RIP Alex Chilton

Yeah, I know I'm late to this party, and it's not breaking news a week on, but he was one of my favorites and he deserves his nod. Surprisingly, and deservedly, he was eulogized in the hallowed halls of the national capitol.



There's not anything I can add to what's been said about the guy, so I'll just say that I'll miss him and keep enjoying his music, and be thankful that I at least got to see Big Star once in my life. I'll leave you with The Replacements' fine tribute to the man.

Puffy - Bring it!

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My abiding love of Puffy is one of those things that people don't seem to understand. Why do I like these 2 silly women singing silly pop songs, who got a silly show on Cartoon Network? I dunno, they're a hoot? Can't that be good enough? Yeah, they can be incredibly derivative, (Their second album rips off The Who and Black Sabbath so hard it's crazy) but so what? They aren't trying to be anything they aren't, just goofy and fun. So 13 years of silliness into their careers they've put out this album, and like the rest of their albums it's full of great songs and horrible ones. A couple of the great songs were written by Shiina Ringo, who is incredibly prolific and talented and plays in any genre she wants to with aplomb. She's a great source of material. Unfortunately though, 2 of the songs were given to them by Avril Lavigne. Enough said about that. A fair amount of the album skirts pop-punk territory, unfortunately, but there's enough good stuff on here to make it worthwhile. "Anata to Watashi", for instance, could easily fit in on Todd Rundgren's "Something/anything?". It's a perfect catchy pop song full of great devices. Through the whole album, their voices, as always, blend together perfectly. And the last track, "Wedding Bell", a cover of an old song by the Japanese pop band Sugar, is just fantastic. It's a snark filled story of a woman going to an old friend's wedding, alone, feeling totally inadequate, and hating it. So she wants to just say "Fuck you, amen" to the bride. It's a very catchy tune, and Puffy really padded out the arrangement with flutes and chimes and strings, which makes the contrast to the lyrics that much better. Still, the overall album is flawed, so its rating must reflect that. And here's a video they made for "Wedding Bell". Hope you understand Japanese.

Stereo Total / Leslie and the LYs - Wonder ballroom, Portland, OR, 4/1/09

Holy shit, dudes. I got invited to go see the Stereo Total show. "OK," I said, "I like those guys well enough, that should be fun." And it was. Stereo Total played a fun set full of the kooky songs they're known for playing, and played it well. Now, I'd been led to believe that they were the headliners, and the ticket reflected this with "STEREO TOTAL" on it in bold type. In fact, another band took to the stage after them. It was Leslie and the LYs, whom I hadn't heard of before, but I had seen a picture of singer Leslie Hall in an amazing gold spandex suit before. So she took to the stage with a couple of backup singers dressed as white tigers and videos of her songs projected onto a screen behind her. No words I can put down will ever do this show justice, but suffice it to say that it rocked the shit out of my fuck. She sings electro songs about gem sweaters and does karate chops. She dedicated a song to Madmartigan and proceded to sing the plot of the movie "Willow". She sang a song about shooting zombies in the head, and on the record it's a duet with Elvira. Fuckin' Elvira! She burned the motherfucker down and closed it out by breakdancing to Shania Twain. She reinvented fun in the form of spandex pants and hideous sweaters covered in rhinestones and puffy paint, high kicking and making bird noises. Look her up on YouTube, and you'll be able to watch the amazing videos she made and showed projected behind her. Also, here's a clip of her performance in Vancouver, BC the night before I saw her. It's amazing.

