I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: CHASTITY BELT-I Used to Spend So Much Time Alone (2017).

Chastity Belt began as a kind of funny punk band with a message.

They have grown more sophisticated with each release.  And the humor has drifted away (except in their hilarious visuals), replaced by a kind of low-key, nonchalant attitude.

And with this album Chastity Belt exposes an unexpected vulnerability and a relatability.  Sure I miss songs like “Nip Slip,” but their song writing and playing has developed so much that I really love what they present now.

“Different Now” opens this third album with a very pretty lead guitar line–nothing too complex, but quite lovely.  And when Julia Shapiro starts singing, other things seem different now, too.  Her voice is gentle and her lyrics are even more thoughtful.  I love the way the two guitars intertwine later in the song and the main vocal melody of the song is really fun.

Lyrically the band still speaks about self empowerment:

You’ll find in time
All the answers that you seek
Have been sitting there just waiting to be seen
Take away your pride and take away your grief
And you’ll finally be right where you need to be

“This Time of Night” rocks a bit harder in the rhythm guitar but has a gentle echoing middle section.

Gretchen Grimm’s song “Stuck” is another highlight–a slow song that builds nicely with a catchy chorus and cool distorted guitar deep in the mix.  “Complain” has a catchy wooziness that sounds great too.  And they haven’t given up on feminism either:

I’ve had a drink and ate some stuff / Now I’m already bored / A couple of bros said some shit I’m choosing to ignore

Themes of being bored at parties abound in Chastity Belt songs.

“What the Hell” slows things down with an acoustic guitar as the main rhythm.  I love this lyric: “If I look at my phone again, I’ll just wanna die / Aside from that, I feel all right”

Its amusing to me that “Something Else also reflects on that phone: “But I got up on my own / And I looked at my phone / We’re all talking about nothing / I wanna do something cool / And I wanna get paid / And wake up feeling great every day”

“Used to Spend” starts slow and kind of dark and then tuns into a gauzy distorted middle section.

I love “5am” for the way the opening sounds like a long-lost Sonic Youth song–unexpected chords and intertwining guitars.  Even the delivery is not unlike Kim Gordon.  This song also has outro that is almost as long as the rest of the song.  It features some repeated guitars and some wailing feedback-filled soloing (more Sonic Youth again).   It’s a fantastic song.  And is a perfect album ender.

There are three bonus tracks.  Bonus tracks are kind of a mixed blessing in that they’re nice to have but they kind of ruin the natural arc of the record.  All three of them are kind of quiet and dreamy.  But it’s also a good opportunity for other members of the band to sing:

“Don’t Worry” is sung by Gretchen (when I saw them live she and Julia switched places for this song).  Lydia sings “Bender.”   And then Julia ends the disc with “I’m Fine.”  These are nice songs to add on, but do feel a bit more like bonus songs–or like songs from a gentler album.

I’m very curious to hear where the band goes next, as their skills improve and their feminism deepens.

Oh, and they are really fun live.

[READ: March 20, 2016] “1=1”

How strange that Anne Carson had fiction published in Harper’s and the New Yorker at the same time.

And they were both elliptical and hard to parse.

The story begins “She visits others. Before they’re up, dawn, she walks to the lake, listening to Bach, the first clavichord exercise, which she plans to have played at her funeral someday, has had this plan since she first heard the music and, thinking of it, she weeps lightly.”  That’s a sentence boyo.

So the first two paragraphs are about her swimming, the challenges of it, the intensity of it and apparently how the time in the water allows her to get into her own head.

Then her visit ends.

And she is back home.

She sees that on the morning she was swimming there was a train crammed with war zone victims trying to flee–how could these things coexist?

Then she goes down to the stoop where Chandler is there drawing with chalk.  He seems as odd as her, perhaps more so.  He draws beautiful things on the sidewalk with the chalk.  They share a moment, although it’s not much of a moment and there’s a pretty funny joke about John Cage and his mother searching for mushrooms.

She goes back inside, but soon enough Chandler rings the bells and shows her that he has finished the day.

And it is a circular story returning us to the water

I can’t say I loved it.