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Archive for the ‘Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts’ Category

Desmond Barry–“Dalton’s Box” (New Yorker, April 23 & 30, 2001)

Posted in Cigarettes, Coronavirus, Funny (ha ha), Kate Davis, Kathleen Edwards, Quarantine, Sharon Van Etten, Short Story, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert on August 6, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KATE DAVIS-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #59 (August 4, 2020).

I hadn’t heard of Kate Davis before this Home Concert.

Her songs are simple and straightforward with a real timeless quality.  She reminds me a lot of Kathleen Edwards.  Turns out that she also co-wrote Sharon van Etten’s “Seventeen.”

Like so many artists, Kate Davis was to be on tour during the spring and summer of 2020. She was scheduled to play a concert at my desk in May. Sitting by her desk at home, Kate Davis is marking time by writing new music….  She’s an extraordinary lyricist. Her 2019 album, Trophy, was a sharply worded collection of songs, many about growing up and a powerful tune about her father’s death.

“Cloud” has a great melody throughout, and the chorus is great–with her falsetto moment an unexpected bonus.  The slow middle section is also a really nice surprise.

“Open Heart,” the second song performed for her Tiny Desk (home) concert, is about a broken heart. It’s a subject tackled by many, but her lyrical prowess sets the scene in the hospital, where the doctor cuts her open, sees her critical condition, and takes out her broken heart. She sings, “Put the pieces back together, looks like it’s been shattered by a bad love,” later adding, “You’d rather feel this pain than have a broken heart.”

This song features another great delivery as she sings the lyric high but then adds a lower almost spoken word during the bridge “deep…breath.”  The song builds and builds to the end and I love that the chugging guitar chords ends with a slightly-off-ringing note that adds a cool amount of dissonance to a song about a broken heart.

I guess these songs sound different on the record since the blurb says:

Hearing these songs stripped to their essence–just Kate Davis and her guitar–exposes her charm and wit.

“I Like Myself” is a finger-picked style of playing–sounding quite different from the other songs.  The lyrics are very thoughtful:

I kind of like myself
Cause she likes me
And since I think the world of her
And she of me
Then I’m exactly who and where I want to be
Who and where I want to be

“Ride or Die,” was written before quarantine and its perspective has changed since.  The chord structure and vocal melody is unusual and very cool.    I especially like the way she adds a really slow section in the middle–a picked melody (of more unusual chords). This is my favorite of her songs and I’m looking forward top hearing more.

Davis looks at the camera a lot during this performance–making her seem very confident, which I gather she is.

[READ: August 1, 2020] “Dalton’s Box”

I loved this story.  It was fast and colloquial.  It was funny and dark and I want to read more stories like it.

The story is basically a conversation between two brothers.  The one brother asks if the other remembers Mick Dalton.  He does.

A few months back, Dalton won the Lottery.  Not a huge amount though, about 3,000 quid.  And Dalton, who is usually in trouble for some petty crime or another, says he’s going to invest it.

That means a get rich quick(ish) scheme selling contraband.  But this time Dalton is smart, you see.  He’;s going to sell contraband Marlboro cigarettes (I have no idea how that’s going to work). (more…)

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Louise Erdrich–“The Shawl” (New Yorker, March 5, 2001)

Posted in Anishinaabe, Beach House, Coronavirus, Drinking, First Nations, John Legend, Louise Erdrich, Native Americans, Quarantine, Racism, Short Story, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Violence, Wolves on August 5, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: JOHN LEGEND-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #58 (August 3, 2020).

I don’t know all that much about John legend.  I know he’s released a lot of popular music and that he seems to be famous for being famous at this point.

But wow, this set is great.  Legend has a terrific voice.  I’m not really sure what genre his music is–it’s very soulful–becuase it’s just really great songwriting.

They kick off the set with “Ooh Laa,” a song John calls “doo-wop meets trap” it’s also the lead-off track to his summer album, Bigger Love. 

I don’t know how the “trap” part fits into this song, but the combination is fantastic.  The song opens with a sample of the “shoo bop shoo bop” from The Flamingos’s “I Only Have Eyes for You.  It works as a great foundation for this song of love and romance.  It’s got a great chorus of, yes, “Ooh Laa,” which is a perfect line for this song.  It also has Kaveh Rastegar on upright bass, which adds a great slow jazzy feel.

