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Archive for the ‘Liz Phair’ Category

Alanis Morissette / Garbage / Cat Power (PNC Bank Arts Center, Holmdel, NJ, September 1, 2021) [rescheduled] [CANCELLED]

Posted in Alanis Morissette, Cancelled, Coronavirus, Garbage, Holmdel, NJ, Liz Phair, PNC Bank Center, Postponed, Quarantine, Tori Amos on September 1, 2021| Leave a Comment »

[CANCELLED: September 1, 2021] Alanis Morissette / Garbage / Liz Phair Cat Power [rescheduled from July 1, 2020]

UPDATE: This show was actually cancelled because of the outrageous storm that was the remnants of Hurricane Ida.  Fortunately, they cancelled it long before anyone would have been heading there (I assume), because this rain storm was one of the worst I can remember–insane flooding and even tornados.

It will not be rescheduled because of previous commitments, so that stinks.

~~~

This show had been postponed once and since then, Liz Phair has been replaced by Cat Power, which seems like a VERY different dynamic to me.

I have two shows coming up this weekend, and it seemed like real folly to go out to a show on a Wednesday night as well.   But as I said, I did want to see Garbage again.  But now with the promise of serious rain and probably thunderstorms, it just seems silly to go out at all.

This was a show I wasn’t sure about.

I have seen Alanis Morissette a few times live way back in the 90s when she toured with Tori Amos.  I was there for Tori and I don’t really remember much about Alanis (which is sad, I know).

On this tour, I was more interested in seeing Garbage again (they put on a heck of a show) and for checking out Liz Phair who I once liked and now kinda don’t but who I’m curious about what she’s like live.

This was definitely a show I was going to get lawn seats and try to upgrade.

Concerts are now being postponed earlier.

On May 9, Alanis sent out this message

“Hi everyone.  My North American tour scheduled to begin in a few weeks is being rescheduled to Summer 2021 out of an abundance of caution. Please hold on to your tickets as they will be honored for the new dates which we hope to announce very soon.

So much going on inside and outside take care of yourselves and each other.  Thank you for understanding.  Can’t wait to see you when it is safe for us all to gather.  Hand on all hearts til then.”

Garbage wrote this message:

So the @Alanis tour that @garbage and @lizphairofficial were supposed to be tagging along on this summer got postponed yesterday. We are totally gutted and apologise for any heartache caused. We assure you that we have every intention of fulfilling our obligations to Alanis and to any garbage fans who bought tickets in support of us. We appreciate you so. Please head on over to the @Alanis socials in the days ahead for further info. Please note this is not our tour so we have no answers whatsoever about what happens next.
Looking forward to the days when we all get to hangout and play for you.

No official word from Liz Phair that I have seen.

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Amos Oz–“Heirs” (New Yorker, January 22, 2007)

Posted in Amos Oz, Coronavirus, Haim Watzman, Huh?, Humiliation, Liz Phair, New Yorker, Old Age, Parenting, Quarantine, Short Story, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Translation on July 10, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: LIZ PHAIR-Tiny Desk Concert #227 (June 23, 2021).

I loved Liz Phair’s first two or three albums.  Then I got a little bored by her.  And then she went really aggressively commercial (to not so great effect).  This new single “Spanish Doors” sounds a lot like old school Phair but retains some pop sensibility in the super catchy bridge.

Liz Phair’s music was always meant to fill arenas. After a clever sleight-of-hand at the top of this Tiny Desk (home) performance, where it briefly seems we’ve returned to in-person sets behind Bob Boilen’s desk, Phair and her backing band do their best to recreate the kind of set you’d see in a much larger space; everyone plugs-in, turns it up and rocks with an impressive light show.

Phair plays three tracks from Soberish, her first new album in more than a decade.

She starts with “Spanish Doors,” a heartbreaking but hooky portrait of a marriage nearing its end.

