TUE., JULY 24, 2007
Post Spotlight to FacebookYour Music: July 2007
by Michael Azerrad
"Oh, no! There's only a few days left in the month and I still have some downloads to use up!" Sound familiar? Well, never fear, dear subscriber, eMusicâs crackerjack Editorial staff has the answer. Or, rather, thirty of them. Welcome to the July edition of âYour Music,â a monthly feature where we'll suggest some of our favorite eMusic tracks for your downloading pleasure. And now, without further adoâ¦
J. Edward Keyes, Managing Editor
Todd Burns, Production Editor
Michael Azerrad, Editor-in-Chief
Skip James – I'm So Glad
When Cream covered "I'm So Glad" on their 1966 debut album, they made it into a denatured hippie rave-up. Bluesman Skip James, who wrote and played the original 1931 version, hated Cream's rendition. But perhaps it's just as well that James, who died in 1969, did not live to witness even lamer versions of his iconic slab of greatness.
James hailed from Bentonia, Mississippi (you know the place — it's about 16 miles south of Yazoo City on US-49), and played a particularly dark strain of the blues, which is really saying something. His songs ("Devil Got My Woman," "22.20 Blues") inspired some of Robert Johnson's most sinister tunes, which is really, really saying something. So when Mr. Nehemiah Curtis "Skip" James says he's glad, there's probably more to it than that.
"I'm So Glad" has its roots in "So Tired," a 1927 tune by jazz songwriters Art Sizemore and George A. Little that was recorded the following year as "I'm So Tired of Livin' All Alone" by another blues guitar hero, Lonnie Johnson. James cut out most of the changes, wrote new, if rudimentary, lyrics and infused it with spellbinding fingerpicking, complete with rumbling bass line, and a keening vocal that knifes through the soul. Basically, he reinvented the song.
James' three-finger picking on this tune is intense, and it only picks up speed as the song goes on. He was a competitive and irascible man who was fiercely protective of his techniques: he was notorious for shunning his colleagues. So a lot of blues scholars believe he played "I'm So Glad" with such high velocity because he wanted to make it difficult for rival musicians to figure out exactly what he was doing. But check out the complete lyrics to the song:
I'm so glad, and I am glad, I am glad, I'm glad
I don't know what to do, don't know what to do, I don't know what to do
I'm tired of weepin', tired of moanin', tired of groanin' for you
The lyrics — almost a chant, really — are partly just a set-up for the red-hot picking, but they do perfectly capture that sweet moment of relief when you realize you're over a painful breakup; as James notes, it's exhausting to get to that point. And now what? "I don't know what to do." So true — your whole future lies before you once again. "I'm So Glad" nails that simple and universal feeling, encapsulated in near-haiku form. The virtuosity of the playing is a metaphor for the triumph it describes.
And for contrast, check out early blues queen Ida Cox's variation — she's so glad because she "got her daddy back." Lightweight!
Download: Skip James' "I'm So Glad," Ida Cox's "I'm So Glad"
Dirty Looks – Dirty Looks
Just a buncha guys from Staten Island who got swept up in new wave's intoxicating undertow, Dirty Looks played CBGB one night and happened to get discovered by the coolest label in the world at the time (1979), Stiff Records of London, England. Dirty Looks' entire debut album summons up a very specific time in pop: the Skinny Tie Moment. It's got that retro-futuro vibe, power-pop infused with the yelpy vocal sound and constricted groove that signified alienated cool in the waning years of the Carter administration — right in there with the early Cars, the Records, and the first Joe Jackson album, but delivered with an enlightened thuggery that none of those bands touched on. If you're a fan of that era, this is a great lost album. Even if you aren't, "Let Go" is an impeccable artifact.
Download: "Let Go"
Alexi Murdoch – Time Without Consequence
Singer-songwriter music is a tough sell for me — generally devoid of little things like melody and rhythm, I find it's mostly just wordy, self-obsessed drivel for people who've lost their visceral connection to music — i.e., grown-ups. But unlike lite jazz, I haven't written off the genre completely, and occasionally, the work of people who commit singer-songwriter music does indeed emanate from my personal digital music device. One such perpetrator is Alexi Murdoch, a Scotsman whom I discovered at In the Attic, Pete Townshend and his incorrigible hambone of a girlfriend Rachel Fuller's traveling low-volume revue, during this year's South by Southwest music convention.
It's almost uncanny, but on his self-released debut album Time Without Consequence, Murdoch rarely uses words of more than two syllables — I think you can count the number of times on one hand — and it lends his gnomic lyrics an oracular clarity. You can hear that on the searching opener, "All My Days" — "I've been trying to find," Murdoch murmurs, "what's been in my mind." Beyond just employing actual rhythms and using actual drums, Murdoch grasps the power of repetition and groove, and isn't afraid to hang onto one chord and repeat phrases like "slowly, slowly, I am drifting" ("Blue Mind") to mesmerizing effect.
