"Something to Talk About" /
Badly Drawn Boy
No, this isn't a cover of the Bonnie Raitt song, although I like that too. (Believe me, Bonnie and I go way back.) It's the theme song from a quietly brilliant little film from 2002, called About a Boy, starring Hugh Grant and based on a novel by Nick Hornby -- combine those two and how could you miss? I'm crazy about the both of them, no use pretending otherwise, and although I'd never heard of Badly Drawn Boy before, I fell in love with the charming soundtrack immediately. Later I found out that it was written by Damon Gough, who is Badly Drawn boy, in one of those I'm-one-guy-but-I-pretend-to-be-a-whole-band deals, a la Dashboard Confessional or Iron and Wine. So be it, I'm willing to keep an open mind. I'm vaguely aware that he dresses like Mike Nesmith gone grunge, but so what? And he cites his favorite artists as Bruce Springsteen, Jeff Buckley, and the Pixies -- well, two out of three ain't bad, as Meat Loaf used to say. (Or still says, for all I know.)
Man, am I cutting this kid slack. But really, let's face it, if the songs are good who cares about the rest? And the songs are good.
Acoustic guitar, a little spatter of keyboards, simple drumbeats, syncopated melody -- this is clean classic pop, married to quirky lyrics that would make Nick Hornby proud. (Have I ever told you guys about my Nick Hornby fixation? How his book Songbook changed my life? Remind me sometime.) The gist of the story -- which like any good story shouldn't be simplified -- is about a slacker cad (my man Hugh Grant) getting gradually entangled with a gawky adolescent and his awkward mother (the brilliant Toni Collette) and discovering that life's all about human connections. I know I know, it sounds like you'd retch at the cliches, but trust me, it works on screen, thanks to brilliant direction by the Weitz brothers Paul and Chris, and also a snarky smart screenplay by Peter Hedges (though from now on they should let Nick write his own screenplays because he's a genius and should get all the money. And Nick, really, if you google yourself and read this, email me because we need to talk).
But back to Badly Drawn Boy. What I love about this song is not only it's stop-and-start rhythmic pattern, which is so engaging, but the great throw-off quality of the lyrics, which matches the slacker sweetness of this movie. It's pretty much all embodied in the middle verse, which is the one I tend to sing to myself at random moments: "Ipso / Facto / Using up your oxygen / You know I'm shallow / Calling out for extra help / You've got to let me in / Or let me out." Well, that 's the movie in a nutshell, and there's some serious genius about getting a soundtrack that really marries to the storyline like that.
Plus, I don't know, but I love Gough's earnest folky voice. Sure, this is laid over with back-up oooh's and a kinda glossy arrangement (it's like a wall of sound writ small), but I find this warm and appealing, the same way as all the songs from the movie Garden State. Which is a whole 'nother story.
Let's cut to the last verse, which sums it all up: "I've been / Dreaming / Of the things I learnt about a boy who's / Leaving / Nothing else to chance again /You've got to let me in / Or let me out." Which is really the quandary we all face, isn't it? How do we manage to still be cool (as you all are) and remain engaged -- which you have to be, face it, to be cool these days. There's no checking out any more. What I love about Badly Drawn Boy is how he plays the groove between emotion and cynicism, understanding how hard it is to commit to lyrical impulse these days. This is a very narrow sector of the listening audience, I appreciate that. But hell, I'm there, and I'm hoping you are too.
Something To Talk About sample
Monday, November 10, 2008
Sunday, November 09, 2008
"Sex on Fire" / Kings of Leon
All those years of training my children to like rock music, and what do I get? I'm now forced to listen to Sirius Radio's Alt Nation channel every time we take a car trip. Of course, some of Alt Nation's artists are fabulous, but I also have to endure such tripe as that screamer in Rise Against, or the endless narcotizing techno riffs of LCD Soundsystem, or worst of all, the Ting Tings, a horrible British duo that's basically the B-52s without a sense of humor (and the whole point of the B-52s was their sense of humor). Not only that, but listen to Alt Nation long enough and you will hear the exact same 37 songs played over and over in exactly the same order.
Do I sound enough like my parents yet?