“Wild” opens with a quiet guitar melody from Ben O’Neill that reminds me of a Beach House song (although it sounds very different with Legend singing).   It’s fascinating how different this song sounds from “Ooh Laa” even though it is very clearly a John Legend song.  It’s also got a fantastic wailing guitar solo, which was completely unexpected.

All of the songs filmed on this day are from Bigger Love, including “Conversations in the Dark,” which John says is “a good song for babies to dance to — you might want to get married to it, too, if you’re so inclined.” Meanwhile, behind the band on a big screen reads, “Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.”

Legend sits at the piano and says you may know this song from This is Us or you may have seen my babies dancing to it.

It also opens with a quiet guitar melody and Legend’s gentle piano which fleshes out this lovely song.  The backing vocalists Keri Lee, Emi Secrest and Alana Linsey really shine on this song.  They sound great on all of them, but they really stand out here.

While introducing his final song, “Bigger Love,”he tells us that “I wrote all the songs before the pandemic, before we saw folks marching in the streets, mourning (the) life of George Floyd, expressing their outrage. But some of these songs feel even more appropriate now, feel like we need them more now then we did even when I wrote them. This song ‘Bigger Love’ is about the power of love to get us through tough times, the idea that when you have love, it makes you more resilient, it makes you more hopeful And we all need a little dance break, too, right?”

“Bigger Love” is catchy and bouncy with some great sounding drums from Jimmy “Rashid” Williams and simple keyboard splashes from Eugene “Man Man” Roberts.

[READ: August 1, 2020] “The Shawl”

This story is compact and written in a well-plotted style.

It begins with a story.  A story that the Anishinaabeg people on her street speak of.

A woman had two children whom she loved: a boy and a girl.  Then she had a baby girl with a different man.  She loved the new man more than her first man and decided to leave her family for the new man.  But she decided to bring her daughters with her.

On the way out of town, their carriage was attacked by wolves and the older girl fell out of the carriage and was killed.  All that was left of her was a torn and bloodied shawl. (more…)

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Adrienne Raphel–Thinking Inside the Box: Adventures with Crosswords and the Puzzling People Who Can’t Live Without Them (2020)

Posted in Adrienne Raphel, Arthur Wynne, Coronavirus, Crossword Puzzles, Edward Powys Mathers, Eugene Maleska, Frank Longo, Jeremiah Farrell, Joseph Pulitzer, Language, Leonard Dawe, Lindsey Browne, Lyric Jones, Margaret Petherbridge, Nameless, New York World, P.G. Wodehouse, Politicians, Puzzler, Quarantine, René Magritte, Sex and the City, The Crossword Mystery, The New York Times, The Telegraph, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Vladimir Nabokov, Will Shortz, Word usage, Wordplay on August 1, 2020| Leave a Comment »

51196238._SX318_SY475_SOUNDTRACK: LYRIC JONES-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #57 (July 29, 2020).

download (69)Lyric Jones is a delight.  A smart, thoughtful woman who not only raps really well, she has a great singing voice too.

She talks A LOT between songs.  She plays 3 songs in 21 minutes.  She talks a lot about her hustling–driving for Uber and Lyft as well as all of the running around one has to do to be a musician.

Lyric makes it abundantly clear that her hustle is nonstop – writing, rapping, singing, drumming, engineering, and grinding it out to make Gas Money (the title of her latest album).  This quintuple threat, trained in the Berklee College of Music’s City Music program, recorded this Tiny Desk (home) concert from her studio in Los Angeles in May.

“All Mine” opens the song and I love how she plays her electronics while keeping her flow fresh.

My favorite song is “Adulting.”  I love watching her create the song a capella–making the beats and the music looping her voice and manipulating it with electronics.

 Her multi-layered prowess is present on “Adulting” a song about the evolutionary growth that happens in your late 20s and early 30s. Lyric uses a TC Helicon vocal processor to create percussive beats, looping her voice as a backdrop and packing a punch with vocal harmonies and ad libs.

After the song she jokes about how in the song she is complaining about wanting to stay home all day and not get up and do shit.  Be careful what you wish for.

