The latest from Sonic Youth

Nice to see these guys still doing really strong music.

Blur and Thurston Moore

Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore clearly enjoys experimental collaboration with his fellow musicians, and here he works out an instrumental melody, one which sounds like a somewhat warped 60s TV theme song, with members of the band Blur. Who would ever have imagined that a combination of these two would work, but in my opinion, this works very well.

Be your own DJ

I may be late to this particular party, but this past weekend, I discovered the joys of such music service websites as Last FM and Pandora Radio. These allow you to create a quasi radio station that plays on the computer, with you, the listener, selecting the initial genre/artists, and with the program then playing continuous content within that framework. It is brilliant and deeply satisfying, and the polar opposite of what corporate/bland programming driven commercial radio has become.

Pandora is the creation of something called the Music Genome Project, which attempts to describe songs via their attributes - a very ambitions project indeed (but, if the proof of this method is in the product, the method seems to be working). As Wikipedia explains,

A given song is represented by a vector (a list of attributes) containing approximately 150 "genes" (analogous to trait-determining genes for organisms in the field of genetics). Each gene corresponds to a characteristic of the music, for example, gender of lead vocalist, level of distortion on the electric guitar, type of background vocals, etc. Rock and pop songs have 150 genes, rap songs have 350, and jazz songs have approximately 400. Other genres of music, such as world and classical, have 300–500 genes. The system depends on a sufficient number of genes to render useful results. Each gene is assigned a number between 1 and 5, in half-integer increments.

Given the vector of one or more songs, a list of other similar songs is constructed using a distance function.

To create a song's genome, it is analyzed by a musician in a process that takes 20 to 30 minutes per song. Ten percent of songs are analyzed by more than one technician to ensure conformity with the standards, i.e., reliability.

The technology is currently used by Pandora to play music for Internet users based on their preferences. Because of licensing restrictions, Pandora is available only to users whose location is reported to be in the USA by Pandora's geolocation software

Using this then, I have created a series of genre stations, based on style of music and named, in each instance for a representative artist of a particular genre/style. Thus, I have my punk station (Saints radio), my indie rock station (Pastels radio) my worldbeat station (Fela radio, though it seems to mostly give me reggae), etc. Right now, it's early morning, and I am wanting mostly folky acoustic tunes, so I have on my "Townes Van Zandt Radio" site; I've this heard Bob Dylan, Donovan, Meic Stevens, Johnny Copland, Jandek, Vic Chesnutt, Syd Barrett, Roky Erickson, Ramblin Jack Elliott, Doc Watson, Charlie Poole, Mississippi John Hurt, Alex Kash, and Eric Von Schmidt. It's been wonderful to hear artists whom I love, and to discover a few new ones along the way. And if I should decide that I want to own a copy of the recording, Pandora easily allows me to make a purchase. So, Amazon, ITunes, and my favorite commercial free music stations are now all together under one (electronic) roof.

Incidentally, last week, I happen to swing by a Virgin megastore in lower Manhattan, and while it was open and pretty busy, it felt like something on it's way out.CD megastores may be facing extinction - and as an embodiment of some old, now obsolete music industry practices, parhaps that is not an altogether bad thing, merely a sign of the evolution of things; as is Pandora Radio.

Two classic scenes from "Car Wash" (1976)

The Afro signifies the 1970s. And the movie Car Wash, which I saw one afternoon at one of the Journal Square movie palaces in my hometown of Jersey City, is a radical, funny, humane depiction of race and class realities in the funky, urban 1970s, courtesy of a great cast led by Richard Pryor, a genius, and a very underrated Franklin Ajaye, in the romantic lead. But it also had a very solid supporting cast, including George Carlin, Bill Dukes, Ivan Dixon, and a very memorable performance by the always amazing Antonio Fargas (famous for his depiction of the pimpy Huggy Bear in the TV series Starsky and Hutch). As Wikipedia explains,

Car Wash covers the exploits of a close-knit group of employees at a Los Angeles Car Wash. In an episodic fashion, the film covers a full day, during which all manner of strange visitors make appearances, including Richard Pryor as a preaching 'wonder-man' who is loved by most but loathed by one, and a man who fits the profile of an active bomber by the way he is holding his bottle, but it is really his urine sample as he is off to the hospital. Additionally, George Carlin appeared as a Taxi Driver searching for a customer who failed to pay the fare.

