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Archive for the ‘Funny (ha ha)’ Category

Ian Boothby & Gisèle Lagacé–Exorsisters: Volume 1: Damned If You Don’t (2019)

Posted in Demons, End of the World, Explosions in the Sky, Funny (ha ha), Gisèle Lagacé, Gods, Graphic Novel, Ian Boothby, NPR/PRI/PBS, Parenting, Son Lux, Supernatural, Superstitions, Surreal, Tiny Desk Concert, YA Books on August 10, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: AMONG AUTHORS-Tiny Desk Contest # 878 (August 9, 2019)

A lot of the time when I say I haven’t heard of a band, tons of other people have.

But I’m expected to say I don’t know who Among Authors is because as of this performance they are unsigned and self-managed.

They make a kind of artful indie prog rock. Two lead guitars, a simple drum kit, and piano.  All centered around pianist Ian Ketterer’s amazing voice.

Out of more than 6,000 entries to our 2018 Tiny Desk Contest, Among Authors was one of the most original bands I’d seen — so much so that we invited the group to perform as part of our Tiny Desk Contest tour in Seattle. I was even more impressed by Among Authors’ songwriting and keen, spare musicianship at that KEXP-sponsored event, so I invited them to play a Tiny Desk concert. By the time their big day came, nearly a year later, they were ready — nervous, but ready.

They play three songs, each one longer than the last.

“Radio Signals” opens with just piano and Ian Ketterer’s soaring falsetto–he sounds a bit like Ryan Lott from Son Lux.  After a minute and a half Patrick Brockwell adds some gentle brushed drums and both guitarists play different intertwining melodies.

Ian Ketterer sat behind our upright piano, partially hidden by his hair and hoodie. Patrick Brockwell’s clean look provided a stark contrast, and his no-frills, perfectly placed rhythms matched his appearance. The two guitarists, Jon Livingston and Jason Ketterer (Ian’s brother), played intertwining melodies, often lifting the songs from their dimness while embracing the mystery in the lyrics.

“The Overture” opens with all of them singing oohs–they have great voices.  The guitar parts are not unlike the slower parts of Explosions in the Sky–fast high notes in repeated melodies that interweave and sound amazing.

The blurb says that these songs aren’t catchy. And that’s true.  These aren’t earworm pop songs.  Yhey are intense and inviting.  I’ve listened to this Tony Desk more than many others.  It’s impressive when Brockwell hits his low drums (floor tom, I assume) how deep it is–there’s not a lot of bass in these songs so the low notes really stand out.  And Ian’s voice is really quite amazing–he gives this his all.

“Lure” opens with lovely intertwining guitar lines.  When the main part of the song kicks in, the thumping drums and fast piano really propel the song along.  It’s fantastic.  The song runs about 8 minutes with an extended instrumental outro that is dynamite.

Just to add some even more fascinating detail to this band

Nearly a dozen years ago, at 23, bandleader Ian Ketterer had open-heart surgery. Born without a thumb on his right hand and deaf in his right ear, he plays piano and sings.

I don’t know how hard it was to overcome any of that, but he (and the rest of the band) certainly did.  I’m going to have to look for this CD.

[READ: August 2019] Exorsisters Vol. 1

I saw this book in the store during an Image comic book sale.  I loved the title and was blown away by the art.  The whole premise seemed like a lot of fun.

I love the way the story doesn’t explain the set up for several chapters, it just jumps right in at a wedding.

As a pretty redhead is about to marry a handsome blond, dude, chains comes out of the ground and pull the man into hell.

Everyone in the audience believes that she was stood up, but she saw him get grabbed by a demon.

Then we meet twin sisters Cate and Kate.  Cate is prim and Kate is a rocker.  Lagacé’s artwork is perfect from the start.  They are distinct but similar.  Her whole style is almost like an Archie comic, but less sweet.  I love it.

The girls promise to investigate.

Meanwhile, we see a woman who proves to be their mom.  She bets a guy in a bar that she has done something worse than he has. We don’t hear what she has done, but she clearly beat his horrible tale. (more…)

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Bryan Lee O’Malley, Leslie Hung–Snotgirl: Green Hair Don’t Care (Vol. 1)

Posted in Allergies, Ap Bio, Bryan Lee O'Malley, Crosby Stills & Nash, Crosby Stills Nash and Young, CSN, CSN&Y, David Crosby, Funny (ha ha), Graphic Novel, Huh?, Leslie Hung, NPR/PRI/PBS, The Lighthouse Band, Tiny Desk Concert, Unfinished series, Unfunny, YA Books, Yuck! on August 8, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: DAVID CROSBY & THE LIGHTHOUSE BAND-Tiny Desk #876 (August 7, 2019).

I had more or less assumed that David Crosby was done with music.  He seemed more of a punchline than anything else lately.  He hadn’t put out much in the way of music in the last decade or so.  But the new Lighthouse album was getting some positive reviews.

It seems odd that he’s never been on a Tiny Desk before, but then again, he hasn’t done much lately to warrant it.  Nevertheless, here he and his band are.

