As for female songwriter-y records

I thought the subject was uneven output. As for the female songsmiths...

My favorite obscure ones are all by women with very small output:
Karen Dalton, It's So Hard to Tell..., friend of Fred Neil and Bob Dylan
Erica Pomerance, You Used to Think, drugged out, meandering, theatric disaster (in a good way, I swear)
Linda Perhacs, Parallelograms, floaty and light, nice

Between the 3, I only know of one other record (Karen Dalton made a second)

Bryter Eayrlier

In response to Arum's last post: Talk Talk and the Gang of Four are the first two that come to mind. The Grateful Dead and the Rolling Stones, from a different era. (I know the early Talk Talk stuff does have its fans, including No Doubt).

And yes, despite one or two good songs ("Disamistade" comes to mind), that last de Andre record (Anime Salve) ain't no La Buona Nouvella.

On to recent listening: Chris McGregor. Rock fans will know Chris McGregor because he played piano on Bryter Layter (Joe Boyd's new book is helping to draw attention to this fact). He has a long history before and after that album, which the record that just left my turntable (Blue Notes for Johnny) emphasizes. McGregor spent the early 60s in South Africa in the group the Blue Notes. They were certainly odd for that country--McGregor was the group's sole caucasian member at a time of apartheid. While all 5 members had active jazz careers after their move to England, the ones with the broadest visibility were McGregor and trumpeter Mongezi Feza, who appeared on Robert Wyatt's classic Ruth is Stranger than Richard. The strangest record from the bunch was Dyani/Temiz/Feza's Music for Xaba, which I have a hard time describing. I quite enjoyed Blue Notes for Johnny for many reasons, including its timeless recording/production style from an era (the late 80s) where even experimental jazz tended to sound "modern" on record. It's a tribute to their recently deceased (as of 1987) bassist Johnny Dyani by the 3 surviving Blue Notes: McGregor, Dudu Pukwana (reeds), and Louis Moholo (percussion). For their ability to combine truly strange jazz influences with the energy of local/traditional South African music, the lengthy catalog of the members of the Blue Notes is too long to list and definitely worth pursuing with open ears.

A musical inquiry: the lady sings

Three artists I think I like but who have probably done great things and awful things.

Where do I start?

• Buffy Sainte-Marie
• Carly Simon
• Joan Baez

If you live in Brooklyn, feel free to skip these artists and substitute the Fabrizio De Andre for my Leonard Cohen.

If you're in Canada and you speak up, I will do somersaults, or have the cats do them at my bidding.

~Arum
listening to "Unsatisfied" by the Replacements, ironically, since I just posted about it a while back

FUCK YOU. Yeah.

Tuesday at workday's close, Arum was in a fantastic mood. He'd discovered something really useful to help him achieve a pie-in-the-sky work scheme he'd be knowing around for a while.

And what a great evening, so beautiful! He put down the windows and turned the stereo up, heads south back to urban wonderful, the music loud enough hear windows open, but not ungodly loud.

Fast forward 25 miles, and they were fast miles, Arum's off the express way and waiting to turn home, and he's happy as hell. There's a duct tape Buick convertible with lovely rap music thumping next to him. He smiles at the fellow, a white guy with a really bad haircut, and even worse acne, and this conversation occurs over the loud riff of "Walk On":

ACNE GUY leaning toward Arum's open window: "TURN THAT FUCKING SHIT DOWN!"

ARUM his impossibly good mood intact, leaning toward the window with the single message "huh?" conveyed by his tilted head: "BURN THE DUCKY PIT DOWN?"

ACNE GUY, startled: "TURN THAT FUCKING SHIT DOWN!"

ARUM with a look even more quizzical, friendly and dopey: "SHIZNIT THE PARTY CLOWN?"

ACNE GUY, starting to get it: "FUCK YOU"

ARUM, now staring forward and smiling so wide his mouth is opens, nods: "YEAH."

Green light.

Internet Radio Day of Silence

Wondering why Pandora, Rhapsody, my favorite WOXY.com, and other internt radio sources aren't playing any music today? It's to protest the absurd an grossly unbalanced new royalty scheme due to go into effect on July 15th.

It's the Internet Radio Day of Silence.

If you're a fan of internet radio, please take a minute and contact your congressperson about this issue.

Listening

After hearing a few songs by Joan as Police Woman, I went ahead and shelled out the $9.90 to buy her record in iTunes. There's certainly some good stuff, but I'm not sure about the record as a whole. I'll keep listening. Dig her here. And Here. And Here.