But at least that means that every 37 songs I got to hear the Kings of Leon again. This is a completely addictive track, and excellent driving music, too; you absolutely have to pound the steering wheel when it comes on. The title is stupid, I'll agree, like something Justin Timberlake would write, and it's extra embarrassing to listen with your adolescent daughter to what's basically a song about a blow job. But so far she hasn't caught on, so we're safe. For a while, still.
Let's get one thing out of the way: The opening riffs of "Sex on Fire" are stolen straight from Bruce Springsteen's "Dancing in the Dark." Still, that seems to be standard operating procedure on Alt Nation; Fall Out Boy's latest single is a complete rip-off of "Spirit in the Sky," and since two out of the three Alt Nation listeners in my car had never heard "Spirit in the Sky," my guess is that Fall Out Boy will get away with it. Anyhow, the opening riff is the only really good thing about "Dancing in the Dark," so let's just call the Kings of Leon's version an "homage" and move on.
They get extra points from me for being another brother band -- in fact, they beat out the Davies brothers, because there are not two but three Followill brothers in the band, as well as their cousin. It makes more sense to compare them to the Allman Brothers, or the Black Crowes' Robinson brothers, or Luther and Cody Dickinson of the North Mississippi All-Stars, because these guys are classic Southern rockers. That borrowed riff becomes a propulsive motor for this song, cruising lustily around the curves without braking for a moment. But while the crisp drums and hopped-up bass and chugging guitar never let up, Caleb Followill's hoarse high vocals howl and soar and swoop all over the place, adding a great jittery nervous energy.
The lyrics are ambiguous, of course, and vaguely poetic, as in "Hot as a fever / Rattling bones" or "The dark of the alley / The break of the day / Ahead while I'm driving / I'm driving." (Or is it "a head while I'm driving"?).
There's one little rhythmic trick they pull off that's sheer genius. At the end of every verse, they repeat the last phrase of the last line -- as in "feels like you're dying, you're dying" -- standard pop technique, right? But nooooo, they make you wait for it, stuffing in an extra measure while the song's motor keeps pulsating, and even when you get the repeat it still idles anxiously on a minor chord. What did you expect, resolution? No way; they just downshift gears and accelerate into the next verse. The spasmodic tension this creates is just brilliant. Like I said, it's a song about a blow job (not only that, but a blow job in a moving car) so it's a perfect case of art imitating nature.
Well, the road trip's over, and I'm happy to go back to my own little quirky playlist of cute aging British rockers. But I've "borrowed" my son's Only By the Night CD and downloaded a few of the Followill boys' tracks -- after all, you never know when you'll need a little steamy Southern alt smut.
Sex on Fire sample
All those years of training my children to like rock music, and what do I get? I'm now forced to listen to Sirius Radio's Alt Nation channel every time we take a car trip. Of course, some of Alt Nation's artists are fabulous, but I also have to endure such tripe as that screamer in Rise Against, or the endless narcotizing techno riffs of LCD Soundsystem, or worst of all, the Ting Tings, a horrible British duo that's basically the B-52s without a sense of humor (and the whole point of the B-52s was their sense of humor). Not only that, but listen to Alt Nation long enough and you will hear the exact same 37 songs played over and over in exactly the same order.
Do I sound enough like my parents yet?
But at least that means that every 37 songs I got to hear the Kings of Leon again. This is a completely addictive track, and excellent driving music, too; you absolutely have to pound the steering wheel when it comes on. The title is stupid, I'll agree, like something Justin Timberlake would write, and it's extra embarrassing to listen with your adolescent daughter to what's basically a song about a blow job. But so far she hasn't caught on, so we're safe. For a while, still.
Let's get one thing out of the way: The opening riffs of "Sex on Fire" are stolen straight from Bruce Springsteen's "Dancing in the Dark." Still, that seems to be standard operating procedure on Alt Nation; Fall Out Boy's latest single is a complete rip-off of "Spirit in the Sky," and since two out of the three Alt Nation listeners in my car had never heard "Spirit in the Sky," my guess is that Fall Out Boy will get away with it. Anyhow, the opening riff is the only really good thing about "Dancing in the Dark," so let's just call the Kings of Leon's version an "homage" and move on.
