Well, darlings, I'm on the road, chasing the eclipse, and I don't have time -- or reliable enough Wi-Fi -- to write a proper blog post. But I for one am looking forward to the moment after the eclipse, when sunlight begins to reappear and we're all reassured that the world isn't ending after all.
So while there are many Graham Park tunes on my personal eclipse road trip playlist, I thought this one would be the most fitting for the end of our journey together.
It's from the delicious 2012 album Three Chords Good, whereupon Graham Parker reunites with his original backing band The Rumour after thirty-plus solo years. (Here's my earlier post about why this album is so amazing.) Listen to how this song swings, a little jazzy, a little swampy road-house rock, but always coming back to that insistent guitar lick. Like the philosopher king he is, GP dispenses worldly advice: "You don't have to / Live in shadows / You don't have to / Lock yourself up in the dark."
Whomever he's talking to, it's someone who's let the world get the worst of him/her. I don't know about you, but these days I feel like the whole world is tending that way. Belligerence, suspicion, anger, and hate are boiling over.
And honestly, there's no point in living that way. Give yourself a break. Take this opportunity to make a new start. Snap your fingers and let the beat lift your spirits. It's your choice to make.
Believe it or not, I started this blog a little more than 10 years ago -- my first post was on October 26, 2006, to be exact. (The song: "Learning How to Love You" by my hometown hero John Hiatt.) I had some high hopes that I could hit the 1,000-post mark on October 26, 2016, but life got in the way, as it so often does.
I don't post as often now as I used to, but while the internet is littered with abandoned blogs, here I still am, writing about the artists I love.
Oh, and there were many others along the way -- fascinating artists whose names you can find in the sound cloud to the right. Old artists, new artists, women and men, of all genres -- I do love to mix it up.
For the 1,000th post, I wanted something momentous, a track I had never written about before, and something that perhaps sums up my outlook on life. In the flurry of social media these days, with the increasingly bizarre turn of events in the United States at the moment, nothing superficial would do.
And then it came to me.
This is how good Randy Newman was right from the get-go -- it appears on his debut album, Randy Newman, released way back in 1968. The list of artists who've covered this song is simply mind-boggling -- Dusty Springfield, Nina Simone, Peggy Lee, Neil Diamond, Dave Van Ronk, Cass Elliot, Francoise Hardy, Ricky Nelson, Joe Cocker, Cleo Laine, Bette Midler, Barbara Streisand, UB40, Norah Jones, Madeleine Peyroux, Irma Thomas, Paul Carrack, Peter Gabriel, even Leonard Nimoy. I myself first heard it on Judy Collins' 1966 LP In My Life, back in my Earnest Folkie Phase -- that was the first I ever heard of Randy Newman. But it led me to buy his 1971 LP Randy Newman Live, and to see him in concert in 1974 in Northampton, Massachusetts (on a double bill with Ry Cooder, no less). And to become a Fan For Life.
For all the covers, Randy's own stripped-down, plangent, wistfully bemused rendering will forever be my favorite.
You want poetic imagery? He's got it. He leads off verse one with evocative scene-setting: "Broken windows and empty hallways / A pale dead moon in the sky streaked with gray." And in verse two, a rueful stroke of social satire: "Scarecrows dressed in the latest styles / With frozen smiles to chase love away."
But it's that refrain I keep coming back to -- that despairing, deeply ironic refrain: "Human kindness is overflowing / And I think it's going to rain today." It's heartbreaking how the melodic line rises on "human kindness" and then wilts disappointedly downward on "overflowing," to move into the regretful cadence of "And I think it's going to rain today."
In verse three, he offers a fleeting glimpse of social action: "Bright before me the signs implore me / To help the needy and show them the way." Oh, those do-gooders. But Randy doesn't place much faith in them; knee-jerk liberals can write a check one minute and forget the dispossessed the next. The rain will still fall.
The bridge is absolutely haunting: "Lonely, / Lonely. / Tin can at my feet / Think I'll kick it down the street / That's the way to treat a friend." Those broken, almost disconnected phrases, the fatalistic shrug of "Think I'll kick it down the street" -- there's more than a shot of Leonard Cohen world-weariness there.
Whether or not this is explicitly about homelessness, or alienation, or -- who knows? -- refugees and immigrants, I 'll leave to you to decide. In the 50 years since, I've pored over a lot of Randy Newman songs, and I know that his satire is complex and elusive. Every one of his songs is written from a character's viewpoint, and it's not always clear how much he means us to identify with the character. (Check out, for example, his devastating song "Political Science," which terrifyingly feels more true today than ever.)
But it's not just about the lyrics; it's also about the heart-breaking melody. It's no surprise to me that Randy Newman has blossomed into one of our great film composers; there's something in his melodic sense that hits all the emotional buttons. Which is why I'd always rather hear Randy himself sing the songs, in his deceptively unshowy, croaky, real-guy voice. No pyrotechnics; just the real thing.
An A to Z series of artists I love. And who else could be P but: Graham Parker / "Suspension Bridge"
Throw a dart at a pile of all of Graham Parker's albums, and the odds are overwhelming that you'll hit a great song. Now, I'm not saying you should really do this -- because, you know, scratches -- but you get my drift. The man simply does not write bad songs; or if he does, he has the good taste (unlike some major artists I know) not to record them, or to put them on his albums.
In fact, Graham Parker has so many great songs that his new career-spanning box set, These Dreams Will Never Sleep, dropping today (order here or here) -- which is packed with 6 CDs of studio and live tracks -- doesn't have room for all my favorites. Like this one . . .
It's from 2007's Don't Tell Columbus, which some Parker fans -- including me -- consider one of his greatest solo albums. (If I have any beef at all with this new box set, it's that it gorges on GP's work with the Rumour and doesn't have enough of his seriously brilliant solo stuff, which is the material that made me a lifelong Parker fan). My fellow Parkerista Jerry Leibowitz did a pretty wonderful job of dissecting the album's greatness here on his blog, I Discovered America, which is named after Track 1 of this album.
"Suspension Bridge" is a sort of dark slinky samba, all chromatic melody and diminished and minor chords, with a sinuous syncopated guitar riff lacing it all together with a hint of menace. I consider this song Graham Parker's dark-star equivalent to William Wordsworth's "Intimations of Immortality" and "Tintern Abbey" -- it's haunted by the past, telescoping childhood and adult perceptions, suffused with a sense of loss.
We're in nostalgia territory, yet it's not feel-good nostalgia, despite the first verse's vignette of a loving dad and son: "My daddy took me to see it / When I was no more than 10 / They'd just finished painting the metal / Then they had to start all over again." That's just the kind of information a kid would latch onto -- Dad's trying to impress him with the size of the bridge, while the boy fixates on the futility of human effort.
In verse 2 he seems to be in the present, but in a landscape worthy of Hieronymous Bosch: "And the daredevil pilots fly over me / And the suicide lovers swim under the sea / And the murderers submit an innocent plea / And the prisoners dream of the free." Welcome to adult life, son.
In the third verse, he time travels back to that afternoon with his father: "And the stories that my daddy told me / About the place on the other side." Heaven and hell? We-ellll...for the time being, let's say it's just crossing the river, and GP recalls the info he committed to heart: "About the dip of the chains and the height of the piers / And the men who worked there and died." Stories calculated to awe and overwhelm. Remember when you were a kid, how your parents seemed to know everything? How reassuring that felt -- and how lost we sometimes feel as adults, without that illusion.
The chorus resolves into major key, and an almost anthemic grandeur: "I'm still standing here / On that suspension bridge / With the wind blowing through my hair." But don't take anything for granted. Graham Parker is a master of metaphor, and when we think about what a suspension bridge is -- linking two shores, but hanging perilously in mid-air -- well, it's a balancing act. Industrial Revolution technology gave man the power to span wider and deeper channels, but only by being willing to sway in the wind.
Sources suggest that the suspension bridge Parker's referring to is the Clifton Suspension Bridge in North Somerset, a classic 19th-century bridge by the great Isambard Kingdom Brunel. It's a fair way from GP's childhood home in Deepcut, Surrey (hence the title of his great 2001 album Deepcut to Nowhere), but not too far for a father-and-son bonding field trip.
