3.01.2002

 
Little riffs
The lost chord

I could see a huge Clash revival on the horizon in the next year or two. Part of that will no doubt come when the group is eligible for induction in Cleveland; I imagine, if there's any justice in the world, they'll make it on the first ballot. This being a Hall of Fame which has Bonnie Raitt and the Ramones enshrined but has rebuffed Patti Smith, Jackson Browne, and Black Sabbath, there isn't a lot of evidence of justice in that I.M. Pei building on the lake, so who knows how it will play.

They certainly should make it in: for acts of significance, popularity, and, most of all quality who made their first recordings after 1976, I can name few other comparable acts: Prince, Madonna, U2, maybe REM if we close our eyes after Bill Berry left the group, maybe Public Enemy.

The Clash were much more important (and more interesting) than the Police, but like the Police, they too have resisted the reunion temptation, with Strummer doing solo work and subbing for Shane MacGowan in the Pogues and Mick Jones having varying success with different iterations of Big Audio Dynamite.

Given the inconsistent later careers of its members, it's sometimes easy to forget how crucial and alive the band was. If you didn't already buy Lester Bangs' only published anthology, Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung, when Almost Famous and a fine turn by Phillip Seymour Hoffman (the performance of the movie, in my opinion, fuck Kate Hudson) made positive that everyone had at least heard of Bangs, then it's perhaps unlikely that you'll buy it now.

You should, and if you already own a copy, do yourself a favor and re-read Bangs' three part series on the Clash written for New Musical Express. It might be the best thing of Bangs' I've ever read, with the possible exception of the interview with Lou Reed where Bangs took his musical hero apart for releasing to the masses the two-disc fuck you of Metal Machine Music. (The Amazon.com reviews of MMM are priceless.)

In the Clash piece, Bangs discusses what the Clash represented, not just musically, but politically. Punk here in America was a rebellion against consumerism and the establishment. In the UK, the Sex Pistols turned it into a post-modern experiment, a commentary on media in and of itself. But the Clash made it all about liberation, on all fronts.

Here's an excerpt from the Bangs' piece:

"So much of what's (doles) out as punk merely amounts to saying I suck, you suck, the world sucks, and who gives a damn -- which is, er, ah, somehow insufficient.

Don't ask me why; I'm just an observer, really. But any observer could tell that, to put it in terms of Us vs. Them, saying the above is exactly what They want you to do, because it amounts to capitulation. It is unutterably boring and disheartening to try to find some fun or meaning while shoveling through all the shit we've been handed the last few years, but merely puking on yourself is not gonna change anything. (I know, 'cause I tried it.) I guess what it all boils down to is:

(a) You can't like people who don't like themselves; and
(b) You gotta like people who stand up for what they believe in, as long as what they believe in is
(c) Righteous.

A precious and elusive quality, this righteousness... I should say that being righteous means you're more or less on the side of the angels, waging Armageddon for the ultimate victory of the forces of Good over the Kingdom of Death (see how perilously we skirt hippiedom here?), working to enlighten others as to their own possibilities rather than merely sprawling in the muck yodeling about what a drag everything is.

The righteous minstrel may be rife with lamentations and criticisms of the existing order, but even if he doesn't have a coherent program for social change he is informed of hope. The MC5 were righteous where the Stooges were not. The third and fourth Velvet Underground albums were righteous, the first and second weren't. (Needless to say, Lou Reed is not righteous). Patti Smith has been righteous. The Stones have flirted with righteousness (e.g., "Salt of the Earth"), but when they were good the Beatles were all-righteous. The Sex Pistols are not righteous, but, perhaps more than any other new wave band, the Clash are.

The reason they are is that beneath their wired harsh soundscape lurks a persisten humanism. It's hard to put your finger on in the actual lyrics, which are mostly pretty despairing... To appreciate it in the Clash's music you might have to be the sort of person who could see Joe strummer crying out for a riot of his own as someone making a positive statement. You perceive that as much as this music seeths with rage and pain, it also champs at the bit of the present system of things, lunging after some glimpse of a new and better world.

I know it's easy to be cynical about all this; in fact, one of the most uncool things you can do these days is to be committed about anything. The Clash are so committed they're downright militant .... The Clash are authentic because their music carries such brutal conviction, not because they're Noble Savages."

