SOUNDTRACK: STEVEN PAGE-Page One (2010).
This is the first proper solo album for Steven Page, former Barenaked Lady. He did have a side projet while he was still a BNL guy, called The Vanity project, but this comes after he left the band. As a lead songwriter for BNL, this album sounds an awful lot like a BNL album. But he does branch out a bit for better and worse, on a couple of songs. I like that the record is designed sort of like a book. And that there’s a library check out sleeve and that one of the names who checked out the “book” is Leland Palmer (ha).
“A New Shore” sounds like classic Barenaked Ladies, with a big chorus (and Page’s great voice), strings and even a whistling section. If you imagine the harmony vocals are by Ed Robertson, this could easily fit on a BNL disc. “Indecision” sounds like latter BNL with the “whoo hoos” and the way the verses really slow down the craziness of the chorus. The big difference is the female backing vocals. “Clifton Springs” opens with a ba da da section and a very catchy melody that sounds like a sitcom theme song (hey sitcoms, check this out!). It’s a mellow song that really highlights Page’s voice.
“Entourage” is a kind of dance song. It has a kind of Pet Shop Boys feel (or else I’ve been listening to the Pet Shop Boys too much). It even has a line “I only love you when I’m drunk” which echoes Pet Shop Boys’ “You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You’re Drunk.” But I love the way Page says “Alright” at the end of the chorus and it could possibly have been a dance hit. It ends with a minute or so of a jazzy coda. “Marry Me” could also be a theme (to the new show Marry Me, duh). It’s energetic and poppy.
“All the Young Monogamists” has cello and violin and in some places, little else. It’s quite a different sound for the album, like a minor orchestral piece. It works mostly. “She’s Trying to Save Me” is a great return to the bouncy single that BNL did so well. “Over Joy” has a very sixties feel (the way Page’s voice is processed). I believe it is also the same melody as the Barenaked Ladies song “Hannukah Blessings” which Page wrote. And why not? It’s very catchy.
“If You Love Me” has a very synthy 90s pop feel. I can see it being on the far end of Page’s fun zone, but I don’t really like it. When the song ramps up to the next notes around 2:50, it is excruciating. On the other end of the spectrum is “Leave Her Alone” which opens like a big band number (and stays that way in the chorus) but has verses that are very electronic.
“Queen of America” is a big bouncy song, that I wish I liked more. The final song, the five and a half-minute “The Chorus Girl” is a sad ballad (the kind that Page also writes very well). The song seems to want to be an epic (with horns an extended coda), but I think it drags on a bit too long.
Anyone who misses Page in BNL will certainly like this album. And those who are a little disappointed in the Page-less BNL newer records could easily mix half a dozen songs from this and some of the best songs from the newer BNL records into a very satisfying BNL+Page disc which would sound totally coherent.
[READ: April 25, 2014] Further Joy
This is Brandon’s first collection of short stories and I enjoyed them all quite a lot. Brandon specialized in disaffected protagonists, settled and settling in the South. And there is a nice amount of diversity in these stories.
The Favorite
In this story, Gardner returns to his home town after ten years of being away. he was quite a success when he left, but his return is less than exciting. He lives in small town that was big into high school football and he was glad to be away from it. But now that he is back he goes to games with his mother. The locals are happy he’s back, they think it’s great that he returned to be with his mom and to look after her. But he is miserable.
The only thing that makes the return palatable is seeing Ainsley. They dated in high school but didn’t have a bad breakup when he left. She is divorced now and single. She works in a doctor’s office and tells him stories about patients (despite it being against HIPPA–although she ever gives names). Since he is short on cash, he uses some information that she gives him to bet on an upcoming football game (he was able to figure out one of the players from the injury she described). Now the question is, could he go through with the scheme. He calls on a favor from another former friend who has never had much success. It could all go horribly wrong, of course. I really enjoyed this story a lot, and I loved the way the title played into the story unexpectedly.
The Picnickers
Kim drives to her old friend Rita’s house in Chicago. Rita moved to Chicago from their small town many years ago and she always kept in touch. While she mocked the suburban moms that she now hung around with, it was clear to Kim that she was becoming one of them. So when Rita and her friends plan to spend the day shopping, Kim demurs. It’s then that Rita’s teenaged son, Franklin, says that he has to go to a museum for school and he needs someone to accompany him for the assignment. Rita is furious that he waited until now to say this, but Kim agrees to go (Rita knows that Kim likes museums more than shopping) so off they go.
They have a very nice time, with Franklin basically controlling the day. But the day does not involve a museum. Rather they go on a picnic and it’s quite clear that Franklin is flirting with Kim. And she is flattered but confused by his attention. Just how far can this possibly go? I enjoyed the way this sort was written and the incredible tension that Brandon evokes throughout.
