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Saturday, July 30
I was frozen... To the face of the earth
Pitchfork has a great interview with Ryan Adams, who seems to be recovering nicely from his 4 year bout of recursive self involvement.
He says
I backed off myself. I kind of let it go, and I think that the way that it turned around was that when I went back to write songs again, it wasn't writing songs about songs. I wasn't like, using myself as a songwriter and then writing about that. I mean, hopefully-- hopefully!-- I was going a few inches deeper
I have allways suspected his problem is a bit like alcoholism in that he'll never be able to kick it completely, but it sounds like he's on the right track. I just put in Cold Roses, which I had been avoiding. [Whats with his singing on this Plateau Song. A bad start.]
This is funny too:
Recently somebody sent me a funny e-mail they'd gotten where this guy wrote, "It's bad enough that this guy, like, totally calls himself Ryan Adams, so that he can get Bryan Adams' fans, but like, he's still playing that 9/11 anthem?"
[Second song is much better]
At some point today I was googling around and came across mention of Andrew Sullivan pontificating on how iPods are keeping us detached from the world.
[Adams is relying on Momentum quite a bit more. Could be his Dead appreciation coming through]
I am sure Sullivan made his point well, and if not, I am sure other people out there have made it well, but I can't be bother to check. I mean, for pete's sake, if your tether to the world is so frayed that you're treasuring your relationship to strangers on the bus, the iPod isn't your problem. [Title Track is a standout]
Back to Ryan Adams. He just said, "Angry as a Breeze". What does that mean?
"Talented Breezes that blow off your hat with a sneer" always bothered me too.
He got a problem with confusing similes and Breezes aparantly. Both songs survive though.
Well, 'Damn Sam' did more than survive, it was frooking awesome.
I was just going to write that song I am listening to now is pretty good, but then it got all 'Cold Mountain' like, with its war message. And then I checked the song title, and saw that it is fact called "Magnolia Mountain". This may tie back to the source of his famed Jack White Fued, I don't know.
UPDATE: I just read the pitchfork review of the album. They got to the Grateful dead point before me, but they were talking about vocals, not momentum. They LIKE the Magnolia Mountian song. It did start strong, at least. And the next song was worse. They did write this though, which is cool:
it's increasingly difficult to say exactly when Adams transitioned from bloated media darling to scrappy underdog, but it happened, and he commandeered the passage all by himself, squirming away from the overblown antics of yesteryear and embracing, instead, the staid earnestness of his roots. It's a welcome return.
No Pho, I wasn't drunk when I wrote this. I just couldn't see the keyboard very well, and had spent all day traveling. I had woke up in Corpus Christi, drove to San Antonio, then flown through El Paso en route to LAX. By the end of the day I had eaten breakfast burritos outside of Corpus, Enchiladas at las palapas at San Antonio IA, Enchiladas at El Paso Airport, and then MooShoo in Manhatton. This might explain any incoherance on my part.
by
Sean
on July 30, 2005 08:38PM (PDT)
Wednesday, July 27
You're soft as glass, and I'm a gentle man
Geeesie Weesie, I can't have everyone think I am bitter. Here is some poetry, to showcase my sensitive side.
Postscript (Come Morning)
The Earth succumbs at last
To gentle, growing, unrest
Earthquakes and Tempests reborn as shudders
Under shallow pools of light,
Where caressing fingers play
And Conjure images of the night.
by
Sean
on July 27, 2005 08:06PM (PDT)
Tuesday, July 26
Is anybody going to San Antone
I have gotten a bit rusty, missing an obvious Blue Velvet Reference, its ancillary Black Velvet Reference, and a Road Rash reference to tie all together. I guess the post was gay enough anyhow, and Lita Ford would have kicked that Canadian’s ass, no matter what her name is.
So now I am sitting at a desk in the burbs of San Antonio, drinking Maxwell house out of a single serving French press watching the garden trolls patrol the backyard pool. Exciting stuff. Last night I went to the River Walk in San Antonio.