The second time he sings the chorus, he adds a couple of telling lines: "Not in one world or the other / Losing my father like I lost my mother" -- which suggests to me that this was inspired by his father's death. It's an elegy, and I'm grieving because -- do I know Graham Parker's father? No, but my dad died too, and I've never gotten over it.
I can't listen to this song without pondering all the bridges in my life: between youth and adulthood, between life and death, between one homeland and another, between being a child and being a parent oneself. Suspension bridges may be miracles of engineering, defying nature -- but they still sway in the wind, and halfway over I always look down at the water far below and freak out. You cross them at your peril.
And Graham Parker is just too much of an artist to let you rest easy with the bridges in your life.
My 26-day challenge to myself -- write about a different band every day, working from A to Z. So while we're in Stiff Records mode...this could go under E, G, or W, but what the hell, I needed an E for today. And I love this record. Wreckless Eric / "Whole Wide World"
One of the most lovable tracks that Stiff Records ever released (right up there with Elvis Costello's "Alison" and Ian Dury's "Sex and Drugs and Rock 'n' Roll,") this 1977 single was Eric Goulden's debut, and it was auspicious indeed. Oddly enough, it never made the charts, but it's since been covered by everybody from the Monkees to Paul Westerberg to Will Ferrell. It's one of those songs that, even if you don't know it, you know it.
Despite Stiff's reputation for outrageous stunts and proto-punk agression, this song is wonderfully tender, even in the loud and growly parts. What it does share with the Stiff aesthetic is that stripped-down punk simplicity -- only two chords, strummed over and over, in dogged 4/4 time -- and the deliberately raw production quality. Apparently Stiff's house producer, Nick Lowe, played not only the bass but most other instruments on this track, while Steve Goulding of the Rumour sits in on the drums. (The same sort of wistful melancholy runs through Graham Parker & the Rumour's "Watch the Moon Come Down" from their Stick to Me album, also from 1977, also produced by Nick Lowe, also with Steve Goulding on the drums. But that's another story.)
This is an undying-love song, but with a twist -- undying love for a girl he hasn't met yet (think Paul McCartney's "I Will" from The White Album, which BTW he wrote specifically for me). That accounts for the undertow of loneliness; no wonder he's sounding desperate and frantic by the last verse. "When I was a young boy / My mama said to me," he begins, a classic folk-music opener -- but then it goes south: "'There's only one girl in the world for you / And she probably lives in Tahiti." That flash of deprecating Cockney humor -- that's another Stiff hallmark, but it's also authentically Wreckless Eric, as he's gone on to prove in song after song.
But you've gotta admire the kid's determination: "I'd go the whole wide world / I'd go the whole wide world / Just to find her." Now there's a romantic soul. The woebegone quality of Eric's voice is just perfect; the lad's got a pure heart, even if he is a bit thick. (I love how Wreckless Eric stops just this side of making this character the butt of his humor.)
On Eric's website, he jokes that he's never checked out the geography for fear he got it wrong all those years ago. Don't worry, Eric, you're close enough. "Or maybe she's in the Bahamas / Where the Caribbean sea is blue / Weeping in a tropical moonlit night / Because nobody's told her 'bout you." There's a nice touch, the idea that the girl's lonely and longing too.
And as the buzzy guitars and smackdown drums kick in, Eric's getting a leetle paranoid; he changes up the refrain, "I'd go the whole wide world / Find out where they hide her."
Verse three and four are particularly fun -- he portrays himself "hanging around in the rain out here / Trying to pick up a girl" compared to his Ms. Right "lying on a tropical beach somewhere / Underneath the tropical sun / Pining away in a heatwave there." That juxtaposition is a stroke of something very near genius -- shades of the Beatles' "Sitting in an English garden / Waiting for the sun / If the sun you don't come you get a tan from standing in the English rain."
He caps it off in verse five, imagining himself "lying on that sun-soaked beach with her / Caressing her warm brown skin / And then in a year or maybe not quite / We'll be sharing the same next of kin." He manages to deliver a happy ending without getting sappy, without breaking character (and I do love that "skin/kin" rhyme"). By the time he gets here, I'm yearning too for him to get what he wants.
It was a great start to what's turned out to be an interesting career. Eric's still performing, still recording, but he's also painting and writing and doing radio shows and . . . well, check it out here.
After James Brown yesterday, I just couldn't resist.
You know -- or maybe you don't -- what an over-the-top Graham Parker fan I am. I realize that not too many of you may own his delicious 1994 EP Graham Parker's Christmas Cracker (although that is a lack you could quickly remedy by clicking this link.) But if you are among the lucky few who are currently in possession of this gem, you'll know that "Soul Christmas" is a holiday classic just waiting to be discovered.
It's as if GP has invited us to his own personal holiday bash. Okay, okay, things start out traditional -- Christmas tree, "A Wonderful Life," yadda yadda yadda -- but when the kids get bored, our cool cat Chairman kicks it up a notch, inviting all of his classic soul heroes to step up to the mike. He does it all in a syncopated talking blues that's as cool-cat as a cool cat can get. And for good measure, he's got the inimitable Nona Hendryx throwing in backing vocals.
It's like a holiday edition of Arthur Conley's "Sweet Soul Music," name-checking all the greats: Sam and Dave, James Brown, Mary Wells, Eddie Floyd, and all the Stax house band -- Booker T, Al Jackson, Donald "Duck" Dunn, Steve Cropper. We get Sam Cooke, Carla Thomas, Otis Redding, the whole Memphis crew.
But wait -- there's more! GP dips into the stocking and pulls out Don Covay, Little Milton, Al Green, Junior Walker. This is a man who seriously knows his soul music roots. Yeah, okay, in his own records he has brewed those soul influences up with reggae, folk, country, and everything else in the book. (Because that's what a creative genius does: he digests all the classic stuff and makes something new and wonderful and uniquely his own.) But this track has forever wed me to the vision of a young Graham Parker in his teenage bedroom spinning these soul platters and drinking in their essence to the core of his musical DNA.
And of course, the great question is -- where's Aretha? "Where is the Queen of Soul?" he asks. "Is that sweet Mama gonna grace us with her presence / Hey, when is Aretha gonna show?" And don't we all love Aretha? (Although GP has another song about that...)
Does Aretha ever get to the party? She doesn't like to fly, we all know that, but I like to think she drives up in her pink Cadillac as the chorus goes into a fade. Because Graham has thrown the ultimate soul Christmas party here, and it would be a shame if Aretha wasn't there.
Friday, June 19, 2015
"Flying Into London" / Graham Parker and the Rumour
Selfish thing that I am, I've been hoarding to myself this incredible new album Mystery Glue. I should have written about it weeks ago, I know. But then, one thing I've learned about being a Graham Parker fan: Give the songs time to marinate and you'll discover they're even better than you thought at first listen.
I did try, honest. I have half-written posts on so many songs from this rich album -- "Pub Crawl,""I've Done Bad Things,""Fast Crowd," the deliciously self-deprecating "My Life In Movieland," the deft media satire "Slow News Day" (which, I read in an interview, Graham identifies as his "Ray Davies song, more like the Kinks than the Beatles" -- oh, yes.)
And then I went to see Graham and the Rumour last Friday night at the Tarrytown Music Hall and I had to go back to square one. Seeing GP on stage reunited with his original backing band kicks the whole thing up a notch. As good as Parker's solo stuff has been (and seriously, I'll fight anyone who claims there's a better album than Struck By Lightning), watching him being re-energized by his old bandmates is such a thrill. They were fantastic on their first reunion album, Three Chords Good, but lordy, lordy, lordy -- they are totally swinging in that groove now.
And, as I was dancing in the side aisle with my international band of GP peeps (because, yes, I AM that kind of fangirl), this was the song that completely bowled me over.
So what was it that so struck me last week about this song? I suddenly realized that Graham, who has for years been such an insightful outsider-observer of the American cultural scene, has now had to confront returning to his homeland, England, with all the baggage that entails. Yes, it's where he's from, and where several (not all) of his reconnected bandmates still live. But that doesn't mean going home is simple.
