Month: December 2015

Wait Another Day

On December 31, 2015

This year’s music mix has a new factor thrown in. Normally these collections are culled from the music I’ve been listening to over the previous year (with “year” being defined as November – October, so I can get the CD mailed to Wales in time for Christmas). That part hasn’t changed, but the new factor is the album assignments game I’ve been playing with Robby over the fall. That’s changed my listening habits, so that a couple of days out of each week are now devoted to a particular album, with the aim of writing about it later. That’s brought in some things that wouldn’t have been in my regular rotation — Elvis Costello and The Clash among them. It also means that some of this stuff I’ve already written about, so I’ll try not to repeat myself. Of course, that means I may be a bit briefer than usual on some tunes.

1. The Airborne Toxic Event – No More Lonely Nights
Case in point. TATE is now on my “to-do” list after this track, which performs the minor miracle of resurrecting this Give My Regards To Broad Street tune into something subtle and moving.

2. Stevie Nicks – Belle Fleur
Okay, I just wrote four paragraphs of background about Stevie’s 24 Karat Gold album, then realized that they’re supposed to go in my article about the album itself. Robby doesn’t know it yet (as I write this), but I’m assigning that album to him next.

Meanwhile, a few words about this song. It’s an example of a song that I’ve had in demo form for decades, but never really connected with that much. This re-recording, on the other hand, moves me a lot. To me, it’s a story of love and magic, but not magic love — it’s no ticket to dreamland. What it is, though, is an exchange of stories, and a sharing of lives — you sing to me, and I’ll sing to you.

3. Joe Jackson – Ode To Joy
Speaking of new albums from old friends, I just saw Joe Jackson in concert in October, touring to support his new record Fast Forward. This was my favorite song he played that night, and my favorite from the new CD. I love its wholehearted embrace of joy, joy as a pure experience unfettered by the material and phenomenological planes. The New Yorker did a wonderful profile of Joe, and one of my favorite parts of that is this quote:

Some of my early stuff was infected by the deadly disease of cynicism, which is a disease of the young, I think. When you’re young, it seems very clever to be cynical. But as you get older, hopefully, if you’re not completely stupid, you realize that you have to be a bit more positive, as a simple matter of survival.

I happened to listen to this album right before reviewing Don Henley’s Cass County, and Joe’s optimism is a lovely contrast to some the harshness on display there. And being Joe, he cleverly quotes Beethoven in the bargain.

4. Elvis Costello – Mystery Dance
I wonder if the kind of world that could produce this song is gone forever. Can sex still be mysterious when so much information about it is so easily retrieved? Sure, there’s a world of difference between reading about something and doing it, and lots of what’s out there could warp a kid’s perceptions and blur the difference between fantasy and reality, but there was a time in living memory when you could try and try and still be mystified. Does that happen anymore?

5. The Clash – Death Or Glory
I can hardly say more about this than I did in my London Calling post. Suffice it to say that I put it on repeat in my car for a day, and never got sick of it. And I drive a lot! It’s as energizing the 20th time as it was the first.

6. Fleetwood Mac – Songbird (live)
This last year was a special one for Fleetwood Mac fans, because we saw something we never thought we’d see again: Chrstine McVie touring with the band. I actually saw them in December 2014 and April 2015, which is why there are two songs from the set list on this CD. In April, she didn’t play “Songbird” — apparently she was dealing with some kind of injury, because it came back to the set later. She played it in December though, and it’s just the most perfect set closer. I never got the chance to see Fleetwood Mac in its prime — my first FM show was the 1987 tour where they replaced Lindsey with two other guitarists, and my first time seeing the classic lineup was in 1997. That was also my last time until now. It was such a joy to hear this song at the end of the show. This recording is from 1977, and was included in the Rumours expanded edition that they released a couple of years ago. [The YouTube clip I linked to above is from a different 1977 show — I couldn’t find the expanded edition one online.]

