Music is My Radar

I awoke this morning to an unseasonably cold, rainy, and generally nasty day.  Biking to work at 7:30 this morning was no fun, but as always I’m glad I did.  My 8:00 AM appointment was a little late, but at least she showed up - students skipping out on meetings is bad enough, but doing so on an 8:00 Monday morning meeting is a frakkin’ capital crime.  Fortunately, the rest of my day is mostly free of interruption, leaving me plenty of time to work on research and, you know, blog.

Anyway, on such a generally miserable day I would ordinarily have no trouble finding several hours worth of music perfectly suited to guiding me through a productive workday under less than ideal circumstances.  Today is no exception; I’m currently listening to an old favorite from back in the day, one that I firmly believe is one of the most underrated or under-appreciated CDs in my collection.  I mean, does anyone actually remember the Ballistic Brothers?  Likely not.

But for whatever reason, I had this song stuck in my head all morning:

Walking back to my office from my morning coffee and bagel, I had to hear it.  I gotta say, it’s a seriously stupid and brilliant song.  I thought about writing this as one of my Guilty Pleasure entries, but nope.  I am all too proud to rock the Humpty.

I laughed when I read about this, but then rolled my eyes a bit when I read this.  An entire restaurant menu and beer devoted to one band?  This is certainly not the most egregious form of product tie-in, but seriously.  Nothing against Wilco mind you; maybe it’s the dad-rock entrepreneurs cashing in on their musical love.

That said, I had a similar idea back in the day: a Beatles-themed restaurant.  Seems simple, right?  A highly beloved band, some good food - what could go wrong?  The problem was that I could only think of one item for the menu: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Sandwich.  Perhaps featuring Mean Mr. Mustard sauce.

Let the groaning begin.

Sadly, this question has now been answered.

Rest in peace, Corey.

Lately I’ve been trying to listen to some of the mp3s I’ve accumulated over the years but never really spent any time with.  (Since most of these were acquired, um, via non-market means, I never worried about wasting money on unlistened-to music, as I would had I bought them on CD.)  It’s been interesting; turns out that I have quite a back-log of good music to work through.

Anyway, I was listening to this earlier today as I was working at home (God bless spring break) and doing my best to avoid grading papers.  I suppose it’s reflective of how little time I’ve spent exploring shoegaze that I’m only now spending time with two of the genre’s notable members: Chapterhouse and Catherine Wheel.  I have spent quite a bit of time with some great bands of that period - My Bloody Valentine, the Jesus and Mary Chain, Slowdive, even that one Yo La Tengo record (one of my all-time favorites by the band, BTW).  (For my money, I’ve always considered Catherine Wheel to be a little too rawk for shoegaze, but they do have the nice, loud, drone-y guitars common among the scene.  Reasonable people may differ.)

But whatever the case, it was the sampled drumbeat in “Pearl” by Chapterhouse that inspired this post.  For the uninitiated, the sample comes from “When the Levee Breaks” by Led Zeppelin and is probably one of the most sampled drum tracks of all time.  (Along with this, of course, which arguably was the germ of the genesis of an entire genre.  But I digress.)  Indeed, one of the things that annoyed me about the early Beastie Boys - other than their general brattiness - was that they sampled “Levee” on their first rap album License to Ill.  At the time, you see, I was much more of a classic rock fan than rap/hip-hop fan.  (In later years, my fandom did a nearly perfect 180, but again, I digress.)

Hearing that riff, sampled and sped up as it was, reminded me of this song and that quintessential early 1990s production style: everything lush, breathy vocals, the familiar drum riff.  My guy friends and I absolutely loved “Damn, I Wish I Was Your Lover,” perhaps because very few women had ever expressed an interest in being our lovers, and so to hear that sentiment over such a commanding beat; well it was more than we could bear.

I could go further about the “Levee” riff or sampling in general, but I won’t, because I do really need to grade papers, and I’d rather just leave you with those two songs.  Enjoy.

As much as I shy away from live shows, for reasons I’ve discussed before, I might have to take advantage of this opportunity.

Of course, I’ve never had much luck with reunion shows - seeing two of my favorite bands from the 1990s slog their way through concerts in the 2000s was rather painful.  But at least Pavement hasn’t been gone from the scene as long as other bands, and shit - I think I’d be a fool to pass on this.

Atlanta road-trip anyone?  September 26 is a Sunday night, but I likely won’t have to teach the next day …

Last weekend my wife and I watched The House of the Devil, which we both agreed is one of the best horror films we’ve seen in a long time.  (Given that we are both confirmed horror movie buffs, albeit with a regrettable lack of exposure to certain subsets of the horror movie genre, we have fairly high standards for scary stuff.  Sadly, not all movies we’ve seen recently meet our standards, although others do.)  If you haven’t seen The House of the Devil, I strongly encourage you to do so, especially if you have experience with horror films from the 1970s and 1980s, as well as the “satanic panic” that gripped the U.S. in the 1980s.  I could go on about the quality of the movie; about how even the smallest elements of the film - from the props to the music to the camera angles and lighting - are near-perfect evocations of a bygone era of horror cinema.  But I’ll leave that to those more knowledgeable (or at least more opinionated).

Instead, I’ll focus on one aspect of the film, it’s authenticity.  Again, many elements of the film are so retro as to be reverential.  Indeed, at times it seems surprising that this movie was made in the 2000s and not the 1980s.  (At other points in the film, this is not so surprising, but again, I digress.)  This made me ponder - is there a musical equivalent to this film?  Not in content, mind you; I’m not talking about the many genres of music that lean toward the horrific.  Instead, I’m referring to albums or songs that so perfectly evoke the sound and feel of a particular genre or scene or time period that it almost sounds as though it was unearthed from a time capsule (hence this post’s title) and dusted off for the kids of today.

I can think of one good example.  (Sorry, Wolfmother - better luck next time.)  Admittedly, I’m a little biased here, because I know the lead singer/guitarist from his time employed here and here.  And I can personally attest that he’s a swell guy.  But really, I’ve spent a fair amount of time listening to the band’s first (and only) long-player, and I gotta say, it’s pretty effing brilliant.  (And I’m not the only one who thinks so.)

Here’s why.

Continue Reading »