Before the last song she has two important things.  First, how you can support Lyric Jones (ha).  But she takes the virus seriously, encouraging everyone to be kind to ourselves and patient with ourselves. It’s important to feed ourselves mentally, creatively and to literally feed ourselves.

In grappling with the pandemic, Lyric expresses the deep importance of this moment: “Whatever we put out in this time, in this era is a bookmark in history. Especially as musicians. … For me, my personal testament, I want to be intentional. … My children’s children are gonna know about this time. And I want to know that I impacted it with intentional music, intentional thoughts, insights and perspectives.”

She ends with “Lush Lux Life,” her “affirmation song” about “what I should be doing–living luxuriously.”  I really like this song for the excellent retro-sounding music behind the song.  I’m really curious if the jam at the end of the song is new or a sample from an interesting rocking jazzy solo.  Her producer Nameless has some great skill.

[READ: July 29, 2020] Thinking Inside the Box

A couple of years ago I read Cluetopia, a history of the crossword puzzle written from a British writer.  Now here’s a book about crossword puzzles written from an American writer.

Is the country significant?  In some ways, very much so.  Because Americans and Britons have very different styles of crossword.  Americans’ puzzles are full of puns and definitions as well as facts and information.  British crosswords are known as cryptics and are mostly full of wordplay–you don’t need external information to solve the puzzles, exactly.  Most of the time the clue contains all you need to find the answer (sometimes it even contains the answer itself) but they are quite challenging.

Other than that, the origin of the author is not that significant, because the origins of the crossword are the same regardless where you write from.  Arthur Wynne was a Liverpudlian lad who moved to Pittsburgh and then to New York City.  He worked on the New York World which was eventually run by Joseph Pulitzer.  (It’s ironic that awards of excellence are in his name since he ran the World full of pulpy news and yellow journalism).

In 1913, Wynne was put in charge of the FUN section.  He needed to fill space so he came up with a Word-Cross Puzzle.  It was shaped like a diamond and the three and four letter answers ran around a center hole.  He based it on similar word puzzles he had seen as a child in England.  The puzzle became a weekly feature.  Eventually a typo changed it to crossword.  The puzzles weren’t especially challenging because they were meant to be fun.

Wynne wanted to patent the crossword but the paper wouldn’t pay for the expense. (more…)

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Shirley Jackson–“The Lottery” (New Yorker, July 27, 2020)

Posted in Anti-war, Antiracism, Black Lives Matter, Calvin Trillin, Coronavirus, Death, Essays, History, Lottery, Lucinda Williams, Luck, Martin Luther King, New Yorker, Quarantine, Racism, Shirley Jackson, Short Story, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Violence on July 31, 2020| 2 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: LUCINDA WILLIAMS-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #55 (July 27, 2020).

I don’t really like Lucinda Williams.  Her voice really bugs me. I don’t know if she always sang like this but this sort of drunken drawl just hurts my head.

I know that she’s a legend and everyone loves her, but I have a hard time getting through her songs.  And that’s a shame because her lyrics are great.  Well, maybe not her lyrics, but her sentiments.

Because the lyrics to “Bad News Blues” are not great.  It’s a pretty standard blues song in which she lists all of the bad news that she has around her.

Bad news on my left
Bad news on my right
Bad news in the morning
Bad news at night

The only thing interesting about this song really is the bluesy lead guitar work from Stuart Mathis.  Otherwise, it’s a blues song.

“Big Black Train” is a slower bluesy song about not wanting to get on board the train that’s barreling towards us.  Wow, her singing the chorus really hurts my ears.

“You Can’t Rule Me” is on the radio a lot and I’ve been turning it off when it comes on.  It’s obviously a song of empowerment but I can’t stand the drawl of her voice.  Although once again Stuart’s lead is pretty tasty.  In fact the guitar work from both of them is great throughout.

The set ends with “Man Without A Soul” and this is the song that made me think more highly of her.  Musically the song isn’t much.  In fact, it sounds pretty close to “Bog Black Train” in the chorus.  But its’ the words that are impactful.