They get extra points from me for being another brother band -- in fact, they beat out the Davies brothers, because there are not two but three Followill brothers in the band, as well as their cousin. It makes more sense to compare them to the Allman Brothers, or the Black Crowes' Robinson brothers, or Luther and Cody Dickinson of the North Mississippi All-Stars, because these guys are classic Southern rockers. That borrowed riff becomes a propulsive motor for this song, cruising lustily around the curves without braking for a moment. But while the crisp drums and hopped-up bass and chugging guitar never let up, Caleb Followill's hoarse high vocals howl and soar and swoop all over the place, adding a great jittery nervous energy.
The lyrics are ambiguous, of course, and vaguely poetic, as in "Hot as a fever / Rattling bones" or "The dark of the alley / The break of the day / Ahead while I'm driving / I'm driving." (Or is it "a head while I'm driving"?).
There's one little rhythmic trick they pull off that's sheer genius. At the end of every verse, they repeat the last phrase of the last line -- as in "feels like you're dying, you're dying" -- standard pop technique, right? But nooooo, they make you wait for it, stuffing in an extra measure while the song's motor keeps pulsating, and even when you get the repeat it still idles anxiously on a minor chord. What did you expect, resolution? No way; they just downshift gears and accelerate into the next verse. The spasmodic tension this creates is just brilliant. Like I said, it's a song about a blow job (not only that, but a blow job in a moving car) so it's a perfect case of art imitating nature.
Well, the road trip's over, and I'm happy to go back to my own little quirky playlist of cute aging British rockers. But I've "borrowed" my son's Only By the Night CD and downloaded a few of the Followill boys' tracks -- after all, you never know when you'll need a little steamy Southern alt smut.
Sex on Fire sample
Thursday, November 06, 2008
"You Didn't Have to Be So Nice" /
The Lovin' Spoonful
Once I get into that Sixties groove, it's only a matter of time before the Spoonful pops up. I guess if I'd been older in 1966 -- more serious, more sophisticated -- I might have preferred the Byrds. But I'm sorry, no one in the Byrds was as adorable as John Sebastian in a striped boatneck shirt, peering out through those wire-rim glasses, cradling that autoharp on Hullabaloo (or was it Shindig?). It was no contest.
Autoharp? Come on, who else played an autoharp? There was no macho swagger to the Lovin' Spoonful, just loads of impish charm. Still, you always knew they were red-blooded males, not wimpy flower-child troubadors. They sang songs about ditching a girl for her sister ("Did You Ever Have to Make Up Your Mind?"), coolly breaking a girl's heart ("Didn't Want to Have To Do It"), and going on the urban prowl ("Summer in the City"). In "Darling Be Home Soon," he wants his woman home so urgently, I never believed it was only about "the great relief of having you to talk to." And how sexy they made it sound to get caught in a downpour in "Rain on the Roof" (I love that meaningful pause after "Maybe we'll be caught for hours / Waiting out the sun . . . "). Yep, you knew these guys would never miss a chance to get a little action.
So even as a dopey adolescent, I sensed that "You Didn't Have To Be So Nice" was saturated with lust. Oh, sure, it's bouncy and light-hearted, like their previous hits "Do You Believe in Magic?" and "Daydream," and Sebastian's breathy singing is all cuddly teddybear. But John B. admits right up front that pursuing this woman has nothing to do with her "nice" personality. ("Nice" as in "not bitchy" -- I never even considered it could mean "not slutty.") He's clearly on the make -- "they said the time was right for me to follow you / I knew I'd find you in a day or two"; why, he's practically stalking her. And he seems helpless to resist this animal attraction: "I knew that it would be that way / The minute that I saw your face." The backing singers echo everything he says, just egging him on.
Maybe it's just me, but somehow I get the idea that her niceness is a problem for him. Like all he wanted was a little making out -- "if you had kissed me once or twice /Then gone upon your quiet way" -- and instead he finds himself getting entangled with someone he knows deserves to be treated well. There's a stubborn reluctance here; he's not entirely sure that he wants to put his caddish ways aside. When you think about it, this song could easily be Part One to the story that ends with "Didn't Want to Have to Do It."
