How did Red Man tobacco get my email address? Got a message from them this morning promoting their Red Man Moist Snuff and the Red Man Racing Team (featuring Greg Biffle driving the #27). Does it have anything to do with the Georgia Satellites CD I purchased recently? Gotta say, though, the prospect of winning a Biffle-autographed pit crew fire suit is almost enough to make me start dippin'.
[Note to Red Man: I am not serious. Please do not send me any free samples.]
[Note to kids: Do not put this stuff in your mouth. Your lips will fall off. Not right away, but eventually.]
[Note to readers: Please do not think I am making fun of the Georgia Satellites. They were awesome. Two words: "Battleship Chains".]
Friday, February 26, 2010
Thursday, February 25, 2010
First They Came For The Bundt Cake, And I Said Nothing...
I initially misread "food deserts" as "food desserts" in this Village Voice headline:
Michelle Obama Wants to Eliminate Food Deserts in Seven Years
and thought, "Maybe we really are on the road to tyranny" and also, "aren't all desserts 'food'?"
Michelle Obama Wants to Eliminate Food Deserts in Seven Years
and thought, "Maybe we really are on the road to tyranny" and also, "aren't all desserts 'food'?"
On Contra and Words In/As Music
Since I semi-panned Vampire Weekend's "Horchata" (and attempted to point out the absurdity of their far-in-advance ticket sales) in this space, I figured I was compelled to follow up on the subject of Contra, mainly to say the following:
1. Still not able to fully surrender myself to the pop pleasures of "Horchata" because the lyrics won't let me (and while I'll grant that this can sometimes be a good thing, it's not in this case).
2. Think Contra is really good.
Some elaboration (in which I argue for less emphasis on VW's lyrics while talking mostly about VW's lyrics):
To describe a general trend, the older I get, the less I listen to lyrics. Or, I should say, the less I listen to lyrics for their meaning or "content" per se. I listen to lyrics as another component of a song's overall sound - I'm favoring sound over meaning. I find myself thinking about lyrics only when a phrase jumps out at me, either because it's jarringly bad or out-of-place or strikingly good or apt. Or when a song is recorded in such a way as to force me to pay close attention to the vocals.
"Horchata" has the unfortunate combination of vocal-centric production and awkward lyrics. On VW's debut, there were plenty of memorable phrases, good and bad (Oxford commas, climbing to Dharamsala, "a Mansard roof through the trees": yes, please; "kefir on your keffiyah": not workin' for me). On the rest of Contra, I find fewer phrases jumping out at me than on VW, even though Ezra Koenig's vocals are way out front for most of the album. And for the most part, out front is where they belong. Koenig's vocals are very good. I'm a sucker for the slipping in and out of falsetto thing (there's probably a proper musical term for this) that he's really good at. He makes it sound like an expressive technique rather than a gimmick or quirk, and the songs on Contra give him a good platform to show it off. I propose that there's a lot more pleasure to be had from VW's music by focusing more attention on Koenig's singing and less on his words*, but to each his own.
Some of my fears on hearing "Horchata" were realized on the album as a whole, but what I thought were going to be deficiencies, particularly the sidelining of Koenig's guitar in favor of what I interpreted as Rostam Batmanglij's musical fussiness (I swear I typed this last part before I heard that Rostam came out - I found out while Googling the spelling of his name!), actually work and help make Contra sound like a step forward, though a somewhat unexpected one, from VW's debut. The AutoTune, the ska - these touches show me that the band was unafraid to walk the line between making a fun, enjoyably scattershot pop album and a goofy, embarassing mess. They ended up on the right side of that line, but close enough to the edge for the album to demand, and reward, attention.
* This discussion of VW's lyrics got me thinking more about this subject, but I guess the title of the post ("Contra and How We Read Lyrics") illustrates my fundamental difference of opinion. I know what the author means by "read" in this context, but I still think I'm primarily "listening" to lyrics rather than reading them in any sense. At a basic "what I'm listening to this music for" level, I just don't care about the levels of meaning that may or may not exist in Koenig's lyrics. I agree that they can stand up to a bit of analysis and are "interesting" in that way, but they're not that interesting to me in that way.
The way Koenig sings "contra" as four syllables (or later, ten!?) and "lie" as three, one word taking the melody down, the other bringing it up, and the effect that produces, is much more interesting to me than whatever he means by "I think yr a contra". That's not to say that any word with a similar sound would do just as well as "contra", but I think the fact that it's a surprising, non-obvious, non-trite word is more important to the success of the song than any other associations it might have.