It’s pretty clear who this song is about:

You’re a man without truth
A man of greed, a man of hate
A man of envy and doubt
You’re a man without a soul
All the money in the world
Will never fill that hole
You’re a man bought and sold
You’re a man without a soul
You bring nothing good to this world
Beyond a web of cheating and stealing
You hide behind your wall of lies
But it’s coming down
Yeah, it’s coming down
You’re a man without shame
Without dignity and grace
No way to save face
You’re a man without a soul

She says she wrote this to shake people up and wake people up.  I don’t know if it will do either, but I hope some people’s minds are changed by it.

[READ: July 31, 2020] “The Lottery”

This issue of the New Yorker is an Archival Issue.  It’s weird to me that at a time of unprecedented everything, the magazine would choose to have virtually no new content.

Except that the articles in it are strangely timely.

Calvin Trillin (he was writing in 1964?) was on a flight that Martin Luther King, Jr. was on and he overheard a white preppy-looking post-college boy who disagreed with King (believing that King was advocating violence and was therefore unChristian).  It was a remarkably peaceful conversation even if the boy never saw King’s point of view.

The second article is about Black Lives Matter with the subtitle “A new kind of movement found its moment.” What will its future be?”  But this article was written in 2016 and it ends “Black Lives Matter may never have more influence than it has now.”  How wrong that was?

And then there is the Shirley Jackson story, originally written in 1948.

I read this story in sixth or seventh grade and it has stuck with me all of these years.  I remember being rather blown away by it in school, thinking it was one thing and then realizing it was something else entirely.

I have not read it since. I felt that I didn’t really have to read it because it stuck with me so much.  But I’m glad I did re-read it, because although some details were still there, I had forgotten some pretty intense stuff.

(more…)

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Jhumpa Lahiri–“Nobody’s Business” (New Yorker, March 12, 2001)

Posted in Arranged Marriage, Coronavirus, Jhumpa Lahiri, John Hancock, New Yorker, Nilüfer Yanya, Quarantine, Racism, Romance, Short Story, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Violence on July 27, 2020| Leave a Comment »

download (62)SOUNDTRACK: NILÜFER YANYA-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #54 (July 22, 2020).

download (61)Nilüfer Yanya is a pretty mesmerizing singer.  I feel lucky to have seen her live and would like to see her again.

In the meantime, this Tiny Desk (Home) Concert will have to do.

There’s something unique about the way Yanya constructs songs.  And her singing voice is really unlike anyone else’s that I’ve heard.

For this Tiny Desk (Home) Concert, she plays four songs.  Three from her 2019 album and one new one.  All four are different from when she played Tiny Desk last year.

In her previous Tiny Desk Concert and when I saw her live, she had a full band. But for this one, it’s just her guitar and her voice.

For “Heat Rises,” she plays spare guitar lines and quiet chords as she sings in her unique style.  As the song moves along she adds high notes to the chords–fleshing things out in a subtle but effective way.

After performing “Heat Rises,” Nilüfer Yanya pauses to say a few things about herself, something we’ve been asking artists to do for these Tiny Desk (home) concerts.

“One of the things that’s been on my mind a lot is the racism and violence and injustice going on towards Black people and people of color, not only in America but here in the U.K. and all over the world. As a person of mixed heritage” — Nilüfer’s father is Turkish and her mother is of Irish and Barbadian descent — “this issue is something close to my heart.” Nilüfer urges us all to see the hurt being done. It’s the only way forward.

She then plays “Paralyzed,” a song that she says relates to the issue.  She’s never played it live before.  The song has a cool four note chord progression followed by a sinister feeling five note riff.

Bob Boilen writes: “I hear these words so differently now:”

I hear strained screams from Heaven singin’
“save me”
This can’t be okay
Shadow’s lyin’ here
And it’s blocking out the light
(I am paralyzed)

The above part of the song turns musically bright as she sings those dark lyrics.

“Day 7” is the new song.  She sings in a similar style to the one she uses on “Baby Luv” where she sings with an accent or inflection that is impossible to place but is very compelling.  This song also features a simple but unusual riff as she builds the song using all of the neck of her guitar (the chords she plays during the “go go” section are so interesting).

She ends the set with the final track from her album, “Heavyweight Champion of the Year.”  This is the only song from this set that she played when I saw her.  I was blown away by the song when I saw her live because the song mixed quiet and range perfectly.  It’s more subtle here and demands that you listen closely to the words.

