Let me be your one light

Still reeling from last night's viewing of Gravity in all its 3D, vertiginous, space is awe-inspiring/freezing/vastly and utterly inhuman splendor. My mind casts out to a space object that is a much easier fit for romantic paeans. This one is worthy reading of Big Star's classic; a beautiful light pours out of it.  

His Name Is Alive — Blue Moon

Spirited

There's been a lot of talk about "the new normal" for life in a post-Sandy world. Maybe we can expect killer storms every year or two, landscapes reshaped, and all modern comforts exposed for how fragile they are. Scary obviously, but also a little bit liberating if you're inclined to fall into ruts. And on the positive side, maybe it's also a world where volunteers wrap around the block and you don't honestly consider yourself satisfied unless you've done something for someone who has lost more than you. On the musical front, it seems I've entered a world where this song has suddenly become appealing.

Patti Smith - Smells Like Teen Spirit

Covered in tattoos

Sticking with cover tunes and things tangentially related to jazz. Petra Haden (daughter of famed bassist Charlie Haden) had the fun idea to cover the entirety of The Who Sell Out using only her very flexible voice. Gimmicky? Sure, but if you've got range and a sense of humor, I say go for it. Also, the effort foregrounds the mischief and warmth of the album itself despite Pete Townshend's big rock narcissism.

This tune is funny, and also a little sad to me. Less the song's fault and more my admittedly fuddy-duddy distaste for the cringe-worthy ink I see on nearly every body around. I'm already bored of tramp stamps, ankle butterflies, full sleeves, and neck tributes to babies/grandma. Stephen Wright joked that he had a full body tattoo of himself, except 2 inches taller. Who's laughing now?

Petra Haden - Tattoo

Square shadows

Dave Brubeck gets no respect. I suppose it's due to his shameless brand of white, European-ish jazz that was decidedly non-hep in its day. Also, those odd time signatures, which are bound to get you marginalized in any era. 

Improviser David Slusser had his work cut out in covering this moody little noir nugget. And he nailed it. I like how he bear-hugs the nerd factor, then throws an avant-noisy curveball, followed by nice some bluesy guitar strangling. Goes to show that maybe Brubeck wasn't as square as he seemed. Or that it is indeed hip to be square, as another much-maligned paleface has taught us.

Dave Slusser - Blue Shadows In The Street

Swing from a good good rope

These days, I'm wouldn't even pretend to boast about being the first kid on the block to get to know about this or that band. I wasn't a super early adopter 10 or so years ago, but I do remember catching an early wind of TV On The Radio's Young Liars EP and knowing there was something special about them, even if in retrospect they were just beginning to crawl out the Williamsburg murk and into the sunshine of global acclaim.

That debut work continues to sounds great. In some ways, even better than the big brilliance of what they've evolved into. This song remains my favorite — a bold cover that absolutely re-imagines (and arguably overtakes) an indie rock semi-classic. People talk about the voices that haunt. This has about 15 of them.

TV On The Radio - Mr. Grieves

Say you don't know me, I'm your native son

I'm mostly unqualified to hold forth on Willie Nelson's music, beyond a general affection for his nasally pipes and an amusement over his very public stoniness. But his lovely version of this paean to the faded railroad life of America sends a not so patriotic chill up my spine. Which alone makes it a totally suitable tune for this Memorial Day weekend. (And I'm pretty sure Willie will be firing up more than a grill on Monday.) Meanwhile, see you back on Tuesday.

Willie Nelson - City Of New Orleans

A world so sweet and true

Love or hate, you can't deny the basic sweet-spot appeal of dreamy synth pop. I've spied curmudgeons who breathlessly grasp for pejoratives absently tapping their feet when they think no one's looking. I embraced the candy full-on a while back, and I've never found it hard to equally love "serious" music at the same time.