Moments before the first note at the Tiny Desk, David Crosby needed the mics rearranged: He asked that his microphone be positioned evenly with the rest of his band mates, rather than in front of them, explaining that while his name is the one on the marquee, The Lighthouse Band has no hierarchy.

That band is an inter-generational ensemble, featuring Snarky Puppy bandleader and bassist Michael League, as well as guitarist Becca Stevens and keyboardist Michelle Willis, both accomplished singers and songwriters in their own right. They all first came together while the members were collaboratively writing and recording for Crosby’s 2016 album Lighthouse. Everybody sings in this band, trading lead vocals for harmonies and vice-versa in just about every combination.

The Lighthouse Band sounds fantastic and Crosby really does take a back seat to the younger musicians.

“What Are Their Names” is a political song sung in a capella style.  It is short and smart

I wonder who they are
The men who really run this land
And I wonder why they run it
With such a thoughtless hand
What are their names
And on what streets do they live
I’d like to ride right over
This afternoon and give
Them a piece of my mind
About peace for mankind
Peace is not an awful lot to ask

Crosby sings lead on “Looks In Their Eyes.”  His voice still sounds pretty good–although he’s not pushing too hard.  Becca Stevens has a wonderful high voice.

Before “Other Half Rule” Crosby says that this is a song about asking women to take over the world–you couldn’t possibly do any worse.  Michael League sings lead (his voice is much better than Crosby’s).  Becca and Michelle sing the second verse and sound terrific together.  The design of this song is very CSN&Y and you can certainly hear their voices in the harmonies.  I also really like the part where Becca plays a lead riff on the electric 12-string in between strums from Michael.

Then they play the classic “Woodstock” with a new arrangement but still wonderful harmonies.  This is a fantastic song in any version and this version is pretty great.

[READ: August 2019] Snotgirl Vol. 1

I loved Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim books.  The whole story was funny and the artwork was great.

This series is written by O’Malley, so it has a lot of the really funny moments like Scott Pilgrim did.  But it is drawn by leslie Hung, so the style is very different.

Hung’s drawing style is quite pretty, which befits the character-a fashion blogger.  Now, Scott Pilgim took O’Malley’s style and made the humor exaggerated.  Hung’s more pretty style is a contrast to O’Malley’s content.  It kind of works, although it almost deemphasizes the humor.

So what we have is a story about a vapid LA fashion blogger and, honestly, its not that interesting.  Scott Pilgrim was a loser, but his story was funny and interesting.  But Lottie might be too vapid to be interesting. Lottie’s biggest problem is that she has allergies (hence Snotgirl).

Is it possible to build a story around that?  Possibly not.

It starts with O’Malley’s humor as he introduces the characters.  Each woman gets a tag:

Lottie Person; Fashion Blogger; Style: effortlessly chic; Age: 25 3/4

Then her two best friends:
Megan Foster “Normgirl”; Style: boring, normie; Age 23? 27? don’t care
Misty Sutton “Cutegirl” Fashion blogger; Style: too cute; Age ???

She has to give everyone a nickname because she can’t keep anyone straight otherwise.

Then we see the first crisis of Lottie’s life.  Her ex-boyfriend Sunny Day is now dating her former intern, Charlene.  Charlene is younger, but thankfully not cuter.

While Lottie is freaking out about this she meets a pretty woman, Caroline, who orders the same weird coffee as her.  Lottie calls her “Coolgirl.”  Coolgirl knows of Lottie and follows her blog.  Coolgirl is an aspiring fashion blogger herself (good grief how many are there?).

Coolgirl is so cool, she forgot her phone and she’s living her life anyway.  Who does that?

Lottie goes to her allergist, but it’s a new fellow, a hot young guy who gives her a new experimental drug.

That night she meets Coolgirl at the bar (Lottie doesn’t normally go out). She has an allergy attack and runs to the restroom to hide her snot and take her new pills.  But Coolgirl barges in on her to se that she’s okay.  She laughs and calls Lottie “Snottie.”  Lottie seems to black out and when she wakes up, Coolgirl is dead on the floor.

But the next day (Lottie has no memory of getting home) there is no word of a dead girl anywhere in the news.  She;s pretty freaked out until her new intern, Esther Dumont (Style: my intern; Age unpaid) arrives to make all of Lottie’s problems go away.  [It’s staggering to think that Lottie would have an intern].

Lottie goes out for coffee with her “friends,” the haters club.  Charlene works at this coffee shop.  [I love that Charlene looks like Heather my favorite character from AP Bio, although this is from 2017, so its clearly a coincidence].  Charlene puts Lottie milk in her coffee (Lottie is lactose intolerant, of course) and that’s the last straw.

Then there’s a new character introduced, a detective.  His name is John Cho (no relation to the beloved actor).  Hes 27, and rising star with the LAPD. Now that he’s been made a detective he can unleash his greatest skill: Fashion!  This is such a wonderful O’Malley joke and delivery, that I wish it paid off more.  Cho is a huge fan of Lottie’s blog and believes her to be perfect in real life.  Their paths will cross later.