But even so, I loved this song back in 1966. I was way too young to be in love with anybody real, so in my mind this was the song that Paul McCartney (or was it Peter Noone?) would sing someday when he finally met me. Or maybe it was John B himself, glasses and autoharp and paisley shirt and all. I was young; the possibilities were endless. But thanks to this song, at least I knew it was safe to be nice.
You Didn't Have To Be So Nice sample
The Lovin' Spoonful
Once I get into that Sixties groove, it's only a matter of time before the Spoonful pops up. I guess if I'd been older in 1966 -- more serious, more sophisticated -- I might have preferred the Byrds. But I'm sorry, no one in the Byrds was as adorable as John Sebastian in a striped boatneck shirt, peering out through those wire-rim glasses, cradling that autoharp on Hullabaloo (or was it Shindig?). It was no contest.
Autoharp? Come on, who else played an autoharp? There was no macho swagger to the Lovin' Spoonful, just loads of impish charm. Still, you always knew they were red-blooded males, not wimpy flower-child troubadors. They sang songs about ditching a girl for her sister ("Did You Ever Have to Make Up Your Mind?"), coolly breaking a girl's heart ("Didn't Want to Have To Do It"), and going on the urban prowl ("Summer in the City"). In "Darling Be Home Soon," he wants his woman home so urgently, I never believed it was only about "the great relief of having you to talk to." And how sexy they made it sound to get caught in a downpour in "Rain on the Roof" (I love that meaningful pause after "Maybe we'll be caught for hours / Waiting out the sun . . . "). Yep, you knew these guys would never miss a chance to get a little action.
So even as a dopey adolescent, I sensed that "You Didn't Have To Be So Nice" was saturated with lust. Oh, sure, it's bouncy and light-hearted, like their previous hits "Do You Believe in Magic?" and "Daydream," and Sebastian's breathy singing is all cuddly teddybear. But John B. admits right up front that pursuing this woman has nothing to do with her "nice" personality. ("Nice" as in "not bitchy" -- I never even considered it could mean "not slutty.") He's clearly on the make -- "they said the time was right for me to follow you / I knew I'd find you in a day or two"; why, he's practically stalking her. And he seems helpless to resist this animal attraction: "I knew that it would be that way / The minute that I saw your face." The backing singers echo everything he says, just egging him on.
Maybe it's just me, but somehow I get the idea that her niceness is a problem for him. Like all he wanted was a little making out -- "if you had kissed me once or twice /Then gone upon your quiet way" -- and instead he finds himself getting entangled with someone he knows deserves to be treated well. There's a stubborn reluctance here; he's not entirely sure that he wants to put his caddish ways aside. When you think about it, this song could easily be Part One to the story that ends with "Didn't Want to Have to Do It."
But even so, I loved this song back in 1966. I was way too young to be in love with anybody real, so in my mind this was the song that Paul McCartney (or was it Peter Noone?) would sing someday when he finally met me. Or maybe it was John B himself, glasses and autoharp and paisley shirt and all. I was young; the possibilities were endless. But thanks to this song, at least I knew it was safe to be nice.
You Didn't Have To Be So Nice sample
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
"On the Road to Find Out" /
Cat Stevens
Apropos of nothing -- or maybe apropos of everything -- I've been stuck on this song ever since it popped up on my shuffle today. There are days when I can't remember what the Sixties felt felt like, but boy, yesterday sure wiped all the rust and dust off those Sixties ideals.
Suppose you were making a movie and you wanted to slap something on the soundtrack that says 1970; you couldn't go wrong with any song from Tea for the Tillerman. Okay, I know Hal Ashby already pulled that trick with Harold and Maude, but Tea for the Tillerman is so much more than just Harold and Maude for me. I was precisely the right age, and precisely the right target demographic, to think that this was the wisest and most beautiful album ever (at least for a few months, until Carole King's Tapestry came out). It seemed to be playing everywhere I went -- maybe not on Top 40 radio or on the musak at the mall, but at every party and at every friend's house. That folkie acoustic guitar, Stevens' quavery voice, the flower child conceits, the romantic loner alienation -- how better to appeal to us hippie wannabes?