Car Wash was also written by Joel Schumacher, who's had a long film career filled with hits and misses; Car Wash is a high point. Yet, in its day, Car Wash seemed to be considered a mere lightweight comedy; However, in retrospect, it is one of the great, unsung comedies of the decade, with a rather substantive populist message (not to mention a disco/funk classic theme song). And how cool is it to see a well made working class, populist comedy from this period with a largely black cast.

Anyway, here are two classic scenes.



I love the way that Ajaye's character, T.C., gets cheered on by the guys at the car wash throughout the film, as he pursues the love of the waitress; we in the audience are cheering, too. And that Afro! Great song, too, by Norman Whitfield and Rose Royce.

Here's a scene in which the film's quasi-Marxist politics come shining through (as they do in so many 70s genre films).



I need to own this movie, and let it sit next to my copy of The Warriors on my video shelf.

UPDATE: Last night, I went into the local Circuit City, looking for a CD case for my car, and picked up a DVD copy of Car Wash for $6.99. I also got a CD/DVD multimedia tower, to keep things organized.

Psychedelic Lollipops: Some mid 60s rock cameo moments on TV

From the TV time capsule.



The Beau Brummelstones on the Flintstones





Gilligan's Island



The Standells on the Munsters.



The Seeds on the Mothers-In-Law



Boyce and Hart on Bewitched

(Here is Redd Kross's tribute):





and here are Boyce and Hart (as well as Phil Spector) on I Dream of Jeannie





Chad and Jeremy on Batman




Some rocking guitar, on the Andy Griffith Show



The Bedbugs on F-Troop



Lewis and Clarke Expedition on I Dream of Jeannie



Sacred Cows (and Larry Storch as the Groovy Guru) on get Smart



The Turtles on That's Life



The Castaways



Ann Margaret and Desi Arnaz Jr. on Here's Lucy



Herb Alpert. I'm not exactly clear on the source.

And some non singing moments



The Monkees on Laugh-In



And, here's Frank Zappa and Mike Nesmith, in a clip from the Monkees, with both guys mocking the Monkees as insipid.




Ringo on Laugh-In

As well as this



Wednesday doing the Watusi on The Addams Family (which also features Gomez doing the Freddie)

And this was apparently never aired. Too bad!



Paul Revere and the Raiders on the unaired TV pilot, The Treasure of 67.

Here are some performance clips from various programs



The Knickerbockers - "Lies"



The Easybeats - "Friday On My Mind"



The Grassroots - "Midnight Confessions"



The Who - "My Generation" on the Smothers Brothers show



The Buckinghams - "Kind of a Drag"



Question Mark & The Mysterians - "96 Tears"



The Standells - "Dirty Water"



The Barbarians - "Hey Little Bird"



The Byrds - "Turn, Turn, Turn"



The Count Five - "Psychotic Reaction"



The Electric Prunes - "I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night)" - The Mike Douglas Show



Music Explosion - Little Bit O'Soul



Lemon Pipers - "Green Tambourine"



1910 Fruitgum Company - "1,2,3 Red Light"



The Association - "Along Comes Mary"



Gary Lewis & The Playboys - "She's Just My Style"



The American Breed - "Bend Me, Shape Me"



from German TV, The Monks



from Dutch TV, the Pretty Things




The Cyrkle - "A Turn Down Day"



The Lovin' Spoonful - "Do You Believe in Magic?"



The Boxtops - "The Letter"



Captain Beefheart - "Diddy Wah Diddy"




Harper's Bizarre - "The 59th Bridge Street Song"



Blues Magoos - "We Ain't Got Nothing Yet"



The Cowsills - "The Rain, The Park, and Other Things"



Dino, Desi and Billy - RC Cola ad



Every Mother's Son - "Come On Down To My Boat"



The Five Americans - "Western Union"



The McCoys - "Hang On Sloopy"



The Kingsmen - "Louie, Louie" (a song that always makes me think of Animal House)




Sopwith Camel - "Hello Hello"



13th Floor Elevators - "You're Gonna Miss Me"



MC5 - "Black To Comm"



The Music Machine - "Talk, Talk"



The Leaves - "Hey Joe"


Love - "My Little Red Book"


and for something completely different



The Mothers of Invention on Dutch TV; this would have never aired in America.