[READ: July 20, 2020] “Nobody’s Business”

I’ve wanted to read more from Jhumpa Lahiri for years–she’s yet another writer who I feel like I need more stories from.  And I really liked this story a lot.

The story is written in the third person.  It’s about a woman named Sang.  She is living in Boston, having just dropped out of a graduate program from Harvard.   Sang has two roommates, Paul and Heather.

What was so interesting about the way that it was written is that it seems to be Sang’s story.  She is, after all, the person with all the action.  But by the end of the story it becomes more about Paul.  I thought that shift of perspective was quite engaging.

Sang is Bengali and every so often she would receive a call from a Bengali man who was courting her. These men had heard that she was pretty and smart and unmarried at thirty, so they were trying to arrange something with her.  Sang was never rude to these men.  She even met some of them.  But Sang was very serious about her boyfriend, Farouk, who was presently in Cairo.  That’s not a ruse, she is really dating him. (more…)

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Steve Martin–“The Ethicist” (New Yorker, March 5, 2001)

Posted in Coronavirus, Food, Funny (ha ha), New Yorker, Quarantine, Sex, Sexism, Sigur Rós, Steve Martin, The New York Times Magazine, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Tom Adams, Unfunny on July 26, 2020| Leave a Comment »

download (59)SOUNDTRACK: TOM ADAMS-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #53 (July 21, 2020).

download (60)I had heard of Tom Adams from Bob Boilen, but I guess I hadn’t actually heard him before.  This performance is otherworldly. It reminds me in some ways of Sigur Rós, although only in the ethereal moments.

Tom’s 2017 album Silence features Tom singing and playing minimal piano.  But here

what we have is Tom Adams at his home in Cornwall, England, playing four brand-new songs with minimal electric guitar and an enthralling mix of tech-altered sounds.

For the basis of this performance Adams is playing a subdued and lovely electric guitar (finger-picked).   He sings some fairly simple folk melodies, but it’s when he starts “oohing” and crooning high notes that things transcend the familiar.  Because even though his singing voice is fairly deep, he has an amazing falsetto.   And it’ s that falsetto that he manipulates in fascinating way.

That box with all the wires in the foreground is a Eurorack modular synthesizer which, in real time, processes his majestic voice in ways unpredictable even to Tom. He wrote to tell me that, “Once the system is set in motion, you never know exactly what will happen next… I like to think of it as being a bit like the waves on the beach; to some extent, they are all predictable, yet each wave is still unique.”

“The Turning Of The Year” is a delightful folk ballad with delightful lyrics

What a day / What a day / to share with these good friends
We sing the songs we always sing until / we’ve sung them all
and through the evening our voices ring / in the rafters of the hall.

But when the Eurorack takes over, that simple trip with friends feels very different.

“A Flower Disappearing” is a slower song with a deeper guitar sound.  It’s easy to forget about his falsetto and the electronics until he throws them briefly in after the verses.

I wondered though if all of the songs would be manipulated–would his regular voice hav a chance to shine?  It does on “If My Love Was A Guitar.”  He sings some delightful ooohing without any electronics.  His songs and vocal style reminds of Nick Drake, and this song in particular fits that bill (except for the falsetto, of course).

If my love was a guitar / it wouldn’t matter where you are
you could just take me in your arms / and hear the music in my heart
…playing gently

And if I was a melody / then you could take me when you leave
and anytime you felt a need / you could just sing along with me
…in perfect harmony

His amusing reaction at being out of tune is a nice moment of levity in this otherwise mellow performance.  “Postcards From The Road” features an entire section in beautiful unaltered falsetto.

all the friends you still miss / you kept in touch but cast adrift / you walked away but now you’re looking back

all the stories left behind / but when you read the final lines / turn a page and start to write something new

because all the choices that you make / these are not regrets to take / with you they’re just postcards from the road.

I love the cool effects that the Eurorack provides, but it’s great to hear him sing without it as well–his voice is really great.

[READ: July 24, 2020] “The Ethicist”

This is a Shouts and Murmurs piece that is a series of questions.  Typically I think this style works better than trying o stretch out a joke to a full page.