The Midnight Gales
This is a weird story that has a guy who moved here from New Mexico who is obsessed with aliens. He was attracted to their town because of the weird things going on. In what seems like an unrelated but also odd event, the narrator is home schooled and then state schooled in alternating years. The state discouraged this with mounds of paperwork but his mom really lies paperwork, so she does it anyway. As the story progresses, miracles and aliens crop up, and the church plays a very large part in the community. There’s an elliptical feeling in the story as in the sentence: “‘there are places more south than this,’ I say, ‘places that don’t have…what we have going on'” (61). The end of the story is just plain weird, but visually very interesting.
Palatka
Palatka is a town in Florida. In this story Mal is a seventeen year old girl who lives next to Pauline. They share a balcony. Mal is a weird young girl–Pauline has never seen her come home with groceries and she seems to be dating all the time. Pauline was only six years older but felt so much more worldly and confuse by Mal’s life. Especially when Pauline hints at the danger of online dating and Mal dismisses the idea of danger with a knowing nod. Meanwhile Pauline hasn’t had sex in over a year. She was always too picky. Some days later, though, Mal has not returned to her apartment. There is no sign of her–she doesn’t answer her phone or anything. The police and landlord just assume Mal was a transient girl and don;t seem worried, but Pauline is freaked out. And Mal’s disappearance affects Pauline in many ways. She is very upset and uses her balcony less and less but it also inspires her to be more adventurous. So she goes to the bar, she flirts with a telemarketer who cold calls her. But then she winds up meeting a guy named Herbie who just might be the danger she warned Mal about,.
Prospectus
Marky is a bad little league player who wants to buy a giant drum from a guy named Hurley. But really what he wants is to get the local legend Nelson to support him on his latest venture. Of course Nelson wants nothing to do with him. But Marky has plans, and plans are hard to break sometimes.
Further Joy
I am always interested in titular stories of short story collections. But this one was the weirdest and least satisfying of the bunch. The whole story is told about One Girl, but it is not just one girl because at one point she is described as one of the girls and it seems to be a series of events that were nearly stream of consciousness and therefore hard to recall.
The Inland News
Sofia is preparing for an experiment, with Uncle Tunsil promising that he’ll be there the whole time if she wants. But as it turns out, the experiment is to see if Sofia can help the police with a murder investigation. The dead man, Barn Renfro was an unlikable sort whom nobody liked. But it was also the first murder in town in ten years and the police needed it solved. Sofia seemed to have a supernatural gift. The police were reluctant to call her in–how would that look? But they need the mystery solved. Sofia interrogates the men in the town (her attitude is that she is used to men lying to her). But can she actually help?
Naples. Not Italy.
I really liked the title of this story, as it is set in Naples, Florida. Things are pretty bleak in Naples. A couple lives in an apartment where they are the youngest by decades. One highlight is playing 20 Point Turn which is all about watching old folks try to park. But the truth is that the boring life they lead hides some martial issues.
The Differing Views
Mitchell is living alone in the house that he and his girl Bet used to share. She left him and he is by himself–jobless, friendless. Then one day he wakes up and there are brains floating near the ground in her old room. He tries to imagine what this could mean but he can’t place it. I enjoyed the way Bet’s life kept intruding back on his own–both in the form of a letter she sent him an a package sent for her. He keeps putting off reading the letter in case it tells him something significant that he can’t handle. But the letter proves to be nothing that he thought. The brains were a little lees satisfying as they didn’t really seem to do anything, except maybe count as a hallucination. I wanted them to tie in to the rest of the story but felt they never really did.
Skybound
This story is in three unconnected parts. The first one, San Joaquin, was not that exciting–a look at a man trying to find himself. But the second part, The Migration, was an interesting story about police looking to a spiritualist for help in locating someone who has stolen a piano. In the final piece, Joyce has begin smoking again and a boy asks her to buy him cigarettes. As the story ends we learn that Joyce has had a rough time of late, with a horrible tragedy looming over her head.
Estuary
This was probably my favorite story in the book–a great one to end on. In it, the narrator seems to be straddling two worlds. In the first, he is living with his old friends Mike and Melanie. They were also friends with his ex-girlfriend (of nine years) but it’s not awkward (amazingly). Melanie keeps him updated on Dana’s love life (they women are still friends) even though the narrator doesn’t really want to know. He feels bad freeloading, but they have a lot of room and Mike likes having him around. In his other compartment he is working as a handyman, building a restaurant for a lesbian and her partner. He is getting paid by the day and isn’t sure how fast he should be working. Cammie loves the work he’s doing and seems fond of him as well. As the story draws to close, Cammie warns him that her girlfriend wants to leave. The narrator figures this is par for the course with his projects. The ending is sort of continuation of the status quo with some questions left in the air as well. I really enjoyed the dynamics of the narrator with his friends.
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