I was given this when I was six

Back when I was a kid, I was a huge fan of the Monkees. I watched their show, and thought that it was funny. I listened to their music with much pleasure. I liked having - in the late 1960s - an American group (I also loved the Beatles) to look up to. I didn't know that the Monkees were considered a "manufactured" group, and being very young, probably would not have cared.

Today, I still really like a lot of the "poppier" music of the mid to late 1960s; Tommy James, the 1910 Fruitgum Company, Boyce and Hart, Sonny and Cher, the Ohio Express, the Lemon Pipers, and even cartoon bands like the Banana Splits and the Archies all sound good to me, and strains of this type of pop can be heard in such various Elephant Six bands like the Apples in Stereo and the Olivia Tremor Control and even in such indie bands as the Clean, the Minders, and Unrest. Not to mention all the great powerpop bands of the 70s and 80s (also borrowing from a lot of the poppier bands on the various Nuggets-type reissues.

It is also the case, I feel, that the Monkees were something more than simply a manufactured pop group. They had talented songwriters, such as Neil Diamond, writing very well crafted songs for them. Their film, Head, was a genuine attempt to embrace hipness (with Peter Tork being the one member who most embraced the 60s counterculture - he appears, as himself, in the Holy Modal Rounders documentary, which I recently watched). Of course, many rock fans know the story of Jimi Hendrix opening for them, and of bewildering the Monkees' core audience. But, the bottom line for me is that the Monkees are an endearing part of my late 1960s childhood (which was a time when I also listened to things like this).











Anyway, I was telling my wife, after we were amusedly viewing some retro K-Tel ads on line, about an experience I had as a kid. My one aunt bought me, as a special gift, what she may have thought was a Monkees record. But the thing was, it was not a Monkees record. Instead, it was a cheap knockoff, on the "Wyncote" label, by a group called the Chimps. It was meant to dupe people into thinking that they'd bought one thing without realizing that they'd gotten a lesser version (which my wife told me has also happened a few time to her record-collecting dad); notice for example how much the word "monkey" on this cover resembles the chosen font of the Monkees' logo? As far as the Wyncote Label, as Mike Callahan, Steve Klein, David Edwards, and Patrice Eyries of the Both Sides Now website, all explain,

In 1964, Cameo-Parkway started Wyncote, a budget label subsidiary named for a Philadelphia suburb, to reissue their large back catalog. The product on Wyncote was very typical of budget label of the 1960s. Record jackets were inexpensively made and tended toward falling apart easily, there was no inner paper or plastic sleeves for the albums, and there were usually only nine or ten tracks on each album. Many times the artists names weren't even given. Far worse, though, was the substandard vinyl pressings which were noisy and had many bumps. The vinyl on some of the early Wyncote albums could only be described as pathetic, with blisters, peels and bumps abounding. After the first few issues, they settled down to a vinyl quality that was passable, but not much more.

Also typical of budget labels was the annoying habit of using deceptive names or record jackets to fool a casual record buyer into thinking they were buying a better-known product. Thus we got the Mexican Brass doing hits by the Tijuana Brass, an album with "Beatlemania!" across the front in big letters which actually had tunes by a group called the Liverpools, and an unnamed band (actually, the Chimps) doing Monkees songs. Probably the worst offense in this regard (and they must have thought they were being soooo clever) was the takeoff on the very popular album Bach's Greatest Hits, which had been out a couple of years earlier by the Swingle Singers. Wyncote SW-9088 was Bach's Biggest Hits by the Single Swingers! Sheesh!

And as for the Chimps record, here is the track listing:
W/SW-9199 - Monkey Business - Chimps [1967] I'm A Beliver/Last Train To Clarksville/Sunday's Kid/Papa's Blue Jeans/Sally Sally//Watch Out/Sit Tight Girl/Just A Little To Early/No Survivors/I Realize

I think that I listened to it once. It sounded odd, and I set it off to the side of the records in our house. I don't know what became of it, but today, I'd love to still own it, for its sheer novelty value. I'm also not sure of what became of my Bobby "Boris" Pickett and the Crypt Kickers LP. And today, I sort of prefer this version of the song The Monster Mash.

The boy with perpetual nervousness

A classic from Crazy Rhythms.