7. Tori Amos – Promise
I’ve been a Tori Amos fan for a long time now, so I was aware that she had a daughter named Tash. But that wasn’t uppermost in my mind while I was listening to her new album Unrepentant Geraldines this year. So when I heard this song, I could tell it was a duet, but I didn’t recognize the other voice — all I could hear was that it was somebody who had a lot on common with Tori vocally. As I listened to the lyrics, discerning that this was a conversation between mother and daughter, I started to wonder, “Could this be Tash?” And sure enough, it is. That realization sent chills through me. Tash was born on 2000, so she was probably 13 when this song was recorded. Given that, it’s a remarkable performance, and as a parent I find the lyrics very moving.

8. Roger McGuinn – If We Never Meet Again
I revisited McGuinn’s album Back From Rio this year — I’ve always liked his twelve-string guitar sound, and this is my favorite of his non-Byrds releases. This time around, “If We Never Meet Again” latched onto me. The tone is just golden, and the message of acceptance for whatever may come sits well with me.

9. Best Coast – Each And Everyday
I came across this band on a Fleetwood Mac tribute album done by a bunch of indie groups, called Just Tell Me That You Want Me. There were lots of great covers on that album, but Best Coast’s version of “Rhiannon” really grabbed me, mainly I think because of singer Bethany Cosentino’s voice. So I sought to know more about them and ended up quite enjoying both of their first two albums. (I haven’t got their third yet, but it’s on my wish list.) This is a track from their debut.

10. The Clash – The Card Cheat
There are so many great things about this song, but it has to start with the production. Contrary to what you might expect from a punk band, this song is as well-produced as any pop gem. The ringing piano, valedictory horns, majestic rhythm section — it’s like a classic Phil Spector “Wall Of Sound” record, infused with a cathedral grandeur. Wedding this incredible sound to the tale of a lowlife gambler is like the aural version of a Scorsese film, elevating the dismal criminal world to an operatic level.

11. Paul F. Tompkins – King Hat
My friend Tashi put me onto this comedian, whose records I just adore. Many of his bits have now become part of the conceptual vocabulary in my mind, especially the ones from his most recent album Laboring Under Delusions, which is a concept piece about all the various jobs he’s done in his life. I listened to that album a bunch over this last year, and knew I wanted to include something from it. I had a hard time picking. I went with this one because a) it’s a great showcase for his style, b) it’s a linguistic rant, which I find endearing, and c) it reminds me so much of the stories Laura tells me about her retail-esque experiences at the library. Oh, and because it’s so freakin’ funny, of course.

12. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis feat. Mary Lambert – Same Love
Here’s another album I spent an awful lot of time with over the last year. I was a bit late to the Macklemore party, but boy The Heist is great. A number of songs from it got thrown into the hopper for this mix, but if I had to pick just one (and, it turned out, I did), it’d be “Same Love.” I so appreciate the personal story flowing into the cultural analysis, and the strong, clear call for hip-hop to stand behind marriage equality. Damn right I support it.

13. Dan Wilson – Free Life
Dan Wilson was the lead singer and writer of the 90’s band Semisonic, who were a one-hit wonder with the song “Closing Time.” It’s a shame that they never found greater success, because Wilson is an absolutely brilliant songwriter, who did amazing work with Semisonic and then went on to co-write such killer songs as Adele’s “Someone Like You” and the Dixie Chicks’ “Not Ready To Make Nice.” This song is from his 2007 solo debut, and it stands out for me this year because my iPod dialed it up as I was driving back from New Mexico, having just participated in the 2015 Geek Bowl in Albuquerque. It felt so perfect for that specific moment in my life that I put it on repeat a few times, just listening to the music and feeling free.

14. Elton John – Rocket Man (I Think It’s Going To Be A Long Long Time)
Sometimes a classic just jumps out and reminds you why it’s a classic. I was listening to Honky Château in the car, and when this song came on I marveled at how intensely gorgeous it is. Plus, it’s a fantastic song to sing along to, which is probably why I sang it over and over on that 45-minute commute.

15. Elliott Smith – Junk Bond Trader
I’ve had XO in my collection for a while, and while I enjoy it, I never really imprinted on it. Figure 8, on the other hand, knocked me out. So many great songs on that album — as with Macklemore, there were a bunch in the running and it came down to this one. The lyrics to this are so fantastic — elliptical and evocative, with the occasional razor-sharp one liner, like “Checking into a small reality / Boring as a drug you take too regularly.” What’s it about? I really don’t know. But I sure do dig how it’s about it.