On the way there I found out that Alex shares my hatred of Fantasy Football. Well, his hatred is broad, where mine is deep. He is likely to dismiss you outright, no matter the level of your participation. He’s like that though. I dare say it’s his specialty, and he does it with enthusiasm. But much like Officer Shrift, he isn’t stickler for enforcement. (“We all do here [eat our words], you should have made a tastier speech!”)
I, on the other had, don’t care what you do alone on the internet in your bedroom, but if you start talking about Fantasy Football during an actual football game, you should be ejected from the premises. No excuses. I am going write an essay on this soon, so I will table the subject for the time being, but let me make one point. The “It Makes the Games More Interesting” argument, first deployed in defense of sports betting, is the worst since “Well, the Dutch do it that way”.
Who are these people that need to contrive reasons to watch football? It’s not a history lesson: If you aren’t interested, for everyone’s sake go do something else! There used to be a name for people who complained about watching games they weren’t interested in. Women.
(Disclaimer One: I don’t believe Sports Betting needs a defense, but people are always offering unsolicited ones)
(Disclaimer Two: I know plenty of women who say they love to watch football, and I sometimes I even believe them)
by
Sean
on July 26, 2005 03:40PM (PDT)
Sunday, July 24
if you want to destroy my sweater
Went to Bazaar both nights this weekend.
Alex snagged a dude with his Rolex, which was a monumental waste of the best pick-up line since "excuse me, I seemed to have misplaced my congression medal of honor":.
"Excuse me, But your sweater has gotten stuck on my Rolex".
The guy took it like a champ, if you know what I mean. After the incident the sweater was earning horrific to-the-pain-esque remarks from the crowd like "Oh my god, what is that thing!!". It looked like he took a shotgun blast to the kidneys. I would have had to go home, but he was dancing with the prettiest woman in the bar, says Alex. (I thought the prettiest was the girl in the striped dress and matching wrist band).
Earlier a guy had ordered two red bull drinks, which we would have mocked had we had the energy. The irony wasn't lost on us. And then another man of questionble taste ordered two buttery nipples and Vanilla Stoli-and -Coke. This definately would have galvanized our attack had he not paid for it with a UGA Visa. Oh, make no mistake about it, this pissed us off even more, but we were too stunned to act. All this had Alex mumbling to himself "I am in a David Lynch Movie, I am in A David Lynch Movie....". I told him that after a half-dozen of the Grey Goose and Bombays he'd been drinking, everything starts to feel like a David Lynch Movie. No one knows how to make one of those by the way. Probably this is because there is no right way.
One bartender laid down a Gin Martini with a shot of Vodka on The side, and then asked, "Who's the senior citizen who orders these types of drinks?". Everyone pointed to me.
I can't get a fair shake.
If it wasn't the strange drinks making Alex dizzy, it was my handwriting. I usually just bite my tongue when people say things like "I have the worst handwriting in the world". There are a lot of diseases and conditiones one could have that might effect someone's penmanship such that it is worse than mine. I saw, for instance, a guy whose toes were surgically attatched to his hand to replace his fingers. Something like that might put you in the runnning.
Anyhow, Alex got ahold of some of my penmanship and had laughed himself into demensia. At one point he was cordially asking people at the bar to transcribe "WhiskeySlowdown", in an attempt to establish a benchmark. Fortunately for me, Atlanta women are largly incapable of conversation this beyond the norm, and often retreat behind horrified or snide stares. "Excuse me, would you mind writing THIS [pointing to words on napkin] on THIS [pointing to blank napkin], is not the same as as saying "Can you write THIS [Pointing to words], on THIS [Grabbing her Ass]", but the differnce is apparantly lost on some people. The old Alex would have then insulted them untill they cried, which was allways fun.
At the airport Alex talked me into staying in San Antonio for a week. Were going to go see Bob Schneider in Corpus Christi on Friday and work on the QProject all week.
We did do some business this weekend, coming up with the company slogan "The only thing we do Offsore, is Vacation".
by
Sean
on July 24, 2005 08:00PM (PDT)
Monday, July 18
It sounds just like the sun
The problem with brilliant things is that they often blind, or otherwise cause mild discomfort. So much great new music will give you a headache in certain circumstances: Take for instance every-other Dismemberment Plan song, and the edges of most Wilco songs. But we've learned to accept it and at times expect it, so when something comes along that doesn't touch a few nerves, we tend to towards skepticism. How good can a new CD be if it is immediately and completely listenable? Pretty good, and I submit Broken Social Scene's sophomore Album "You Forgot it in People" as evidence.