It rocks a bit harder here with three guitars (Phair, Connor Sullivan), with lead solos from Cody Perrin.  Liz seems surprisingly nervous here–or maybe her patter is rusty.

She follows with a song against loneliness called “In There.”

It’s a mellow song with snapping drums (Neal Daniels) and rumbling bass (Ben Sturley).  It’s almost sounds like Liz Phair of old but is missing something.

followed by “The Game,” a meditation on the mind games that sabotage troubled relationships.

Liz switches to acoustic guitar for this one–and her guitar sounds wonderful.  There’s some terrific harmonies on this corner which really does sound like old school Liz.

Phair still finds joy and a playful sense of humor in her earliest work, closing her Tiny Desk with a generous version of “Never Said,” from Exile.

I loved Exile in Guyville and listened to it all the time.  It’s great to hear “Never Said” live like this.  When she played a few years ago, I didn’t feel the need to go, but if she played more of these older song (and the newer ones), I’m sure it would be an enjoyable show.

[READ: July 9, 2021] “Heirs”

This was an unusual story in which reality is never fully explained.

A man, Aryeh Zelnik, is resting on a hammock on his porch.  A second man pulls up in a car and heads to the porch.

The story goes into remarkably great detail about the man with his car–how he looks, what he does, even how he smells (not great).

We also learn a lot about the man on the porch.  His wife has left him and now lives in America (the story is set in Israel).  He has moved back in with his mother and is more or less waiting for her to die so that house can revert to him.

The man who arrives in the car, though, begins talking about legal issues.  At first he is very circumspect about what he really wants.

Would it be more comfortable for you if we were to chat awhile longer about [the loveliness of the land here]? Or will you allow me to go straight, without any circumlocution, to our little agenda?

Aryeh Zelnik is suspicious if not downright annoyed by this man who claims to have official business but who keeps avoiding details and calling him Zelkin. (more…)

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Samantha Irby–Wow, No Thank You.: essays (2020)

Posted in Alanis Morissette, Ani DiFranco, Beck, Bjork, Broad City, Dave Matthews Band, Drugs, Erykah Badu, Everything Sucks, Fiona Apple, Ginuwine, Hole, Indigo Girls, Jill Scott, Juliana Hatfield, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, LGBTQ, Lisa Loeb, Liz Phair, Mariah Carey, Marriage (Happy), Memoirs, Menstruation, Michigan, Parenting, Pearl Jam, PJ Harvey, Poo, Portishead, Poverty, Queer, Racism, Radiohead, Reality Bites, Restrooms, Samantha Irby, Sarah McLachlan, Sex, Sexism, Shrill, Smashing Pumpkins, Taxes, Technology, Teeth, The Breeders, The Cranberries, The Roots, Toilets, Tori Amos on November 11, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: THE ROOTS feat. JILL SCOTT-“You Got Me” (1999).

I’ve wanted to listen to more from The Roots ever since I was exposed to them on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.  But as typically happens, I’m listening to other things instead.  So this seemed like a good opportunity to check them out (based on Samantha Irby’s rave below).

One of the best things about this recording (and The Roots in general) is Questlove’s drumming.  In addition to his being a terrific drummer, his drums sound amazing in this live setting.

Erykah Badu sings on the album but Jill Scott (Jilly from Philly) who wrote the part, sings here.

It starts out quietly with just a twinkling keyboard and Scott’s rough but pretty voice.  Then comes the main rapping verses from Black Thought.  I love the way Scott sings backing vocals on the verses and Black Thought adds backing vocals to the chorus.

Midway through the song, it shifts gears and gets a little more funky.  Around five minutes, the band does some serious jamming.  Jill Scott does some vocal bits, the turntablist goes a little wild with the scratching and Questlove is on fire.

Then things slow down for Scott to show off her amazing voice in a quiet solo-ish section.  This song shows off how great both The Roots and Jill Scott are.  Time to dig deeper.

[READ: November 1, 2020] Wow, no thank you.