Those opening riffs, both the guitar and the organ lines, sound almost defiantly country & western to me, and the whole song has a relaxed, soul-infused swing that is anything but BritPop. "Flying Into London" isn't exactly a talking blues song, but it does pack in the lyrics (echoes of Dylan?), as if nattering away will help keep his anxiety at bay.
There's no faked-up drama here -- not with that strolling tempo and major key -- it's just life, throwing another curve ball. You get the sense that, like a cat, he'll land on his feet, but he's registering every nuance in the meantime. In verse two, he underlines this: "This internal geography just drives the stress / And you don't get a road map or a GPS" -- that's homecomings for you. Anybody gone to a college reunion lately? I have, and this song nails it.
In true poetic fashion (because I do believe that this man is a poet worthy of taking his place alongside Keats and Shelley), he works all the metaphors, the turbulence and the clouds and "the warning lights were on all this time." There's an element of regret as well, for the beloved left behind "cleaning up my mess" and "I didn't see the tears baby, pooling in your eye." Because every homecoming is also a leave-taking.
And that's where Graham, bless him, leaves us -- struggling with the emotions of connection, here, there, and everywhere. "Yeah I've left it, left it all behind," he claims, but we know it's not that easy. And here are his old pals, singing (very far forward in the mix) a cheery "Whoa-oh-oh whoa-oh-oh [beat beat, chord change] whoa oh-oh-oh." How much do I love those up-front-and-personal Rumour backing vocals? In my humble opinion they are the soul of this extraordinary album. Where the genius Graham Parker happily lets his bandmates stand and deliver.
Is there a better singer/songwriter working today? I seriously doubt it. But where you're this good, why not let your supremely talented bandmates have a piece of the action?
I have to say, I love this whole band. I adore Brinsley Schwarz's and Martin Belmont's inventive guitar riffs, Andrew Bodnar's snaky bass lines, Steve Goulding's funky drum tracks, Bob Andrew's soulful roadhouse groove on the keyboards. It all works so gloriously together. But then it all comes back to Graham Parker. Who wrote the songs. Who sings the songs.
And the man is a freaking genius, so . . . I don't know. Once I sign onto an artist who truly moves me, I'm in for life. And this guy? I am so in his camp.
Thursday, May 14, 2015
"Lady Doctor" / Graham Parker & The Rumour
Ah, the earworm gods have a logic all their own. Why this song? Why now? There's no rhyme or reason -- but I am not complaining.
It's remarkable, really, that Graham Parker's sound was already so well-forged on Howlin' Wind, his 1976 debut album with The Rumour. They still do this song in concert, and it sounds as fresh as ever -- that strolling bluesy beat, the loungey soul-infused syncopation, and Graham's trademark bit o' sass. It's not a message song, not a searing autobiographical statement, not a tender love song. It's just a swinging song that hits its mark, over and over again, and I wouldn't change a note of it.
I'd like to believe there's a feminist note here -- in 1976, women physicians were still more the exception than the rule, and I'm sure back then there were people who refused to be treated by a female doctor. But the lady doctor that Graham's going to isn't entirely valued for her, er, medical ability. (After all, the refrain reminds us that "there ain't nothing wrong with me.")
She's clearly a babe in a white coat, and his crush on her could so easily seem creepy. But that's one of the things I love about Graham Parker -- his unerring light touch, never crossing the line between cheekiness and bad taste. The wink-wink puns are there ("I went in with a heart burn," "be a patient patient") along with the euphemisms ("stretch right out on that couch," "get under the stethoscope") but his playful vocals make it clear he's just having fun.
And the fun is infectious.
All the vintage soul signifiers are there -- the horn section, the sax solo, the sneaky guitar riffs, the lead singer's testifying drawl. In 1976, no less, when the music scene was mostly folk rock and punk squaring off at each other, while heavy metal and prog rock hunkered in their caves. But here's Graham Parker, on his very first album, mapping a new road, with The Rumour oh so ably driving the bus. What's not to love?
Thank you, earworm gods.
Sunday, April 12, 2015
"Whenever You're On My Mind" / Marshall Crenshaw
Oh, my brothers and sisters, I wish I could post here more often. I promise I will do so, hopefully after, oh, let's say June 15th. And in the meantime . . . well, today I was grocery shopping for my mother (90 years old, broken hip, let's not get started) and who did I hear on the muzak? Yes, Marshall Crenshaw.
Now, Marshall Crenshaw is definitely one of My Guys -- the musicians I love so much, and listen to so much, that I feel like they are my friends. Old boyfriends, even. And (with the exception of Paul McCartney, who needs no more fans, but I could no more abandon him than stop breathing), My Guys are inexplicably artists who just don't get the attention I feel they deserve. I never hear Graham Parker or John Hiatt on muzak, and I certainly never hear Robyn Hitchcock. Once or twice maybe Nick Lowe, and if so, only "Cruel to Be Kind.*" (*Note: a song co-written with Ian Gomm).
But this isn't the first time I've heard Marshall Crenshaw on muzak. I'm sure there are business marketing reasons why MC has gotten his product into the proper lucrative channels, and I note that it's usually his earlier power-pop-ish stuff (not the magnificent 2009 Jaggedland or even my current favorite, 1999's dark and delicious #447). This particular track is from Marshall's sophomore effort, Field Day, which some haters people trash, and I personally love. But it is more power-pop than his later stuff, and it sounds perfectly plausible coming out of the PA system.
So I asked my sister, with whom I was shopping (I said DON'T get me started), "Do you know who this is?"
Well, she didn't, even though she lived in New York with me in 1982 when my buddies and I were all ga-ga over Marshall Crenshaw. Guess she wasn't listening. And by the time Field Day had come out, she'd decamped to Connecticut.
So what's your excuse?
Jangly? You betcha. And yet, there's a wistfulness, a yearning to this song that a lot of power pop completely missed out on. Those hooky guitar riffs spangle in the foreground, while Marshall's earnest and youthful vocals puzzle over his dilemma. The very thought of this girl sends him into an existential dither -- everything is foggy, he's disoriented in a crowd, he loses track of time -- it's a "reverie," a "fantasy." The jangliness adds a certain star-crossed quality that totally works here.
What really hit me in the grocery aisle today, though, is the rhythmic sophistication of this track. (Yes, I'll admit: I danced with my shopping cart.) We start out in Buddy Holly-ish straight time, but with a sinuous melodic line. Then we shift into that bridge full of syncopated modulations (hey, the guy's confused!), resurfacing in a samba-like chorus of bright and sunny harmonic resolutions.
We're always driving towards the major key, the 4/4 time. The kid's an uncertain mess, but the song itself lets us know that in the end, he's gonna be all right. And not just all right; better, because he's given in to the copacetic flow. The very thought of this girl will make him better than himself, if he can only give it time. And we're witnesses to his faithful surrender
Did Marshall Crenshaw and his cowriter, the great Bill Teeley, think this all out when they wrote this song? Nah, probably not. They just wrote it. But that's the mark of real songwriters; their instincts tell them where to go.
And me, dancing in the grocery aisle? Well, I felt the fug of my mother's illness magically lift, and I felt grateful for my sister's solidarity (even if she didn't know who Marshall Crenshaw is), and I felt just this teensy bit lighter in my heart.
Which is, let's admit it, the whole reason we listen to music.
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
My Musical Advent Calendar
"Christmas Is For Mugs" / Graham Parker
Instead of a glitter-spangled scene with doors for every day of December, how about a daily treat from my iTunes holiday playlist?
Trust my man Graham Parker to keep holiday spirits from getting too cloying. His 1994 EP Graham Parker's Christmas Cracker is definitely one of my unsentimental Yuletide go-to's. (See here for a bit of "Soul Christmas.") But you don't release a Christmas record if you really do hate the holiday, and snarky as GP's take may be, I've still gotta think he gets a kick out of it.
It's a great shaggy-dog story, as Graham does so well. Though he's in full Americana mode, he's shopping around modern-day London for a present that'll please his darling -- and yet everything goes disastrously awry. We've all been there, up against that December 24 deadline, panicking when gift after gift fails, and Christmas spirit is in woefully short supply.