"On the Road To Find Out" is your classic spiritual quest song, and we -- the generation that made Siddhartha a cult classic -- liked our spiritual quests, and the vaguer the better. The singer starts out by leaving his happy home "to see what I could find out," "with the aim to clear my mind out," et cetera et cetera et cetera, all very soft-focus and high-minded. It isn't all easy going -- he mentions snow, frost, thunder, howling winds -- and worst of all, human loneliness hits: "Then I found myself alone, hoping someone would miss me / Thinking about my home, and the last woman to kiss me (kiss me)." Still, he perseveres, as the chorus tells us over and over: "So on and on I go, the seconds tick the time out / There's so much left to know, and I'm on the road to find out." This is more Easy Rider than The Searchers, that's for sure.
Cat lays this down with swelling and climbing melodies, a distant chorus cheering him on, drums and a touch of bass and organ building up that folky guitar ever so subtly until it almost feels EPIC. We are totally with him -- or are we? Because I'll bet that ninety percent of the kids who wore the grooves off this LP still think it's about running away from home -- whereas, I now realize, it's about the folly of running away. Like he says in the last verse, "Then I found my head one day when I wasn't even trying / And here I have to say, 'cause there is no use in lying / Yes, the answer lies within, so why not take a look now? /Kick out the devil's sin, pick up, pick up a good book now." (Or is it "the Good Book" he's talking about? Knowing that Cat eventually became a serious Muslim, changing his name to Yusuf Islam, you've got to wonder.)
PICK UP A BOOK? That wasn't the message we wanted to hear -- that's like something the school librarian would tell you. And what we wanted was to go out of state to college and smoke dope and drop acid and live in communes until we found The Answer. It almost didn't matter what Cat Stevens was trying to tell us, we heard what we wanted to.
And you know what? It still doesn't matter. I still get that yearning to hit the road when I hear this song. And even if the answer lies within, I still want to believe there is an Answer. Yesterday gave me hope again that there is.
On the Road To Find Out sample
Cat Stevens
Apropos of nothing -- or maybe apropos of everything -- I've been stuck on this song ever since it popped up on my shuffle today. There are days when I can't remember what the Sixties felt felt like, but boy, yesterday sure wiped all the rust and dust off those Sixties ideals.
Suppose you were making a movie and you wanted to slap something on the soundtrack that says 1970; you couldn't go wrong with any song from Tea for the Tillerman. Okay, I know Hal Ashby already pulled that trick with Harold and Maude, but Tea for the Tillerman is so much more than just Harold and Maude for me. I was precisely the right age, and precisely the right target demographic, to think that this was the wisest and most beautiful album ever (at least for a few months, until Carole King's Tapestry came out). It seemed to be playing everywhere I went -- maybe not on Top 40 radio or on the musak at the mall, but at every party and at every friend's house. That folkie acoustic guitar, Stevens' quavery voice, the flower child conceits, the romantic loner alienation -- how better to appeal to us hippie wannabes?
"On the Road To Find Out" is your classic spiritual quest song, and we -- the generation that made Siddhartha a cult classic -- liked our spiritual quests, and the vaguer the better. The singer starts out by leaving his happy home "to see what I could find out," "with the aim to clear my mind out," et cetera et cetera et cetera, all very soft-focus and high-minded. It isn't all easy going -- he mentions snow, frost, thunder, howling winds -- and worst of all, human loneliness hits: "Then I found myself alone, hoping someone would miss me / Thinking about my home, and the last woman to kiss me (kiss me)." Still, he perseveres, as the chorus tells us over and over: "So on and on I go, the seconds tick the time out / There's so much left to know, and I'm on the road to find out." This is more Easy Rider than The Searchers, that's for sure.
Cat lays this down with swelling and climbing melodies, a distant chorus cheering him on, drums and a touch of bass and organ building up that folky guitar ever so subtly until it almost feels EPIC. We are totally with him -- or are we? Because I'll bet that ninety percent of the kids who wore the grooves off this LP still think it's about running away from home -- whereas, I now realize, it's about the folly of running away. Like he says in the last verse, "Then I found my head one day when I wasn't even trying / And here I have to say, 'cause there is no use in lying / Yes, the answer lies within, so why not take a look now? /Kick out the devil's sin, pick up, pick up a good book now." (Or is it "the Good Book" he's talking about? Knowing that Cat eventually became a serious Muslim, changing his name to Yusuf Islam, you've got to wonder.)