This book kept popping up on various recommended lists.  The bunny on the cover was pretty adorable, so I thought I’d check it out. I’d never heard of Samantha Irby before this, but the title and the blurbs made this sound really funny.

And some of it is really funny. Irby is self-deprecating and seems to be full of self-loathing, but she puts a humorous spin on it all.  She also has Crohn’s disease and terribly irritable bowels–there’s lots of talk about poo in this book.

Irby had a pretty miserable upbringing.  Many of the essays detail this upbringing.  She also has low self-esteem and many of the essays detail that.  She also doesn’t take care of herself at all and she writes about that.  She also doesn’t really want much to do with children or dogs.  And yet somehow she is married to a woman with children.

From what some of these essays say, it sounds like she is married to this woman yet somehow lives an entirely separate life from the rest of the house.  It’s all rather puzzling, although I suppose if you are already a fan, you may know many of the details already. (more…)

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Alanis Morissette / Garbage / Liz Phair (PNC Bank Arts Center, Holmdel, NJ, July 1, 2020) [POSTPONED]

Posted in Alanis Morissette, Coronavirus, Garbage, Holmdel, NJ, Liz Phair, PNC Bank Center, Postponed, Quarantine, Tori Amos on July 1, 2020| Leave a Comment »

[POSTPONED: July 1, 2020] Alanis Morissette / Garbage / Liz Phair [moved to September 1, 2021]

indexThis was a show I wasn’t sure about.

I have seen Alanis Morissette a few times live way back in the 90s when she toured with Tori Amos.  I was there for Tori and I don’t really remember much about Alanis (which is sad, I know).

On this tour, I was more interested in seeing Garbage again (they put on a heck of a show) and for checking out Liz Phair who I once liked and now kinda don’t but who I’m curious about what she’s like live.

This was definitely a show I was going to get lawn seats and try to upgrade.

Concerts are now being postponed earlier.

On May 9, Alanis sent out this message

“Hi everyone.  My North American tour scheduled to begin in a few weeks is being rescheduled to Summer 2021 out of an abundance of caution. Please hold on to your tickets as they will be honored for the new dates which we hope to announce very soon.

So much going on inside and outside take care of yourselves and each other.  Thank you for understanding.  Can’t wait to see you when it is safe for us all to gather.  Hand on all hearts til then.”

Garbage wrote this message:

So the @Alanis tour that @garbage and @lizphairofficial were supposed to be tagging along on this summer got postponed yesterday. We are totally gutted and apologise for any heartache caused. We assure you that we have every intention of fulfilling our obligations to Alanis and to any garbage fans who bought tickets in support of us. We appreciate you so. Please head on over to the @Alanis socials in the days ahead for further info. Please note this is not our tour so we have no answers whatsoever about what happens next.
Looking forward to the days when we all get to hangout and play for you.

No official word from Liz Phair that I have seen.

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Holly Black & Ted Naifeh–The Good Neighbors: Book One: Kin (2008)

Posted in All Songs Considered, Alternate Reality, David Bowie, Death, Fears, Goblins, Goths, Graphic Novel, Holly Black, Humiliation, Lemmy, Liz Phair, Marriage Trouble, Motorhead, Oddities, Phoebe Bridgers, Regrets, Romance, Sex, South X Lullaby, Supernatural, SXSW, Ted Naifeh, Violence, YA Books, Yuck! on April 16, 2017| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: PHOEBE BRIDGERS-“Smoke Signals” NPR’S SOUTH X LULLABY (March 22, 2017).

Bridgers’ “Smoke Signals” is a beautiful haunting song that reminds me a little of Liz Phair in her delivery.  I had heard this song before and really liked it–I especially loved the arrangement, which had echoing guitars that reminded me of Twin Peaks.