Broken social scene is a 11 person band commonly referred to as a collective. This word seems to mean nothing, except that the members come from other bands and that there are lots of them. The only moment on the whole CD that tickles anything other than the pleasure sensors of your brain in the imagery of the song "Lover's Spit", and perhaps the unsingable lyrics of the song "I'm Still your Fag". But like the fire swamps,and the rest of the album, the song titles telegraph the their contents. The only serious flaw on the CD is that these two mellow songs seem misplaced at the end of such a rich, complex CD. And that's my larger point: This is a album with 11 people placing complex, catchy, adventurous Pop, and they never misstep.
The album starts with "Capture the Flag" which is something of an overture. I get to call it that because its instrumental and first. It sets up, in a pattern repeated later, the awesome "KC Accident", which builds into the first musical highpoint before making room for its delicate boyish vocal refrain. The song structure, at least in macro terms, is reminiscent of Wilco's Ghost is Born with its rising drum action leading into delicate vocals, the main difference is that here and throughout there is an emphasis on pop sensibility and song structure over contrast and experimentalism.
Not that they don't do more that just flirt with feedback two songs later on the anthemic "Almost Crimes", but its subtly muted and matched by dueling male and female vocals. The song is reminiscent of Sparklehorse's "Piano Birds" in which Linkous enlisted a game PJ Harvey to help sing over one of the louder, and crunchier, songs on his second album. "Almost Crimes" also benifits from driving drum section, what sounds like a petulant hornist trapped in a closet, and some well placed arcade tazers. It also leads into the looping "Looks just like the sun", which begins and ends with that hypnotic refrain. This song may not have the staying power of some of the others, but it jumps out in the same manner as GeggeyTah's repetive "Last Word", in which an equally delicate voice laments that "she said I was the one for her".
They unplug the horns on the instrumental "Pacific Theme" and add some shimmering guitars and vibraphone work. There are definitely things jangling throughout, but its comfortable through-and-though. This concept is perhaps best described as the difference between the Shins brilliant "Saint Simon' and the more infectious "New Slang".
The next song features first only a female vocalist and a plucking banjo, but slowly adds a violin to compliment the increasing but still hushed urgency of her repeated instruction, "park that car, drop that phone, sleep on the floor, dream about me". The song is titled "Anthem for a seventeen year old girl", and thought the title goes to content, you can't hear that song and not realize that had you known of this band in highschool, you would have scribbled their name all over your trapper-keeper.
And then right on cue we get "Cause = Time", which is ripe with High-School navel gazing like
You come in, check my time
You got fornication crimes
I've seen your hope on television
Where you've been, wore my word
They've got tricycles in skirts
This is a mouth that needs religion
And they all want to love the cause
'Cause they all need to be the cause
They all want to fuck the cause
And it works. Sure, it wouldn't work if there was another song like it on the album but their isn't, either musically or lyrically. Its fuzzy pop-rock number that gets compared to Dinosaur Jr, which is only obvious once someone mentions it.
The next song is the instrumental "Late Night bedroom rock for missionaries". Its suitably spare, continuing the trend of perfectly instructive song titles, and effective as it sets up the incredible "Shampoo Suicide". The song, and especially its simmering guitar notes, remind me of the best moments of James WahWah album, which was a collection of jams the band captured while recording their Laid album.
The song transitions nicely into "Lover's spit", which would be out of place if there was any other place to put it (There isn't, I tried). Its too good to leave off though, as is the following "I'm still your fag" which, by virtue of being the simplest song musically, manages so showcase some clever, but otherwise oblique, wordplay.
Heard about your wife and kids where we slept
Felt their mouths with stitches at that were slowly lit
Capture uniform this time because I couldn't quit
Haven't felt the ground so cold without getting sick
And I'm still your fag
I'm still your fag
The final song is reprisal. I know this because it is short, instrumental, and familiar, repeating a earlier melody at half speed. The album ends slowly, and I think thats it only failing.
