eno-ville? The old man still has it! (At times, anyway.)
Something about Italy I've taken back with me — a weird appreciation of American roads and drivers. I guess eventually you get used to hairpin turns on ridiculously narrow hill roads, sudden appearances of main streets and pedestrians following blind curves, and nearly no signs, as well as road sharers who haven't got the slightest bit of patience for your perplexity. Maybe, but I'm happy to not have to. It's hard to choose music for that type of driving. Back on our roads, you can imagine all kinds of sinister and unrestrained contexts. Here's a song for some of that.
Does feeling a little alienated from the post-punk records you own signify a healthy engagement with daily life or deeper alienation from your snarling inner self? It occurs to me that I've been wrestling with this question for a while now, given my attraction to bright, upward-pulling sounds over the last few years. Digging out some Au Pairs and digging this tune in particular doesn't really clarify things. But it does spark some happiness. Maybe it's the crosseyed horns.
Something about vacationing with a mostly British cast of characters just puts an Anglo playlist in my head. Or maybe I'm just reaching for a segue to this heroic pop nugget, which refuses to be undone by terrible lyrics and silly outro vox.
Back from vacation! A much-needed week and a half and literally accurate — my daily life mostly vacated, aided by amazing vistas, pastas, good company, and a happily spotty Internet signal. I'm just now getting reacquainted with familiar things (like paying for train rides in advance and not getting nailed with a stiff fine for not having a ticket when there's no clear place to buy one). And girding myself for pizza that's not supernaturally delicious.
Erkay...back to music then. Usually during vacations, a song or two slip into my head and loop through it insistently. Not so this time, and I'm not sure why. Maybe it means the getaway was so effective that songs in memory couldn't find me. At any rate, here's one that I'd been humming for a couple days just before leaving. Another song about ambiguous distances. I don't quite connect with it personally, but the scratchiness feels like home.
Yikes, trying to get everything in order pre-vacation = a short week and not much of a segue. OK, well, here's another band with numbers in its name. That's all I got. Actually, this one suits the mindstate I'm aiming for. Something far from these frantic, nervy days. Typical of 10cc, the lyrics are far less vacation-y than the music would suggest (don't want to think of telephone lines as lifelines). That said, I'm off to rural Italia! The plan is to be back on decks on 6/14. See you then.
Oops, looks like Tuesday got away from me. I suppose Memorial Day is technically the start of summer slackerdom. And what with my heading out on vacation Thursday, it'll be a mostly Songblague-less first half of June. Allow me to make up for my upcoming absence with enough musical intensity for a whole week. (Also, it's a nice little segue from last week's Krautrockery. I can't imagine this band existing without those vintage motors).
Another one from the dust-off-the-CD files. I'm in the minority of Elliott Smith fans in that I don't get all that affected by the lo-fi misery of the early albums. Rather, his big-label albums with their big sound are what do justice to his big talent. XO in particular is just about flawless, end to end. And this tune conjures visions of 1998 that don't even make me cringe.
A nightmare that hopefully won't recur — I'm dressed like a teenage girl, mascara smeared on my face, holes in my jeans and on the soles of my Doc Martens. I'm alienated from all the other campers, but perhaps most alarmingly, I'm playing air bass and making corresponding faces at the mirror in my bunk. I don't think I like this dream, but I kinda dig this part of the soundtrack.
You know when you get into conversations with people who are think they have the bounds of music pretty well figured out? You want to blow their minds, but the right bands never come to your own mind. Times like that, it's best to reach for some Sun City Girls. Not really to out-obscure anyone (a useless pursuit), but simply for illuminating purposes. And as much as anything to remind yourself that there is no end to the musical universe.
Another weekend out of the city, this time in vast acreage and high-end leisure. I wonder if I need musical escapism whenever I get it in my actual life. And then I turn to a cruiser like this one (thanks Art Decade!) and remind myself that mental/musical excursions are indeed necessary, if only because they don't present thorny issues of class ambivalence. Also, because everyone involved in this recording probably developed a serious coke problem, and in the fantasy, I don't have to worry about any of that.