Also listening to Marianne Faithful's 2004 release Before the Poison on which seh collaborated with PJ Harvey, Nick Cave and John Brion. I heard this when it came out, but soemhow it didn't stick, but a friend just came back from a road trip singing its praises, so I'm going back for another listen, and I'm enjoying it quite a bit.

Lady in a Turban by the Cocaine Tree

This morning brought Van Dyke Parks Discover America to my turntable. He's been "hip" again lately after his collaboration with Joanna Newsom. People like to talk about his debut Song Cycle. It's a weird psychedelic/un-psychedelic meander through strangely structured and arranged songs, a bit like Tim Buckley with more ambitious orchestration and less remarkable vocals. Discover America, however, is far stranger. It has a comedic element that leaves it where comedic elements usually land... ignored. Layers of deadpan vocals, absurdist lyrics, and a steelband don't typically plead with fans to scream for more; they're more likely to alienate people. The crazy part is that such an infuriating and purposely misguided record includes huge string sections, many vocalists, and lots more--the ambition wasn't abandoned or even diminished just because the frustration knob was turned up to 11. It does include a cover of Little Feat's "Sailin' Shoes" and cameos by most of that band (plus Buell Neidlinger, Gloria Jones, and a guy named Gary Coleman).

Also Lou Reed Street Hassle. A friend once dated a woman who cried every time she listened to this record. I can't top that story.

As a Man Grows Older

I've listened to Flying Saucer Attack pretty much non-stop since I first heard them in 1993 or '94. I stopped purposely listening to either Built to Spill or the Replacements about 10 years ago. Not sure what any of this says about me, or about aging. The one big change I have seen in my taste the last few years is increased openness for electronic music with beats. I didn't hear anything remotely like the Cog-Polmo Polpo 12" or Denzel & Huhn's Paraport in 1997--there wasn't much that resembled them to hear. Had I heard them, though, I know I wouldn't have had the patience to appreciate them. When I listened to both the other night, I enjoyed them. I could weigh in on strengths and weaknesses of each, but I'll leave it at the fact that both are weird and fascinating and worth a listen.

I'll weigh in for longer on things I've been familiar with for many years.

1. OMD, Dazzle Ships One of my favorite records in 1995. Its insane use of compression sounds weird to my ears today, but it gives a really distinct synthetic character that resembles little else. The pop songs are memorable, and the "futuristic" lyrics don't seem embarrassingly dated (an impressive feat). The interstitial material is more charming than distracting, and the whole thing flows quite well. It's no longer one of my favorite records, but I remain a committed fan. While everyone is probably familiar with later OMD records, their commercial phase didn't start until later in their career. This record and Architecture & Morality, which are my favorites, came after the "goth" singles ("Enola Gay", "Electricity") and before the later Top 40 style.

2. Hans-Joachim Roedelius, Durch Die Wuste. I've been a Cluster fan since 1995 or so, but this record is newer to me. It's not as consistent as the Cluster & Eno record from the same time, but is definitely similar in many ways, with Conny Plank recording both. There's a lot of compression here too, but they're more traditional sounding compressors, that bring the drums into the sound-world of the synthetic instruments without sounding as syntactically modern. I'm a huge fan of the floaty repetitions of the Cluster and related records of this era, and this one is a good example of why.

rambling on the aging process and why I listen to difficult music less, or acknowledging that I do

The last few weeks I’ve been thinking a lot about how tastes change over time. Part of it is that some people listen to more and more difficult music as time goes by, and I noticed since I got my iPod, I’m more likely to give artists I didn’t like I second shot. Those later Built to Spill records I didn’t think were anywhere near as good as There’s Nothing Wrong With Love? They’re still pretty good. The Replacements? I tolerated them at best from high school on, but now that I listen to them, well, the production isn’t to my taste but I like the attitude and the lyrics a lot more than I did when I was young. “Unsatisfied” and “Here Comes a Regular” are way better than I remember. Rocket from the Crypt? Still not my thing, oh well. The library and eMusic both encourage me to try stuff out I wouldn’t normally listen to.

It’s tied in part to my comment to Sorrow. I hadn’t thought of Flying Saucer Attack for a while. I remember playing them when I lived on Wood in Chicago and my Puerto Rican neighbors asking me, sincerely, if everything was alright. Kinda reminds me of the story (lore?) about The Swans having a practice space in a neighborhood and scaring the hell out of some Mexican family that eventually started sacrificing chickens and leaving them on their doorstep. I think Tiller told me that. I suppose I listen to my share of angry or loud or discordant music, but I do listen to it less. You get older, and Kris Kristofferson and Tom T Hall and Joan Baez make more sense. It’s chilling.

