I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: BARENAKED LADIES-The Yellow Tape (1991).

The Yellow Tape is legendary in terms of demos.  It was an indie cassette-only release and it went platinum in Canada.

Before the internet, it was really hard to come across this cassette (again, even though it went platinum in Canada, I don’t know that it ever even made it south of the border).  Of course, now with the web, you can hear all 5 tracks on the cassette (thanks YouTube).

Four of the 5 songs appeared on their first album anyhow, and they don’t sound dramatically different from the “Yellow” versions (“Brian Wilson” still has that awesome bass from Jim Creeggan for instance). It basically sounds like an early live recording.  (The harmonies are spot on, the only difference is Steven Page’s vamping, which is a bit more than on the release).  Although I think “Blame It on Me” sounds a little less exciting than the Gordon version.

And of course, the final track is their original cover of “Fight the Power.”

It’s interesting that the band chose these 5 songs, two of which talk about famous people and are sort of funny. (And then a cover of a Public Enemy song!)  It really sets them up as a goofy band (which they are, although they are much more than that), but it kind of put them in a novelty niche right off the bat.   A niche which they never really outgrew, even if their later discs were much more serious.

[READ: August 17, 2010] “Second Lives”

Daniel Alarcón is another New Yorker 20 Under 40.

I love the way this story begins.  It informs us that the narrator’s parents had the foresight to have their first child in the United States.  His parents were in Baltimore on a visa.  His father enrolled in school and his mother worked in the health care profession.  They were comfortable enough in their lives to have their son Francisco there.  But then a coup broke out back home, their visas are not renewed and they were forced to return home.  Their second son, the narrator, with whom his mother was pregnant at the time wound up being born not in America.

And so, when your brother has American citizenship and can freely roam the American countryside, what exactly are you supposed to think when you are denied this freedom?

The narrator follows his brother from afar, learning about his life with his family’s friends who emigrated to Birmingham some time ago.  He only learns about his brother through the letters that his brother sends them–which grow less frequent and less informative.

I enjoyed this plotline, but I enjoyed even more the other plot of the narrator’s neighbors Alejandro and Luz.  Alejandro has an affair and when the details come out everyone is shocked.  It was handled so well, and somewhat comically, so I actually wanted to hear more about that (since I didn’t care for Francisco very much).

But that’s the point.  Francisco is in America, doing his thing, while things back home are doing in his family.  The litany of troubles grows longer and longer.  And when the two plots converge, in a firestorm of contention, the story grows even darker.

The final few lines of the story are incredibly powerful.  It’s a wonderful indictment of chance and luck.

His Q&A is here.