Which may be why it's cool to hear '70s proggers and other musos getting hip to such simple joys. Case in point — today's tunes, which by way of segue, feature Barbara Gaskin (faire maiden vocalist of yesterday's song) teamed up with Dave Stewart, who played in just about every Canterbury art rock band in shaggier-haired days (not the guy from Eurythmics).

This duo had some '80s hits, but generally played it under the radar. Honestly, they're hit or miss, but these two are surely hits in my mind. And mischievous ones at that, being radically rethought cover versions (check the originals here and here). The chorus of the first one, in particular, does transport me to a different world — accessible only for a few moments, and all the more sublime as a result. Plus, pitch bending!

Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin - I'm In A Different World
Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin - Roads Girdle The Globe

Now I care

Last year, some folks in LA had the bright idea to showcase local bands by having them cover Television's under-celebrated Adventure album. I too have under-celebrated this album because, well, it's not Marquee Moon. Which is itself an over-celebrated album, in my opinion.

Of course, this 'blague has given some tender love and real estate to Adventure's best track. But the beauty of covers is how interpretation can bring out a song's hidden virtues. In this case, a fairly pedestrian four-count rocker grows a country beard and rises glowing and newly translucent up above quiet waters in the beautiful moonlight.

Local Natives - Careful

Crepuscular activity

Keeping with the strange fusions. It took an odd set of post-punkers to hitch their wagon to samba styles that must've seemed a million miles from their time. But these juxtapositions just remind us how arbitrary any time is and how many different versions could exist. Taking a cue from the cover, I prefer to imagine these streams flowing into a future I may be brave enough to inhabit. Or at least an apartment I might rent. Here are two songs from that world — one coldly wacked-out cover, the other a warm bolus of mechanical sunshine.

Antena - The Boy From Ipanema

Antena - Camino Del Sol

I need excitement, oh I need it bad

John Peel famously said that "Teenage Kicks" was his favorite song of all time. Can't argue with the tastes of a legend. And it's right up there for me too. When your aim is this true, it's hard to call it anything but perfection. Pure rock n' roll, topped off with a rare consciousness that these kicks desperately being craved are the special domain of the teenage animal.

The Undertones - Teenage Kicks

Also, a great song sounds great in any language. Including broken English.

Nouvelle Vague - Teenage Kicks

Automatic person operation

Another find from Lights in the Night. This one made me do a double-take. A lot less menacing, a lot more...sexy? Well, maybe. When it sounds like you're reading off of phonetic cue cards, the dread just melts away. I guess once Ms. Anderson had her accidental chart hit, she thought "dance mix next!" I'm still trying to figure out exactly what dance this calls for. Any suggestions?

A.P.O. - O Superman

I'm gonna open up your gate

My sister keeps proselytizing me on Lee Hazlewood. I don't resist so much as enjoy at a remove. Just not my cup of '60s, although I do commend his mastery over Nancy Sinatra. Meanwhile, I've had warm feelings for Slowdive since high school, an age when folks are most susceptible to their hazy charms. And those hazy charms work wonders for one of Hazlewood's signature ditties. A shimmering ocean of a pop song.

Slowdive - Some Velvet Morning

Trois Gymnopédies, trois vues

Some historians talk about the short 20th century, meaning that the real break with the previous century occurred with the first shots of World War I. That may be true, but in another sense, the long 20th century began with Erik Satie's 3 Gymnopédies—the granddaddy of ambient, minimalism, maybe even jazz (stuff's kinda blue, after all). And to me at least, they suggest a subjective, interior space that cuts against the old paradigm for this kind of stuff.

These pieces don't feel connected to any particular time or place. So in the Modernist spirit, I'm thinking why not get all cubist and offer three very different ways of looking at one of them. Here's the faithful piano version, performed by an eminent Satie interpreter.

Aldo Ciccolini - Trois Gymnopédies: Lent et Douloureux

And here's the Yesterday's Future version, late-'70s style. Music for evening contemplation in space cities. Best thing Gary Numan ever did.