There's a kid I know but not too well
He doesn't have a lot to say
Well this boy lives right next door and he
Never has nothin' to say

It doesn't seem like he does anything
He never helps out in the yard
He lets his mother carry in groceries
Cause he doesn't plan to work too hard

The boy next door is into better things
As far as I can see
The boy next door is into bigger things
The boy next door is me

All right

Well he's not like the boys we used to have
Not like them at all - oh no
Those ones made their parents proud
This one beats 'em all

The boy next door is into better things
As far as I can see
The boy next door is into bigger things
The boy next door is me

Yeah

Two real examples of what's right about globalization

Globalization is a force to be reckoned with, and may be inevitable. Yet along with its destabilizing effects, there are some real plusses, particularly in the areas of music and culture. And here are two examples - the Bollywood Brass Band, a London based band inspired by Bollywood musicals (which are themselves an homage to old Hollywood musicals) and a song by the cult band the Shaggs played, lovingly, by a young Japanese band.






As one commentator said, abut this latter clip,

I just can't get over my astonishment that anyone beyond the English-speaking world even knows the Shaggs exist...

So what's right about globalization? Members of one sort of cultural background getting exposed to the culture of an other, and digging that culture, appreciating it on its own terms. We see lots of that happening. And that gives me hope for the future.

Wild Man Fischer and the Bonzo Dog Band

I don't know much about Wild Man Fischer, but on a quick listen, I find that I enjoy the sheer primitivism of his music. But, according to Wikipedia his life has not been without its troubles. I wouldn't be surprised to know that he's been potentially exploited by those who knew him. Not everybody, though. And it is also possible that his 'craziness' and his detachment from the normal conventions of polite society was interpreted, in the freewheeling late 1960s in L.A., as something heroic. Again, since i don't know very much, I am intrigued to try to find out more.

Fischer was institutionalized at age 16 for attacking his mother with a knife[citation needed]. He was later diagnosed with two mental disorders: severe paranoid schizophrenia and bipolar disorder (manic depression). Following his release, Fischer wandered L.A. singing his unique brand of songs for 10¢ to passers-by. Discovered by Frank Zappa, with whom he recorded his first album, Fischer became an underground concert favorite, earning him the title "godfather of outsider music." Zappa was responsible for Fischer's initial foray into the business of music, an album called An Evening with Wild Man Fischer, contains 36 tracks of "something not exactly musical." Frank and the Wild Man remained close--until Fischer threw a jar at Moon Unit Zappa, barely missing.

Frank Zappa's interest - given his championing of other outsider artists such as the Shaggs and Captain Beefheart - in this was undoubtedly genuine, however. But, I've seen other clips of Wild Man Fischer on late night TV, and he is basically rendered a sideshow clown, there to amuse the supposedly "normals" in the audience.

He's also been the subject of a documentary film. I plan to watch, when I can.

Interestingly, the Youtube page for Larry Fischer also links, not surprisingly, to the equally eccentric and very delightful and funny Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band, a band described by Trouser Press in the following way.

Absurdity is, admittedly, not for everybody. It takes a certain sort of mental ticklishness to recognize the artistic merit in a urinal or the wit in a painting of a pipe over the phrase "Ceci n'est pas une pipe." Linear thinkers could easily consider the Ministry of Silly Walks just plain silly — which, of course, it was, but crossed with a wildly inventive rejection of the obvious and soused to the gills with irony. Absurd is never irrational. A clown with a water-spouting flower might have been clever once upon a time, but absurdity dies on repetition, which is why Gallagher is stupid and Steve Martin can be very funny. Translated into any medium, the institutionalization of absurdity as the art movement dubbed dada is not simply random-play nonsense, it's highly-informed and thoroughly considered random-play nonsense. There is, indeed, good dada and bad dada, although good luck finding two people with such similar sensibilities as to agree on which might be which.

That human impossibility is one of the reasons why the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, which had as many as nine instrumental absurdists in its lineup, remains so clearly outstanding in its field — and so impossible to categorize. Lowbrows who consider the British group a novelty act are simply failing to grasp the worthiness of humor, as if making people smile somehow negates the difficulty of creating great art. And the Bonzos' records are great art, a cornucopia of musical styles from the first half of the 20th century blendered into the freewheeling thrall of the psychedelic '60s.