Later that night at a party Charlene and Sunny Day are there. Charlene is wearing one of Lottie’s old dresses (Esther the intern sold it to her).  Lottie gets right in her face and yells “Take everything. Take my dress, take Sunny, you’re nothing but a stalker and worse than that, you’re a fake!”

But when Charlene says she saw Lotte go into the bathroom with the pretty girl and she knows what Lottie did, well Lottie can’t deal and she pushes Charlene into the pool.

And yet just as things seem their worst, Lottie gets a text from Cool girl.  She is at the party too.  She’s not dead.

On New Year’s Eve, Lottie goes out.  Charlene is there and she drunkenly pulls up her dress at Lottie and says, “I’m wearing your panties!”  There is a buzz around the room until Lottie has to tell everyone that they are not hers, she designed them.

Moments later, Lottie is talking to Charlene on the roof.  Charlene is in tears and Lottie feels like she wants to help this crazy girl.  But as the new year chimes in Coolgirl sees the two of them and jealously pushes Charlene off the roof.

What kind of story is this?

I found this book really hard to read.  Not because of the text girl speak (although that was annoying) but because the characters are so unpleasant and dull.  The first few chapters were meant as exposition I guess, but they were expository of characters that were hard to distinguish and seem ultimately irrelevant.

And again, the concept that Lottie’s biggest concern is allergies is hard to imagine as the basis for a story.

I’m not dying to read the other two books, but I want to give O’Malley the benefit of the doubt.

 

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Dave Eggers–This Bridge Will Not Be Gray (2015)

Posted in Barack Obama, Bridges, Children's Books, Dave Eggers, Funny (ha ha), Irving Morrow, Joseph Strauss, Leon Moisseiff, NPR/PRI/PBS, San Francisco, CA, Tiny Desk Concert, Tucker Nichols on August 7, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: BAS-Tiny Desk Concert #875 (August 5, 2019).

I’ve never heard of Bas, but he performs a surprisingly upbeat-sounding set of songs for lyrics with so many curses.

Bas, the Paris-born, Queens-bred MC delivered an energetic and comical set.  Just like his lyrically impressive and sometimes dance-inducing Tiny Desk — peep his headbanging and seated sambas throughout — Bas always balances his bravado with a relatable sense of humility.

The four songs are from his third studio album, Milky Way.

“Barack Obama Special” starts with this fascinating lyric:
This one is dedicated to
My bitch ass neighbors, haha, yeah
‘Cause I’m living better now, better now
Bitch I’m living better now
Yeah
I had to move ’cause neighbors so racist

But he makes sure to clarify

“My new neighbor’s mad cool. So shout out to Peggy.  Peggy be picking up my mail when I’m on tour.  I don’t want her to watch and be like I thought you was such a nice young man.”

The song segued into “Purge” which starts with a simple but cool sounding guitar riff from Nathan Foley.  Sweet keys are sprinkled over the top.  Mereba and Justin Jackson provide gentle backing vocals.  Ron Gilmore adds some very cool bass lines from the keys throughout all the songs.

“Designer” has some cool off tempo synth lines and ends with a ripping distorted Prince-like guitar solo.

The song finishes with a bouncy instrumental section and Bas says, “I feel like I just won the whole circuit in Mario Kart.  Where’d you get that music from?  Don’t get me sued.  Nintendo coming for us.”

Ron Gilmore then plays a fun little circus music riff and Bas says, “Nintendo cut the check!”

Throughout the set, Johnathon Lee Lucas on drums is a lot of fun to watch as he’s got a whole array of drums and pads to play.

They are having so much fun they almost forget to play the last song “Tribe.”  This one ends with another nice instrumental jam which Bas says went on for much longer than they rehearsed–that was cool.

[READ: August 1, 2019] This Bridge Will Not Be Gray

Dave Eggers has written all kinds of books through his career.  This was his first children’s book (with cut-out art by Tucker Nichols).

Eggers is from San Francisco and he loves his home city.  This book is a love letter to the Golden Gate Bridge and the area that inspired it.

I honestly had no idea about any of the information in this book, so it was educational for me as well.

For instance, I did not realize that the passageway between the bay and the ocean was called The Golden Gate.  Thus, that’s why the Bridge is named that, not because it was supposed to be gold. (more…)

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Dave Bidini–Midnight Light: A Personal Journey to the North (2018)

Posted in Athanaskan, Books about writers, Calle 13, Canadian Content, Canadian Music, Corb Lund, Culture Shock, Dan Mangan, Dave Bidini, Délı̨nę, Northwest Territories, Dené, Dog Sleds, Domestic Violence, Drinking, First Nations, Folk on the Rocks Festival, Friendship, Funny (ha ha), Homelessness, Humiliation, iLe, Non-fiction, NPR/PRI/PBS, Politicians, Prison, Puerto Rico, Regrets, Relationships, Religion, Research, Revenge, Rheostatics, Rush, Sahtú, Science, Sexism, Sexual Assault, Sports, Supernatural, Superstitions, Tanya Tagaq, Terra Lightfoot, The Globe and Mail, The Sun, The Telegram, The Yellowknifer, Tiny Desk Concert, Toronto Star, Travel, Tuktoyaktuk, Northwest Territories, Violence, West End Phoenix, Yellowknife, Northwest Territories on August 6, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: iLe-Tiny Desk Concert #874 (August 3, 2019).