He does fairly vividly recall Nick Drake, one of the scant few other singer-songwriters who aren't a waste of time; and on "Wait," he taps into the same kind of paralyzing melancholy that afflicted St. Nick: "I know I have the strength to move a hill/ I can hardly leave my room." If you've ever been there, you'll probably feel Alexi Murdoch. Oh yeah, the moving "Orange Sky" was apparently quite a favorite on something called The O.C., whatever that is.
Download: "All My Days," "Blue Mind," "Wait," "Orange Sky"
Caninus – Now the Animals Have a Voice
You know how all those grindcore singers kind of sound like growling pit bulls? Well, Caninus just cut to the chase — their lead singer actually is a growling pit bull. Make that two pit bulls, named Budgie and Basil. Caninus' MySpace page boldly claims they're "The World's First Ever [sic] Animal-Fronted Band." Try telling that to the Bermuda Tree Frogs, fellas. Now, I make no claims for the musical worth of this endeavor, but you gotta throw them a bone for the concept. "Bite the Hand that Feeds You" is as good an example as any, but probably the best track here isn't musical — it's the aptly titled "Studio Guy Gets Pissed," in which Budgie and Basil apparently try to bust a move, prompting some indignant protestations by the titular recordist: "WHOAH! HEY! WHOAH! C'mon, man, this isn't a fuckin' park! Can you get the dogs back in the vocal booth please?"
Download: "Bite the Hand that Feeds You," "Studio Guy Gets Pissed"
The National – The Boxer
When I hear the word "empire," not only do I reach for my revolver, but I also think of the post-9/11 United States and the unprovoked invasion of an oil-rich sovereign nation, condoned by a blissfully ill-informed electorate and a cowed Congress. So when the National's singer Matt Berninger intones, "We're half-awake in a fake empire" I hear a distinct echo of Sonic Youth's immortal phrase from two decades ago, "Daydream Nation," to describe a widespread state of willful ignorance and denial. Or as Berninger puts it later in this haunting, incantatory song, "No thinking for a little while/ Let's not try to figure out everything at once." The next line, "It’s hard to keep track of you falling through the sky," conjures up an all-too-familiar image. The song's pointedly martial drums not only underscore the military undertone but an inexorable march to oblivion, or at least obliviousness. And yet "Fake Empire" is neither scathing, righteous or even ominous; the weariness in Berninger's voice implies that the way we're going now, the future won't be scary, it'll just be sad.
Download: "Fake Empire"
Todd Burns, Production Editor
Skip James – I'm So Glad
When Cream covered "I'm So Glad" on their 1966 debut album, they made it into a denatured hippie rave-up. Bluesman Skip James, who wrote and played the original 1931 version, hated Cream's rendition. But perhaps it's just as well that James, who died in 1969, did not live to witness even lamer versions of his iconic slab of greatness.
James hailed from Bentonia, Mississippi (you know the place — it's about 16 miles south of Yazoo City on US-49), and played a particularly dark strain of the blues, which is really saying something. His songs ("Devil Got My Woman," "22.20 Blues") inspired some of Robert Johnson's most sinister tunes, which is really, really saying something. So when Mr. Nehemiah Curtis "Skip" James says he's glad, there's probably more to it than that.
"I'm So Glad" has its roots in "So Tired," a 1927 tune by jazz songwriters Art Sizemore and George A. Little that was recorded the following year as "I'm So Tired of Livin' All Alone" by another blues guitar hero, Lonnie Johnson. James cut out most of the changes, wrote new, if rudimentary, lyrics and infused it with spellbinding fingerpicking, complete with rumbling bass line, and a keening vocal that knifes through the soul. Basically, he reinvented the song.
James' three-finger picking on this tune is intense, and it only picks up speed as the song goes on. He was a competitive and irascible man who was fiercely protective of his techniques: he was notorious for shunning his colleagues. So a lot of blues scholars believe he played "I'm So Glad" with such high velocity because he wanted to make it difficult for rival musicians to figure out exactly what he was doing. But check out the complete lyrics to the song:
I'm so glad, and I am glad, I am glad, I'm glad
I don't know what to do, don't know what to do, I don't know what to do
I'm tired of weepin', tired of moanin', tired of groanin' for you
The lyrics — almost a chant, really — are partly just a set-up for the red-hot picking, but they do perfectly capture that sweet moment of relief when you realize you're over a painful breakup; as James notes, it's exhausting to get to that point. And now what? "I don't know what to do." So true — your whole future lies before you once again. "I'm So Glad" nails that simple and universal feeling, encapsulated in near-haiku form. The virtuosity of the playing is a metaphor for the triumph it describes.