I suppose I’m not dead yet. If I can dig out an FSA CD, I’ll listen to it. And I’m tempted to buy a bunch of Okka Disc stuff, including some Brotzmann-related stuff, just because Bruno, who runs my favorite neighborhood bar and the jazz label Okka Disc, has such good taste, I’m curious to buy something and listen to it, imagining hearing it with his ears and mindset.

~Arum
currently listening to Phoebe Snow

responding to a comment in the main thread

I find the main thread easier to read than comments. Our gracious (flealess) host pointed out in one his unfamiliarity with Globe Unity, so I'll give a brief synopsis here. Globe Unity is a large group of predominantly European improvisers in a jazz-informed style making strange music. The line-up varies, but the central organizer is definitely pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach. Their records are overwhelming from sheer mass of crazed players, and this early one from 1973 is definitely not an exception. Line-up includes notables like Evan Parker, Peter Brotzmann, Paul Rutherford, Peter Kowald, and Paul Lovens. It's as impressive as would be expected from such a marquee cast. It's one of the early releases on the German label FMP, which continues to specialize in this style.

Right now I'm listening to the new September Collective CD on Mosz, All the Birds were Anarchists. I'd been impressed by the little bit I'd heard by Barbara Morgenstern, who is 1/3 of the group, and what I read about the album sounded interesting. (plus it looks cool and has a great title). Unfortunately, on first listen, I'm underwhelmed. There are interesting things happening, but the looped rhythms are overly stylized and predictable, so that the other interesting parts get buried underneath. It's tasteful and very well-executed, but so far (and I just got it today, so it may be an overly hasty judgement), it's definitely not flooring me.

Cubemates are funny.

Okay, so this guy who sits in the cubical next to mine was telling me what an awesome record Jethro Tull's Broadsword & the Beast album is. He was waxing poetic about how unique of a
musical experience it is, and how fine a sound is. And this might be a perfect soundtrack to playing some WoW, but I'll leave that to Arum and his armies of darkness... Anyhow, I went to Amazon and listened to sound samples...(and you should too, because this is quite a "unique"
experience)

http://www.amazon.com/Broadsword-Beast-Jethro-Tull/dp/B000008H1S

Freaking hilarious, this is the quintessential definition of "hobbit rock". Anyhow, it was recorded in 1983, so the production is very 80s, meaning the drum sounds are abyssmal...dreck...there's so much reverb, it's just awful, and inspiring for it's inspidness...

Now, you're probably wondering about this guy (I know I was). But he's actually pretty cool. First of all, we got on to the subject because he was lighting up when talking about Led Zeppelin's Whole Lotta Love making the hair on his neck stand up and then extolling the virtues of Black Sabbath's first album... Secondly, I'll cut the guy some slack as he grew up in Korea. For a Korean engineer, he's alright, I'm going to turn him onto the Decemberists' The Tain...I think that should right his ship...and rattle his cage... (and thanks to Arum for turning me onto this epic song!).

some recent listening, no clever title

The last two records that I've listened to and wanted to write about have left me a bit short on words. Flying Saucer Attack New Lands and Globe Unity 73: Live in Wuppertal both feel too obvious and canonical to say too much about. Both are very much of their eras. New Lands mid/late-90s lo-fi guitar ambience, Globe Unity early-70s huge European jazz-tinged improvisation freak-out. Acclaimed records on respected labels (though it's hard to equate Drag City with FMP's insanely consistent quality of releases). Both records define their eras and styles more than transcending them, but they're both as fine examples of their respective styles as could be hoped for. Both are dark/subversive and fantastically beautiful at the same time. And, in the end, they have really nothing in common except that I happened to listen to them over the last few days.

Punk Planet is no more, so says the Village Voice

Punk Planet is ceasing publication, says this Village Voice article. The second paragraph, for several sentences, kinda nails it for me. Start at "I don't know if I can in good conscience call Punk Planet a consistently great magazine...." read through how great it was in all its imperfection, because he kinda nails it, and stop before any praise for Jessica Hopper comes in, because, well, she bores me.

Retirement Community Overthrow

I'm listening to, and enjoying, the Project Perfect CD on Community Library. The recordings date from Portland, 2000-2002, and PM+ is some sort of reissue. Andy Brown from Jessamine and Fontanelle is one of the brains behind the thing, and it's my favorite record he's been involved with.

I'm having a really tough time describing this one. It sounds vaguely like Miles Davis Get Up with It but it's a lot sparser and even more lost/meandering. It's a lot less riff-centered than Tortoise and a lot mellower than This Heat. It's more confusing and less lucid (or structured) than any of these reference points. The closest comparison might be Spaceheads, but without the most overt dance grooves (though there are weird beats thrown in sometimes).