It’s not very often that you hear a song that is all percussion.  But the first song of this set is only percussion and (Spanish) vocals.

iLe is a singer in the Puerto Rican band Calle 13.  Her most recent solo album Almadura:

is filled with metaphors and allegories about the political, social and economic conditions in Puerto Rico.

When vocalist Ileana Cabra Joglar and her band visited the Tiny Desk, they’d just arrived from the front lines of the historic demonstrations taking place in Puerto Rico. Two days earlier, they were part of a crowd of tens of thousands who were on the streets calling for the resignation of embattled Gov. Ricardo Rosselló. (Rosselló recently stepped down, effective August 2.)

Right from the start, it was clear what was on iLe’s mind in her song “Curandera” — “I am a healer / I don’t need candles to illuminate / I bring purifying water to cleanse / Removing pains so they never return” — as congas and percussion shook the room with an Afro-Caribbean beat.

This is the song in which all of the band members play percussion–primarily congas although Ismael Cancel is on the drum kit.  While everyone plays congas, it is Jeren Guzmán who is the most accomplished and who plays the fast conga “solo.”

In the chorus of the slow-burning “Contra Todo,” iLe sings about channeling inner strengths and frustrations to win battles and remake the world. Her lyrics are rich with history, capturing the spirit of the streets of San Juan even as she stood, eyes closed, behind the Tiny Desk. Her entire performance is a startling reflection of this moment in Puerto Rican history.

“Contra Todo” has a rich deep five string bass from Jonathan Gonzalez and two trombones (Joey Oyola and Nicolás Márquez). Two guitars (Bayoán Ríos and Adalberto Rosario) add a kind of percussive strumming and a quiet song-ending riff.  Jeren Guzmán plays the congas with mallets, something I’ve never seen before.

By the time iLe and her band launched into “Sin Masticar,” they’d already captured the full power of protest, as their musical arrangements raged with the intensity of a crowd joined by a shared cause and pulse.

“Sin Masticar” has a super catchy chorus, perhaps the best way to get people involved in a protest.

[READ: August 2019] Midnight Light

Two years ago Dave Bidini co-founded The West End Phoenix, a newspaper that is for people in Toronto’s West End.  It’s print, it’s old school, and it’s pretty awesome.  I don’t think I’ve ever been to the West End, but I find the writing and the content to be interesting and really enjoyable.

It’s no surprise that Bidini has worked in journalism and loved and hated it.

I’ve always loved newspaper: the smell of the ink and the rough of the newsprint weighted in my hands, their broadsheets flapping like Viking sails.  When I was a kid, our family read them all–the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, The Sun, and before that The Telegram–at the kitchen table with each person drawing out whatever they needed: comics, sports, business, entertainment (and yet never Wheels, the Star’s automotive supplement).

He started writing before he picked up a guitar.  When he was 11 he submitted a poem about a hockey player to The Sun‘s “Young Sun” section.  It was accepted and he won a T-shirt.

In 1991, he was asked to write a regular column for a Star satellite weekly called Metropolis.  The day his first piece was to be in print he waited at the nearest newsbox for the delivery man.

But he had no stamina and fewer ideas and he was eventually let go.  Which led to writing books.  But he still wanted to write for the paper and then he remembered: Hey, Yellowknife had a newspaper.

This book is about journalism.  But it’s also about the Canadian North.  And while the journalism stuff is interesting–and the way it ties to the North is interesting too, it’s the outsider’s perspective of this region of the world (that most people don’t even think about) which is just amazing to read about–the people, the landscape, the conditions.  It’s fascinating. (more…)

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Colin Barrett–“The Alps” (Harper’s, August 2019)

Posted in Colin Barrett, Drones, Funny (ha ha), Futility, Harper's, Jacob Collier, NPR/PRI/PBS, Short Story, Tiny Desk Concert, UFOs, Violence on August 3, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: JACOB COLLIER-Tiny Desk Concert #869 (July 22, 2019).

I’ve never heard of Jacob Collier, but wow is he an impressive figure.

the North London 24-year-old can hardly contain his creative energy. It comes out in his wardrobe and most definitely in his music, but it’s not misdirected or out of control. These are intricate and precise compositions, like a ship in a bottle made of thousands of planks of wood, yet light enough to sail in a breeze.

He starts with “Make Me Cry.”  Collier plays a fascinatingly deep-sounding acoustic guitar (with amazing flourishes).  But the biggest shock comes when he sings.  He has such a deep sonorous voice.  The backing vocals (from Becca Stevens–who also plays the charango–and MARO on the acoustic guitar) are high–a real contrast to his voice. That is until he switches to piano (while still holding the guitar) and then his voice reaches the high notes as well. Drummer Christian Euman adds some nice xylophone bells to the song as Collier’s voice soars impressively.