Shuggie Otis - Inspiration information

Aw yeah. Who's this dude? He's a mostly-forgotten funk wunderkind of the early 70s who took too long making this album and was subsequently written off by the music industry as a prima donna. He's the son of the noted blues and R&B bandleader (and sometime politician and pastor) Johnny Otis. He played bass for Frank Zappa on "Peaches en regalia". He played almost every instrument on this album. He is pretty awesome. Anyway, the album. This is the re-release of "Inspiration information", his 1974 opus, with a handful of tracks from his previous offering, 1971's "Freedom flight" thrown in for good measure. So what's it sound like, then? Well, it's lazy, lounging, weed-smoking funk for a sunny afternoon. Sometimes it sounds cinematic and sometimes it sounds, well, rural somehow. When I was a kid, my grandparents had a Hohner organ in the living room, the kind with footpedals and all kinds of switches and a rudimentary drum machine with preset rhythms like "beguine" and "waltz" and a tempo knob. I figured out pretty early on that you could get some crazy beats by pressing down more than one button at a time, and so did Shuggie Otis. Several songs have these crude early drum machine beats. Many have the "living room organ" sound all over them. In a way, he was making the lo-fi electronica of his time. He dabbles in jazz and plays drums and really makes the bass sound good. There's some electric piano too, but just for some atmosphere in places. He does funk on an acoustic guitar. It makes sense when you hear it, but who'd have thought to do it like that? This album was way ahead of its time. He basically invented ambient electronica on acoustic instruments and and slipped it through in a wrapper of experimental funk, like you'd hide your dog's worm pills in some peanut butter. Pick this one up and give it a listen.

Also, he played in "Snatch and the poontangs" when he was a teenager. With his dad the pastor. People need to know that because it's awesome.

Lastly, here's his song "Ice cold daydream" set to some great old stock footage.

!!!!!

I came across this video on the Rad Dudes blog. As awful as it is, it's rather mystifying and I find myself quite impressed with this gentleman by the time it's over.

The greatest music video was one of the first

We've all seen it, and most likely some of us have forgotten it completely. There are several versions, most shorter than this one, but I like this because it has the most jazzy solos, the most psychedelic scenery, and also "ee-levennnn". It kind of makes me wish I smoked dope. Let's face it, there were times when Sesame Street brought the funk, and this is some fine ass funk indeed, courtesy of the Pointer Sisters, of all people. Anyway, enjoy.



Since I'm talking up Sesame Street funk, here's the feelgood king of them all:



Yeah!

Last exit...

Shortly after finding those ghost in the machine demos of Sting's, it came to my attention that his pre-police band, Last Exit, had recorded a couple of demo tapes, and that those tapes were of excellent quality. I have yet to get my mitts on them, but apparently someone did, and has put a handful of tracks up on youtube. Here's one, called "Carrion prince".


It's funny seeing how sting recycled his existing material into songs he played with the Police. I also like the Steely Dan circa "Katie lied" vibe going on here.

Now, here's another Last exit track that became a Police tune. Embedding was disabled, boo for that, but check it out. You're back? Yeah, it was better as "So lonely".

For the love of obscure Police goodies, here's my favorite track from the Ghost demos, "Don't you believe me baby":



And here's another one from those same demos: It could have been on "dream of the blue turtles".


Finally, Sting channels Billy Joel, which I inexplicably enjoy:



Yeah.

Life is life

I'm feeling lazy, but I want to post. Here's what I'll do: a comparison of a cheezzzz ball song and its brilliant retooling at the hands of a group of Slovenian geniuses. First, here's the Austrian band Opus, with their 1985 (s)hit "Live is life":



I like how the thugs go in to kick some ass, but then are overcome with the "awesomeness" of the band and their music. Yes, that was pretty crappy. Next is "Life is life", so titled because that's what the lyrics were in the first place. The cheese has been restructured and refitted to become a work of genius by the Slovenian art collective called Laibach. Lo! Behold Majesty!



You can find this track on Laibach's album "Opus Dei".

Music to my eyes

OK, this isn't music-related at all, but I finally saw it. Friends had told me about this whole thing going down, and how channel 2 here in portland would occasionally dust off the footage and air it, lest someone NOT get to enjoy it. Not that I'd doubted them, but I sure did want to see the spectacle. Now I have, and so shall you.



You're welcome.