I've listened to PM+ a couple of times and have found it a bit impenetrable, definitely strange and fascinating.

Hooks 'n' Licks 'n' Cigarette Tricks

I'll be brief. I'm currently listening to Guns 'n' Roses's Appetite for Destuction and it is fucking awesome. I was in junior high when this album came out. I loved it then, and I love it now. It is probably one of the best commericial 'metal' albums ever. The hooks are great, the licks are smoking, and Axl is totally in charge. I remember listening to my cassette in the car a lot with my dad. His favorite track was Mr. Brownstone. He liked the syncopated beat, but neither of us realized that the song was about heroin. I remember once my dad got pulled over for speeding and Appettie was on the stereo, and when the cop pulled up he could hear it. He let my dad off with a warning, and suggested that he turn down the music. My dad pulled away and turned up the volume, feeling (I think) a little rebellious and cool listening to 'heavy metal' with his son.

It's funny to think of this album as heavy metal, because I listen to it now, and it's pure classic rock moves, which is part of why it has endured so well.

One of these days I'll wax lyrical about the LA Rock scene, and I'll draw a line connecting Appetite to Stone Temple Pilots's Tiny Music from the Vatican Giftshop, which is the standout record for the 90s from the LA rock scene, and another record that I love, despite being maligned by rock snobs.

And sometime, too, I'll put down a few thoughts on Scott Weiland and Axl and the Phenomenon of the Rock Star through the lens of Belgian theologian Edward Schillebeeckx's notion of the Saving Remnant.

More on covers...

Johnny Cash went out in style. His fertile pairing in those last years with Rick Rubin tapped a rich vein of soulful performance, recorded in a way in tune with the moment, and yet that I think will prove timeless.

Johnny Cash is a commanding performer and a deep, historied , dark personality, a known symbol in an of himself in American culture.

Whether he or his management put together this pairing of Rubin and Cash, it’ll preserve his legacy, and it was an extended parting shot at extending his songbook, and cementing his name across generations in popular culture.

But I feel Rubin’s fingerprints all over these song choices, or at least the ones we’re looking at, and while the old man wasn’t exactly propped up and asked to sing songs he didn’t know at all, sometimes, well, it feels kinda close to that. That the commanding performer Cash was, and the personality he established across decades, it carried him gloriously doing those Danzig, Nice Cave, Depeche Mode, Soundgarden, Tom Petty, Neil Diamond, NiN, U2 songs. And while I wouldn’t change it, it doesn’t seem like the same achievement that creating the persona was. I want to hear the Folsom prison record over and over again still, and I’m dying to see his TV show if it ever comes out on DVD.

Lately I’ve been listening to the Rubin-produced Neil Diamond CD, and honestly there’s more original material on that one disc that I like and see merit in than in the whole American catalog of Cash.

So I agree, I See a Darkness, a great song and a great cover, among many covers he did then, chosen for him or by him. I like the original and listen to it often honestly, and in the context of an amazing record Will Oldham conceived. Cash actually gave me more insight into the lyrics with his delivery and made me revisit it. But it was already a song I saw carried a lot of meaning.

I listen with wonder to inventive covers like Joel Phelps (whose vocal style admittedly could be gated and trimmed about 10% of the time) and his piano version of Guns of Brixton by the Clash, as he pulls that song into a while new context and light. Or M Ward doing his sensually acoustic version of Bowie’s Let’s Dance. Man, those are glorious reinventions. I could listen to those over and over again.

Cash didn’t really make art with covers that way for me in those last days. He added good songs to his songbook of competency, and a couple times his authority and delivery really brought new life and fresh eyes to a song for me, like with U2’s “One”, and all this work late in life was probably the best he could do at the time, and it’s often enjoyable as hell to listen to, and it’s a dignified parting shot-- but not the meat of the matter of Johnny Cash, and it’s not the kind of art that a weird, cool, perceptive treatment in a cover can be.

That would be my two copper.

~Arum

currently listening to "Save Me a Saturday Night" by Neil Diamond

Careys Bay Young Drinkers Club

It's cliched and a bit too easy to praise the early-90s output of cacophonous New Zealand eccentrics the Dead C. It's also more than deserved. Tonight I listened to 1992's Clyma Est Mort. From the Fall-derived cover art on, it's probably their least careful, most tossed-off album. It's also truly remarkable. At times it resembles the Sightings, Growing, and (for a brief minute) the Tower Recordings. Even having heard all of those bands for years now, Clyma Est Mort still impresses me, perhaps more than any of them... only it's not a mix-up of those bands by methodical record-collector fans. It predates them all, from 1992! Its purposeful and well-considered (but still chaotic) diversity reminds me a bit of Meat Puppets II, though the two records are obviously quite different. To continue rambling about a band who certainly still receive their due feels like an unnecessary exercise, so I'll stop here.