After the first song he says “I’ve spent the last year or so making four full length albums [called Djesse].  I don’t know why, its quite exhausting. But its fun.  Each is it’s own musical universe.”  All three songs today are from Vol 2.

But another example of his excess is this:

This year he covered Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer’s “Moon River” by recording himself 5,000 times and working in 144 other vocal submissions, and then he printed and sold signed copies of his Logic Pro audio session for fans while on tour.

“Feel” opens with a simple drum pattern and everyone giving some gentle oohs before Jacob plays a slow piano motif.  Robin Mullarkey switches from acoustic to electric bass.  This song is a more jazzy composition with some lead vocals from MARO (Collier sounds great doing backing vocals as well).

Before the final song,”It Don’t Matter” he explains that he wrote this song about five days ago specifically for this event.  It starts with him making a fascinating array of sounds with his mouth–clicks, hisses and water droplets–and then adding percussive elements like the top of the piano. Then he plays a funky bass line on the tiny acoustic bass.   Becca Stevens gets a lead verse.  And the middle of the song has a melodica solo.

Virtually every combination of band members harmonizes at some point in the show. It’s reflective of his philosophy on music as a connecting tool, to use the instrument we all possess, which drew me to his art in the first place. And as if to make good on those beliefs and bring all of us into one moment, he invited the crowd to sing the final lyrics of the concert together.

The NPR employees are always good sports (and have good voices) so the end of the show is a good one.

[READ: August 1, 2019] “The Alps”

I noted the last time I read a story by Colin Barrett that he writes about Ireland and drugs.  This story was also about Ireland.  But not about drugs.

It’s also not about the Alps as you might expect.

In this story, The Alps are three brothers: Rory, Eustace and Bimbo.  Bimbo was 37, the other two in their fifties.  They claimed to be tradesmen, but none of them have a trade.  Rather they painted, wired, tiled and plumbed at a competitive rate.  They ate too much take out, and downed vats of Guinness.  They traveled together, they worked together, they drank together.

As they pull into Mikey’s pub, Bimbo sees a light up in the sky. It’s behaving strangely and for a minute I thought this story was going to be about UFOs.  But instead, Bimbo realizes it’s a drone surveying the landscape.  Its owned by Landry, a rich man with a lot of land. (more…)

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Donald Antrim–“The Pancake Supper” (New Yorker, December 27, 1999 & January 3, 2000)

Posted in Canadian Music, Donald Antrim, Funny (ha ha), Huh?, Humiliation, New Yorker, Pancakes, Rheostatics, Short Story, The Jack Family, Therapy, Work on July 31, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: THE JACK FAMILY-“You Are My Sunshine” (Moose: The Compilation, 1991).

Back in the 1990s, it was common to buy a compilation or soundtrack or even a band’s album based on one song.  Only to then find that you didn’t really like anything else on it.

Maybe that single sounded like nothing else on the album.  Maybe the movie was almost entirely one genre, but they had that one song that you liked over the credits.  Or maybe the compilation was for something you didn’t know, but a song you really wanted was on it, too.

With streaming music that need not happen anymore.  Except in this case.

I bought this compilation, used, recently exclusively for one song, Rheostatics’ “Woodstuck.”  It’s a goofy song and this is the only place you can get the studio version.  The actual compilation was not well documented, so I didn’t know what the other bands on it might sound like.  It turns out to be a compilation for Ontario based Moose Records which specialized in Rock, Folk, World & Country.  They put out another compilation in 1992 and that’s all I can find out about them.

According to Reno Jack’s biography: The Jack Family was a bunch of musicians who jammed out to whichever song was chosen by whoever was singing. Unrehearsed and free floating each member choosing an alias with the last name Jack just having fun away from the pressures of presenting original music. The band had names like Reno Jack, Bunk “Everyone Drums” Jack, Chief Don Jack, Mercedes Jack, Monterey Jack, Nevada Jack, One-Eyed Jack, Y “Tip” Jack and The Jackets backing singers.

This is the slowest, mopiest take on “You Are My Sunshine” I have ever heard.  Reno Jack is know for “country blues” and this version sounds like the most depressing part of both genres.

[READ: July 30, 2019] “The Pancake Supper”

Thomas suggested that all of the teaching analysts go out for a pancake supper twice a year.  Not at the fancy pancake house, but at the modest open-all night Pancake House & Bar.

Because Breakfast foods, except for cereals, that contain inordinate amounts of sugar, have, in my experience, a comforting, antidepressant quality.

The first to arrive was Manuel Escobar who disagreed with that sentiment: “I suppose that is true is you are an American.”

Escobar flirted with the waitress.  He also wanted to make love to Thomas’ wife.  Thomas was introspective about this:

It has occurred to me from time to time that an affair between this man and my wife could be harmless enough, and might solve a variety of problems in my home life.