I do take pleasure in lyrics that register as rich and complex as words while also being singably musical and at one with the melody - for me, this is the essence of Bob Dylan's genius, to cite one obvious example (assignment for a songwriting or music appreciation class: try listening to "Visions of Johanna" and just concentrating on the vowel sounds. One of Robyn Hitchcock's versions will work nicely if Dylan isn't handy). I also value lyrics for the way they can cue an emotional response, either reinforcing the mood of the music or, sometimes, whether intentionally or not, sending a conflicting emotional message. In these two areas, VW's lyrics certainly get passing marks from me. Even with "Horchata", it's only the verses that bother me - I think the chorus is actually pretty good.
[Update 3/11/10: Sounds like some good points were made related to the topics discussed above in this conversation between Koenig and author John Wray. The idea of Koenig taking the scattershot, reference-heavy, product-naming approach to lyric writing from rap and applying it to guitar-keyboard-pop is particularly interesting and, I think, explains a lot. Others probably made that connection a long time ago, but I didn't.]
1. Still not able to fully surrender myself to the pop pleasures of "Horchata" because the lyrics won't let me (and while I'll grant that this can sometimes be a good thing, it's not in this case).
2. Think Contra is really good.
Some elaboration (in which I argue for less emphasis on VW's lyrics while talking mostly about VW's lyrics):
To describe a general trend, the older I get, the less I listen to lyrics. Or, I should say, the less I listen to lyrics for their meaning or "content" per se. I listen to lyrics as another component of a song's overall sound - I'm favoring sound over meaning. I find myself thinking about lyrics only when a phrase jumps out at me, either because it's jarringly bad or out-of-place or strikingly good or apt. Or when a song is recorded in such a way as to force me to pay close attention to the vocals.
"Horchata" has the unfortunate combination of vocal-centric production and awkward lyrics. On VW's debut, there were plenty of memorable phrases, good and bad (Oxford commas, climbing to Dharamsala, "a Mansard roof through the trees": yes, please; "kefir on your keffiyah": not workin' for me). On the rest of Contra, I find fewer phrases jumping out at me than on VW, even though Ezra Koenig's vocals are way out front for most of the album. And for the most part, out front is where they belong. Koenig's vocals are very good. I'm a sucker for the slipping in and out of falsetto thing (there's probably a proper musical term for this) that he's really good at. He makes it sound like an expressive technique rather than a gimmick or quirk, and the songs on Contra give him a good platform to show it off. I propose that there's a lot more pleasure to be had from VW's music by focusing more attention on Koenig's singing and less on his words*, but to each his own.
Some of my fears on hearing "Horchata" were realized on the album as a whole, but what I thought were going to be deficiencies, particularly the sidelining of Koenig's guitar in favor of what I interpreted as Rostam Batmanglij's musical fussiness (I swear I typed this last part before I heard that Rostam came out - I found out while Googling the spelling of his name!), actually work and help make Contra sound like a step forward, though a somewhat unexpected one, from VW's debut. The AutoTune, the ska - these touches show me that the band was unafraid to walk the line between making a fun, enjoyably scattershot pop album and a goofy, embarassing mess. They ended up on the right side of that line, but close enough to the edge for the album to demand, and reward, attention.
* This discussion of VW's lyrics got me thinking more about this subject, but I guess the title of the post ("Contra and How We Read Lyrics") illustrates my fundamental difference of opinion. I know what the author means by "read" in this context, but I still think I'm primarily "listening" to lyrics rather than reading them in any sense. At a basic "what I'm listening to this music for" level, I just don't care about the levels of meaning that may or may not exist in Koenig's lyrics. I agree that they can stand up to a bit of analysis and are "interesting" in that way, but they're not that interesting to me in that way.
The way Koenig sings "contra" as four syllables (or later, ten!?) and "lie" as three, one word taking the melody down, the other bringing it up, and the effect that produces, is much more interesting to me than whatever he means by "I think yr a contra". That's not to say that any word with a similar sound would do just as well as "contra", but I think the fact that it's a surprising, non-obvious, non-trite word is more important to the success of the song than any other associations it might have.
I do take pleasure in lyrics that register as rich and complex as words while also being singably musical and at one with the melody - for me, this is the essence of Bob Dylan's genius, to cite one obvious example (assignment for a songwriting or music appreciation class: try listening to "Visions of Johanna" and just concentrating on the vowel sounds. One of Robyn Hitchcock's versions will work nicely if Dylan isn't handy). I also value lyrics for the way they can cue an emotional response, either reinforcing the mood of the music or, sometimes, whether intentionally or not, sending a conflicting emotional message. In these two areas, VW's lyrics certainly get passing marks from me. Even with "Horchata", it's only the verses that bother me - I think the chorus is actually pretty good.
[Update 3/11/10: Sounds like some good points were made related to the topics discussed above in this conversation between Koenig and author John Wray. The idea of Koenig taking the scattershot, reference-heavy, product-naming approach to lyric writing from rap and applying it to guitar-keyboard-pop is particularly interesting and, I think, explains a lot. Others probably made that connection a long time ago, but I didn't.]