“For this Tiny Desk, Bridgers and percussionist Marshall Vore came to Bob Boilen’s hotel room just before midnight to play the striking ‘Smoke Signals.'”  The music is great with Bridgers’ open chords, and Vore’s suitcase percussion, children’s toy bells and vocal harmony.  The cho and vibe are removed in this version which means you must really listen to the words–which are pretty intense.

I like how she talks about musicians in such an interesting way:

Singing ‘Ace of Spades’ when Lemmy died / nothing’s changed LA’s alright

and then later

Its been on my mind since Bowie died/ just checking out to hide from life

The toy bells and harmonies are a really nice touch, but again, it’s those lyrics:

I went with you up to
The place you grew up in
We spent a week in the cold
Just long enough to
“Walden” it with you
Any longer, it would have got old

This song is a little too slow for my preferences, but it’s very beautiful. I’d like to hear more from her.

[READ: February 5, 2016] The Good Neighbors: Kin

This book was on the new shelf at my library.  And since I like Black and Naifeh I was grabbed it.  Then I saw that it actually came out in 2008. Whatever.

It also turns out that my library has book two of this trilogy but neither had book 3 (which came out in 2010).  What gives?

Holly Black is best known (by me anyway) as having written The Spiderwick Chronicles.

This story is actually a YA graphic novel and it definitely skews older.  But like Spiderwick, it deals with a normally unseen world coming into contact with out own. (more…)

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Donald Antrim–“The Emerald Light in the Air” (New Yorker, February 3, 2014)

Posted in Courtney Barnett, Donald Antrim, Liz Phair, Marriage Trouble, New Yorker, Short Story, Tiny Desk Concert, Virginity (Loss of) on June 20, 2014| Leave a Comment »

CV1_TNY_02_03_14Blitt.inddSOUNDTRACK: COURTNEY BARNETT-Tiny Desk Concert #348 (April 14, 2014).

cbThe first time I hear Courtney Barnett’s “Avant Gardener,” I fell in love with it.  A nearly spoken word almost slacker style vocal delivery of some really funny and very clever lyrics.  Plus a catchy chorus.  Swoon.

Then WXPN started playing it to death and I got a little tired of it. Thankfully, they found another track on the album (two eps together with the delightfully odd name The Double EP: A Sea Of Split Peas).  And that proved to be just as good.  Then I saw her live on a late night show and her live delivery was different and even more compelling.

In this Tiny Desk Concert, she plays the guitar differently on “Avant Gardener”, bringing in some new textures behind her accented Australian voice.  The second song “History Eraser” is another song from the EPs.  She has mentioned loving Nirvana, and I can see a similar style of guitar playing in this one.   The chorus reminds me of Liz Phair’s “Flower” which is no bad thing.

The final song is a new one about a suburb near Melbourne called Preston.  The song is called “Depreston,” and its about house hunting.  It’s another interesting story telling song with a great melody.

Barnett doesn’t do staggeringly original music, but it’s all really enjoyable.  And it’s fun to see just her and her guitar in this setting.

[READ: June 11, 2014] “The Emerald Light in the Air”

This story begins as one thing (which I liked) and slowly turns into something else (which I also liked but not as much).

As it opens, we see a man driving his father’s (and his father’s before that) Mercedes in Charlottesville.  There had been thunderstorms that afternoon and one of the roads is blocked by a large tree.

What I liked about the story was the way his present (driving, planning his dinner for his date tonight) was interspersed almost on a paragraph by paragraph basis with moments from his past.  The past is brought up by the present events–he is having a date with Mary Doan, the woman he lost his virginity to.  They happened to run into each other after all of these years.  Humorously, she didn’t remember him, even though she was a huge part of his life.