16. Fleetwood Mac – Sisters Of The Moon
This was the highlight of the April 2015 Fleetwood Mac show. It’s always been one of my favorite Stevie songs — I love the power chord progression and the mystical vibe. She can’t hit those high notes any more (the backup singers do it for her), and the cocaine-fueled frenzy that used to characterize live performances of this song is long behind her, but still, it is a powerful, spellbinding incantation, and it lifts me up every time I see it.

17. Florence + The Machine – Dog Days Are Over
Speaking of powerful. Ceremonials was a big record for me in 2014, so I decided to check out Florence’s debut as well, and I’m glad I did. There’s a reason this song got so famous. I love rock songs with big drums and a big voice like this — they make me feel like I’m flying.

18. Best Coast – The Only Place
Here’s a song from Best Coast’s second album. True to their name, it’s a paean to California, and I have to say they make a pretty good case. Especially for somebody like me who could be perfectly happy never seeing snow again, Southern California seems like a pretty amazing place to live. Oh, except for the earthquakes. And, I guess the mudslides. And the forest fires. And how expensive everything is. But other than that, aces!

19. Fountains Of Wayne – Bright Future In Sales
One final showcase from another album I really got into in 2014. My friend Trish has been a huge FoW fan for ages, and always told me I should check them out. You know how it is with that kind of thing, though — I’d always think, “Yeah, I should,” and then go listen to something I already know. That’s the beauty of the wishlist, though. I can just tag something based on a passing thought, and then some angel will bring it into my life, where I can give it the attention it deserves. This album, Welcome Interstate Managers, dominated my car for about 3 weeks, and I got to love each and every song on it. There were a bunch to choose from, but this one does a great job of encapsulating the humor, the characterization, the storytelling, and the awesome power pop slam that Fountains Of Wayne brings to its music.

Album Assignments: The Velvet Underground & Nico

By paulobrian

On December 28, 2015

In Uncategorized

The Velvet Underground & Nico is one of those albums about which a lot has been written. Most of it, I haven’t read. I know the Brian Eno quip about how only a few thousand people bought it, but each one started a band. Other than that, I haven’t taken the class. I’ve listened to the songs an awful lot over the years, but that’s all. Consequently, I’m a bit self-conscious of the fact that I am highly unlikely to have an original thought about it.

With that disclaimer out of the way, here’s what’s in my head. One of the most striking things about this record, to me, is the fact that it was released in 1967. Yet not only does it sound (almost) completely contemporary, it would be a challenging and avant-garde album even today. Not only was it way ahead of its time, I think it’s still pretty well ahead of ours.

Musically, I identify 1967 with Jefferson Airplane, Sgt. Pepper’s, the Summer Of Love. Yet this record seems like it came from another planet altogether, and perhaps it did. The album radiates New York City, and mostly not the pretty parts either. The Velvet Underground’s New York feels like the yin to 1967 San Francisco’s yang. Where the Frisco vibe was laid-back, open, and loving, New York is tense, paranoid, and angry. Where the hippies wanted to save the world with peace, Lou Reed’s characters mostly want to annihilate themselves or each other. And where the primary theme of the Summer Of Love is freedom, the primary theme of this album is pressure. Both states can produce remarkable accomplishments, and in 1967, both did.

Album cover for The Velvet Underground And Nico

They’re worlds apart musically as well. Where the California sound was all about pretty chiming and blues tropes, The Velvet Underground & Nico is redolent with atonal shrieks, shatters, bangs, and staggers. The song structures are often bizarre — take “European Son”, whose lyrics run out about seven minutes before its music does. Much of that music careens crazily up and down non-traditional scales, veering into feedback and hyperactive hemidemisemiquavers, in front of a guitar strumming over and over and over on the same chord, until it’s more of a drone than a rhythm. In fact, some kind of drone comes up in a lot of the VU’s songs on this collection — it’s behind “Venus In Furs”, “All Tomorrow’s Parties”, “Heroin”, “Femme Fatale”, and more. It’s kind of their signature sound here.