That jaundiced chorus says it all: "Now everybody's talking about the kisses and the hugs / And all the little heartstrings that the festive season tugs / But all I see are lager louts, shoplifters and thugs / So fill mine up, 'cause Christmas is for mugs."
And yet . . . and yet . . and yet.
Last verse, in which brilliant wordsmith Graham flaunts not just four rhymes, but five: "Now all the crepe and tinsel is left lying on the floor / The wreath we hung up weeks ago is rotting on the door / And I'd like to punch the lights out of that crooked tree vendor / And if I saw St. Nick tonight there'd be a scene of gore / I'd throw a match into the fire and make the chimney roar." And not in a good way.
My take on this? Sure, it makes him mad -- because somewhere in there, he still wants for Christmas to be something special. Something magical. And when it isn't . . .
But what the hey. If nothing else, we'll fill our mugs (pun intended) and make do with what we can get out of the holiday season. Because here we are, in the scrum of real life, and we'll deal with it just fine. What really matters, of course, is the fact that he loves his partner and would love to get her a present that will make her happy. The world's working against him, but he's a guy who can go with the flow.
A real-world Christmas scenario -- I'm cool with that.
For this shuffle, I made a special curated playlist of songs about freedom and America, for your listening pleasure.
Note that the links (click on song titles) now go to YouTube rather than Amazon. Three reasons: YouTube gives you the full track, not just a sample; none of you ever buy the Amazon tracks so I'm not getting any revenues anyway; and my Best Food Writing book is now being published by a Hachette subsidiary that potentially may get screwed by Amazon. So until YouTube turns out to be a tool of the corporate machine (any day now...)
Because this is what it means to live in America today -- figuring out whether Facebook, Amazon, Google, or Apple is The Man. (Disclaimer: It's definitely not Google because I love Google....)
1. "Time I Took A Holiday" / Nick Lowe
From Dig My Mood (1998)
Oh, yes, let's start things off slouchy and mellow. (Note: loads of chat before they get to the song, but ohmigod do we not love Daryl Hall too?) "It's time I took a holiday / Before I blow my top / I've got to kick my shoes off / Before I drop..." Nick's vocals make it clear he's not relaxed yet (dig the unresolved chords building up urgency), but he's gonna be very soon. "I gotta get some attention / In my baby's arms...." Volunteering for duty, Mr. Lowe!
2. "America" / Simon & Garfunkel
From Bookends (1968)
A seminal song from my angsty teen years -- as I explain here. And while we're on the subject -- is this the same Kathy's as in "Kathy's Song"? Was she pissed off when Carrie Fisher entered the picture?
3. "Fourth of July" / Dave Alvin
From King of California (1994)
America as most folks know it. "Hey, baby, it's the Fourth of July," Dave implores her, adding (a telling detail), "Whatever happened, I apologize." Dammit, it's supposed to be a holiday -- why can't they get in a happy place? I love how he sets this all-too-real scene: "On the stairs I smoke a cigarette alone / Mexican kids are shooting fireworks below." Been there.
4. "The Only Living Boy In New York" / Simon & Garfunkel
From Bridge Over Troubled Water (1970)
On a day devoted to independence, here's a song about breaking free. "Tom, get your plane right on time.." What a lonely, existential song this is, and yet how full of hope. "I know that you've been eager to shine now." Bio notes: Tom was Art Garfunkel's name in the early S&G iteration Tom and Jerry, and while he was off in Mexico making a movie (Catch-22) Paul Simon was back in NYC, writing wistful songs about their impending break-up. Maybe it's those plush background ah's, all full of spacey cloud-surfing promise, but somehow I get the idea that Tom's gonna make it out okay. Even though quite possibly Jerry had all the talent....
5. "Summertime" / DJ Jazzy Jeff & Fresh Prince
But hey, July 4th isn't just a holiday -- it's shorthand for THE summer holiday, height of the sizzle and shizzizzle, and let's sample this early rap classic, full of urban heat and real-time celebration. WAY before Will Smith jumped the shark. Fire hydrants shall be opened -- let the tar roof barbecues begin.
6. "Political Science" / Randy Newman
From Sail Away (1972)
Lest you be feeling patriotic on this most American holiday, here's our national Snarkmaster, laying on us a political treatise with seven delicious layers of irony. Really, when Randy Newman gets in gear, he takes no prisoners. "They all hate us anyhow / Let's drop the big one now." This calls for a roundtable of pundits to discuss amongst themselves.
7. "Livin' in America" / Black 47
From Fire of Freedom (1993)
If America is truly a nation of immigrants -- a piety seldom remembered on July 4th -- then let's have a very ambiguous Irish take on what it feels like to live on the edge of American affluence. "In the cold daylight / I feel like shite" -- telling it like it is. Riding subways, minding other people's children, laboring like a navvy -- "Oh, mammy dear, we're all mad over here / Livin' in America."
8. "Disney's America" / Graham Parker
From 12 Haunted Episodes (1993)
It takes a transplanted Englishman like Graham Parker to see America clearly and whole. I can just imagine GP and his wife taking the kids to Williamsburg and having this brilliant vision of how the whole thing went down. Please, if you listen to nothing else, listen to every word of this brilliant song.
9. "Gotta Be Free" / The Kinks
From Lola V Powerman and the Moneygoround Part 1 (1970)
This Americana-tinged track (a hint of Muswell Hillbillies to come?) from Lola V Powerman, Ray Davies' lament about how the music industry had screwed his band. All quite true, of course, but as a listener this is my take-away: Freedom at any price. It was 1970, after all, and whether or not we were legit hippies, we all wanted to be free. And isn't that what Independence Day is all about?
10. "Live Free or Die" / Hayes Carll
From Flowers and Liquor (2007)
While we're in a country frame of mind...a little sneaky satire from Hayes Carll, about a prison inmate's view on freedom. Mayhap you have never thought about why being in a New Hampshire prison is especially tough: "Live free or die / Oh Lord tell me why/ Can't they say "Seat belts fastened" or "Oklahoma is OK"? / "Vacationland" sounds mighty great / Wouldn't mind stamping out "The Garden State." Because we can't all be free, even on July 4th.
Friday, December 21, 2012
My Top Ten Eleven Albums of 2012
All in one place . . . like a Christmas list. I'm not numbering them 1 to 10 because they're too good -- and too different -- to rank absolutely. Click on each title for a link to my original post.
Graham Parker & The Rumour: Three Chords Good
Even I, a confirmed Graham Parker fanatic, didn't predict just HOW good this reunion album would be. I'm gobsmacked by its
brilliance.
The Shins: Port of Morrow A combination of gorgeous
melody, striking lyrics, and a sweetly melancholy worldview -- it's almost
drunkenly beautiful.
Corb Lund:Cabin Fever
Ranging from honky-tonk to rockabilly to
bluegrass to Western swing, Lund doesn't approach country music like an artifact or an ironic affectation; he
approaches it like a cowboy..
Rhett Miller:
Dreamer From the Old 97s front man, an entire alt-country album about love, lost and found, sour and sweet.
Paul Weller: Sonik Kicks
Ever the restless risk-taker, Weller loads up this album with studio effects and sonic experiments, while his insane commitment to melody and to syncopation shines gloriously
through.
The Ben Folds Five: The Sound of the Life of the Mind
I adore Ben Folds' solo work as well, but the driving energy and impish wit of
the Ben Folds Five is something else.
The dBs: Falling Off the Sky
Reuniting this beloved late 70s band so many years down the road seems like a joyful and
natural thing, judging from the copasetic energy of Falling Off the
Sky.
John Hiatt: Mystic Pinball
Start to finish, that raspy voice, the visceral rhythms, the crunchy guitarwork,
all come together to craft a sound so authentic and idiosyncratic, it fits like
a glove.
The Avett Brothers: The Carpenter
Scott and Seth Avett have never shed the upbeat sweetness of their southern
folk roots, even as they steer it into rock territory.
Mumford & Sons:
Babel
Hipster indie Brits forge their own peculiar Americana sound, like O Brother Where Art
Thou? meets Martin Amis, full of post-modern angst and old-time
religion.