PICK UP A BOOK? That wasn't the message we wanted to hear -- that's like something the school librarian would tell you. And what we wanted was to go out of state to college and smoke dope and drop acid and live in communes until we found The Answer. It almost didn't matter what Cat Stevens was trying to tell us, we heard what we wanted to.
And you know what? It still doesn't matter. I still get that yearning to hit the road when I hear this song. And even if the answer lies within, I still want to believe there is an Answer. Yesterday gave me hope again that there is.
On the Road To Find Out sample
Monday, November 03, 2008
"Sitting in the Midday Sun" /
The Kinks
I've finished the book. I've finished the book. And yes, I know there'll be queries to answer, and proofs to read, and all that crap down the line, but I'VE FINISHED THE BOOK, and now I can get back to business here at last!
Frankly, while I was working there were no songs in my head. Well, only one song, Nick Lowe's "I Live On A Battlefield," which I've written about before, and besides I reckon you're tired of hearing me go on about Nick Lowe. I'm tired of hearing me go on about Nick Lowe. So this is how I know I've really finished the book; today I woke up singing this dreamy little Kinks tune, one of my favoritest mellow lazy tunes ever.
Ray Davies loves to play the quizzical observer of life, and so he's given us a passel of these "sitting" songs. First there was 1965's "Sittin' On My Sofa," a morose moan from a shellshocked guy whose girlfriend's left him. Next came his sly 1968 satiric hit "Sitting By the Riverside," about a wealthy guy blindsided by financial distress (how apt these days!). In 1972 we got the plaintive "Sitting In My Hotel," an (I assume) autobiographical track about a lonely celebrity isolated by fame, and one of my favorite Kinks songs ever.
Preservation Act I came along in 1973, one of Ray's forays into rock opera, a road which many of his former fans didn't "get." (Ray's still trying out musical theater -- he's got a new play in London right now called Come Dancing that I've heard is simply brilliant.) But I love both of the Preservation albums, and one of my favorite characters in this story is the Tramp, the narrator/observer of the play's action. He kinda disappears in Act II, but in Act I he gets all the best songs -- the wistful love song "Sweet Lady Genevieve," his nostalgic take on Swinging London, "Where Are They Now," and this little charmer.
It's a real musical theater tune -- you could almost do a soft shoe to it -- with its soaring woodwind intro, the ripply glockenspiels, and the Beach Boys-ish falsetto harmonized "ooohs." Of course it's a little ambivalent -- this wouldn't be Ray Davies without a little ambivalence -- but surely we're supposed to side with the Tramp. The guy's got nothing, as verse 2 tells us: "Everybody say I'm lazy / They tell me, 'Get a job you slob' / But I'd rather be a hobo, walking 'round with nothing / Than a rich man scared of losing all he's got" (echoes of "Sitting By the Riverside"). He freely admits, "I haven't got a steady occupation / And I can't afford a telephone / I haven't got a stereo, radio, or video" -- OR "A mortgage, overdraft, or bank loan." (I love how deftly Ray spins that list around.) Wouldn't we all like to be in that situation, especially nowadays? Suddenly this song is totally relevant.
"So I'm just sitting in the midday sun," he muses lazily, "Just soaking up that currant bun." (It took me years to find out that "currant bun" is Cockney rhyming slang for "sun.") And then, ever so casually, he points out, "Everybody thinks I'm crazy / Everybody says I'm dumb / But when I see the people shouting with each other / I'd rather be an out-of-work bum." So here I am, the night before the election, with nothing to do except finally clean my apartment and go walk my dog. Okay, today the weather's gray and overcast and a little chilly, but I'm heading outdoors anyway -- gotta go soak up that currant bun for a change.
Sitting in the Midday Sun sample
The Kinks
I've finished the book. I've finished the book. And yes, I know there'll be queries to answer, and proofs to read, and all that crap down the line, but I'VE FINISHED THE BOOK, and now I can get back to business here at last!
Frankly, while I was working there were no songs in my head. Well, only one song, Nick Lowe's "I Live On A Battlefield," which I've written about before, and besides I reckon you're tired of hearing me go on about Nick Lowe. I'm tired of hearing me go on about Nick Lowe. So this is how I know I've really finished the book; today I woke up singing this dreamy little Kinks tune, one of my favoritest mellow lazy tunes ever.