Led by daft renaissance man Vivian Stanshall (who died in a 1995 fire), a genius of enormous creative imagination and skill, the Bonzos played a crucial role in the development of British humor (by providing a direct connection between music and comedy, they connected the Goon Show and Temperance Seven to the Pythons, especially in their filmmaking endeavors, for which Bonzo Neil Innes provided much of the music). They also hung out with the Beatles (appearing in Magical Mystery Tour), shared stages with Led Zeppelin, inadvertently provided the name for this journalistic endeavor and introduced dada to rock a good ten years before new wave's cynical wiseacres came along to need it. How did they do it?

When my wife and I first got together, she gave me a Bonzo Dog boxed set as a gift; is it any wonder that I love her madly :-)

Much better than Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers

Tiny Masters of Today




The Muldoons


Here are two really cool bands, made up of young musicians, which I learned about on Myspace. The brother-sister act Tiny Masters of Today hail from Brooklyn, where lots of NYC's rock community now is, and the Muldoons, two young brothers (with their dad on drums) reflect the great proto-punk Stooges/MC5 legacy of their native Detroit.

I really like indie rock played with integrity, and I generally really like kids. So I especially like kids who are into indie rock. On the other hand, I have little use for mass marketed, Disney-esque crap, or for superficial, phony, Radio Disney style entertainment. And I hate bad music, which seems to be everywhere these days.

And so, regarding Tiny Masters and the Muldoons, I love them both. They give me much faith in the next generation and of the future of music. And I am so inspired by them that I want to buy a guitar for my beautiful little baby niece, who lives up in Canada. Of course, she's not even one yet. But I want her to be a cool kid, not unlike bass playing Ada. As Artrocker magazine says, re: Tiny Masters - "Each of their songs was a barrage of distorted guitar noise and they obviously thought they were the coolest 11-year-olds on the planet. They quite possibly are."--The Telegraph

Here are some select videos for these two bands. And they truly are bands, and not novelty acts or manifactured pieces of pop from the culture industry/corporate entertainment industry.





And finally, here is a clip that puts these bands in perspective, and gives an indication of how growing up in places like Brooklyn may have shaped these bands.

On the film 1991: The Year that Punk Broke

I own a video copy of 1991: The Year Punk Broke, a rather fine concert documentary of (mostly) Sonic Youth and a variety of other bands (including Nirvana and Dinosaur Jr.) touring Europe. It remains in my video collection, and it's really good, particularly if you like the music, which I very much do.


I am curious, though, about the title. Did "punk" really "break" in 1991? I don't really think so. In fact, historically, Sonic Youth, the main band in 1991, came out of the No Wave scene in NY in the early 80s, which was arguably the most radical and experimental wing of post-punk. I would think that SY would not be trying to "break" something which had long been seen as no longer existent. Yet, by 1991, Sonic Youth, with their integrity still intact, would seem to be fully conscious of marketing, and wouldn't necessarily be bothered with wanting to argue about whether or not punk has *finally* caught on. I also don't that they, like Cobain, really wanted to see punk become a mass phenomenon.

In any case, the reference to punk "breaking" refers here, in part, to a quote by Thurston Moore, made at the very beginning of part 9 of this film. As hesays it, it seems, he does so with tongue firmly planted in cheek; it is unclear whether he believes that punk - whatever that might mean - has ever broken, or will ever do so. At least that's how I hear him.

And, as a commentator here noted, the reference to punk "breaking" was in reference to an inside joke during the tour, after the filmmaker and band caught Motley Crue covering "Anarchy in the UK" on tv. Dave, the commentator, notes that it was tounge-in-cheek, and has been misunderstood since the film's release in 1992. I would tend to agree.

Instead, I think what "broke" then was an almost retro hard rock, with punk, metal, 70s classic rock, and various other influences all parts of the mix – in fact, I’d argue that the whole "Seattle sound" phenomenon was as much derived from “Toys in the Attic” as it was from “Never Mind the Bollocks”; and while this music was hyped as "grunge," there soon was a backlash against this term, just as there was against the connected term, "Generation X,” just as much as there was the predictable emergence of pop grunge acts like Stone Temple Pilots and The Smashing Pumpkins

Incidentally, I also have 1/2 Japanese's excellent documentary, The Band That Would Be King, in my video collection, purchased around the same time that I picked this up. But that's for another post.

