There's A Storm A-Comin

Okay--actually it is here. Tropical Storm Hanna is rolling through as we speak. As evidence that it isn't much more right now than a big windy rain storm, I took the time to throw up a new Mixwit volume dedicated to storm--or more accurately, rain.

A few words about the mix--first, as always it is limited to what MW has (as I haven't taken the time to learn how to add songs)--hence a few obvious choices are missing such as "Wasn't that a Mighty Storm" by Tom Rush. I also didn't add a couple obvious songs cuz truth be told they aren't my favorites (in case you wonder why that obvious Neil Young isn't there)--although I did put the Scorpions on there as I just couldn't see how such a mix didn't include that song. Finally, I focused a bit more on rain given the type of storm we are having so you get "Fool in the Rain" rather than "When the Levee Breaks" by the Zep. And of course I realize that all the songs aren't really about rain or storms! So there you have it. What did I miss?

Modern Guilt . . . Whatever!

I have decided that Beck put out his new album, Modern Guilt with me in mind—or at least people with my particular kind of attachment (casual) to his music. That said I think that pretty much anyone who likes Beck is going to like this one to some (or to a greater) degree.

Hardcore Beck fan? I am going to guess you like it, but not as much as whatever you think the core Beck album is. Or, perhaps you think Beck is too clanky/techno/x-games for you? This still has some of that, but I think if you have danced around other Beck albums, this might be the one for you. Or if you are like me and you listened in on those key, ur, popular/critically acclaimed, albums, Mellow Gold and Odelay (okay I have Mutations too), and liked them but weren’t committed enough to explore more offerings, I am going to recommend you head out and pick this up.

First of all, Beck has just simply given us some great songs here that have that cool psychedelic sound set in his signature techno-remix feel. It really makes me think Sgt. Pepper’s. Okay, I don’t mean I think it is the classic that Sgt. Pepper’s is, but it has that feel within a 2008 Beck album and I don’t use that comparison lightly. Let me also say that I am keenly aware that I am often guilty of judging albums by their earlier tracks and as Rolling Stone suggests: “taken as a whole, the album's first five songs stand among Beck's strongest work”—so that might be part of my bias.

Now as for the content of the songs, folks keep saying, as Paste does, that this is “Beck’s darkest record to date.” Yeah okay—can I say Johnny M. Yes, Beck is worrying about aging, the environment, the world . . .but who isn’t. I have to say that I think UNCUT has it just right with the focus and tone of their review.

There has always been a shade of Austin Powers to Beck’s more upbeat efforts – one thinks of “Pay No Mind” and its pastiche video – and on frisky rug-cutter “Gamma Ray” Beck sings of “these ice caps melting down” and the “transistor sound” over Carnaby Street chug and twang, his voice phasing across the track. “Chemtrails” – wait, is he concerned about the environment? – blends plaintive sighing and refrains about “too many people” with the kind of lolloping funk, tumbling drums and driving guitars that Ride mastered on Nowhere. . . . So Beck is finally fun again, and you suspect the person most surprised by how well Modern Guilt turned out is the guy who made it.

For more evidence I give you the title track which has lyrics that capture mid-life angst as well as any, but the beat is just too fun for anyone to get to worried about that.

Harps and Angels

Randy Newman might love LA, but his verbal delivery always puts me in smack dab in the middle of New Orleans, which somehow seems appropriate today. That sense is magnified by many of the tunes having a NOLA jazz feel to the arrangements, although some sound more like something from a musical. But if you like Newman's style of telling you a story more than singing you one, and the synthesis of stage and jazz is something you appreciate, you are going to really love this album.

Of course, on any Newman album, lyrics are key--I mean how many people can work "arrhythmic" into a song. That would be part of his heart attack/near death title track in which God and his angels provide the following advice:

When they lay you on the table
Better keep your business ("bid-ness") clean
'Fore they lay you on the table
Better keep you business clean
Don't want no back stabbing, ass grabbing
You know exactly what I mean
Alright girls -- we're outta here

Is it inappropriate of me to laugh at the idea of God calling his angels girls? Speaking of girls, how about these heartfelt lines for his daughter in "Potholes":

I even love my teenage daughter
There's no accounting for it
Apparently I don't care how I'm treated
My love is unconditional or something

Of course, all of these edgier observations that make the soft songs all the more sincere.