M. Ward: A Wasteland Companion
OOF!! Released way back last April, I forgot at first to put this on my 2012 top ten list. But I adore its acoustic reverbed charm, a retro-flavored meditation on love, loss, and resilience.
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
My Top Ten Albums of 2012 I'm still in awe of this album -- the best reunion yet.
Graham Parker & The Rumour: Three Chords Good "Old Soul"
So here we come to the tenth day of my Top Ten Albums countdown -- and even though I said it was in no particular order, I saved this one for last because it IS my favorite album of the year.
I'll admit I'm a bit biased when it comes to Graham Parker. Okay, more than a bit. But I have to say, this reunion with his original backing band The Rumour has exceeded all my expectations. Live, they are absolutely smoking, as anybody can attest who's seen them on their current tour. And the thing I really love is that they are not just trotting out the old Squeezing Out Sparks hits -- nearly half their set has been drawn from this brand-new album of Parker-penned winners.
So even if you've missed the tour, you don't have to miss all the fun. If you aren't already on the bandwagon, this album could make a believer of you. These songs are soulful, they're wicked smart, they're funny, they break your heart (but in a good way). They're vintage Graham Parker, in other words.
Here's my original post about my favorite track on the album. Since writing this post, I've been told it's Graham's current favorite song, too. I hope you'll see why.
Monday, November 19, 2012
Old Soul / Graham Parker & the Rumour
I HATE lame reunions, don't you? The Half-Who, the Pink-ish Floyd, the Beach Codgers, the Mercury-free Queen -- we all want them to be as good as they once were, and they hardly ever are. (One notable exception: The Zombies.) As much as we Kinks fans yearn to have the brothers Davies back together, what if they reunited and they -- gasp -- sucked? Better never to know.
Yet I never for a minute doubted that Graham Parker & the Rumour would pull it off. GP has been working at the top of his game for so long, I knew his gift hadn't deserted him. More than that, when I saw most of the band play together a couple of years ago, it was clear that the old fire was totally there. I saw Graham and keyboardist Bob Andrews perform together a couple months later and it was magic. As the old Magic 8-Ball would say, All signs point to yes.
But even I didn't predict just HOW good this reunion would be. And now that Three Chords Good, the reunion album, is out, I'm gobsmacked by its brilliance.
Pick a track, any track -- they're all fantastic. Okay, let's go with this one:
One of the problems with many reunions is that the bands are all trying to act like they're 25 years old again. Screw that! We fans aren't 25 anymore either -- why not acknowledge that? In the interim, Graham Parker has expanded the horizons of his soul-infused rock with country and folk, so slipping into a jazz mode feels incredibly logical. (I would too, if I had Bob Andrews' supple piano to back me up.) And by labeling it "Old Soul" -- as in, the precursor to soul -- it makes perfect sense.
But we're still dealing with GP's deliciously cynical world view. "They said you was an old soul / They say a lot of things," he gruffly confides, still puzzling over a relationship that was doomed from the start. That gap between what "they say" and what we feel to be true -- we'd love to buck it, but we are only human and time and again, we fall for the hype. And even though it doesn't work out, we can't help but be intrigued by what transpires. As he says in verse 2: "You wore a lot of strange masks / and clipped a lot of wings / like venom in a shot glass / like liqueur in a hot flask." Despite the acerbic edge to his voice, the poetic imagery infuses this fraught affair with its own dark glamour. He knew in his heart of hearts that she was no good, but what is life if we take no risks?
Best couplet in the song comes in the bridge: "Why am I left half alive / when you're only half dead?" This is so typical of Graham Parker's lyrical genius: yeah, it refers to the old trope about the glass being half-full or half-empty, but it gives it a fresh twist that invokes vampires, clinical depression, and years of couples therapy. And the way he marries it to the melody -- "half alive" rises as a cry for help, while "half dead" circles down in despair -- well, this is art, folks, and I'm telling you that this phrase has already lodged itself in my personal ledger of Phrases That Sum It All Up. .
He's willing to acknowledge his own willful blindness in the last verse -- "I thought you was a sweet child / I think a lot of things." (I love that rueful inversion of the first verse.) And yet, would he have given up the experience? "You took me on a wild ride / all bumper cars and swings" -- sounds memorable to me. Raise your hand if you've ever had a relationship like this, where the thrills are almost -- but not quite -- worth the emotional torment that was bound to ensue.
And sure, in the end it took its toll -- "You swore that you was high class / But you brought me down so low" -- but he knew it was a gamble. "I knew that love could not last / With an old soul like you."
"Old soul" -- it's a cliche to admire people, especially children, by saying they are old souls. We imagine that old souls are more compassionate, or wiser, than the rest of us. But Graham Parker loves setting cliches on their heads. Really, why are old souls any better? What if the "oldness" they embrace is like medieval brutalism or Renaissance duplicity or Gilded Age callousness?
The world-weariness of that jazz tempo is our key. None of us are punked-up kids anymore; a song like "Don't Get Excited" (from Squeezing Out Sparks) would simply not apply. Rather than trotting out the old sound, Graham Parker & the Rumour have cut a new groove, one that's just as magnetic as the old one.
Mere nostalgia is so irrelevant. This is an album you could love even if you didn't have Howlin' Wind or Heat Treatment on your turntable in the late 1970s. These guys aren't trying to fit themselves back into their old soul shoes -- they've all lived interesting lives and done interesting things in the interim, and they've brought all that to the table. It's almost irrelevant to think of it as a reunion album -- better to simply say they're working together again, better than ever.
Monday, June 25, 2012
Obsessed With Aretha / Graham Parker
Maybe this popped into my head today as an antidote to yesterday's soul-centric post. I swear, I reallly do love all those 60s soul singers -- and so does Graham Parker, honest. But the man just can't help but unleash his snarky acerbic wit, and I for one love him for it.
Hard to believe that Graham wrote this in 1996, for his album Acid Bubblegum, way before the wannabes of the current neo-soul revival jumped on the bandwagon. But Graham saw it all coming, as well as the rise of the religious right and self-righteous conservative pundits. And Graham Parker is definitely an equal-opportunity satirist -- why not train his laser beam of scorn and derision on everybody all at once?
I was thrilled to find this on YouTube (who but a true Parker fan would take the time to craft such a detailed video?) True, it jumps ahead in time a bit -- you'll see as you watch it that the objects of scorn are totally up to the minute -- but I have a feeling that GP would thoroughly approve of adding them to his list.
From the very start, notice how deftly Parker cuts his own soul groove, owning his debt to R&B tradition without being hamstrung by it. Graham Parker has always been a moving target when it comes to musical labels. Blend punk attitude, New Wave braininess, and pub rock looseness with R&B hipness, rockabilly swing, and protest folk topicality -- I can't think of anybody else who hits so many marks, and hits them all superlatively well.
"You get a lot of girl singers," GP launches into it, "obsessed with Aretha." Aretha who? Come on, we ALL know the Queen of Soul, we've all belted out R-E-S-P-E-C-T in the back of a car at some time or another -- we're already implicated. But surely we're not the girl singers, the "little swingers" that Graham is condescending to. And then he generously admits, "Some of those girls can rock and roll / All God's children got a little bit of soul" -- but then he snatches it away: "But not that much, / Oh no no no, not that much." I have to say, I burst out laughing the first time I heard that lyric. I can just picture him, shaking his head with musing regret as he sings the no no no no's.
.
And on he presses. In verse two, he shows no mercy, excoriating "a lot of fat Christians / you want to throw to the lions / Put 'em in a barrel / Roll 'em off of Mount Zion." Parker is famously agnostic, or, to be more precise, opposed to organized religion, and he never misses a ripe target for derision. In verse three, it's back to the musical scene, with newly-minted pop stars -- the video shows us Justin Bieber, but he's only the latest in a long string of half-talented headline-grabbers that seem to gall Graham Parker. (Pete Doherty, anyone?) Verse four gets us back to right-wing political commentators -- hello, Fox News! -- who trample rough-shod over journalistic truth. "You don't have to tell the truth to get paid / Well not that much..." Zing!