Up next was Maria who immediately praised Escobar’s work. (more…)

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Salman Rushdie–“The Little King” (New Yorker, July 29, 2019)

Posted in Anne Bourne, Canadian Music, Corporate skewering, Don Kerr, Drugs, Funny (ha ha), Lawrence Howarth, Loreena McKennitt, Ron Sexsmith, Salman Rushdie, Short Story, Sloan on July 29, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: ANNE BOURNE-“Evangeline” (Moose: The Compilation, 1991).

Back in the 1990s, it was common to buy a compilation or soundtrack or even a band’s album based on one song.  Only to then find that you didn’t really like anything else on it.

Maybe that single sounded like nothing else on the album.  Maybe the movie was almost entirely one genre, but they had that one song that you liked over the credits.  Or maybe the compilation was for something but a song you really wanted was on it, too.

With streaming music that need not happen anymore.  Except in this case.

I bought this compilation, used, recently exclusively for one song, Rheostatics’ “Woodstuck.”  It’s a goofy song and this is the only place you can get the studio version.  The actual compilation was not well documented, so I didn’t know what the other bands on it might sound like.  It turns out to be a compilation for Ontario based Moose Records which specialized in Rock, Folk, World & Country.  They put out another compilation in 1992 and that’s all I can find out about them.

This is one of my favorite songs on this record (that’s not the Rheostatics song).  The song is deep and low with a cool rumbling bass and drum pattern.  Anne Bourne’s voice is deep and intense and generates a wonderful slow burn.

Maybe I like it because Don Kerr, a future Rheostatic, plays cello on it.

Interestingly, there is an Anne Bourne who is a Canadian cello player. I have to assume it’s the same person, but it’s very hard to tell.  If it is, she has played on a huge number of great Canadian albums by Cowboy Junkies, Ron Sexsmith, Sloan, Jane Siberry and Loreena McKennit.

[READ: July 29, 2019] “The Little King”

Salman Rushdie obviously has a reputation as being a cryptic writer who is hard to read–deserved from The Satanic Verses, but otherwise rather unfounded.  Especially when you read a story like this.

This two-pronged story is about two men, distantly related, who couldn’t be more different.  The first man that we meet is obsessed (like really obsessed) with the Indian talk show host Salma R.  The other man is Dr. R.K. Smile, the world-renowned creator of a tremendous pain reliever called InSmile.

The first man had no real friends.  The only thing he wanted to do was obsess over Salma R.  He had never met her but he characterized what they had as love.  He even christened himself Quichotte for Don Quichotte and resolved to be her beloved knight-errant.  Everyone who heard of his plans tried to dissuade him–even people he friended on Facebook told him it was terrible idea.   And this is where Rushdie proves that he is not a snobby writer

In response to his posts there were frown emojis and Bitmojis wagging fingers at him reprovingly and there were GIFs of Salma R. herself crossing her eyes, sticking out her tongue and rotating a finger by her right temple all of which added up to the universally recognized set of gestures meaning “cray cray.”

Quichotte worked in pharmaceutical sales for his wealthy cousin, the very R. K. Smile mentioned above.  Dr. Smile was hugely successful and although he knew that Quichotte was a terrible employee, he felt that it was his duty to protect this layabout–lest he turn into a Willy Loman character.  Since R.K. Smile’s business had recently taken off in a massive way–he was now officially a billionaire–he could easily afford to have an unproductive relative as an employee. (more…)

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George Saunders–“Pastoralia” (New Yorker, April 3, 2000)

Posted in Anachronisms, Cavemen, Elastica, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), George Saunders, King Crimson, Museums, New Yorker, Short Story, Wire on June 30, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: WIRE-Kidney Bingos (1988).

Wire’s first three albums are punk and post-pink classics.  So classic that a Britpop band ripped off one of their songs to make an even bigger hit.  (I rather like Elastica too).

After their hiatus in the early 1980s, they returned with a new sound.  Like King Crimson only with fewer notes.

Their second post-hiatus album A Bell is a Cup even had a single, “Kidney Bingos.”

This song is remarkably far from their early punk sound. It’s almost as if on their first albums, their guitars only had the low strings,  And on this one, they only have the high strings.

The guitars on this song are gentle and jangly.  The bass is pretty similar–nice and deep with a great resonance, although the tempo is much slower and more chill.

The chorus is a really catchy bit if pop fun, even if for 30 years I had no idea that he was saying

Money spines paper lung kidney bingos organ fun

which makes as much sense as what I thought he was saying.

The end of the song throws in some synths and a wordless singalong that shows a real depth to Newman’s voice.

[READ: June 29, 2019] “Pastoralia”

I was sure I had read this story before.  But it turns out I’ve had his collection Pastoralia on my “too read” list but had never actually read it.  In the collection, this story is almost 70 pages.  It’s pretty long in the New Yorker, but i do have to wonder if it is an excerpt as there’s so much that is unexplained.

This story is set in what I think of as the Saunders future.  There’s no ProperName objects as there usually are.  But this future has a lot of the mildly dystopian qualities that Saunders tends to put in his stories

This one includes an exhibit where humans act out historical scenarios in a museum of sorts (the details are never given).