Here are some clips of 1991

Snow is Starting to Fall Here

I guess I am in for the weekend. The snow is starting to fall, and we are expecting up to ten inches. I have been aching to get into NYC for some time now, and am kicking myself knowing that I am probably not going to be able to get to see a Gilbert and George exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum; it is closing after this weekend.

Anyway, being snowed in here in Beacon, and wanting to get out for some culture, I am recalling one very musically busy weekend I had a few years ago, back in the summer of 2002.

Seeing live outdoor shows has long been one of my favorite summer activities. When I used to live in Boston, I would occasionally attend the Lowell Folk Festival. In 2002, I was back living in NJ, Several weeks later, I ventured in to Prospect Park in Brooklyn, to check out one of my favorite all time bands, Yo La Tengo. It was, I think, my first time seeing them.

Anyway, in August 2002, here was one memorable weekend.

First off, on a particular Saturday, I went to Damrosch Park, which sides to one side of Lincoln Center, to experience a free show, part of the Lincoln Center Out of Doors free music festival. It was a nice night to be outdoors, surrounded by the lights of Manhattan. The opening group was Liam Clancy from the Clancy Brothers, his son Donal Clancy, and nephew, Robbie O'Connell. They strummed acoustic guitars and played mostly Celtic folk and traditional songs (what sounded like pub songs and/or marching songs). I discovered that Liam Clancy is a very charismatic performer and a terrific singer. They were then followed by the Greenbriar Boys, who were back together doing a series of reunion shows. They had started in NY in the late 50s during the pre-Dylan folk boom, and then gravitated toward bluegrass and became master bluegrass musicians, remaining as a group through the 1960s and then disbanding; their lead singer, John Herald, has a real Appalachian twang to his voice, and one of their other members is Eric Weissberg, who later had big success composing and playing on "Dueling Banjoes." In fact, they did a rather fantastic cover of that particular song. Finally, the last act was the legendary Doc Watson, who came out on stage, initially accompanied by his grandson, and later by another musician. He and each partner each played acoustic guitar, and each sang, though Doc did most of the singing. He sat on a stool, played, sang, and talked with the audience, and just gave the audience a completely soulful performance. At one point, he did a very moving cover of the Moody Blues "Nights in White Satin." For the encore, the Greenbriar Boys came back out, and they and Doc Watson jammed together. It was a great 3 hours of music; and it was free.


On Sunday, I ventured to Central Park, for another free show - NY's own Sonic Youth, back home from touring. The first act was a German techno group called Monolake, who produced a kind of cool, pleasant, minimalist techno sound as the crowd was entering into the enclosed bandshell area. It was good chill out music, which helped a bit given the 90 plus temperature in Central Park. I kind of stood, initially, looking at the stage and at the crowd, and then I walked around the perimeter of the frontstage area and sat with part of the crowd on the ground and just waited and listened to the techno. The crowd kept getting bigger and bigger. The second group then came out on stage, and they were some kind of modern jazz supergroup called Wadada Leo Smith's Golden Quartet, featuring a pair of legendary jazz guys, Jack DeJohnnette , on drums and Anthony Davis
on keyboard. They reminded me a lot of fusion era Miles Davis, and after moving much nearer to the stage to watch them from a more up-close perspective, I found myself becoming very engrossed in their deep, fusiony sound, filled as it was with complex harmonies and shifting polyrhythms.

Finally, Sonic Youth
- now a five member band with the addition of guitarist Jim O'Rourke - came out to a heroes welcome, and played for about 70 minutes, and then did two sets of encores, including an early classic, "Making the Nature Scene." They played songs spanning their entire career, with an emphasis on such "hits" as "Kool Thing," "Eric's Trip," "Candle," and "Bull in the Heather." They seemed to be in a really good mood and happy to be playing, and they played with quite a bit of intensity, periodically breaking guitar strings, playing their guitars like percussion instruments, and producing gusts of their patented feedback/noise sounds. They seemed a tad mellower than when I last saw them live, around 1987 or thereabouts, but in generally good form.

One other thing; while not a live show, I went, in that same week, to see the British rock music film "24 Hour Party People,"
about the band Joy Division and the city of Manchester, UK's role in the world of rock, rave, and modern music, and thought it to be one of the best music history films I'd ever seen. Great film.

Memorable week, that was.