And for contrast, check out early blues queen Ida Cox's variation — she's so glad because she "got her daddy back." Lightweight!
Download: Skip James' "I'm So Glad," Ida Cox's "I'm So Glad"
Dirty Looks – Dirty Looks
Just a buncha guys from Staten Island who got swept up in new wave's intoxicating undertow, Dirty Looks played CBGB one night and happened to get discovered by the coolest label in the world at the time (1979), Stiff Records of London, England. Dirty Looks' entire debut album summons up a very specific time in pop: the Skinny Tie Moment. It's got that retro-futuro vibe, power-pop infused with the yelpy vocal sound and constricted groove that signified alienated cool in the waning years of the Carter administration — right in there with the early Cars, the Records, and the first Joe Jackson album, but delivered with an enlightened thuggery that none of those bands touched on. If you're a fan of that era, this is a great lost album. Even if you aren't, "Let Go" is an impeccable artifact.
Download: "Let Go"
Alexi Murdoch – Time Without Consequence
Singer-songwriter music is a tough sell for me — generally devoid of little things like melody and rhythm, I find it's mostly just wordy, self-obsessed drivel for people who've lost their visceral connection to music — i.e., grown-ups. But unlike lite jazz, I haven't written off the genre completely, and occasionally, the work of people who commit singer-songwriter music does indeed emanate from my personal digital music device. One such perpetrator is Alexi Murdoch, a Scotsman whom I discovered at In the Attic, Pete Townshend and his incorrigible hambone of a girlfriend Rachel Fuller's traveling low-volume revue, during this year's South by Southwest music convention.
It's almost uncanny, but on his self-released debut album Time Without Consequence, Murdoch rarely uses words of more than two syllables — I think you can count the number of times on one hand — and it lends his gnomic lyrics an oracular clarity. You can hear that on the searching opener, "All My Days" — "I've been trying to find," Murdoch murmurs, "what's been in my mind." Beyond just employing actual rhythms and using actual drums, Murdoch grasps the power of repetition and groove, and isn't afraid to hang onto one chord and repeat phrases like "slowly, slowly, I am drifting" ("Blue Mind") to mesmerizing effect.
He does fairly vividly recall Nick Drake, one of the scant few other singer-songwriters who aren't a waste of time; and on "Wait," he taps into the same kind of paralyzing melancholy that afflicted St. Nick: "I know I have the strength to move a hill/ I can hardly leave my room." If you've ever been there, you'll probably feel Alexi Murdoch. Oh yeah, the moving "Orange Sky" was apparently quite a favorite on something called The O.C., whatever that is.
Download: "All My Days," "Blue Mind," "Wait," "Orange Sky"
Caninus – Now the Animals Have a Voice
You know how all those grindcore singers kind of sound like growling pit bulls? Well, Caninus just cut to the chase — their lead singer actually is a growling pit bull. Make that two pit bulls, named Budgie and Basil. Caninus' MySpace page boldly claims they're "The World's First Ever [sic] Animal-Fronted Band." Try telling that to the Bermuda Tree Frogs, fellas. Now, I make no claims for the musical worth of this endeavor, but you gotta throw them a bone for the concept. "Bite the Hand that Feeds You" is as good an example as any, but probably the best track here isn't musical — it's the aptly titled "Studio Guy Gets Pissed," in which Budgie and Basil apparently try to bust a move, prompting some indignant protestations by the titular recordist: "WHOAH! HEY! WHOAH! C'mon, man, this isn't a fuckin' park! Can you get the dogs back in the vocal booth please?"
Download: "Bite the Hand that Feeds You," "Studio Guy Gets Pissed"
The National – The Boxer
When I hear the word "empire," not only do I reach for my revolver, but I also think of the post-9/11 United States and the unprovoked invasion of an oil-rich sovereign nation, condoned by a blissfully ill-informed electorate and a cowed Congress. So when the National's singer Matt Berninger intones, "We're half-awake in a fake empire" I hear a distinct echo of Sonic Youth's immortal phrase from two decades ago, "Daydream Nation," to describe a widespread state of willful ignorance and denial. Or as Berninger puts it later in this haunting, incantatory song, "No thinking for a little while/ Let's not try to figure out everything at once." The next line, "It’s hard to keep track of you falling through the sky," conjures up an all-too-familiar image. The song's pointedly martial drums not only underscore the military undertone but an inexorable march to oblivion, or at least obliviousness. And yet "Fake Empire" is neither scathing, righteous or even ominous; the weariness in Berninger's voice implies that the way we're going now, the future won't be scary, it'll just be sad.
Download: "Fake Empire"
© 1992 - 2009 All Media Guide, LLC