Category: music

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When I decided to take some time off of social media I had some grand plans. I was going to blog, read, and yes listen to music. It was a deliberate choice in order to recharge and take shelter from the unrelenting bad news and constant anger.

Yes, great plans… In reality all I’ve done is listen to music, a good 6 to 7 hours of it a day. This is something that I have done for all of my adult life in lieu of watching TV or movies. I haven’t done much of it in the last 3 or 4 years for a variety of reasons. Now I’m back to listening and wow did I miss it. I feel like my psyche/soul/whatever is being refilled. Maybe I was becoming a savage beast?

The choice of music has been all over the place. Punk, funk, soul, rock, hip hop, classical, jazz, you name it I’ve listened to it. A lot of it comes from random neural firings in my head but some of it is from suggestions by Apple Music.

One of those suggestions was the album From Elvis in Memphis. I’m a fan of The King but I’ll admit that I have always been a purist/snob. Give me 50s Elvis or get out! This particular album was released in 69. Think about what was going on in 69. Woodstock, moon landing, Vietnam. What about Elvis? What was his cultural contribution? In 1969 Elvis released his final films, Change of Habit and The Trouble with Girls along with this album. So um, not exactly capturing the zeitgeist of the times.

Suspicious Minds and In the Ghetto are the hits off of this album. Let’s be clear, they don’t hold a candle to his early hits. They are also emblematic of the quality of the rest of the album. It’s a little schmaltzy, maybe even maudlin at times. It is irrelevant culturally and a pale imitation of Elvis in his heyday. So why am I so enamored with it?

There is a qualitative difference between live and recorded music. Plenty of music is enjoyable live and boring during playback. This album isn’t live but it is recorded incredibly well. Elvis in your room will get your attention. I’m only kind of joking when I say that regular systems let me hear what music sounds like. Good recordings on good systems are enthralling. I can not only hear the music but experience it.

So yeah, I’ve been caught in Elvis’s trap, I can’t get out cause I love it too much (baby)…

Since making some time away from social media I’ve jumped back into my listening habits of old. While some binge TV or movies, I listen to music. And of course I am serious about my system and that always makes it much easier to connect with the music. Upon hearing my system for the first time my cousin said, “It’s like you can watch music!” It really is a different experience than what people usually get out of music there days.

Anyways, I’ve been binging, big time. Started with some old favorites from Dylan’s first couple of albums. Then I decided to tackle an album of his I had always meant to get to, Nashville Skyline.

Lord help me but the worst track on the whole album is the first one, and it’s a duet with Johnny Cash! Seriously though, it’s a mess. The only song I had heard before was “Lay Lady Lay” and the rest seemed to fall in line with that song. Like all Dylan I’ll have to listen a few more times before coming to any solid conclusion.

From there I went on to Phil Ochs, Woodie Guthrie, and then on to to “Mermaid Avenue” which has Woodie Guthrie lyrics put to music by Billy Bragg and Wilco. “Tapestry” by Carol king was next, then “Dusty in Memphis” and on and on and on. It’s fair to say I’ve been missing this a lot.

I’ll leave this post with what I’m listening to right now. I’ve always loved the song “Down and Out in New York City” by James Brown so I decided to check out the album it came from, The Soundtrack to Black Caesar. I have no doubt that it was a terrible film but wow! This sound track is classic 70s JB! Funk and soul for the soul. Plus it was recorded incredibly well. I need to check out more of his albums instead of single songs. Click the picture to hear one of my favorites from the album.

Let’s be real for a second, I love far more than 10 albums but this has been a fun exercise. I really struggled to name my last album but ultimately shrugged and decided to just pick another one I love.

It took me quite a while to warm up to Marquee Moon. I first heard it in college and dismissed it as a band that wanted to sound like the Cars but was trying too hard. Over time I grew to appreciate the sound and its place in history. And I don’t necessarily mean musical history. There is a kind of weariness to it and in my mind that fits in well with the times. I can’t help but hear Vietnam and Watergate fatigue in the sound.

That weariness is also why I’ve never really considered it a punk album. It doesn’t have the attitude and snarl I expect out of punk. Marquee Moon strikes me as a mood album. The guitars are more atmospheric than driving in my opinion. But what a mood! I love the feel and sound of this album, they more than justify its perpetual placement on critics’ best albums lists. It’s another one that too few people have heard.

Punk Rock!

Take a prototypical American punk album, lo-fi, grating, low on talent but high on attitude, and mix it with third wave feminism and you get this album. Bikini Kill was at the forefront of the so-called Riot Girrrl movement, female punk rockers carving out their own space in punk music. Here is a quick primer on the movement as a whole. I think Bikini Kill was easily the most “punk” of all of them.

This album starts with the lead singer Kathleen Hannah yelling, “WE’RE BIKINI KILL AND WE WANT REVOLUTION!!” That sets the stage for the onslaught of guitars, screaming, and general badassery to come. Punk rock has always specialized in confrontational, deliberately antagonizing songs and trying to shock people that they see as antagonists. There are some doozies on this album that fit into that punk archetype like Carnival, Suck my Left One, and White Boy. Also on here is what most people think is their signature song Rebel Girl.

Listening to this in 92 was a revelation. It also reminded me of the music scene I had fallen into at college. Today I think it is bracing, like splashing cold water on your face. I will still listen to this when I need to get my blood pumping and my senses sharpened.

This may be my favorite important album that most people have never heard of or the artist.

Double Nickels on the Dime is an American punk classic. The only song from it most people recognize is Corona because it was used as the theme to the movie Jackass. As an aside, Corona is a brilliant song and it pains me that people’s only connection to it involves the Jackass franchise. Sigh.

Released in 1984, DNOTD features sparse, witty songs with the Minutemen’s signature brevity. “We are time Nazis…” is one of D. Boone’s self descriptive lyrics. Some of my favorite songs on the album include the aforementioned Corona, The Big Foist, Jesus and Tequila, Little Man with a Gun in his Hand, and their taking-the-piss versions of Steely Dan’s Dr. Wu and Van Halen’s Ain’t talking ’bout Love. I think anyone that loves honest, blue collar rock with punk leanings needs to hear this album. I’ll always love it.

This is the fifth installment of my list of my 10 favorite albums. You can see the beginning of it here.

Today’s album still haunts me after all these years.

Pretty on the Inside is not fun to listen to, nor is it filled with songs that you’ll find yourself humming. Harrowing is the best word I can find to describe it. The album seems to chronicle a woman’s descent into heroin and prostitution. Abusive relationships, the threat of overdoses, and the constant fear of herself round out the fun times. The songs hold together really well and the lyrics are both well crafted and delivered expertly.

I don’t usually like concept albums, or even albums with a narrative thread. Most of them never transcend the didacticism of their story telling. I always imagine the artist presenting their very important work to me and I’m supposed to be the grateful receiver of their message. Pretty on the Inside manages to transcend this problem by simultaneously painting an excruciatingly stark painting of this woman’s life and not caring if you “get something” out of it or not. The lyrics and performance feel too honest to be just stories. Knowing what we know about Courtney Love’s life makes me sure she has first hand knowledge of what happens to the protagonist on this album.

I love this album because it is an honest, complete piece of performance art. Love has managed to make a towering monument to self-loathing and bad decisions. I think it is important to experience art like this from time to time in order to empathize with people in these sorts of situations. Sometimes you have to stand in the dark in order to see the light. This album gives you a taste of what living in a spiritual and emotional darkness must be like.