He is also thinking about his ex-wife.  He has some of her drawings and paintings in the trunk of his car.  He’s planning on taken them to the dump so they’re out of his house.   So he thinks back to their days as young artists together.  He also thinks back to the days when he was suicidal, and how now he carries a gun but only for his art, not for suicide. (more…)

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Five Dials Number 4: I Remember 5 November 2008 (2008)

Posted in All Songs Considered, Craig Taylor, Five Dials, Hari Kunzru, History, J. Robert Lennon, Kevin Brockmeier, Liz Phair, Lydia Millet, Michael Martone, Nina Chakrabarti, Noam Chomsky, Paul Maliszewski, Political Humor, Robin Yassin-Kassab, Saïd Sayrafiezadeh, Short Story, The Future on May 14, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: LIZ PHAIR-Exile in Guyville Live October 6, 2008 (2008).

Like all indie rock hipsters I loved Exile in Guyville when it came out.  And like all indie rock hipsters, I hated that Liz Phair later made an album that is had the top cover below.  I didn’t even care anymore when she made the album with the second cover below.

The irony of course is that Liz made Guyville because she was sick of the hipster boys who were living in Chicago at the time.  And now it was the same hipster boys (only older) who were dismissing her for selling out.  (At least, that’s what I get from the interview that’s attached to the end of the concert and this separate interview from around the same time).

But regardless of my hipster cred (and subsequent loss of same) I really didn’t like Liz’s new pop style (but good for her for still being hot, right?).  In fact, I hadn’t even really listened to her since 2000 anyhow so when she came out with her pop albums I just kind of shrugged.

So, what’s up with this return to Guyville?  Well, the interviews mention her needing some closure on the rough time in her life when she made the record.  And also feeling that since could actually play her guitar now, it was worth giving fans (and herself) the experience of actually enjoying playing the album live.  So, good vibes and happy feelings all around (and sex and sex and more sex).

The concert is the entire Guyville album, played start to finish, with occasional banter in between.  And she is quite faithful to the original (she even has a special guest sing the “Every time I see your face, I get all wet between my legs” line on “Flower.”  The main flaw with the concert is that the bassist hits a number of flat notes and also on at least two songs is either out of tune or just mixed too loud or something.

The other flaw is directly related to Liz saying how much better she is at performing.  Because as the set opens, her voice sounds really off on the first couple of songs.  In the interview, she says that she still feels uncomfortable on stage until about the fourth song. And maybe that’s what’s happening on 6′ 1″ or, quite possibly, she can’t hit those notes anymore (her voice is considerably higher on her newer songs and 6′ 1″ is a low register, almost flat singing style and she just doesn’t seem comfortable doing it).  Indeed, by the fourth or fifth song, she seems more comfortable and seems to be having more fun and the set moves pretty smoothly from there.

She has a good rapport with the audience.  Humility was never her strong suit, and it shows, which makes me her a little less likable, but she still has good banter.

When the album is over she comes back for a brief encore.  She plays two songs solo (which are okay).  And then the band comes back for two of her other hits: “Supernova” and “Polyester Bride” which both sound fantastic.

Listening to Exile in Guyville again was great, the songs hold up really well.  I’ll have to pull her old CDs out and listen to the originals again (the concert is mixed a little low, but–good on NPR–all of the bad words are left in!).  The NPR page also said that Guyville had gone out of print until it was reissued recently.  Is it really possible that Matador let it go out of print?

[READ: April 22, 2011] Five Dials Number 4

The conceit behind this issue is “Eleven writers tell us Exactly What Happened …Days Before It Happened.”  And the authors tell us in past tense what happened on the fateful night of the election between Obama nad McCain.  (even though they are written some time before it has happened).

This issue is short again (all of 14 pages), but with such a tidy topic, the fourteen pages are packed with information.  There are eleven authors who write about the election.  Most are just a couple of paragraphs, so I’m not going to try to summarize them.  I’m going to say their predictions for what happened and (in one case) the uncanny accuracy.

CRAIG TAYLOR-A Letter from the Editor “On Elections and Chomsky”
He lays out what the point of this speculation fiction is: “We’ve become tired of the uncertainty and of the waiting.  It’s time someone told us exactly how this election ends.”   And also, Chomsky is almost 80, and he’s still vibrant. (more…)

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