Okay, one more quote from Bangs:

"[The Clash] actually play better and certainly more interestingly when they slow down and get, well, funky. You can hear it in the live if not studio version of "Police and Thieves," as well as in "(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais," probably the best thing they've written. Somewhere in their assimilation of reggae is the closest thing to yet to the lost chord, the msising link between black music and white noise, rock capable of making a bow to black forms without smearing on the blackface."

"Train in Vain" is certainly in my top ten of the greatest rock singles of all time, and on some days, I might put it in the top 5. You can find that on the two disc The Story of the Clash, but you might as well buy London Calling, which has "Train" hidden at the end, not to mention "Spanish Bombs," an homage to Montgomery Clift, and even a little bit of "Stagolee" thrown in for good measure.

posted by Anon. 3:46 PM

2.28.2002

 
Grammy Recap
Oh, brother

I didn't actually watch the Grammys last night, which is a shame only in that I missed the only opportunity I will ever have of watching Ralph Stanley sing on a major network broadcast.

The awards seemed to range from the predictable to the undeserving upsets. O Brother Where Art Thou won the best album category; it seems like forever since that album was released, and yet, here it is, the Best Album of the Year according to members of the Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Given my fondness for twang and Americana music, you might think I'd rejoice. You'd think wrong.

O Brothersounds stale to me, a museum piece through and through, a compilation of music that collapses upon its own respect for the past and earnestness for the present. The highlights of the album, to my ear, are the Stanley Brothers' version of the classic "Angel Band," and the more than 50 year old version of "Big Rock Candy Mountain" by Harry McClintock. Much of the rest of the album is, well, dull.

That doesn't mean it's not listenable. It makes for fine background noise, with its pretty fiddles and prettier voices. But it doesn't challenge the listener the way Love and Theft does, growing in importance and scope with each listen, as nuances are revealed as one pushes and pokes on repeated spins. And it doesn't exhilarate the way the best songs of All That You Can't Leave Behind do.

The rest of the award winners? Lucinda Williams received a Grammy for "Get Right with God," a mediocre song from a disappointing album, but this was for Best Rock Female Vocal, which when you think about it has so few representatives that Tina Turner still gets nominated some years in this category, even though the last vital music she released was during the first Bush administration. Dylan did win best Contemporary Folk Album, which every year seems to be the category where I like or even love most of the nominees: the El Corazons, the Mermaid Avenues, and so on.

It was a good year also for those born during the Depression, as Ralph Stanley and the Blind Boys of Alabama all took Grammy gold.

And in the strangeness department, Walter Mosley and They Might Be Giants are now proud owners of Grammys: the author of the Easy Rawlins' mysteries for his liner notes for the Richard Pryor box set; the two Johns for their theme song to Malcolm and the Middle. Weird.

Want to get a Grammy? I'd do an album of rock instrumentals. That seems to be the weakest category of the major genres. Unless it's a year when Clapton has released another record of boring blues, or when a Duane Eddy or Dick Dale mounts a comeback effort, you'll have a good shot of taking home the prize.

posted by Anon. 12:52 PM

2.27.2002

 
Daily record
Meow mix

Cat Power, the nom de plume of Chan Marshall, is most famous perhaps for her live performances. They aren't live performances so much as they are scenes from a nervous breakdown. Marshall's falling apart in the middle of a performance, stopping for several minutes to break down in tears, is not uncommon. This can be exciting, in terms of the unscripted nature of a performance in a world of pre-scripted pauses and pseudo ad-lib patter. It also can be trying, for those who came to see a concert and not performance art.

Her 2000 release on Matador, The Covers Record, though, is a strange and mesmerizing record. It's twelve covers of songs, from a range of artists from the Velvet Underground to Bob Dylan to Bobby Darin, all accompanied by little more than guitar or piano. Marshall's voice is that of a choirgirl falling apart -- in each song, it feels like she could stop or break up any second. It's affecting, whether she's doing the Stones' "Satisfaction," eliminating the choruses and rendering the song with a creepy nervousness, or giving Dylan's "Paths of Victory" a bang-on-the-piano-keys union song quality. Her voice is one that's hard to shake off, and in these stripped down arrangements, with such brazenly naked vocals, this album is a hard one to ignore. Taken as individual songs, they may seem overly spare and shapeless; taken as an album, it's a work of a fracturing intensity.