The narrator’s name is never given.  Over the course of a few pages we determine that he is a caveman in an exhibit.  Every day he is supposed to “eat grubs,” “see” a herd of animals and not speak English.  He has a “wife,” Janet.  She is not his real wife, he has a real wife and children.  In fact he doesn’t especially like Janet. She tends to speak English a lot and disregards most other work protocols.

In many respects it doesn’t matter because hardly anyone comes into the museum.  But they are doing a job and they do have supervisors.

When the light dims as if it were night time they each go to their separate personal quarters where they have such modern amenities as a fax machine (this was written in 2000 so that’s not a goof, I don’t think).  (more…)

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Zev Borow–“Superstring Theory for Dummies” (New Yorker, August 14, 2000)

Posted in Dave Eggers, Funny (ha ha), Graham Coxon, McSweeney's, Might, New Yorker, Science, The End of the F***cking World, Unfunny, Zev Borow on June 22, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: GRAHAM COXON-The End Of The F***ing World (Original Songs and Score) (2018).

When I saw Graham Coxon live, he played a bunch of songs from this soundtrack.

I assumed that the soundtrack would be one song and a bunch of moody instrumentals, so I never really looked into it. But recently I read that it was really good.

And it is.

There’s 16 songs on the record.  Most are full songs and the few instrumental pieces are just as interesting.

“Walking All Day” is the catchy song that he played live that did interest me in the soundtrack.  It’s a bouncy folk song with a buzzy acoustic guitar solo.  He sings in a quiet whispery voice which sounds different from his usual singing voice.  The lyrics are sweet, if not odd:

Walking all day with my mouth on fire
trying to get talking to you.

“Angry Me” has a punky strum on acoustic guitar.  It sounds like a bratty Blur song from the album that “Song 2” came from.  [He played this].

“Flashback” is 16 seconds of heavy metal noise with saxophones and pummeling drums.  It’s very disconcerting between these two songs, and I feel like it should come later for better sequencing.  But it is only 16 seconds.

“In My Room” is a quiet acoustic song.  It starts with just the guitar.  Then the bass and drums come in as Coxon slowly sings about those outside of his room:

Outside the window they’re singing
Inside the doorway there’s me
Endlessly thinking and working

“Bus Stop” is five minutes long.  There’s a two-minute super catchy instrumental section which is followed by a bouncy verse with rather shoegaze feel.

Then there’s a few really short songs all around two minutes.  “The Beach” starts with a rumbling slide guitar solo and adds picked guitar notes.  It’s got a very Western feeling.  “Saturday Night” is a quiet mournful ballad of acoustic guitar and piano.  He played this live (without the piano).

“On the Prowl” is a garage rock song with a very fifties feel.

“It’s All Blue” is another delicate folk song that Graham played live.  It features his more innocent vocal lines.

“The Snare” is a heavily reverbed noir kind of song with that familiar detective bass line and echoing guitar (very David Lynch).  The last minute or so totally rocks out with a distortion filled solo.

“Lucifer’s Behind Me” is a fast song with bongos and more vibrato guitar lines.  It’s kind of upbeat despite the feeling of pursuit in the lyrics.

“Field” is a lovely instrumental.  A 90 second acoustic guitar piece that is rather relaxing.  A nice contrast to “She Left the Light On– a stark and sinister acoustic song with a lead whistle!  The middle is catchy.  He played this one live.

“Roaming Star” is a 2 minute gentle acoustic piece with soft vocals  About half way through there’s some very old-fashioned sounding horns.  He played this one.

“Sleuth” is a two minute instrumental.  It has a chugging electric guitar with some looping guitar solo work over the top.

“There’s Something in the Way that You Cry” is a slow mournful ballad that he played live.  It’s a pretty sad ending to a soundtrack album that holds together really well and isn’t only instrumental pieces.

I now wish I had heard them before the show so I could have really appreciated them live.

[UPDATE: I watched the show in May 2020 and the soundtrack works really well.  The show is very very dark, as you might guess from the title].

[READ: June 20, 2019] “Superstring Theory for Dummies”

Zev Borow is associated with Dave Eggers.  He worked on their magazine Might and also on McSweeney’s ( I don’t think they work together anymore, but they might).  Since then, has written for just about every publication out there.  He also wrote episodes of and became a prominent story editor in the show Chuck.

This is the first piece of his I’ve read in the New Yorker and, as with so many Shouts & Murmurs, it’s mildly funny.

The bit starts with a quote from the Times in which the author tried to describe superstring theory which looks beyond the three dimensions of space.  Imagine that you are in the book Flatland.  You can move forward and back, left and right but not up or down.

So Borow expands on that.

(more…)

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David Schickler–“The Smoker” (New Yorker, June 19 & 26, 2000)

Posted in Arranged Marriage, Bo Diddley, Cats, David Schickler, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), Gnocchi, Herman Melville, NonComm, Parenting, Patti Smith, Set at School, Sidecars, Tom Petty on June 6, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: K.T. TUNSTALL-NonComm (May 16, 2019).

Most artists at NonCOMM get about 20 minutes.  The headliners get about 40 minutes.