So in this one, people are writing in to The Ethicist with their problems.  The Ethicist is a real column in The New York Times Magazine and people write in with serious ethical issues.  Some people really like reading this column.  It was started in 1999 by a humorist, Randy Cohen, who did take the ethical questions seriously.  he stepped down in 2011 and others have run the column in his stead.

So this piece was written after the column had been around for two years or so.

Martin is his delightfully absurd self with his questions: (more…)

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Ibram X. Kendi–How to be an Antiracist (2019)

Posted in Activism, Antiracism, Bahamas, Cancer as plot device, Coronavirus, Gomes de Zurara, Ibram X. Kendi, Lenny Kravitz, LGBTQ, Marriage (Happy), NPR/PRI/PBS, Quarantine, Queer, Racism, Set at School, Sexism, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Universities, Violence on July 25, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: LENNY KRAVITZ-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #52 (July 20, 2020).

Few people are as cool as Lenny Kravitz.  Look at how amazing this room in the Bahamas looks.  Listen to how good his voice sounds (both when he’s singing and when he’s speaking).  When he speaks between songs he sounds otherworldly.

This Brooklyn-raised bohemian rock icon brings us to his home and tropical paradise in Eleuthera in the Bahamas for this visually alluring Tiny Desk (home) concert.

The set begins with the wonderful “Thinking Of You.”  The guitar sound(s) of this song are just amazing. Between Craig Ross’s acoustic echoing notes and Lenny’s strums the room fills with warm echoing guitars.  Midway through the song Bahamian native Yianni Giannakopoulos plays a chill lead guitar with expressive wah wah.  I hadn’t heard this song before, and it’s really terrific.

After wrapping an evocative rendition of “Thinking of You,” a touching song he penned in 1998 about his late mother, Lenny Kravitz imparts what’s really weighing on him during this historic time. “In the midst of all that’s transpiring on our planet right now,” he says, “it’s a blessed time for introspection, more importantly action. … What side of history are you standing on?”

For “What Did I Do With My Life?”, Lenny and Craig step outside (under palm trees) to play this questioning ballad.  Ross gets a really good electric guitar sound out of his acoustic guitar.  Over the course of the song as Lenny asks the title question, it grows more intense with him searching for an answer.

And it’s only fitting that he ended with “We Can Get It All Together,” a message about the power of unity and oneness.

For this final song, all three players are back, this time in front of an expansive (stormy?) sky. Once again Craig’s acoustic guitar sounds huge.  And this time Yianni’s electric guitar has a Middle Eastern twang to it.

I often forget how much I like Lenny’s music.  This was a great reminder.

[READ: July 20, 2020] How to be an Antiracist 

This book has been on the top of everyone’s recommended lists for being proactive about understanding systemic racism.

There’s a lot of reasons people might have for not reading this book.  I’m not talking about people who are racist and simply would never read a book like this, but about decent people who think they are doing their part.  Maybe they’re afraid of being preached at or of being told they’re doing things wrong.  Or maybe they feel that they can’t handle a book that seems especially intense.

I had some of these concerns myself before reading this book.  But I can say that if you have those fears or concerns about reading this book, put them aside and jump in.

Ibram X. Kendi is not writing this to make you feel bad about yourself.  He is not here to tell you that you are bad and should be ashamed of yourself.

He is writing to tell his story–his realization that racism is a cancer that is eating away at the country and that we can all work together to change things.

He is also writing to talk about antiracism.  Antiracism is a fairly simple idea, but it is very hard to achieve.  Indeed, his first point is to undo accepted ideas of racism. (more…)

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Ian Frazier–“The American Persuasion” (New Yorker, April 2, 2001)

Posted in Alanis Morissette, Alexander Hamilton, Anachronisms, Benjamin Franklin, Coronavirus, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Diana Gordon, Ethan Allen, Funny (ha ha), George Washington, Hamilton, History, Huh?, Ian Frazier, John Hancock, Marquis de Lafayette, New Yorker, Paul Revere, Quarantine, The Cranberries, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Unfunny, Wynter Gordon on July 24, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: DIANA GORDON-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #51 (July 15, 2020).