posted by Anon. 2:10 PM

2.26.2002

 
Little riffs
Flirt with death

If you pressed me for my favorite one hit wonder, I might very well choose "Another Girl, Another Planet," originally done in the late '70s by a band named, appropriately enough, the Only Ones. This song about irritation and frustration with a woman mixed together with the weariness of space travel is an oddball delight. The Only Ones didn't do the version I first heard; no, that was on a badly dubbed Replacements bootleg, one I had from the Tim tour. I then found a copy of the Only Ones' version when I plucked a cut-out cassette copy of one of Rhino's power pop compliations. Sloppy guitar, sneering vocals, and unabashedly romantic lyrics -- this one's a keeper. A look on the All Music Guide shows that aside from the Replacements and the Only Ones, Greg "Jeopardy" Kihn also did a version. A mark of a truly great song may be its ability to withstand molestation from mediocre artists. Hmm.

posted by Anon. 6:42 PM

 
Daily Record

When commenting on Beatles covers in an earlier post, I had forgotten to mention one of the more unusual Beatles covers I've heard: "Blackbird," on The Waterboys' 1988 album, Fisherman's Blues.

If you look at the track listing, though, you won't find a listing for "Blackbird." How come?

Because Mike Scott and company do "Blackbird" within the last minute or two of a 7 minute version of Van Morrison's "Sweet Thing."

Covering the Beatles and Van Morrison in the same track? That takes some chutzpah. But Scott manages to make it work, and work well. Fisherman's Blues is as deep in ambition as it is tradition, as Scott melds traditional Irish folk elements with alternative rock; for the most part, it's a winning combination.

And perhaps it would be a damning one: Scott and the Waterboys haven't done anything so inspired since. Part of that is because they left the folk elements behind on later releases, and I find Scott's voice too high and weak to service an electric, rocking sound. But here, singing the title track (featured years later on the Good Will Hunting soundtrack) and "When Will We Be Married," the voice sounds right at home among the mandolins, fiddles, and pipes. And it doesn't feel like quaint Irish music, no Cheftains' museum piece, no backdrop for Riverdance. It's folk rock, just with a brogue.

The highlight here is "And a Bang on the Ear," another 7 minute plus track, where Scott recalls all of the women he loved around the world, reporting, when he knows, where they are now, and in all cases, wishing them the best -- and a bang on the ear. It's a wonderful song, and listening to it, it's hard not to think back to one's own travelogue of the heart.

The album closes on a musical treatment of a Yeats' "The Stolen Child," with the verses read by Gaelic singer Tomas McKeown, and Scott singing the refrain. To cover Van Morrison and the Beatles is one thing; to then set William Butler Yeats to music is another. Yet somehow, Scott pulls it off. Probably because in this case, the act of ambition is also a labor of love.

posted by Anon. 2:23 PM

2.25.2002

 
Little riffs
You've got the power

There are people who think filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson is brilliant and eagerly await his every move.

I'm not one of them. I'm in the camp that says he can't tell a story, has no restraint, and is a visual show-off. The film of his I like the best is the one that was taken away and re-edited, Hard Eight.

But I do have to say that a scene I enjoy in Boogie Nights is the scene where Wahlberg and John C. Reilly are recording an album in a recording studio. You may remember that they sing a truly awful song -- "You've got the touch/you've got the power..."

You might think that part of Anderson's "genius" included writing that song for the movie. Wrong. Anderson had nothing to do with the composition of the song. "The Touch" actually first appeared on a soundtrack to a movie that's a world away from the subject matter of 70s porn. You can see the lyrics here.

posted by Anon. 10:51 AM

 
Little riffs
Morning edition

Forgive the brief hiatus and the meager postings this past week, but I've been participating in a week-long e-symposium of music fans, journalists, and scholars. Much to think about -- and much to write about. Here.

There's an interesting cover story on Bono's activism in Time this week. They also describe Bono as the globe's biggest rock star. Hyperbole? I think so. Unless we're separating the pop stars from the rock stars, this lady may have something to say about that "biggest rock star" title.

posted by Anon. 9:11 AM