This isn't an album that begs to be discussed, it begs only to be listened to. But once you start writing about you keep finding things to talk about. I didn't, for instance, mention one of the best songs, "Stars and Stripes" which uses handclaps to perfection. I didn't mention the perfect production which at one point elevates the vocal cues between band memebers: "Come in after this" he says , before he continues singing "It looks like the sun. It looks just like it". I could continue, but this line, as a comment on the identification of things brilliant, is a suitable place to stop.
Go check it out.
by
Sean
on July 18, 2005 06:19PM (PDT)
Thursday, July 14
Gotta gotta get up, get down
So I'm standing there paying for my 15` surfing platform and the guy says, "Nice Shirt. Where did you get it?"
He was asking about the tank I mentioned this morning. The one made by Ms. Lauren Strish (Strike-Four image, bottom right of this page).
I bagged the first wave I spied, except it realy wasn't a wave, in the common sense. Not in the scientific sense either, actually. WhiteWash, my 17 year old instructor said. I am a natural, she also said.
So I have found my new summer hobby. Tommorrow I hit the waves at 11, and get lunch afterwards at the BeachHut. To get anymore Dude, you need Kahlua.
by
Sean
on July 14, 2005 05:37PM (PDT)
You take your car to work, I'll take my board
The 'Lost Party' got lost. Well, I think they just flaked. Remember that commedian who pointed out, a long time ago, that Southern Californians have to deal with random flakiness. "I'm sorry Dude, I just Flaked", he mimed. I guess 'party' was too strong of word anyway: What do you call it when people get together to watch a television show?
I have a surfing lesson today. I descided that you can't come this close to the beach and then Rollerblade, even if people allready have an image of me "roller blading down the boardwalk with your newly 600 million cd loaded ipod ( in jean shorts and muscle tank)".
Its a shame too, since I have a new favorite muscle tank that has a stencil of a muscle car on it. Maybe I'll wear it surfing.
by
Sean
on July 14, 2005 07:59AM (PDT)
Wednesday, July 13
We were..inverted
My masseuse tells me that the flagship SportsClubLa was the one we were in. In Orange County. This supports my theory that the Orange County Distinction didn't crystallize until the last seven or eight years.
She tells me that you can't work someone’s back and hamstrings in a mere half-hour, but that she has to pick up her son, so can't work any longer. I was a walk-in, so I'll take what I can get. She asked when I walked in, if I had "showered off". Off-balanced, I stammered that I hadn't worked out yet. This was met by blank stares from her and the clerk. So I stammered some more: "I am pretty clean. I showered before I left home".
She paused for a second, and said, "well, we can start now and be done at 7:30 or.."
"Lets start at 7:15", I interrupted, "that'll give me time to put my stuff in the locker......and take shower".
Fifteen minutes later I was disrobed, literally, and under the sheet, waiting for her. I wasn't entirely sure if I was supposed to be nude, but I figured if I was going to guess wrong, I would err on the pro-side.
When she was finished, and I shook her hand, she stared at me for a second, as if she was expecting something. I have no idea what: I had added the gratuity before hand. Was I supposed to give her a quick reciprocal massage, like we do amongst friends?
Went to the gym to try out my new relaxed muscles, and nifty iPod Arm-band. Generic version, I had to cut a hole in it for the earphones. Its still nearly impossible to close without inadvertently turning the iPod off. That's my only complaint about the iPod, its pauses on too slight of contact. My new Brookstone vibraphone headphones help a little, with their elbow shaped jack, but they aren’t shaped enough to stay in my ears when inverted.
This morning I talked myself out of boot camp. Its too expensive for the lack of intensity. The first time I went the girl next to me in the ring of death by sit-ups had the official iPod armband, with the clear face. I was curious, since we were on the beach, if it ever got sand in it, but I couldn't see interrupting her jam with such a question. If was was writing a sitcom, I sure I could up with some suitable farcical phrasing.
Taking the fam to the airport for lunch, getting measured for a tux afterwards, maybe hang out on the beach for a while this evening, and then I'm supposed to go to a "lost" party tonight.
by
Sean
on July 13, 2005 09:40AM (PDT)
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