I have a shelf at home full of burned CDs. I almost never flip through them. Middle child problem. I sometimes stare at the towers of discs I bought/acquired over the years, with the patterns of spines that radiate a homey familiarity. But more often than not, I submit to digital ease and play something off the computer. Mostly stuff I never intend to transfer to a 1-cent piece of plastic. Which is fine. Like with most people, that's the neighborhood I've been building up the last few years. I'm trying to visit the burns from the just-pre-iPod era more often. Happily there's almost always a reward. Like this beautiful song. A fitting close to a week that began with looking at clouds.
Know these guys Jochen Arbeit, Gerd Bessler, Hopek Quirin? Me neither, really. Somehow it got into my audiospace. But I like improvisations that coalesce into something that sounds deliberate. And I like that this sounds like some far off commotion that holds a rhythmic face and doesn't care whether or not you come hither.
Listening to The Cars' debut album is like flipping through a photo album of a genetically engineered family. Pop-wise, everything is aligned for perfection. Except this black sheep. Maybe it was a bone thrown to the art schoolers in their audience. I can't help but hear the chorus as a warning.
From the sublime to...the Stranglers! These guys were so underrated, especially their humor. This track is actually more weird than sleazy. Punk feel with Boston-sized organ break. It also features what is now one of my favorite synth solos. The kind that reminds you how much the instrument is just asking to be used for nastier purposes.
Father's Day brought me back home for a quick 24-hour check-in, which is a near-ideal amount of time. And luckily, weather and supplies allowed for some boardwalk bike cruising. And also some slow sky watching. Saturday night offered a beautiful sunset, all kinds of swirling pink textures on gentle display before its exit was obscured by the sounds of the casino periphery. What could a guy do but head off to Eno-ville? The old man still has it! (At times, anyway.)
Something about Italy I've taken back with me — a weird appreciation of American roads and drivers. I guess eventually you get used to hairpin turns on ridiculously narrow hill roads, sudden appearances of main streets and pedestrians following blind curves, and nearly no signs, as well as road sharers who haven't got the slightest bit of patience for your perplexity. Maybe, but I'm happy to not have to. It's hard to choose music for that type of driving. Back on our roads, you can imagine all kinds of sinister and unrestrained contexts. Here's a song for some of that.
Does feeling a little alienated from the post-punk records you own signify a healthy engagement with daily life or deeper alienation from your snarling inner self? It occurs to me that I've been wrestling with this question for a while now, given my attraction to bright, upward-pulling sounds over the last few years. Digging out some Au Pairs and digging this tune in particular doesn't really clarify things. But it does spark some happiness. Maybe it's the crosseyed horns.
Something about vacationing with a mostly British cast of characters just puts an Anglo playlist in my head. Or maybe I'm just reaching for a segue to this heroic pop nugget, which refuses to be undone by terrible lyrics and silly outro vox. 
Back from vacation! A much-needed week and a half and literally accurate — my daily life mostly vacated, aided by amazing vistas, pastas, good company, and a happily spotty Internet signal. I'm just now getting reacquainted with familiar things (like paying for train rides in advance and not getting nailed with a stiff fine for not having a ticket when there's no clear place to buy one). And girding myself for pizza that's not supernaturally delicious.
Yikes, trying to get everything in order pre-vacation = a short week and not much of a segue. OK, well, here's another band with numbers in its name. That's all I got. Actually, this one suits the mindstate I'm aiming for. Something far from these frantic, nervy days. Typical of 10cc, the lyrics are far less vacation-y than the music would suggest (don't want to think of telephone lines as lifelines). That said, I'm off to rural Italia! The plan is to be back on decks on 6/14. See you then. 
Oops, looks like Tuesday got away from me. I suppose Memorial Day is technically the start of summer slackerdom. And what with my heading out on vacation Thursday, it'll be a mostly Songblague-less first half of June. Allow me to make up for my upcoming absence with enough musical intensity for a whole week. (Also, it's a nice little segue from last week's Krautrockery. I can't imagine this band existing without those vintage motors).