Gary Numan - Trois Gymnopédies: Lent et Douloureux

And in a nice inversion of mood, here's the candyland J-pop version. Satie goes Animé.

Pine*am - Gymnopédie 0.1

Another VU

So you may have heard Beck recently recorded a full-album interpretation of The Velvet Underground and Nico. It has a nice homespun quality; having your own home studio facilitates that. The covers are a pleasing, playful homage to that big, intimidating work. Nothing revolutionary, nothing embarrassing.

But this track stands out, mainly because the Germanic elements are flipped. Instead of Nico's teutonic harshness, we get warm-throated Thorunn Magnusdottir. And rather than John Cale's avant piano poundings, we get throwback krautpop of the best kind—with its one-chord background insistence, ghostly synth, and a graceful sparseness that hints at some kind of ceremony. It rolls ahead but feels almost suspended in air, pulling off the trick that bands like Harmonia had down pat in their '70s halcyon days. Or maybe I like it because it feels like Autumn, and so does the weather.

Beck - All Tomorrow's Parties

Dancin' woozy in the space age

Been a couple of weighty days, musically speaking. I think it's time for something light and playful. Like a little cat. But I have cat allergies. How about a song instead? A song to be played for a drunkard dancing with a lampshade.

Oranj Symphonette were some jazzers who got together to do fun romps through the Henry Mancini songbook. They expanded the palette to other like-minded guys on their second album. This tune was written by Burt Bacharach for a movie of the same name, which apparently flopped. It was sung by Peter Sellers, which is always a plus. No vox here, but the plunger mute has character to spare.

Oranj Symphonette - After The Fox

Cover me (psychotic behavior)

People usually think John Cale was the civilized one in the Velvet Underground, what with the viola and the accent. But he could do spine-tingling, locked-in-a-closet-for-2-weeks disturbed as well as Lou Reed any day of the week. This one finds Cale taking Elvis out of the maltshop and into a demonic place, capturing the hellishness of lovelorn despair. It's got a great shriek at the end, and Eno hooks him up with some sympathetic keys. A scary little masterpiece, this one.

John Cale - Heartbreak Hotel

Soloing across heaven

I remember the joy and excitement when I first heard Parliament. It was funky alright, but also a lot like a cartoon, with the likes of Star Child and Dr. Funkenstein trying so hard to entertain. Funkadelic, on the other hand, had darker intentions. Sure, they were all one nation under a groove, but the music dove down into deep murky psych territory from which some of them never returned.

If Eddie Hazel had left us with nothing but the guitar solo on "Maggot Brain," he would still deserve statues in his likeness. Is it really a shame that he shortchanged his own genius? Or did he need to be so addled to reach those musical places? Isn't being self-destructive and leaving all those 'what-ifs' often your shrewdest career move? Anyway, here's Eddie bustin' out a sweet version of a song that I finally have some love for.

Eddie Hazel - California Dreamin'

Cover me (Ukrainian edition)

If you're gonna cover the Smiths, you'd better bring your A-game. (Cue mental picture of the Mozzer going one-on-one with Kobe Bryant.) By the high standard we demand for anyone taking up the challenge, these boys come at it from left field and absolutely nail it. They've got a 4-song EP of Smiths adaptations. It's well worth seeking out, but I think this is the best of the batch. Makes me want to down my beer in one gulp and flail around the hinterlands.

Does anyone speak Ukrainian? Have these Ukrainians changed the lyrics to address Eastern concerns? I will barter for a translation.

The Ukrainians - Batyar (Bigmouth Strikes Again)

Cover me

I admit, I'm still a sucker for Mark Kozelek's music, even at its most emotionally raw. And I'm always amazed at his ability to draw the same intensity out of other people's songs. Who'd have thought a fairly minor Cars tune could sound so epic and heartfelt? Slowed down, stripped down, it opens wide, with a voice somber and beautiful like a cello. It's so good you can almost forgive him licensing it for a Gap ad.

Red House Painters - All Mixed Up