Speaking of drone, let’s talk about Nico. This may be heretical, but I’m not sure her presence is a net gain for the record. Her vocals are certainly interesting, and often surprising, but their effect on the songs tends to be odd and distancing, generally to the detriment of the overall experience. “I’ll Be Your Mirror” fares the worst — it’s far and away the sweetest song on the album, but her frosty tone dampens its warmth, and her heavy German accent makes the gorgeous words harder to understand. Similarly, the lyrics to “All Tomorrow’s Parties” read on the page as compassionate, or at least pitying, but out of Nico’s mouth they sound contemptuous. That tone works better on “Femme Fatale”, which really is a sneering song, one that perhaps sounds a smidgen less misogynist when sung by a woman.

On the other hand, Lou Reed inhabits these characters with a marvelous intensity. That little laugh in “Heroin”, after “it’s my wife and it’s my life”, encapsulates the junkie’s longed-for detachment, finally achieved via a spike in the vein. Or how the obsequious “Oh pardon me sir, it’s furthest from my mind” in “Waiting For The Man” brings across the nervousness of the character while slyly upending the more common racial accusation.

“Venus In Furs” is probably the song that captivated me most this time around. While plenty of the other tunes explore darkness, this song finds a beauty and even a healing in sexual masochism. It has to be one of the first sympathetic portrayals of BDSM in rock — even now not a terribly crowded field in any medium. “Strike dear mistress, and cure his heart” pierces straight to the center of a crucial truth for submissive masochists — that the touch of the whip brings relief, release, and comfort. Sure, endorphins are a part of it, but on an emotional level that willing submission to pain allows them to befriend it, even control it, rather than letting it control them.

That’s a different kind of insight for a 1967 album, and the Velvet Underground pull it off so brilliantly. Almost makes me want to start a band.

Album Assignments: 24 Karat Gold – Songs From The Vault

By paulobrian

On December 14, 2015

In Uncategorized

For decades now, Stevie Nicks fans like me have been passing around demos for her dozens and dozens of unreleased songs. She’s a very prolific writer, but on a Fleetwood Mac album she shares with two other writers, she might get to release 3 songs every 3 years. Her solo career opened the gates a bit more, but even that was derailed after a while by her long tranquilizer addiction, her commitment to Fleetwood Mac recording and touring, and her difficulty finding a producer who would enhance her rough work rather than distorting it. Meanwhile, that meant that there were all these great songs from the 70s and 80s that never found a home.

She kicked the tranquilizers in the mid-90s, but it wasn’t until 2010 that she formed a musical partnership with Dave Stewart (formerly of The Eurythmics) that made her excited about recording again. And in 2014, with Stewart and longtime guitarist Waddy Wachtel as co-producers, she released an album that fans had been waiting for: studio recordings of a bunch of those long-lost demos. Ironically, while I always felt a little bad about the bootlegs, it was their presence on YouTube which reminded her of the songs’ existence in the first place, and inspired her to re-record them.

The resulting record 24 Karat Gold: Songs From The Vault, is almost everything I hoped it would be. Nicks’ re-recordings of her old songs can be a mixed bag, especially when Lindsey Buckingham is producing. On the Say You Will Fleetwood Mac album from 2003, there were several songs that I’d loved for years, but on some of them, particularly “Smile At You,” I still much prefer the demo. On the other hand, her new version of “Goodbye Baby” (known to fans as “The Tower”) had an unbelievably emotional hushed vocal, and despite some kinda banal new lyrics, was a marvelous version of the song. (Though the demo is still one of my all-time favorites.)

Her solo stuff tended to fare better, and both Trouble In Shangri-La and In Your Dreams had excellent versions of previously unreleased songs. 24 Karat Gold is a whole album of that stuff, and for the most part, it is wonderful. Hearing propulsive full-band versions of previously bland or poor-quality demos is a revelation, and many of the songs are vastly improved by this treatment. Also, pieces of tunes that seemed half-formed are now fleshed out and clear. The only thing I wish is that for some of those songs which already had a very good demo, we could somehow have a vocal from the Stevie of the era in which they were written. Nicks’ voice has grown deeper and throatier over the years, and while it suits many songs, it doesn’t suit all of them.