The tough part of this song is the chorus, where GP looks at Aretha herself, bedecked in her jewels and fur stole, still belting out the hits on her rare concert appearances. "You might even say the girl's still got soul," Graham concedes, but then he has to add, "But not that much." This cuts close to the bone, man. Sure, Aretha's gotten old, and her weight has ballooned -- there's a lot of sorrow and insecurity under those sequins. And who could blame her? Personally, I think that's Aretha's gift to mankind -- she still feels lost and hurting, despite all the fame. And isn't that the definition of soul? I still feel incredibly moved by her performances, every time. Cut Aretha some slack, Graham!
But wait -- am I saying that because I'm obsessed with Aretha?
Ah. Checkmate, Mr. Parker.
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Wednesday Shuffle
It's been raining off and on for a week. And I've got a wicked cold incubating in my sinuses. So forget the looming book deadline -- let's shuffle!
1. "Mercury Poisoning" / Graham Parker
From Another Gray Area (1982)
So what do you do on your first album after leaving Mercury Records? You write a song about how much you hated Mercury Records! "Their promotion's so lame...the geriatric staff thinks we're freaks... I've got a dinosaur for a representative" -- GP pulls NO punches on this mischievously danceable track -- and we can't help but sing along.
2. "You Don't Know Me" / Ben Folds with Regina Spektor
From Way to Normal (2008)
This snappy little duet got a lot of airplay a couple years ago, and why not? Ben and Regina blithely trade zingers, their voices weaving in contrapuntal accusations. Why do we always imagine that our true loves will "get us," when in the end we're always disappointed? Just another lesson in disillusionment from this master cynic.
3. "Ohio" / Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
From So Far (1974)
Ah...the days when music and politics walked hand in hand. The Kent State shootings chilled our generation in May 1970; the next weekend, 100,000 students marched on Washington; this record hit the airwaves 2 weeks later, an amazing feat in that pre-digital era. The righteous indignation shivering through Neil Young's voice still stirs me to the bone, more than 40 years later.
4. "Hold On" / Ian Gomm
From Summer Holiday (1978) (Original US title: Gomm With the Wind)
Sparkly New Wave pop from ex-Brinsley Ian Gomm's debut album. This was the album's big radio hit, rising to #18 on the US charts in 1979 (nearly as good as the #12 scored by ex-bandmate Nick Lowe that same year with "Cruel to Be Kind," a song Gomm and Lowe co-wrote). The chorus is a real earworm hook -- just try to get it out of your head.
5. "Do You Remember Walter" / The Kinks
From The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society (1968)
This should be the theme song of all high school reunions. "I bet you're fat and married and you're always home in bed by half-past eight / And if I talked about the old times, you'd get bored and you'd have nothing more to say" -- a jaunty tune underlaid with despair at the fleeting power of nostalgia. Not coincidentally, that's the theme of this entire album, a neglected masterpiece for sure.
6. "Chasing Forever" / Ron Sexsmith and Don Kerr
From Destinations Unknown (2005)
Wistful folk-pop from my favorite Canadian songwriter. Ron's quite a Kinks fan himself, and this album is its own kind of Village Green, reflecting on nostalgia and preserving an already-lost past in songs like "Lemonade Stand" and "Diana Sweets." I've surrendered to the inevitability of Ron Sexsmith; might as well buy all the albums, they're all soul-satisfying.
7. "Nutted By Reality" / Nick Lowe
From Jesus of Cool (1978)
That album cover, featuring Nick in six different outfits (twelve if you count the inside shots), clues us in: This album is all about showing how many different musical styles he can master. And this track goes even further -- it's a two-fer! Adolescent humor rules (a song about castrating Castro -- really?) and if we Americans weren't exactly sure what it means to be "nutted" by reality -- well, it's too catchy for me care. Am I the only person who hears the McCartney parody in all this?
8. "My Home Town" / Alan Price
From Geordie Roots and Branches (1982)
A brassy updated version of this clever little rag, first heard in the brilliant film soundtrack for O Lucky Man! I'm guessing that this album was never released in CD -- I only have the vinyl, and it's one of my most precious rarities -- it was recorded for a Newcastle charity project as a favor to Alan's former Animals bandmate Chas Chandler, a year before their second reunion tour. This track isn't nearly as charming as the O Lucky Man! original, but the very fact that I've got it on my iTunes at all brands me as a hopeless Alan Price fangirl.
9. "Bone Tired" / Gomez
From A New Tide (2009)
I like this young-ish English band (debut 1998), but for some reason I can't quite love them. They've got too many songwriters, and in the name of versatility they dabble in too many styles, so I can never quite find their groove. But hey, I'm still waiting for them to grow on me. Listen and see what you think.
10. "List of Distractions" / Fionn Regan
From 100 Acres of Sycamore (2011)
On the other hand, the minute I heard this winsome Irish songwriter I knew I loved him. This is his second album, and it's just as charming as his first, The End of History. Dig his sweetly confiding voice, the truly poetic lyrics, the romantic sweep of his melodies -- I'm a sucker for it all.
Monday, May 21, 2012
Suspension Bridge / Graham Parker
Forget the Monday Shuffle I had just begun to write -- when a great Graham Parker song dials up on the old iTunes, it's almost impossible to move past it. And this track from his brilliant 2007 album Don't Tell Columbus is such a favorite of mine, I'm amazed to find I haven't written about it before.
Okay, here's the link so you can listen. Because, sadly, I have to assume that you may not yet own the entire Graham Parker oeuvre, though you really should....
Dig that moody vibe, right from the get-go, the haunting minor key and the syncopated guitar riff, repeated like a tic -- oh so simple and yet instantly mesmerizing. The same dark enchantment that Marc Ribot's guitar gave Tom Waits' Rain Dogs completely permeates this track.
We're in nostalgia territory, yet it's not feel-good nostalgia, despite the first verse's vignette of a loving dad and son: "My daddy took me to see it / When I was no more than 10 / They'd just finished painting the metal / Then they had to start all over again." That's just the kind of information a kid would latch onto -- Dad's trying to impress him with the size of the bridge, while the boy gets an entirely different message, a troubling sense of the futility of human effort. It's like freaking Wordsworth at Tintern Abbey, intimations of immortality and all that.
The chorus drops into a sorta major key as it sweeps us to the present: "I'm still standing there on that suspension bridge/ With the wind blowing through my head" -- the boy is father to the man, eh? -- but before he completes it he drops back into minor key, sketching a landscape worthy of Hieronymous Bosch: "And the daredevil pilots fly over me / And the suicide lovers swim under the sea / And the murderers submit an innocent plea / And the prisoners dream of the free." Welcome to adult life, son.
In the third verse, he time travels back to that afternoon with his father -- again, a tender scene (despite that brooding key), as the storyteller dad entertains his boy: "And the stories that my daddy told me / About the place on the other side / About the dip of the chains and the height of the piers / And the men who worked there and died." Not heart-warming stories, but stories calculated to awe and overwhelm. Remember when you were a kid, how your parents seemed to know everything? How reassuring that felt -- and how lost we sometimes feel as adults, without that illusion.
So what is this song about? The second time he sings the chorus, he adds a couple of lines: "Not in one world or the other / Losing my father like I lost my mother" -- which suggests to me that this was inspired by his father's death. This is total surmise on my part -- for all I know, Mr. Parker Senior is still alive and well in England, pontificating on bridge engineering -- but my gut tells me this is an elegy of some sort. And even though Graham's autobiographical suspension bridge was probably in England, I'm stuck on imagining it as one of the New York area bridges that felt suddenly so fragile after the tragic events of 9/11. (After all, GP has lived in the US a long time now, and Don't Tell Columbus is largely a meditation on his adopted home.)
Wherever the real suspension bridge is, this song somehow transforms it into a metaphor. Nothing heavy-handed, mind you -- Graham Parker's poetic craftsmanship is a subtle wonder. But I can't listen to this song without pondering the bridges in my life: between youth and adulthood, between life and death, between one homeland and another, between being a child and being a parent oneself. Suspension bridges may be miracles of engineering, defying nature -- but they still sway in the wind, and halfway over I always look down at the water far below and freak out. You cross them at your peril.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Chills and Fever / Bob Andrews OR: MY NIGHTS AT THE IRIDIUM PART II Watch out, City Winery -- the Iridium is threatening to steal my loyalty as my favorite New York City music joint. A scant three weeks after Marshall Crenshaw & Co. blew the roof off the old jazz club, my musical hero Graham Parker showed up for a weekend stint -- billed as half of the Graham Parker Duo, a musical act that reunites GP with his old Rumour keyboardist Bob Andrews.
