SOUNDTRACK: NEIL YOUNG-Live at the Fillmore East (1970) & Live at Massey Hall (1971).
I came to the Neil Young ballgame much later than lots of fans. I’ve always more or less liked Neil, I really liked his Weld live album, and of course, I knew all of his classic rock, um classics. It was Sarah who really turned me on to Neil’s more mellow side, especially Silver and Gold. And, once you’re into the raucous and the mellow, well, that’s the whole oeuvre, pretty much.
So, I’ve been getting various records by him over the years. And there was so much buzz about these archival releases that I had to check them out. I’m not going to go into whether they were “worth the wait” (some complained about waiting twenty some years for these releases to get only 6 songs on the first one…but I wasn’t waiting terribly long for them, so I don’t care).
Live at the Fillmore East. This is a fun, rowdy little disc. I’m confused as to why it’s only 6 songs, as surely they would have played more at the time, but I’m not going to spend any real time figuring that out. The first two songs, “Everybody Knows This is Nowhere” and “Winterlong” are fuzzy, brief versions of these cuts. They’re a good opening in prep for the twelve minute “Down By the River.” Two more short songs, “Wonderin'” and “Come on Baby Let’s Go Downtown” barely prepare you for the 16 minute “Cowgirl in the Sand” conclusion. I didn’t know that “Downtown” was a “Crazy Horse” song and not a Neil song. I’m not even sure where I know it from, but it was as familiar as most of his tracks. And it was interesting to hear one of the other guys sing the song.
This is Neil and Crazy Horse at their 1970s prime. They sound great, the extended tracks aren’t tiresome, and the quality of the recording is fantastic.
Live at Massey Hall. The same quality is evident on this recording as well. But this record is just Neil solo. It’s a more mellow affair, with the songs being pretty evenly split between acoustic guitar and piano. This disc has 17 songs on it and only one runs over 5 minutes (actually the closing “Dance, Dance, Dance” runs pretty long too, but it’s basically 2 and a half minutes of applause which Neil really should have cut).
What is most interesting/fascinating/cool about this recording is that so many of these songs, which at this point are rightly deemed classic, are heard here by this crowd for the first time. It’s really funny to hear a song like “Needle and the Damage Done” that doesn’t immediately generate a huge round of applause on the first note. You can hear the Toronto audience really listening to the songs. It’s pretty intense.
There’s two or three songs that he says something like, “I just wrote this song last week.” There’s also the really fascinating introduction to “A Man Needs a Maid/Heart of Gold Suite.” I’ve never much like “A Man Needs a Maid” but when he explains the context for writing it (that he’s making a musical (and whether that is true I have no idea) and you can hear the orchestral version playing along in your head) it actually WORKS! The only confusing thing is that he busts into “Heart of Gold” in the middle of the song, and no one bats an eyelash because no one has heard it before!
It’s a really cool collection of songs. I’ve not heard Neil banter so much on record before, and he sounds so YOUNG. It makes sense to hear him write and sing “Old Man” since he wasn’t an old man at the time.
It’s hard to pick one or the other because they are so different, but I think for historical value Massey Hall is the winner. Plus, you get the home town crowd cheering every time he mentions Canada.
[Read: January 28, 2007] This Shape We’re In.
This is a strange little book. It’s about 55 pages. I had never read any Jonathan Lethem before, and since this book was cheap from the McSweeney’s store I thought I’d give it a shot. And boy is it strange. The pun of the title is that the characters are indeed in a shape. (more…)
SOUNDTRACK: THE FUTUREHEADS-News and Tributes (2006).
SOUNDTRACK: BARENAKED LADIES-Barenaked Ladies Are Me (2006) & Barenaked Ladies Are Men (2007). 
Barenaked Ladies Are Me. As I said, I was excited that BNL were basically doing the whole thing themselves, and wouldn’t have any label pressure to release the next big thing. So, I was a bit disappointed at first that the album stayed in the same “mature” vein as Everything to Everyone. There’s nothing crazily exciting on the CD except for the last song “Wind It Up,” which is the rockingest thing they’ve done in years.
Barenaked Ladies Are Men. Five months after Are Me, came this follow up. The packaging and styling of the disc is very similar to the other one (as you can see by the covers). I wasn’t even sure that it was a new record. Well, it turns out that these are more songs from the same recording session. And, rather than releasing a double album, they did a Use Your Illusion I and II type of thing (there, how many reviews of BNL refer to GNR?)
SOUNDTRACK: BARENAKED LADIES-Stunt (1998) & Maroon (2000).
Stunt. BNL took over the world with “One Week,” one of the most ubiquitous songs of 1998, and one that I never actually got sick of, which is pretty surprising. But it’s got many different elements and–and I think this is the clincher–the words are so hard to understand, that I spend most of my time while listening to the song, just trying to figure them out. Weird Al even parodied it (called “Jerry Springer”) so you know it was big.
Maroon. When I grabbed this record next, I had complete forgotten it existed. I assumed that the next one was Everything for Everyone, so imagine my surprise to find Maroon. And, evidently I’m not the only one who forgot about that album: allmusic says sales were off pretty far for this one (do I blame Weird Al?)
SOUNDTRACK: BARENAKED LADIES-Born on a Pirate Ship (1996) & Rock Spectacle (1996).
SOUNDTRACK: BARENAKED LADIES-Gordon (1992) & Maybe You Should Drive (1994).
SOUNDTRACK: MOTHERHEAD BUG-Zambodia (1993).
Motherhead Bug is the creation of David Ouimet. David was my boss at Tower Records way back when. He has been in some other influential NYC bands like Swans and Cop Shoot Cop, and he’s worked with Foetus as well. He has since moved on to bigger and better things, including doing wonderfully creepy illustrations for YA books (like Cat in Glass and Double-Dare to Be Scared).
SOUNDTRACK: NIRVANA: With the Lights Out (2004).
It probably sounds like an urban myth to say that Nirvana was a catalyst for new music way back then. But I can recall when “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was first on the radio, and I was living in a region of the country (hey Office fans, it was Scranton, PA) that was devoid of anything interesting on the radio; it was like a flash of light: there is interesting music out there, somewhere. So, yup, Nirvana was a great moment for me.
SOUNDTRACK: Big Bad Love [Soundtrack] (2002).
Somehow, I came upon a free copy of this CD. I hadn’t really listened to it at all, save for the Tom Waits songs (which turned up on Orphans anyhow). But I listened to it the other day and it’s a really good collection of unorthodox/noisy blues. I’m not a huge fan of the blues, but I can get into short bursts of it. The R.L. Burnside songs are lots of fun, as is the Junior Kimbrough piece. And, there’s a great piece by T-Model Ford called “She Asked Me So I Told Her” which seems to consist entirely of the lyrics, “So she asked me, so I told her, why I’m here” over a very raucous blues riff. There’s also some nice instrumentals by Tom Verlaine & Kronos Quartet.
SOUNDTRACK: THE HOUSEMARTINS-Live at the BBC (2006).
I found out about the Housemartins after enjoying the Beautiful South, and since they only released two albums, it was easy to get into them quickly. This is a collection of live tracks from the BBC, some have an audience and some do not. What is most striking about the record are the amount of acapella works that are on here, and the, surprisingly religious aspect of many of the songs (especially for a bunch of guys who on the latest Beautiful South album say “No thanks to God, he did fuck all.”)
I Just Read About That... 