Album cover of 24 Karat Gold: Songs From The Vault

So that means it’s time for another taxonomy:

Songs that outshine the demos

“Starshine”: I love what Dave Stewart and Stevie do with this song. The demo always seemed fine to me, but I never really connected with it. This version, though, makes it all clear, the way it builds up to a shouted “wrong!” – it’s a cautionary tale about cheating, told from three points of view. Fantastic beat, groovy solo, joyful vocal. Just a great, tight track.
“Mabel Normand”: This is one of the most dramatic improvements. The demo is muttery, meandering — almost unlistenable, for me. I was quite surprised to see it in the track list, but here it sounds awesome, and tells a clear, compelling story. Normand takes her place alongside Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich as celluloid heroines who Stevie identifies as kindred spirits and inspirations.
“Blue Water”: Quick sidebar story here. This is one of the first Stevie demos I ever heard, back in the pre-Internet days. My freshman year of college, I went to NYU and learned to prowl all the record stores in lower Manhattan. I was stunned to discover bootleg records filed right alongside regular releases, especially since I’d worked for a suburban record store my last year of high school, where no such thing would ever be permitted. So when I saw these albums called “Uncirculated Rumours” in the Stevie section, I snatched them right up, and heard my first unreleased songs — this one and a few others, most of which still have not seen the light of day. “Blue Water” always felt a little blah to me — nice melody repeated a lot. The song is still the same, but a studio gloss and an assist from Lady Antebellum does wonders for the tune.
“All The Beautiful Worlds”: This is another one that always felt kind of ethereal to me in its demo form — my mind would always wander when I heard it. Now, when I heard it again after searching for the YouTube link, I think perhaps it may have been a victim of a poor transfer. Many of these demos came to me via cassettes that were god-only-knows how many generations removed from their master copies, and consequently sounded quiet, muffled, and flat. It didn’t matter to me when collecting them — better a crummy tape of a new-to-me Stevie song than no copy at all! But over time, some of them started to feel a bit more skippable to me. In any case, this studio version brings a vibrancy to the song that I never heard in it before.
“24 Karat Gold”: What a wonderful choice to lead with that strong bass line, then layer in the mystical-sounding Fleetwood Mac guitars. When Stevie sings “Set me free, set me free” on the demo, it sounds like a plea. On this track, it sounds like a demand, and the song is far stronger for it. This is a perfect example of a song she’s grown into — her voice today makes it sound like wisdom and reflection, whereas before it sounded more like abstract storytelling.
“If You Were My Love”: This is a pretty simple song, musically — a picking pattern on the guitar with a fairly repetitive melody on top of it. On the demo it sounds kind of barely-there. This version, though, takes that basic skeleton and adds lots of cool ornamentation — background vocals, strings, extra guitar parts, harmonies. Fleshed out like this, it becomes much more enjoyable.
“Belle Fleur”: This is probably my favorite example of how this record is just a godsend to fans. “Belle Fleur” was just one of a hundred demos to me, nothing that ever stood out too much. Here, though, it absolutely shines — Stevie and Dave bring out every ounce of the song’s potential, and end up with a fabulous track. I included it in my 2015 music mix, and wrote about it in those notes, so I’ll save the rest for that.