I was immediately attracted to this Tiny Desk (Home) Concert because I (still) have the exact same neon green iBook.  I don’t know how old Gordon is, but I have to wonder if it’s original.

I don’t know anything about Diana Gordon.  That’s probably logical since although she’s been in the music world for a while, it was mostly a s songwriter and under a different name.

After years of writing hits for others and releasing music under the moniker Wynter Gordon, the Queens, N.Y., native has awakened new aspects of her artistry in recent years that she’s finally ready to share under her given name.

So if she wrote hits, her music must be poppy, right?  Not exactly

But while her earlier work routed through the pop and dance worlds, Wasted Youth balances influences of Whitney Houston, Alanis Morissette and The Cranberries’ Dolores O’Riordan.

I actually hear a lot of Natalie Merchant in her quieter singing–especially with the gorgeous acoustic guitar of her masked-up guitarist, Davin Givhan.

Like the workplace props that flank her, [folders, boxes and a Curb Your Enthusiasm mug and check out that phone!] Gordon’s latest EP, 2020’s Wasted Youth, feels so fitting for these unprecedented times.

Starting with “Rollin,” you can hear “Gordon’s nihilistic invincibility” in a song that name checks Nirvana.  It starts with a great deep guitar riff (it even sounds bad ass on the acoustic guitar).  She adds a raspy vocal intro before singing with a cool (dis)affected 90’s alt rock vocal style.  I really dig it (the record version has a more thumping bass sound making it more danceable but also more distorted).

When the song is over she demonstrates a yodeling sound that underpins her singing in “Rollin.”

“Wolverine” is a quiet ballad that showcases her “forlorn lilting yodel.” It’s a more traditional song with her Natalie Merchant-esque delivery.  This is a pretty song from one of her earlier EPs.

The blurb describes “Wasted Youth” as “a sonic eyeroll-shrug,” but I feel it’s more of an intense song of pain.  Although not to be prudish but I wish there wasn’t quite so much cursing in it.  I mean every instance if the phrase “wasted youth” (several times per chorus) is preceded by “fuckin.”  It would be effective once, but just gets worn out for an entire song.  It’s a really good song otherwise.

“Once A Friend” is another ballad. This one features her “tear-jerking honesty.”  The record version sounds much the same–acoustic guitar, straightforward vocals and a gut punch of a lyric–all in less than two minutes.

I’m definitely going to have to listen to her some more.

[READ: July 20, 2020] “The American Persuasion”

This was a New Yorker Shouts & Murmurs.  These pieces are usually one page, but this one was three.   It’s also labelled “Part 1: The Scent of Liberty.”  I can’t decide if that means there are actually more parts or if that is part of the joke (there’s no part two in a future issue).

The premise of this piece is amusing, it is even more amusing reading it after Hamilton has come out because it also deals with the founding fathers in an unusual way.

The piece starts with George Washington trying to impress the Marquis–the man who would “be known as the noble Lafayette.”  Washington is a dandy, admiring himself in the mirror with fragrance dabbed behind his ears.  He “understood the power of his beauty, and he was not above using it now.”  Lafayette finds him hard to resist.

Washington was assisted in his Revolutionary quest by “noted voluptuaries and lovers of pleasure” Paul Revere, John Hancock and the Adamses. (more…)

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Roddy Doyle–“The Dinner” (New Yorker, February 5, 2001)

Posted in Anderson .Paak, Anderson .Paak & The Free Nationals, Benny Sings, Coronavirus, Funny (ha ha), Irish Writer, New Yorker, Nigeria, Parenting, Quarantine, Racism, Roddy Doyle, Sex, Short Story, Thin Lizzy, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Violence, War on July 23, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: BENNY SINGS-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #50 (July 14, 2020).

I watched a Benny Sings Tiny Desk Concert back in 2016.  I wasn’t that impressed.  I thought it sounded fine, describing him as a slower Elton John.  Since then, he has apparently gone on to bigger things (and must have many fans).

I’ve never come across a moderate Benny Sings fan. The Dutch singer-songwriter and producer has maintained a cult following for over 15 years and performed in the United States for the very first time at the Tiny Desk back in 2016.

Benny and his band play three songs.