Now as some of you may remember, almost exactly one year ago I saw the historic gig at NYC's Lakeside Lounge wherein Graham Parker unofficially reunited with most of The Rumour (they billed themselves as the Kippington Lodge Social Club -- like anybody would be fooled by that!). We should have known they wouldn't stop there, and a few weeks ago we finally got the big news: that the Rumour and Parker have reunited for a role in a Judd Apatow movie, and have recorded a new album, to be released next December to coincide with the movie's release. Now, the fact that these tracks have already been laid down and we won't get to hear them for another YEAR is excruciating. But in the meantime, hopefully we'll get a few more delicious sneak previews like Graham and Bob's Iridium show.
That night the Lakeside was packed beyond the fire laws; I had to watch through the front windows from the sidewalk. But since the band was playing right next to the window, I could see everything. And when they burst into "I Love the Sound of Breaking Glass," I was absolutely riveted by Bob's virtuoso organ break. That's when I really began to understand that, great as Graham is, the Rumour were far more than just a backing band, and Bob Andrews was one of their most essential treasures. (Not to mention what he brought to his pre-Parker group, Brinsley Schwarz, one of the great jam bands of the pub rock era.)
Fast forward to 2011 and cruise uptown to the Iridium. It was just Graham and Bob this time around (although Rumour drummer Steve Goulding, it turned out, was sitting right next to us!) but if anything they were having even more fun than they did downtown. Laughing, dancing, wisecracking, goofing around -- they brought such joy and high spirits to the stage, we were all infected. And I thought to myself: This is why I love rock and roll. This is why you have to see music live. Who cares if neither of these guys will ever see 60 again, or if they haven't a head of shaggy hair between them? Once they started rocking, they were 22-year-old wild men all over again, only a whole lot smarter and funnier.
The setlist was a healthy mix: Graham's solo stuff, a couple superb new reunion songs, and a few greatest hits, including "You Can't Be Too Strong" -- one of my favorite cuts from Squeezing Out Sparks, which I've always longed to hear Graham perform. Now I realize why he doesn't sing it more often: It absolutely, ABSOLUTELY, requires Bob's brilliant little piano fills. And with those fills, it was positively shivers-up-the-spine beautiful.
And they did some of Bob's solo numbers too. If you're lucky enough to visit New Orleans in the near future, check out where Bob's playing -- he hops around his adopted home town, playing at various clubs, letting les bons temps roulez. Another reason to love New Orleans.
I took a crappy video that night, not worth posting, but here's something I cribbed from the Interweb, taken at the House of Blues down in New Orleans:
Come to think of it, this vid isn't much better than the one I took, but it does have the virtue of being shot from the keyboard side. (D'oh!) At any rate, it gives you the idea of Bob's inimitable loose style and lightning fast fingers.
Now here's the full track from Bob's solo CD, appropriately enough also named Chills and Fever:
There's not much to critique about this song -- it's just an insanely catchy R&B artifact, toe-tapping and full of spunk. It's built on a tried-and-true pop metaphor, where fever stands in for love/lust/passion -- a metaphor older than the hills but still apt indeed. But above all, it's a song admirably suited to a barreling roadhouse piano, which is no doubt why Bob Andrews felt compelled to give it a whirl.
"Chills and Fever" first hit the airwaves as an atmospherically spooky 1961 single by Ronnie Love, jazzed up with voodoo-inflected shivering saxes. Apparently -- Bob shared this nugget of information with us -- no less than Allen Toussaint played the piano on that original Dot Records recording; that's what I call good bloodlines.But the song is perhaps best known as Tom Jones' first single in 1964. Though it would take his next release -- "It's Not Unusual" -- to make him a star, Tom Jones' trademark sweaty passion is already all over his heated-up cover version.
Bob takes the horniness back down a notch (whew!); his version is considerably more sprightly than either Ronnie's or Tom's. It's simply a fine excuse to peel off some show-stopping boogie-woogie piano riffs. He's almost like a salesman dropping open his sample case: Who knew one man could wring that many different sounds out of one piano? Like I said, a musical treasure -- and if we are very good children, we just may be hearing a lot more from him in the months to come.
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
When I Was King / Graham Parker
We're long past due for a Graham Parker post, my friends and faithful readers.
The Graham Parker world has been buzzing lately over two groundbreaking pieces of news. Firstly, Graham has reunited with his old backing band, The Rumour, for a new album entitled (don't you love it?) Three Chords Good. And as if that weren't enough, long-time Parker fan and film director Judd Apatow has tapped GP and the Rumour to appear in his new film, a sequel to Knocked Up starring Paul Rudd, set to be released in December 2012 (if we can wait that long!). Is that cool or what?
Now, anyone who knows how funny Graham can be should know that he's just been waiting for an opportunity like this to shine on camera. I predict that he's about to experience a truly epic (and long overdue) career revival. A year from now everyone will be claiming to be Parkeristas, just like everyone this fall claims to be a Nick Lowe fan. Here's your chance to be ahead of the curve and get hip to Graham Parker before the masses move in.
You'll find this track on 1991's Struck By Lightning, which just may be my favorite Graham Parker album ever. (And that's going some.) Side note: The Rumour's Andrew Bodnar plays bass on this album, and Pete Thomas of Elvis Costello's Attractions is the drummer. The Band's Garth Hudson and the Lovin' Spoonful's John Sebastian sit in on a few tracks as well -- not too shabby, eh?
Back in 1979, when Squeezing Out Sparks gave Graham Parker and the Rumour their biggest US success, they pretty much were kings. By 1991, that was well in Graham's past -- but does he sound bitter or regretful? No way. In fact, he seems to have all the confidence of an artist who knows he's doing his best work ever, whether or not the world is listening. (I wasn't even listening in 1991 -- it took me years to rediscover Graham Parker.)
"When I was king," he muses, "I was not really the man I am now." There's just a whiff of satire to that rising melody, the mock stately rhythm lagging behind the beat with noblesse oblige. And the trappings of royalty -- or of pop success -- are almost laughably ephemeral: a "throne of china," a crown fit only to be melted down "to sell as scrap." But being a king is a sort of trap, too: "But they'd run the first run of stamps / People had cashed in their post office savings / To buy some and lick the back of my neck." It's deliciously absurd, but poignant all the same. The coronation happens anyway, and in a sort of fairy-tale reality, he finds himself ruling over "some green and pleasant land / With a frog and a princess, not necessarily in that order."
"I didn't want to be king anyway," Graham protests; "I always preferred to hang out with the servants." I love that line; to me, that epitomizes the common-man approach that makes Graham Parker's work so special. Posturing and pretension have never been his thing. (Bruce Springsteen has spent his career trying to convey the same real-guy honesty; I never buy it from him, but from Graham I do, one hundred percent.)
And after all, what would be the point of being king? "When I was king," he continues in the third verse, "there was no country left to rule / Jesters and fools were leaders / All of them a royal pain." (How could he resist a pun like that?) Too late, perhaps, he realizes he has to get back on top: "Now I'm a serf / But I'm still trying to be a king . . . I'll have to assassinate someone / With a guitar as a gun."
"Oh, it's good to be a king," he'll admit. (Who can forget Mel Brooks' classic line from History of the World Part One -- "It's good to be the king.") "I know that I've been there / Many, many, many, many kingdoms ago..." Fashions in pop music come and go, and being yesterday's hit-maker means nothing today. There's definitely something wistful about this sweet, soaring melody, but he's not weighed down with regret; it's the way of the world, and he can take it in stride.
But let's think -- who were the hitmakers in 1991? Nirvana and Pearl Jam were signaling the rise of grunge, while Guns 'n' Roses was unseating Metallica. R.E.M. and U2 were already peaking (though both continued to release music for many more years). Bryan Adams, Michael Jackson, Phil Collins, and Michael Bolton ruled the charts; Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" and the Divinyl's "I Touch Myself" filled the airwaves. So who was ever going to notice a stripped-down, folk-inflected album like Struck By Lightning?