But ultimately, much of this album is political commenatry on the state of our country, particularly the direction we have been heading as of late. There is this from "A Piece of the Pie":

Jesus Christ it stinks in here high and low
The rich are getting richer
I should know
While we're going up
You're going down
And no one gives a shit but Jackson Browne

And then there is the most direct criticism of the album offered up in "A Few Words in Defense of Our Country"--here are a few choice verses.

I'd like to say a few words
In defense of our country
Whose people aren't bad
Nor are they mean
How the leaders we have
While they're the worst that we've had
Are hardly the worst
This poor world has seen

Take the Ceasars for example
Within the first few of them
They were sleeping with their sister,
Stashing little boys in swimming pools
And burning down the city
And one of 'em, on of 'em
Appointed his own horse to be Consul of the Empire
That's like vice president or something
Wait a minute, that not a very good example is it?

[snip]

A President once said,
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself"
Now we're supposed to be afraid
It's patriotic and color-coded
And what are we supposed to be afraid of?
Why being afraid
That's what terror means, doesn't it?
That's what it used to mean

You know it kind of pisses me off
That this Supreme Court is going to outlive me
A couple of young Italian fellas and a brother on the Court now, too
But I defy you, anywhere in the world,
to find me two Italians as tight-assed as the two Italians we got
And as for the brother, well
Pluto's not a planet anymore either.

The end of an Empire is messy at best
And this Empire is ending
Like all the rest
Like the Spanish Armada adrift on the sea
We're adrift in the land of the brave and the home of the free

Somehow, Newman's concerns about this country's leadership seem appropriate given the news from both ends of the Mississippi today. Let us sincerely hope the the focus today and this week is on the natural event as opposed to the political one.

School Days

Today marks the end of the first week of school for The Artist and The Engineer (the Little Boss starts next week). So in honor of the boys I have put up a new Mixwit volume of tunes about school--or at least mention school. Surely I haven't even begun to scratch the surface of school tunes (although let me just say that since it was the beginning of the year I didn't put that Alice Cooper tune in the mix), so let me know what tunes you think should be added (and if Mixwit has it, I will add it).

Heh, heh, heh . . . .hey!

Just yesterday I asked someone what kind of music they like to listen to (just for the record, it was very telling) and of course I am over 20 and I did start this blog. So I am feeling duly chastised. Of course you shouldn’t be laughing either.

(hat tip to IndieMuse)

Random (sometimes second) Thoughts on Music from the Road

Thanks to a recent purchasing binge and a great big ole stack of discs that Wobs dropped on me right before vacation, there was quite a bit of new music listening--or I should say listening to music that was new to me and some of it was actually new. So here are a few random thoughts on those discs (although truth be told I didn't get to all of them--I mean really you have to know that someone who goes to the same place for vacation each summer isn't in all that an experimental mood when he hits the road for a summer break!).

• John Mayer Okay, so I already wrote about On Any Given Thursday and some of you pointed out that all the entertainment/gossip reporting about JM might get in the way of appreciating his music--and indeed it did seem that for the two weeks after I picked up the disc, I saw pictures of this in every mag rack I passed (do I get points for not naming names and posting a picture in a shameless attempt to drive traffic to my site?). Now I am sure that there are hipsters out there who will be just too cool for this album given his pop status (since all things pop are, well, not hip), but I am going to stick by this pick, although I am not sure it means I am going to go out and buy a bunch of his studio albums.
• Fleet Foxes This one was on my list to get from the first review I read and after hearing the cut "Mykonos" which leads off the Mixwit comp over there on the right (although it is from an earlier EP and not on this first full album). Critics have pretty universally talked-up this album and as I noted earlier, the comparisons to CSN abound. But I gotta say, I am not quite there. It is a decent first album--decent. There is some fine singing and wonderful harmonies (sometimes more Beach Boys than CSN) and the lead, Robin Pecknold, has a really strong voice. But as an album--despite having listened to it a lot (and noting Neats' eyeroll each time) I just haven't been as impressed as some. The songs weren't consistently strong, the mix seemed a bit foggy to me somehow, and it didn't make me want to play it until the grooves were gone. I could see checking out another effort from them as they clearly have lots of talent, but this would get one of those 3 and 1/2 out of 5 ratings for me making one wonder if it was more 4 or more 3. I will let you be the judge.
• Loose Fur Stripped down Wilco credited with leading to a line-up change and new sound for Wilco heading into their fourth album. Any Wilco fan is going to dig this album, Born Again in the USA, but the question for me is if and where to start dipping into the Jim O'Rourke discography--the solo one, although feel free to educate me on his Sonic Youth stint as well. You can check out Loose Fur's "The Ruling Class" on the Mixwit comp as well.
• The Walkmen Okay so Wobs laid two of their discs on me, Bows and Arrows (which made me think of some amped up version of U2) and A Hundred Miles Off which I immediately liked more. I confess to not having listened to either carefully enough to comment critically, although I can't quite tell if they are one of those bands that are just a bit too something for me, or if I am eventually going to really like. I recently read a review of their new album You and Me over at Pitchfork where they noted: "You & Me isn't as hard or immediate as the band's earlier records, but that's not a complaint; its sound is coy, and invites you to spend time with it." Perhaps that will be the way with these guys for me.
  