Recorded at his studio in Amsterdam, the set list reads like an inventory of quarantine essentials, opening with “Apartment” from last year’s Free Nationals LP (shout out to Anderson .Paak).

As with all of the songs, the music is lightly R&B with some disco flavors.  Each song has a loud low end from  Bram Wassink’s bass and crisp drums from Colin Lee.  The songs are gentle and catchy.  “Apartment” is less than three minutes long.

“Sunny Afternoon” was written with PJ Morton and is a bit catchier (and sweeter).  There’s a nice backing vocal “oooh” solo from June Fermie while Adam Bar Pereg play s anice piano solo.

The set ends with “Music.”  Honestly I can’t imagine a worse title for a song than “Music,” but it is about music.  And the blurb admires the sentiment:

The hook reminds me that I’m not the only one who continues to seek refuge in song. He sings, “Music help me through this / I can’t do this on my own / But music help me through this / Whenever I’m down.”

I will not be an immoderate Benny Sings fan.  His music is pleasant, but forgettable.  Although he seems like a very nice fella.

[READ: July 20, 2020] “The Dinner”

As the United States roils with protests about institutional racism and out immoral leaders conduct illegal schemes of violence against citizens, it was an very charged time to read this story about racism in Ireland.

As Roddy Doyle stories tend to do, this story has a lot of heart and humor in it.  It begins by introducing Larry Linnane and his family.  He loves his family.  He loves his girls (he and his wife have four) and his son.

But he especially loved hearing his intelligent girls as they talked about everything at the dinner table.  And, as usual, Doyle’s ear for dialogue is spot on.  Larry is a pretty open minded guy, he doesn’t even mind hearing his daughters talking about their love lives.  Nothing they said or did ever shocked him.

Until Stephanie brought home the black fella. (more…)

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Richard Ford–“Calling” (New Yorker, December 25, 2000 & January 1, 2001)

Posted in Coronavirus, Culture Shock, Death, Drinking, Ducks, Hunting, Joel Culpepper, LGBTQ, Marriage Trouble, New Orleans, LA, New Yorker, Parenting, Quarantine, Richard Ford, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Yussef Dayes on July 22, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: TOM MISCH AND YUSSEF DAYES-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #49 (July 13, 2020).

mishTom Misch and Yussef Dayes play a light jazz with lots of interesting elements floating around the songs.  The blurb says the music “evokes a dreamy utopia, blending live electronica, psychedelia and avant-garde jazz.”

I didn’t realize that Misch was British until the chorus–the way he sings “the dash.”  Actually I first realized when he spoke after the song, but then it was obvious when he sang.

Producer/guitarist Tom Misch and drummer Yussef Dayes released a surprising and stunning collaborative album earlier this year called What Kinda Music,. This Tiny Desk (home) concert — recorded across six different musicians’ homes — features two songs from that album, “Nightrider” and “Tidal Wave.”

“Nightrider” has cool echoing slow guitars and fantastically complex drumming.  But the focus of this song seems to be the wonderfully busy five string bass from Tom Driessler.  Jordan Rakei provides backing vocals and

special guest John Mayer provides a closing solo, just as he did at last year’s Crossroads Guitar Festival.

It’s weird the way Mayer stares at the camera at the end though.

“Tidal Wave” has a different cast.  It features Rocco Palladino on bass, which is not as complex.  Although Yussef’s drumming is fantastic once again.

There’s a nice lead guitar line before the vocals kick in.  I almost wish the song were an instrumental until Joel Culpepper adds his wonderful high backing vocals.

This is some good chill out music.

[READ: July 10, 2020] “Calling”

I know I’ve read Richard Ford stories before, but this stories was so fascinating to me–it felt very different from so many other stories that I read.

Set around Christmas in 1961, the narrator’s father has left him and his mother in New Orleans while he has moved to St. Louis to be with a male doctor.

His mother, meanwhile, had begun a singing career, which essentially meant that she was sleeping with her African American singing coach.

What’s fascinating about the story (aside from how trasnsgressive his parents seem in 1961) is that the narrator is telling the story from the present:

They are all dead now.  My father.  My mother.  Dr. Carter. The black accompanist, Dubinion.

These interjections of the present allow for some reflections on this tumultuous period in his life.  (more…)

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