Finally, here's a fine Sonic Youth video

Further Proof of the Genius of New Zealand Indie Rock

This is a thing of sheer beauty and genius!

The Boy Looked at Johnny.....

Patti Smith's "Horses" starts out with some soft, mournful piano chords, courtesy of Richard Sohl. We then hear a most extraordinary, New York sounding voice, which declares "Jesus died for somebody's sins/but not mine!" And from this moment on, the listener is brought into a kind of wild, subterranean world, a world of poetry and mythos, a world which is an extension of the very soul of the greatest poet to ever become a rock star. As the opening song, "Gloria" continues, picking up speed via Lenny Kaye's crunching guitar riffs and Jay Dee Daugherty's steady drumming, poetry merges with mid-60s garage punk, and a whole new world of possibility opens up. This is followed by the gentle, reggae derived "Redondo Beach," which, it turns out, is one of Patti's great vocal moments; there is a rhythm to her voice which serves this, and other songs, very well, as here, she sings a sad tale which contrasts with the upbeat sound of the song. "Birdland," one of the lengthier songs here, returns to the mournful sound of the beginnings of "Gloria" and is quite sublime. A few songs later is "Kimberly," Patti's tribute to her sister, with some great lyrics and a nice steady, rocking beat. It's one of my favorite all time Patti Smith songs. The record climaxes with "Land," a song sequence, in which Patti creates a near cinematic narrative, set in a high school filled with misfits. She brilliantly alludes to the popular culture of an earlier era.

So, with this record, which sounded like absolutely nothing else that came out in 1975, Patti Smith begat a revolution. She is a historic link between the Dylan/Morrison/Lennon/Hendrix 60s and the CBGBs/Max's Kansas City punks of a few years later. Its hard to imagine folks like Courtney Love, Kurt Cobain, and all of today's female rockers like L7, Sleater-Kinney, and others, even existing, without her getting the ball rolling. While she is still a vibrant artist, this is the place to begin to explore the world of Patti Smith.

I should add that I came very close to meeting Patti Smith a few years ago. I had an activist friend who appeared on stage at an antiwar rally the day before, and was set to introduce me to her the next day. However, she wound up resting up for a show at CBGB's (right before it closed down) and was home resting. Instead, my friend intriduced me to Patti's daughter Jessie (her kid with Fred Smith), who seemed a bit shy, but nice, and pretty cool.

I Hate Myself, i.e., Songs About Self-Pity

Here's another musical theme question. What are some songs that wallow in self-pitying, self-loathing (or at least self-depreciation), or self-objectification?

Here are a few.

Lovesick Blues - Hank Williams



Crying - Roy Orbison

It's My Party - Leslie Gore or Bryan Ferry



What Kind of Fool am I? - Sammy Davis Jr. or Tony Bennett

I'm a Loser - The Beatles

Baby's in Black - The Beatles

In My Room - The Beach Boys

I Wanna Be your Dog - The Stooges

Poor Poor Pitiful Me - Linda Rondstat

You and Me Against the World - Helen Reddy

53rd and 3rd - The Ramones

Pinhead - The Ramones

Pretty Vacant - The Sex Pistols

Seventeen - The Sex Pistols



Boredom - The Buzzcocks

Who Said - Richard Hell and the Voidoids

Life Stinks - Pere Ubu

55 Times the Pain - Husker Du

I Felt Like a Gringo - The Minutemen



Milk It - Nirvana



Rape Me - Nirvana

Deformography - Marilyn Manson

Alex Cox's Film - Sid and Nancy

Great flick - I particularly like the slapstick elements and the documentary-like scenes involving the Sex Pistols, like when Sid stumbles through the glass door, or the performance on the Thames. But I also like the more surreal stuff, like Sid eating pizza and then driving off in the cab, or the "My Way" scene. Or, a scene such as this one (which appears to depict the South Brox, or perhaps the Lower East Side, circa 1978).



The Sex Pistols are an icon to this day.

Wire - 12XU

From the band that, arguably, invented art punk, here is one of their most energized early tracks. This still sounds as great as it did 32 years ago.

Fronting

This is a list I made, in response to a survey question back in 2002. The question: All time favorite Front man/woman of a rock band? My replies.