Ray Davies loves to play the quizzical observer of life, and so he's given us a passel of these "sitting" songs. First there was 1965's "Sittin' On My Sofa," a morose moan from a shellshocked guy whose girlfriend's left him. Next came his sly 1968 satiric hit "Sitting By the Riverside," about a wealthy guy blindsided by financial distress (how apt these days!). In 1972 we got the plaintive "Sitting In My Hotel," an (I assume) autobiographical track about a lonely celebrity isolated by fame, and one of my favorite Kinks songs ever.
Preservation Act I came along in 1973, one of Ray's forays into rock opera, a road which many of his former fans didn't "get." (Ray's still trying out musical theater -- he's got a new play in London right now called Come Dancing that I've heard is simply brilliant.) But I love both of the Preservation albums, and one of my favorite characters in this story is the Tramp, the narrator/observer of the play's action. He kinda disappears in Act II, but in Act I he gets all the best songs -- the wistful love song "Sweet Lady Genevieve," his nostalgic take on Swinging London, "Where Are They Now," and this little charmer.
It's a real musical theater tune -- you could almost do a soft shoe to it -- with its soaring woodwind intro, the ripply glockenspiels, and the Beach Boys-ish falsetto harmonized "ooohs." Of course it's a little ambivalent -- this wouldn't be Ray Davies without a little ambivalence -- but surely we're supposed to side with the Tramp. The guy's got nothing, as verse 2 tells us: "Everybody say I'm lazy / They tell me, 'Get a job you slob' / But I'd rather be a hobo, walking 'round with nothing / Than a rich man scared of losing all he's got" (echoes of "Sitting By the Riverside"). He freely admits, "I haven't got a steady occupation / And I can't afford a telephone / I haven't got a stereo, radio, or video" -- OR "A mortgage, overdraft, or bank loan." (I love how deftly Ray spins that list around.) Wouldn't we all like to be in that situation, especially nowadays? Suddenly this song is totally relevant.
"So I'm just sitting in the midday sun," he muses lazily, "Just soaking up that currant bun." (It took me years to find out that "currant bun" is Cockney rhyming slang for "sun.") And then, ever so casually, he points out, "Everybody thinks I'm crazy / Everybody says I'm dumb / But when I see the people shouting with each other / I'd rather be an out-of-work bum." So here I am, the night before the election, with nothing to do except finally clean my apartment and go walk my dog. Okay, today the weather's gray and overcast and a little chilly, but I'm heading outdoors anyway -- gotta go soak up that currant bun for a change.
Sitting in the Midday Sun sample
Friday, October 24, 2008
"Viva! Sea-Tac" / Robyn Hitchcock
At last! Something in my head besides Nick Lowe ("I Live On A Battlefield" had just got in there and would not budge.*) Granted, Robyn Hitchcock appeals to exactly the same lobe of my musical brain, but technically it's a change.
I imagine Robyn knocking out this exuberant ditty in the taxi on the way in from the airport, whacking on the steering wheel with his non-steering hand (the bashing drumbeat is one of the best things about this track). Great opening line -- "People flock like cattle to Seattle after Kurt Cobain" -- far be it from Robyn Hitchcock to join the herd, but he's here anyway. And he loves it, but only in his own inimitable snarky ambivalent way.
This song has that written-on-the-fly quality that Robyn often gives us -- when he grabs a rhyme out of thin air and it's so absurd, he just has to go with it. "Viva Seattle-Tacoma / Viva viva Sea-Tac!" he exults. "Viva viva viva viva viva viva viva viva Sea-Tac / They've got the best computers and coffee and smack!" Thanks to that line, you'll never hear this used in an ad by the Seattle tourist board, which is really too bad, isn't it?
"Coming and going / It has to be Boeing," he rambles on (probably just as he drives on past the hulking Boeing plant), adding, "The best form of defense is blow them up!" So now it won't be bought for a Boeing ad either, I guess. And as the cityscape comes into view, he muses, "The Space Needle points to the sky / The Space Needle's such a nice guy / But you never know..." Whatever pops into his head is fair game. He ends with a Dylanesque talking blues that peters off into absurdity: "Long live everything / In Washington State, including / Everybody, may they live to a million years / May they reproduce until there's no room to go anywhere / Clustered under the Space Needle like / Walking eggs with arms and legs, yeah!"