On the other hand, who noticed the Kinks' Village Green Preservation Society album in 1968? The satire and lyrical tenderness of that album was out of step with the times, just as Struck By Lightning was out of step with 1991. But here's the thing about truly great albums: When you finally discover them, they seem as fresh as yesterday.
Friday, September 30, 2011
Friday Shuffle
I'm thoroughly bummed that the Amazon widget doesn't seem to work anymore. In cases like this I tend to assume that Blogger/Google and Amazon are having a hissy fit with each other (did Google steal Amazon's boyfriend?) and Google has decided not to play with Amazon ever again. Took me ages to find another way to slip those links in here. Hope it works!
1. Moments Like This / Maria Muldaur
From A Woman Alone With the Blues (2003)
Nice little bit of jazz from Maria Muldaur, in her best kittenish-sultry voice. I've been a fan of Maria's ever since the Jim Kweskin Jug Band days, though my favorite album of hers is definitely Waitress in a Donut Shop. If all you know of her is "Midnight At The Oasis," please investigate further.
2. The Good Old Days/ The Lodger
From Life Is Sweet (2008).
Catchy indie pop number from this Leeds trio -- "Could it be the start of something? / Could it be the end of a phase? / Could it be the start of the future? / Could it be the good old days?" Way too upbeat for the break-up subject matter, but I'll never turn down bouncy hooks like this.
3. One to One / Joe Jackson
From Beat Crazy (1980)
Joe Jackson may have started out wearing a New Wave suitcoat, but it never really fit. By the time of Beat Crazy he was already skewing toward jazz -- we shouldn't have been so surprised by the next year's Jumpin' Jive, though who could have predicted the Latinized glory of Night and Day? The metronomic drum tick of this track is downright hypnotic.
4. I Don't Wanna Talk About Love No More / Amy Rigby
From Little Fugitive (2005)
"I'm tired of emotional discussions / I'm tired of repercussions...." Amy Rigby's such a hoot; she really tells it like it is, our most reliable guide to spunky chick desire.
5. Redneck Friend / Dave Alvin
From West of the West (2006)
Nice cover of a Jackson Browne tune, on Alvin's album-long salute to various of his fellow native California rockers. Alvin's gravelly voice adds a sexy intimacy to this tune, perfectly complemented by a slouchy jazz arrangement. More people should cover Jackson Browne, IMHO.
6. Rush Across the Road/ Joe Jackson
From Rain (2008)
Joe again! And 28 years after Beat Crazy, listen to his muse in full flower on this riveting album, one of the best of the past decade. On the track before this, he rips our hearts out with "Solo (So Low)" -- only to let joy burst in again with "Rush Across the Road," a soaring paean to how love can take you completely by surprise.
7. Stick To Me / Graham Parker & the Rumour
From Stick To Me (1977)
Early GP, and great stuff -- dig those edgy rhythms and driving energy. I swear, this song just crackles out of the speakers.
8. Hate to Say I Told You So / The Hives
From Veni Vidi Vicious (2000)
Well, talk about edgy rhythms and driving energy -- it's the Hives' turn, dialing up the punk with those grating guitars and pounding beat, sweetened with just a dollop of playfulness.
9. Say Yes / Elliott Smith
From Either / Or (1997)
I know very little about Elliott Smith, but the handful of folky tracks that somehow landed on my iTunes always make me wistful. Was this song in the movie Garden State? Sounds like it should have been.
10. You Are A Tourist / Death Cab for Cutie
From Codes and Keys (2011)
"When there's a burning in your heart / An endless yearning in your heart..." I love the layered textures of this track, with its incantatory chorus, spooling guitar riff, and plinging echoes. Even endless radio play this summer couldn't spoil this number for me.
Friday, August 19, 2011
FRIDAY (or maybe Saturday now) SHUFFLE
Oy, it's been a while. I have to admit that my Saturday evenings have been devoted lately not to blogging but to listening to the radio -- specifically Marshall Crenshaw's Bottomless Pit show on WFUV-FM (which you can listen to on the internet, either via live stream or in an archived version -- so now you've got no excuse for not checking it out.) But if I can get the blog done before Marsh's show starts at 10pm Eastern time...
1. Monday Morning / Death Cab for Cutie
From Codes and Keys (2011)
Wow. I was just listening to this new Death Cab CD on a car drive today, trying to decide if I really needed all the tracks in my iTunes library. (Some of those long sonic collages I could do without.) This song made the cut, though; it's tuneful and has a good beat. Plus I like to imagine that it's about Zooey Dechanel. "She may be young but she only likes old things..." Then again, it does have that line about the vultures surrounding you -- ah, Ben Gibbard, you depressive little scamp.
2. I Love That Girl / John Hiatt
From Dirty Jeans and Mudslide Hymns (2011)
What is this, New Release Weekend? Now I really feel guilty that I haven't blogged yet about this brilliant new CD. Because you know I loves me some Johnny Hiatt -- I even saw him live last weekend at City Winery -- well, there's just no excuse. And this jubilant song of love, so simple, so infectious, is a side I like to see him letting loose with.
3. Wild Thing / The Troggs
From From Nowhere (1966)
Did someone say simple and infectious? A true British invasion classic. "Wild thing, I think you move me..."
4. Got To Get Out Of Here / Badfinger
From Wish You Were Here (1974)
Some day I really have to get down to business and listen to ALL of Badfinger's work, beyond the few big irresistible hit singles. There's something sweet and sensitive and sincere about them, and so melodic -- no wonder Paul McCartney wanted to get them onto the Apple label -- and yet a dark underside that makes them really interesting. This song is just draggy enough to make you wonder whether he is ever going to get out of here; compare this to the energy of the Animals' "We Gotta Get Out Of This Place" -- it's an entirely different thing going on.
5. First Day of Spring / Graham Parker
From 12 Haunted Episodes (1995)
If all you know of Graham Parker is Squeezing Out Sparks -- in other words, if you're like I was a year or so ago -- then you'll be amazed to see that GP also has this tender acoustic side. He's got an astonishingly literary gift for metaphor -- but don't let me explicate this one for you, listen for yourself. The guy's a freaking genius, honestly.
6. Woodcutter's Son / Paul Weller
From Stanley Road (1995)
Probably Weller's best post-Jam album, although I have a sneaking fondness for all his Style Council experiments too. Weller's never shy about genre-crossing; here he lets his rocking-out get plenty funky, wandering off into jazzy backwaters and losing all pretense of being a "song." And yet it works.
7. The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys / Traffic
From The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys (1971)
Now there's a brilliant segue. This extended Stevie Winwood/Jim Capaldi jam works pretty much as pure music too. Remember when a song could be 11:02 minutes long and it still wasn't pretentious? They melded rock and jazz so effortlessly, we thought it must be easy. Ha.
8. Modern Nature / Sondre Lerche
From Faces Down (2002)
The movie Dan in Real Life first introduced me to this quirky Norwegian singer-songwriter, with a fondness for the retro show-tunesy side of indie pop. You could practically do a soft shoe dance to this track, but it's sweet as hell.
9. Tip of My Tongue / Graham Parker
From From a Window: The Lost Songs of Lennon & McCartney (2003)
Hooray! Another chance for me to badger you to buy this must-have album, wherein Graham Parker, Kate Pierson, and Bill Janovitz re-interpret various tunes that John & Paul wrote for other artists. As if we needed any more proof that they were brilliant songwriters.
10. Rooftops (A Liberation Broadcast) / Lostprophets
From Liberation Transmission (2006)
Thus proving that shuffles are embarrassingly random. Nevertheless, this is a fun top-of-your-lungs singalong, upbeat and pulsing with punk energy; these Welsh rockers have me preaching revolution without a moment's thought. Makes me nostalgic for 2006 -- ah, yes, a simpler time.
/ Death Cab for Cutie
/ John Hiatt
/ The Troggs
/ Badfinger 
(1995)
/ Paul Weller
/ Traffic
/ Sondre Lerche 
/ Graham Parker
/ Lostprophets