Andrew Bird - "Fake Palindromes"
Within hours of my posting about Final Fantasy, Kathryn - so on the ball she is the ball, - emailed asking about Andrew Bird. He's an obvious Final Fantasy connection, I guess, what with his fiddling and stuff. But as Kathryn pointed out, it's to "a far, ah, less fey result." Where Has A Good Home seems reared by Sufjan Stevens, Camera Obscura, the Hidden Cameras, and Bach, The Mysterious Production of Eggs (great title) suckles at the teat of Ryan Adams, Calexico and (if we're being cruel,) Pete Yorn.
(Of course this is Bird's fifth LP or something. The only earlier one I've heard, Weather Systems, is a whole lot more "fey" than you might guess.)
Preamble aside, I'm not qualified to talk about Andrew Bird. I only heard of the guy last week, when this tune, "Fake Palindromes," made its way to my ears.
But gee whiz - gee whiz! - is it a good song!
First of all, it's only two minutes and fifty-two seconds, which is a very good sign. Also, I don't think the lyrics contain any palindromes. But we're putting the cart before the cattle (is that an expression?). We need to cut to the meat of the matter in a patented Said the Gramophone run-on sentence. The song's clear and obvious claim-to-fame, the wet and beating heart, the energizing whip-snap, is that killer fiddle hook, that four-note earworm, that vivacious blast, that indian sneer of strings with the thunderstomp of drum-and-shaker.
And if you don't fall in love with the tune in the first two seconds, you will when Andrew Bird drawls "coulda died... shoulda died". Or when you notice the weird electric guitar that's stalking through the briar in the back, with long long legs. (Is it a "monster that walks the earth?") Or when "Fake Palindromes" ends (it ends!) after a scarce two minutes and fifty-two seconds. "I want to drill a tiny hole into your head," he sings. Well sign me up - just let me hear this thing again! Put it on a whirling repeat in a purple room with the blinds drawn. Run through that barrage of images, the formaldehyde-swap, the singles ads, the blood in her eyes. And then open the wardrobe and loose the violins, the super strings, the brown swooping things what lift me out the closed window and straight to the moon. [buy]
[buy]
---
Clem Snide - End of Love
Clem Snide's new one is a good 'un, probably the best since Favorite Music, which is no small compliment. It's got dazzle and wit, unabashed love and niggling doubts. The sentimentality of Soft Spot has been put into a poorly-welded box, only to be wheeled out on special occasions. There's exactly the right amount of meanness, and perfect shirt-sleeved descents into noise. That is to say, they take risks - the right ones. (And the album's weak points, "Tiny European Cars" for instance, are those moments when everything's on auto-pilot, Eef's whimsy accompanied by merely pleasant music.)
Since hearing it in concert last year, I've been waiting for the crazy tango of "Something Beautiful." It's caustic and sincere partner for the Mountain Goats' "International Small Arms Trader Blues," rough and fleet-footed. "Made for TV" is so sweet it'll melt the coldest of hearts; but it's not just schlock, it's not just 'a duet with a kid' -- the kid's uncertainty, the mistakes, make it something scary and true.
And "End of Love," my favourite song on the album, is just plain good fun, a rock song where Eef's voice squawks in perfect rhythm with the tune. The vocals are genius, bouncing so effortlessly, taking new twists of emphasis and letting the words hang there in front of your eyes. I don't know how he manages to make the lyrics matter so much, how he pulls such feeling with little, little changes of tone... but he does. "DON'T be apocalyptic," / "what is true-oo," / "SO WHAT," / "secret's [the slightest of pause] safe with you" / "Are you still feeling bad?" / "GUESS what, your pain [with sudden empathy] 's been done." Then there's the coda, of course, the big blow-out where it's all been leading, the horns that sound to me like reversed guitars, everything getting sucked into a black hole at the very end of love.
I was going to put "End of Love" up here, but I see that the fine new blog, Borrowed Tunes, beat me to it. So go get it there, and read John's thoughts on the record as well. (He says it starts like the Counting Crows. Is this a bad thing? [Answer: Sometimes.])
[buy]
---
Loudon Wainwright III - "The Swimming Song"
Another tune from the marvellous anne rousselot.
This is such a clean tune, for all the bluegrassy arrangement. The mandolins are well groomed, the banjos have brushed their teeth. And Loudon's never carried away, he just sings the hopskotch poetry of his lyrics, letting the joy of the repeated words speak for themselves.
"And I moved my arms around."
Even the "Aaaay-hoo!" sounds like something planned, polished to be presentable.
But where this would normally put me off, this preparedness, this shine, here it's wonderful, it's just right. This isn't a hoedown, a barn-burner, a moment of the ecstatic - it's a lesson. It's wisdom. It's a glad and earnest recipe for life, a simple suggestion. It's easy, what Loudon's singing, you could do it. I could do it. "Self-destructive fool[s]" could do it. And there will be bright-and-shiny people to help you through, bright-and-shiny water to catch you fall, bright-and-shiny sunlight to see you do it, to see you hold your breath and kick your feet and move your arms around. To see you swim. Because I know you might have drowned. But you won't. Just listen.
[buy]
---
M.I.A. - Arular
I've not been following the prep-school-Tamil-Tigers-politics-and-art debate about M.I.A., mostly because I only have internet access for a brief time every day, and can't spare the minutes. So I'm going to keep this short:
I get the bombs to make you blow. I got the bits to make you bang bang bang.
Hooray!!!
[buy]
---
Van Morrison - "(Straight To Your Heart) Like A Cannonball"
The last time I went on about the masterpiece that is Astral Weeks, some commenters on this blog entreated me to go back to some of Van's other old records. Their feeling was that despite my blanket assertion that everything after Astral Weeks sucks (with the exception of "Brown Eyed Girl" and "Crazy Love," I suppose), Van's done a lot of good work, on records like T.B. Sheets and Tupelo Honey, etc.
Well, I went back and listened. And in the end, what do I think? Everything after Astral Weeks still sucks, but with the exception of "Brown Eyed Girl," "Crazy Love," "Wild Night" and "(Straight To Your Heart) Like A Cannonball".
Ok - download and listen to this song. Please.
Now play it. And ignore the wiggly ringo starr guitar-line. Bear with it. Listen to Van Morrison and his little existential drama. Listen to the girls who sing to his left. And wait. Wait. WAIT- YES. Flutes. Flutes! How could flutes be so wonderful!?
But oh, they are! They are they are. Keep listening. You're waiting for the flutes, aren't you? You're waiting for that two-and-a-half-bar sounding that seems to affirm all the delight in the world, that seems to affirm all the promise of love.
Van knows how good those flutes are. He knows it. He makes you wait. Then he looses them in a row. Oh god, oh gosh, how much there is for me in those silly breathy brushes of sound, that chorus of woodwind.
Am I wrong?
Flutes!
[buy]
---
LazyWeb: I realize this is a long shot, but I recently heard that Gmail Swap was mentioned (in passing, or a sidebar or something) in Time Magazine last year. Does anyone happen to have seen that reference? I'd love a scan of it, or at least the date/issue, so that I can add it to the appropriate file. thanks!