Robyn, Robyn, Robyn -- you're one in a million, that's for sure.
Viva! Sea-Tac sample
* But hey, was I fighting it? You know me better than that.
At last! Something in my head besides Nick Lowe ("I Live On A Battlefield" had just got in there and would not budge.*) Granted, Robyn Hitchcock appeals to exactly the same lobe of my musical brain, but technically it's a change.
I imagine Robyn knocking out this exuberant ditty in the taxi on the way in from the airport, whacking on the steering wheel with his non-steering hand (the bashing drumbeat is one of the best things about this track). Great opening line -- "People flock like cattle to Seattle after Kurt Cobain" -- far be it from Robyn Hitchcock to join the herd, but he's here anyway. And he loves it, but only in his own inimitable snarky ambivalent way.
This song has that written-on-the-fly quality that Robyn often gives us -- when he grabs a rhyme out of thin air and it's so absurd, he just has to go with it. "Viva Seattle-Tacoma / Viva viva Sea-Tac!" he exults. "Viva viva viva viva viva viva viva viva Sea-Tac / They've got the best computers and coffee and smack!" Thanks to that line, you'll never hear this used in an ad by the Seattle tourist board, which is really too bad, isn't it?
"Coming and going / It has to be Boeing," he rambles on (probably just as he drives on past the hulking Boeing plant), adding, "The best form of defense is blow them up!" So now it won't be bought for a Boeing ad either, I guess. And as the cityscape comes into view, he muses, "The Space Needle points to the sky / The Space Needle's such a nice guy / But you never know..." Whatever pops into his head is fair game. He ends with a Dylanesque talking blues that peters off into absurdity: "Long live everything / In Washington State, including / Everybody, may they live to a million years / May they reproduce until there's no room to go anywhere / Clustered under the Space Needle like / Walking eggs with arms and legs, yeah!"
Robyn, Robyn, Robyn -- you're one in a million, that's for sure.
Viva! Sea-Tac sample
* But hey, was I fighting it? You know me better than that.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
"I Read A Lot" / Nick Lowe
Lord I'm sorry, I've gone AWOL again. I've got one more week to finish this #&@$% book and then I promise.
But hey, all work and no play makes Jack Nicholson turn into an axe-wielding murderer, right? So I did take off Friday night to go see Nick Lowe perform at Carnegie Hall (or at any rate, Carnegie Hall's downstairs recital venue, Zankel Hall). A pretty classy spot for the old geezer, eh? He was in fine voice, relaxed and happy, and...oh, screw the set list and credits, I'm in love with Nick all over again (will this madness never stop?) and just had to post this little bit.
This is a new song he's trying out on the road. Although, as he said Friday night, since he already sang it the last time he was in New York, which was only last April (lucky me!) he can't really get away with calling it a new song anymore. Now it's a just a load of old tosh.
Ha.
Anybody who thinks this guy isn't at the top of his game has to be tone-deaf. Watch, listen, and enjoy -- it's divine.
I Read A Lot video
Lord I'm sorry, I've gone AWOL again. I've got one more week to finish this #&@$% book and then I promise.
But hey, all work and no play makes Jack Nicholson turn into an axe-wielding murderer, right? So I did take off Friday night to go see Nick Lowe perform at Carnegie Hall (or at any rate, Carnegie Hall's downstairs recital venue, Zankel Hall). A pretty classy spot for the old geezer, eh? He was in fine voice, relaxed and happy, and...oh, screw the set list and credits, I'm in love with Nick all over again (will this madness never stop?) and just had to post this little bit.
This is a new song he's trying out on the road. Although, as he said Friday night, since he already sang it the last time he was in New York, which was only last April (lucky me!) he can't really get away with calling it a new song anymore. Now it's a just a load of old tosh.
Ha.
Anybody who thinks this guy isn't at the top of his game has to be tone-deaf. Watch, listen, and enjoy -- it's divine.
I Read A Lot video
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