• Bon Iver Lastly, as this seems to be going on, I never came back to Bon Iver after my first mention of this album and my hopes that it would be as strong as "Skinny Love" which is the first tune I heard--it is. I am not sure how to describe this meditative and yet edgy disc. The guitar sound (and work in many cases) is quite unique--the singing and lyrics are intriguing and the overall songs are wonderful (and yes it does somehow sound composed by a guy in a cabin in winter). Many have commented on the strength of this album, so I won't go on, but here is one observation that might not have shown up anywhere and that is about how many of the songs end. They seem to come undone, to disassemble--as if the song is so constructed, so tightly constructed, that he just can't hold it together and it all falls apart in some clanky chaos--and somehow that fits just perfectly with this album for me.

Okay, so that is enough for now--meant to comment on the new Beck, but I think I will leave that for another post. And just a heads up--the nights are beginning to have that autumnal feeling to them, so you can imagine to see a slight shift into more posts about jazz here. It will be interesting to see how genre specific folks are in their listening habits!

Summertime Sunday

Sunday often means a day of listening to WPFW, a great jazz-oriented community radio station here in DC. The Sunday line-up is killer (in fact it is the whole reason I am a member and I suspect others are as well). It starts with Tom Cole and his show "G-Strings" focused on guitar and other string-driven jazz--perfect for a Sunday morning paper and a cup of coffee. It is followed by "Sunday Kind of Love" hosted by Miyuki Williams who tends to focus on vocals, particularly women vocalists. Then you get "Guy's Groove" with Guy Middleton in the afternoon with a great mix of bop and R&B. And finally, there is "Sound of Surprise" with Larry Applebaum who spins lots of new releases and reissues.

I find the whole day perfectly timed--particularly for a cool fall or winter Sunday--or even a warm summer day when you are trying to get the basement refinished (like today). I would definitely suggest you check it out if you are in town or hanging around your computer on a Sunday (link to the main page over in the right hand column).

I was particularly glad that I tuned in today as when I did I immediately noticed that they were playing a bunch of Eva Cassidy. It soon became clear that the reason was that a new collection of previously unreleased tunes were being released today on a new disc entitled Somewhere. For those who don't know Eva's music and her story, she passed in 1996 at only age 33, but left a serious imprint on the music scene with her amazing vocals.

My first experience with her music was on a beautiful November morning driving home from a meeting in downtown DC about 6 years ago. As I drove north on 16th Ave., her rendition of "Autumn Leaves" from Live at Blues Alley came on. It didn't hurt that the sun was slanting through the trees lining the street and colored leaves were floating gently to the ground. Needless to say, that album was quickly added to my collection and I would recommend it to anyone--great live music that ranges from Irving Berlin to Curtis Mayfield to Sting to Al Green with a tight band.

Miyuki had the new disc in the studio along with Eva's parents who were there for an interview. The samples were all solid--but I particularly found the arrangement of "Summertime" both wonderful to listen to and heartbreaking as I imagined her folks listening to these lyrics. The arrangement was caught on Live @ Pearls (a bootleg as far as I know) and is used here on this YouTube contribution--I recommend closing your eyes and listening.