Songs that are about even with the demos

“The Dealer”: This is a hard one. It’s my favorite song that she hadn’t yet released, and when I heard about this project, I really hoped she’d release it. But part of the reason it’s my favorite is because the demos sound so crazy good, and have such fierce, Bella Donna-era vocals. 65-year-old Stevie is still a great vocalist, but she does not deliver on some of the stuff that 30-year-old Stevie could do. Consequently, the song is a bit slower, with the high notes modulated down, which is really a shame. But still, I love this song, and having a studio version of it is great, even if it lacks some of the power I’d hoped for. I love it too much to say it falls short.
“Lady”: I knew this song as “Knockin’ On Doors” for ages, and always liked the melody. On the other hand, it always kind of seemed like half a song to me. It’s got a solid chorus, a pretty bridge tune, and a verse. I hoped that a studio version would be more developed, and it sort of is, except what it basically does is repeats that whole thing a few times. It gets a little monotonous, lovely as it is.
“She Loves Him Still”: Here’s the thing: I just don’t like this song very much. I find the demo almost interminably whiny — it feels like a strung-out, helpless, middle-of-the-night lament from a really dysfunctional person. Here it sounds like a calm, composed lament from a really dysfunctional person. They feel equivalent to me because I really don’t care for either. Kind of wish this one had stayed on the shelf.

Songs that fall short of the demos

“Cathouse Blues”: The demo to this is one of my favorite Stevie demos of all time, a delightfully different kind of song for her from the Buckingham Nicks period. I love the mischievous edge it has, and her voice on it sounds so young and innocent, which is a great contrast with the lyrics. In the 24KG version, we don’t get that contrast, because her voice can’t sound young and innocent anymore. It’s nice to have it on an official release at last, and the dixieland band portion is a lot of fun, but what a missed opportunity to never have released the song when it could have had maximum effect.
“Watch Chain”: Kind of the same story on this one, except this time the problem is the production. The original is a Bella Donna-era song with a gorgeous bass-heavy folk rock sound — a very intimate and laid back feeling. Now, I usually like Dave Stewart’s production quite a lot on Stevie songs, but here it lands with a heavy thud. He inexplicably cranks up the fuzz, adding grungy guitars and speeding up the song. Stevie’s thicker current voice does nothing to lighten up the feeling. These musical choices work against the gentle, musing lyrics, and kind of torpedo this version of the song.
“Twisted”: 24 Karat Gold supposedly focuses on unreleased treasures, but in this case, it’s actually Stevie’s third time releasing this song. It came out the first time on the soundtrack for the 1996 movie Twister, as a duet with Lindsey Buckingham. It was exciting at the time to hear the two of them together — it’d been almost a decade — but the version was really kind of leaden. A better take was released on 1998 Stevie’s box set Enchanted, and was actually listed as a demo. It sounded polished enough, though, that it’s plenty enjoyable to listen to on its own. This version is a little more produced than that demo, and of course Stevie sounds 20 years older. It’s kind of fun to compare them, but I still prefer the one from Enchanted.

Songs that don’t have an associated demo

“I Don’t Care”: This one was new to me, although I think it’s an old song. It’s kind of a weird outlier for Stevie’s writing, much grittier than her usual mode of expression — thematically reminiscent of “I Don’t Wanna Know” from Rumours. It’s far from my favorite song on the album, but I do like the way it switches from angry to vulnerable and back again.
“Carousel”: This is a cover of a Vanessa Carlton song. Stevie has seemingly taken Vanessa under her wing a bit, and consequently Vanessa was a part of her life as Stevie’s mother Barbara was dying. In her final days, Barbara just wanted to hear them sing this song, so Stevie and Vanessa sing it on this album as a tribute. It’s a pretty song, and makes a sweet addition to this collection.
“Hard Advice”: I think this is my favorite of the new-to-me songs on 24 Karat Gold. Who knows what it’s really about, but for me it brings to mind Stevie’s lifelong difficult connection to Lindsey, with the other “famous friend” being Tom Petty. It’s a matter of record that Tom Petty sat Stevie down and gave her some hard advice on her songwriting — that conversation is the subject of “That Made Me Stronger” from Trouble In Shangri-La. I don’t find it hard to believe at all that he told her she needs to get over Lindsey and start writing songs about something new. The lyrics to this one are wonderfully crafted — the “sometimes he’s my best friend / even when he’s not around” shifts focus, first applying to Lindsey and then to Tom. (In my made-up narrative, that is.) There’s also a great subtle callback to “Silver Springs” — “the sound of his voice / well it follows me down / and reminds me” is an affecting reversal of her promise in that song: “I’ll follow you down til the sound of my voice will haunt you.”