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Lost in a Dream
I've been waiting almost a year for this one. If it captures even half of what it was like to be in the room with this trio, it will be an exceptional album.
I noticed something odd in the way Amazon lists the album credits:
Chris Potter (Artist), Jason Moran (Artist), Paul Motian (Performer)
I like the idea of somebody thinking that Potter and Moran are serious "artists" while Motian is just a "performer", playin' to the crowd, hammin' it up, givin' the people what they want.
I noticed something odd in the way Amazon lists the album credits:
Chris Potter (Artist), Jason Moran (Artist), Paul Motian (Performer)
I like the idea of somebody thinking that Potter and Moran are serious "artists" while Motian is just a "performer", playin' to the crowd, hammin' it up, givin' the people what they want.
Oh Shoot
One of the best pieces I've read on the subject of guns. Nothing flashy - just a clear-headed look at a highly charged subject. The Awl continues to get it done.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Vampire Weekend 2031 Reunion Tour - Tix On Sale This Friday
So I noticed that tickets go on sale this Friday, February 26th, for a Vampire Weekend show on September 15th (don't worry, that's September 2010, not September 2011). And that the Flaming Lips Summerstage show, in late July, is already sold out. When did we get to the point of having to plan SEVEN M*****F****NG MONTHS ahead to see a band play a gig?!?
I was about to get all "in my day" up in here, but then I did a quick search and found out that when Paul McCartney played Shea Stadium last year, 2009, tickets went on sale a month before the show. One month.
I haven't fully thought out the practical economics of this, but it seems to me that selling tickets to a sure-to-be-popular show seven months ahead of time would be a good thing for the ticket resale market (known as "scalping" in the pre-StubHub era). Resellers can snap up a big chunk of the tickets before a lot of people even realize the show has gone on sale (or realize it but hold off on buying tickets), and then rake in the cash as demand increases toward the show date.
BTW, I might post a belated review of Contra soon. Because what the world needs now is love, sweet love, and another opinion on Contra.
UPDATE: I've become aware of a regrettable omission in the above post. I neglected to mention that American Express cardholders can buy tickets via a "presale" on Wednesday the 24th. ROCK'N'F***IN'ROLL!!!!!!!!
UPDATE #2: Apparently, ticket buyers will be required to show ID and the credit card used to buy the tickets to get into the show. Which, in theory, should eliminate scalping and any possibility of getting some money out of the tickets if some kind of schedule conflict comes up in your life between now and September.
I was about to get all "in my day" up in here, but then I did a quick search and found out that when Paul McCartney played Shea Stadium last year, 2009, tickets went on sale a month before the show. One month.
I haven't fully thought out the practical economics of this, but it seems to me that selling tickets to a sure-to-be-popular show seven months ahead of time would be a good thing for the ticket resale market (known as "scalping" in the pre-StubHub era). Resellers can snap up a big chunk of the tickets before a lot of people even realize the show has gone on sale (or realize it but hold off on buying tickets), and then rake in the cash as demand increases toward the show date.
BTW, I might post a belated review of Contra soon. Because what the world needs now is love, sweet love, and another opinion on Contra.
UPDATE: I've become aware of a regrettable omission in the above post. I neglected to mention that American Express cardholders can buy tickets via a "presale" on Wednesday the 24th. ROCK'N'F***IN'ROLL!!!!!!!!
UPDATE #2: Apparently, ticket buyers will be required to show ID and the credit card used to buy the tickets to get into the show. Which, in theory, should eliminate scalping and any possibility of getting some money out of the tickets if some kind of schedule conflict comes up in your life between now and September.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Ebert in Esquire
So, the Esquire profile of Roger Ebert I read yesterday is really sticking with me. I keep thinking about it. I don't think it's necessarily a great piece of journalism, but the material, the story itself, is just very compelling stuff. Especially if, like me, you've been keeping up with Ebert's blog.
I suppose the story could be made into some kind of rote, trite inspirational thing, but the details of it, and Ebert's own personality, keep that from happening. Or more specifically, they keep it from becoming trite. Ebert is, in a real, non-trite way, inspiring. I certainly recommending reading the profile, but more than that, I recommend Ebert's blog (on which he's now posted a response to the profile). Anyone with even a trace of Anglophilia should find his recent pieces on London hard to resist.
I suppose the story could be made into some kind of rote, trite inspirational thing, but the details of it, and Ebert's own personality, keep that from happening. Or more specifically, they keep it from becoming trite. Ebert is, in a real, non-trite way, inspiring. I certainly recommending reading the profile, but more than that, I recommend Ebert's blog (on which he's now posted a response to the profile). Anyone with even a trace of Anglophilia should find his recent pieces on London hard to resist.
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