SNL, Season 1

As some of you may already know, Saturday Night Live, season 1 is out on DVD. I watched the first episode last night, hosted by a young George Carlin. Back then, the show had more music and comedy than sketches, it was very interesting to see. One of the guests was Billy Preston, singing "Nothing from Nothing". They also had Janice Ian singing 2 songs, one was "Seventeen". I've heard that song before, but I never really 'listened' to it, until now. It was quite moving. I don't know much about her, except that she has a lot of albums out there :)


Janis Ian (1967) #29 US
For All the Seasons of Your Mind (1968) #179 US
The Secret Life of J. Eddy Fink (1968)
Who Really Cares (1969)
Present Company (1971)
Stars (1974) #83 US, #63 Japan (1976 release)
Between the Lines (1975) #1 US, #22 Japan
Aftertones (1976) #12 US, #1 Japan
Miracle Row (1977) #45 US, #26 Japan
Best of Janis Ian (collection) 1977 #5 Japan
Janis Ian II (1978) #120 US, #79 Japan
Remember (1978) #72 Japan
Night Rains (1979)
Restless Eyes (1981) #156 US
Uncle Wonderful (1983)
At Seventeen 1990
Up 'Til Now (1992)
Breaking Silence (1993)
Simon Renshaw Presents: Janis Ian Shares Your Pain (1994)
Revenge (1995)
Live on the Test 1976 (1995)
Hunger (1997)
Unreleased 1: Mary's Eyes (1998)
The Bottom Line Encore collection (Live 1980) (1999)
Unreleased 2: Take No Prisoners (2000)
god & the fbi (2000)
Unreleased 3: Society's Child (2001)
Lost Cuts 1 (2002)
Janis Ian Live: Working Without a Net (2003)
Souvenirs: Best of Janis Ian 1972-1981 (collection) (2004)
Billie's Bones (2004)
Folk is the New Black (2006)

And then..

..I looked at the links on the side of the blog and saw that Arum has already linked to Sounds Opinion, which is probably the same exact on that I was talking about. So basically, my post was reiterating what you already know, but LA style. *le sigh*

I will run to tie your shoelaces.

So, I'm going through this time in my life where I really can't get enough of public radio. Sometimes it's the BBC, sometimes NPR. Sometimes, I get to hear theater from a traveling show or from this theater in Los Angeles, or recommendations of books I'll always add to my B.I.N.T.R. (Books I Need to Read; clever, I know) even though I would put money on it that I'd never actually get around to reading. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. (Probably.) There's this show on the station that I listen to called Sounds Opinion. Often times, I don't care much for it (but still listen to, for some reason), but sometimes it's amazing. Tonight, the Decemberists were on. I've never cared one way or another for them-- they weren't my favorite but I wouldn't complain if someone put it on. The show brought it to my attention that they've got much more to them than their albums. The live songs that they performed were awesome. Accordion, melodica, banjo... it's just more impressive when it's live, I guess. There's a great Brian Eno cover on the show, also. I'm not generally one for live recordings, but I enjoy this. Anywho, if you want to listen to it, you can do so here. It's an archive of all of the previous shows as well-- there is some good stuff in there if you look through it.

--

Last night, in Azeroth (or Outland, for those of us who were there) we had a great music conversation. First of all, Titanarum (whom I'm just going to call Arum from now on) can rap. I don't know if you knew that-- but he really can. I felt like the spirit of Rev. Run and DMC were here with me, through the powers of Arum. If you see him on a regular basis, (or even not regular, just.. when you see him) you should ask him to rap for you. I mean, that's gonna be my first request if I ever head that direction. There was also some conversation about Raffi. Yes, the children's singer. Yes, I know he writes songs about sandwiches and whales and sometimes god, but he's a damn good songwriter. I don't actively listen to him or anything, but you can't deny his ability to write a catchy song. What else did we talk about? Hm. It matters not, but is marginally interesting. Mostly the part about Arum being a total rapper. Gang-stuh.

Maybe I'll post something a bit more... interesting later. I have a feeling everyone else who posts here already knows far more about music than I do (which is incredibly intimidating). On the positive side, I'll learn a lot, right? Hahaha.

I just put on Mwng, by the Super Furry Animals. (To end the entry with the current playlist, of course.)