News from Pitchfork

First Brian Wilson finished Smile. Then Jandek played live. And now, Jeff Mangum, the elusive, fragile and possibly downright batty mastermind behind Neutral Milk Hotel, has made his first major public appearance in years, joining Olivia Tremor Control last night at the Bowery Ballroom in New York City. (What next, Syd Barrett does Coachella? Pretty soon, we’ll have no more mysterious crazy geniuses to obsess over.) According to Billboard.com, Mangum "bounded" on stage "decked out in a blue button down shirt and green ball cap" to belt out "I Have Been Floated". The crowd promptly lost their shit, and there was much rejoicing. He later returned for the encore, "Shaving Spiders," which ended in a chaotic group hug/pile-up.

Reader Nicholas Kinsey reports, "When Jeff sang, his voice came from the earth, not the heavens (as he does on the records we love). He was haunted, as if he had not sung a note in five years...It was powerful yet unsure...His eyes darted from the audience and up past the ceiling and into the sky as he clenched a water bottle that looked like it would burst... There was optimism in the whole show...A revolution thought defunct, now alive."

I have been to busy to write lately.  Or, more accurately, to write well. I was all over the place talking about Ryan Adams, and didn't get to make a point about his fast and loose similes.   Well I just heard a Guy Clark song that made the point for me.  Its the first song he wrote and kept, he jokes. But he learned from Townes, so he had a bit of an advantage. Here are the Lyrics.

And that old time feelin' goes sneakin' down the hall,
Like an old gray cat in winter, keepin' close to the wall.
And that old time feelin' comes stumblin' up the street,
Like an old salesman kickin' the papers from his feet.

And that old time feelin' draws circles around the block,
Like old women with no children, holdin' hands with the clock.
And that old time feelin' fall on it's face in the park,
Like and old wino prayin' he can make it 'till it's dark.

And that old time feelin' comes and goes in the rain,
Like an old man with his checkers, dyin' to find a game.
And that old time feelin' plays for beer in bars,
Like and old blues-time picker who don't recall who you are.

And that old time feelin' limps through the night on a crutch,
Like an old soldier wonderin' if he's paid too much.
And that old time feelin' rocks and spits and cries,
Like and old lover rememberin' the girl with the clear blue eyes.

So the grey cat line is great.  I have had Prufrock on my head for over week now too. Remember this:

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes, 
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes 
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening, 
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains, 
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys, 
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap, 
And seeing that it was a soft October night, 
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep. 

Ok, Ok, there isn't much of a relationship between that Cat and Clark's.  Like I said, the poem has been in my head, that's all.

The next song contains this greatness:

Gimme a bowl of chile,

gimme milk and toast.

As long as you're dishing it out Lord

 I'll take a litle of both

Bet Elliot couldn't come up with something like that. Too much swagger for the ole Brit.

Or this line, earlier in the CD

""She's standing on the gone side of  
leaving."            

I just googled that line to make sure I had it right and found some interview with a poet who is claiming it to be his own.  Or maybe I am misterpetting the parenthetical "Orginal" in this:

You take a phrase like "She's on the gone side of leaving me for good" (original).....and build around it. Songs are usually highly structured and poems don't have to be.

Way to ruin a line by trying to do to much with it. And then claim it as your own?

Though I have some different ideas then her, I have always thought Krista at Stumptuos.com was the goto girl for beginning weightlifting tips.  She's got tons of   good advice, and seems plenty motivational.

Here are some money clips from her website.

ON SUGAR

Personally, I think deliberately selling chemical and sugar laced shit to children should be considered akin to corporate child abuse. Probably the same people who make Ritalin also make Froot Loops - it's a great karmic cycle. I think whoever comes up with the latest blue-coloured cartoon-character-sponsored piece of sugared crap should be forced to remain in a small locked room with a toddler who has just consumed that substance.

ON SQUATS

In fact, there is strong evidence that squatting actually improves knee stability! The increased strength, balance, and proprioception from regular squatting can make a substantial contribution to keeping knees healthy. .......Most interesting to me is the problem with what is usually recommended as "safe": squatting to parallel. At parallel (where the thigh is parallel to the floor, higher than the depth of a full squat by about 30 degrees), the compressive forces on the patella (kneecap) are actually at their highest (Huberti & Hayes, Journal of Bone Joint Surgery, 1984: 715-724). Decelerating, stopping, and reversing direction at this angle can inspire significant knee pain in even healthy people, whereas full squats present no problem.

Another exercise which is supposedly "safer" is the leg extension, even though patellar tension and shear forces on the knee joint are demonstrably higher with such an exercise (see sidebar).

ON WOMEN WHO 'DON'T WANT TO GET BIG"

FOR THE LAST FUCKING TIME, YOU CANNOT GET TOO BIG FROM LIFTING WEIGHTS! A NON-DRUG-USING MALE TRAINEE WOULD HAPPILY CRAWL ON HIS LIPS THROUGH A FIELD OF LEECHES TO ADD FIFTEEN CRUMMY LITTLE POUNDS OF MUSCLE A YEAR! DO YOU THINK THAT YOU ARE SOMEHOW SO SPECIAL THAT YOU WILL DEFY THE LAWS OF PHYSIOLOGY AND SUDDENLY BECOME HUGE ONE DAY? WAKE UP AND SMELL THE GODDAMNED TESTOSTERONE, HONEY! WHAT'S THAT? YOU CAN'T? OH, PERHAPS THAT IS BECAUSE YOU DON'T HAVE ENOUGH TO MAKE YOU BULK UP???? RAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHHHH KRISTA SMASH!!

 ON PANDAS

I'm not saying pandas deserve to be eliminated, but....

 

Everyone go check out her site, then get back to me with your favorite quotes.

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.

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.

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)