When I saw K.T. Tunstall was playing, I assumed she would get 20 minutes–how could she be a headliner? Didn’t she have one hit like a decade ago with “Suddenly I See.”

But there she was with a 45 minute set.  I wondered why.  Possibly because she was playing World Cafe Live again the next night for a full show.  Or possibly because she had a huge hit that I didn’t realize was hers.

Tunstall was by herself on stage.  She had a guitar, a drum machine of some sort, a looping pedal and a kazoo.  Having a lengthy set also allowed for a looser, more talkative set.  She is very funny, bold, foul-mouthed (in the best Scottish way) and smart.

As the last night at NON-COMM was winding down, K.T. Tunstall was able to give the crowd one last hoorah. Tunstall’s set mixed the old and the new nicely, playing anything from covers and mashups to her most recognizable hits.

Tunstall started the set with “Little Red Thread,” the opener to her most recent release Wax. The tune was carried by Tunstall’s percussive guitar tapping and tambourine playing, and it sure got the crowd going.

It had a four note heavy riff with some echoey chords that propel the song.  After two verses she messes something up and says, “that’s a really shitty way to start,” but jumps right back in.

She liked playing the new song but then says, “Let’s trustfall into something familiar.”   She asked if anyone had a long-distance relationship.  “It’s a really fucking bad idea.  It’s good sex; it’s just not regular.”  This was an introduction to the quieter “Other Side of the World” off of her 2004 debut Eye to the Telescope.  The song opens with looping quiet percussion and her raspy voice singing over a gentle acoustic guitar.

“Backlash & Vinegar” is about someone trying to keep you down.  It stays quiet with just her guitar and voice.

She recalled going to a karaoke bar drunk with friends and looking for “Faith” by George Michael which they didn’t have.  WTF?!  The friend she was with said there was a song there that she knew all the words to.  It was her song!  What song was it?  There’s a bit more story.

When she first came to the States she performed her first shows inside Barnes & Noble stores. They close at 8 so you have to play at 7.  There were multiple hot women dressed like Jane Fonda.  Finally she asked a woman why she looked like Lydia from Fame.  She replied (in Tunstall’s great “American” accent: “Honey.  You don’t know? You’re huge in Jazzercise.”

So she plays her jazzercise hit “Black Horse And A Cherry Tree.”  This was the massive hit (and it was a massive hit because I’d heard it everywhere) that I had no idea was by her.  It starts immediately recognizably with the looped “who-hoo / whoo-hoo” and if that doesn’t remind you of the song, the chorus is “No no / no no no no / no no / you’re not the one for me.” It sounded sport on.

She ends the song with a kazoo (!) rendition of White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army,” which she looped in the backgroud of the end of her song.

Up next is “The River” which is about taking a spiritual shower and washing the world from our brains.  It’s a catchy folk song that could easily have been a Starbucks hit (and maybe it was).

She then teaches everyone a Scottish word: “jobby” it means “shit.”  It’s like the name of the poo emoji.  She wrote this song as an antidote to when you have a nice pair of white high tops and just out of nowhere you step in a really big jobby.  It’s the kind you cant get off with a stick and you have to go into a meeting with the jobby–it’s a metaphor for life.  You can smell it, other people can smell it.  And what you need is a song to get you through.

This is the intro to “Feel It All,” a catchy simple guitar riff and a quiet vocal line.   I don’t know what these songs sound like on records but they translate into pretty folks songs here.

She felt like with everything going on (a lot of abortion bans being proposed), she needed a cover by a master.

Tunstall banged away as she sang a fantastic cover of Tom Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down,” mixing in percussive elements with her thrilling vocals once again.
a rocking raw version

She said she likes to be a purveyor of joy but she needs to speak up.  She dedicates this song to all the women who have achieved incredible things in their lives.  And one of the reasons they’ve been able to achieve it is because they and their partners have had reproductive rights .   This song is meant to give strength to any woman who might have it taken away.

And there was the song I knew from her: “Suddenly I See.”  She started the song, a shuffling rocker, and said, “Every songwriter is like a juicer. You put a few things in and you hope it doesn’t come out brown and weird. This is what happened when I listened to Patti Smith and Bo Diddley on the same day.”

I never would have thought that on my own, but I sure hear it this time.  The song sounds just like I remember it.  Her shockingly un-Scottish-sounding vocals and a super catchy chorus.

I’m glad she got a 45 minute set, it was a great re-introduction to someone I liked a while ago.

[READ: June 1, 2019] “The Smoker”

I don’t understand the title of this story, but I really enjoyed it’s odd revelations.

Douglas Kerchek is a teacher of 12th grade A.P. English at a prestigious all-girls Catholic school in New York City.

Nicole Bonner was a standout student.  He had already written her a recommendation for Princeton.

She read an entire novel every night and retained what she read.  When he proposed a pop quiz, instead of answering the questions, she wrote the entire first page of Moby Dick verbatim.

Although at the end of a recent essay, she had attached a note saying she had noticed the bruise on his ankle and wondered what he had banged it on. (more…)

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