Joey Ramone (Ramones), Johnny Rotten/Lydon (Sex Pistols/PIL), Patti Smith (Patti Smith Group), Mark Smith (The Fall), Michael Stipe (REM), Ian Curtis (Joy Division), Ray Davies (Kinks), Gibby Haynes (the Butthole Surfers), Howard Devoto(Buzzcocks/Magazine), Joe Strummer (Clash), David Thomas (Pere Ubu), Iggy Pop (Stooges), Jad Fair (Half Japanese), Katrina Mitchell (The Pastels), Stiv Bators (Dead Boys), Jim Morrison (Doors), Paul Westerberg (Replacements), Ian McKaye (Minor
Threat/Fugazi), Jeffrey Lee Pierce (The Gun Club), Robert Pollard (Guided By Voices, Henry Rollins (Black Flag/Rollins Band), Alison Stratton (Young Marble Giants), Exene Cervenka & John Doe (X) Ian Hunter (Mott the Hoople), David Johansen (NY Dolls), Marc Bolan (T Rex), George Clinton (Parliament), Kurt Cobain (Nirvana), Thom Yorke (Radiohead), Chris Bailey (The Saints), Chris Cornell (Soundgarden), David Byrne (Talking Heads), Elizabeth Fraser (Cocteau Twins), Michael Rose (Black Uhuru), Lydia Lunch (Teenage Jesus and the Jerks/8 Eyed Spy), Vic Godard (The Subway Sect) Feargal Sharkey (The Undertones), Colin Newman (Wire)

And speaking of Joey Ramone, here he is with the band, shaping the future of Britpunk in 1977. What a great clip this is.



And, as an example of something that perhaps only Mark E. Smith could ever hope to pull off, here is the audio track of the song Birtwistle's) Girl In Shop. Like a lot of Fall songs, it is not altogether clear what he is singing/ranting about. He also sounds very intoxicated on this. Nonetheless, it's a great recording, and I've been listening to it a lot in the past month or so.

A piece of 80s music nostalgia - Watusi Rodeo

I was driving home from work a short while back, and heard this minor classic on a now non-existent XM new wave station (which before it went under, was, in my opinion, playing too much Duran Duran and Flock of Seagulls, and not enough of stuff like this).



One could also say, remember when MTV played videos by (relatively) underground, critically respected artists? Remember, even when MTV played videos?

And speaking of a blast from the past, my wife, driving my car on another day, discovered this Black Flag classic; she was only six years old when this came out, whereas I was in my late teens



This, though, is for me, the definitive Black Flag song.



One which still holds up, and with a message that still rings rather true.



Henry Rollins - a renaissance man of our time.

Possibly the funniest scene from the film Slacker

I love the movie Slacker, and think that it captures the zeitgeit of 90s alt culture in a way like no other film. Those who have seen it will likely recall this hilarious scene; those who haven't seen this film should add it to the top of their Netflix queue.



This scene is also priceless.

When worlds collided in the 1970s

My aunts used to watch daytime talk shows like Mike Douglas and Dinah Shore. Imagine everyone's surprise when Dinah Shore offered her audience of primarily older housewives this truly weird moment in which Iggy Pop and David Bowie sat down for a chat. It's very sweet watching the ladies on this show express concern about Iggy Pop's self-inflicted scars.

Truly, the 70s were a weird decade; I am glad to have been tuned in and watching on this particular broadcast day.

Here's a clip of the boys performing on the show.

RIP, Ron Asheton

Rest in peace, Ron Asheton and condolences to your family, friends, and bandmates/fellow musicians.

Here he was, discussing his influences, in a recent interview.

Happy 40th Anniversary to Everyday People

Hard to believe that it's been 40 years since this great piece of psychedelic soul was released.



According to one reference source, this song was in the top five in Febraury 1969 and was number one on Feb 15th of that year.

I still remember my sister bringing home a Sly and the Family Stone LP, back when I was in the 3rd grade or so. And I also acknowledge that Sly Stone paved the way for the likes of George Clinton, Prince and so much of the world of hip-hop, and probably much else in the world of music. So, I celebrate this song on its 40th anniversary.

Yo La Tengo - Eight Days a Week

This is a clip that I really like, as it connects the band I loved best in my childhood to a band that represents so many personal and positive things about music.



And how about that amazing looking 12 string (looks like a Mosrite) guitar in Ira Kaplan's hands. Nothing like a classic rock instrument for playing a seminal piece of classic 60s rock.