I've finished watching 'Normal People'. I've "binge-watched" it, as the young people say. I'm not generally inclined to do that, but with this I very much did.
I very much loved it.
I have a few thoughts ... [SLIGHT, TINY, SPOILERS, I suppose]
I will try to write about the TV series in isolation, but inevitably that will dovetail with the source book. I read the book, by Sally Rooney, about 18 months ago. I also loved that a great deal. I had already read 'Conversations with Friends', her other novel.
I have read almost 100 novels in the last couple of years, and 'Normal People' remains in my favourite handful. I can remember few others I was so regularly moved by. Being "moved" isn't the be all and end all, of course. I recently read another work of popular-yet-acclaimed young person's fiction, and though moved very much by a couple of scenes, I did not feel it was a great book by any means.
Whereas I do think 'Normal People' is a great book. It manages to be insightful, funny, compelling, heartbreaking, shocking and above all, real. So the fact that Rooney was in her mid-20s when she wrote it and its protagonists are even younger seems pretty irrelevant to whether it deserves to be considered great or not. I mean, I understand the carping. I couldn't deal with the Arctic Monkeys when they first came along and I was pushing 30. Who did Alex Turner think he was, being 18 and writing songs like that?
I'm not too interested in the idea of "high art" in any medium, but I do try to watch/read/listen to things which are deemed "good" - some of my favourite films are coming-of-age films, but usually they are acclaimed (horrible word, I know) coming-of-age films.
So 'Normal People' was not a great departure, as a book, for me. I had read 'One Day'. I had even (by mistake), read 'The Fault in Our Stars' and loved it.
Talking of 'One Day', the TV series of 'Normal People' has really shown up everything they should have done with that. They got greedy and made an odd film with a horribly miscast Hollywood star. They should have (and I think it was pretty clear at the time, based on the structure of the book, and the specific background of the female protagonist), made a 12-part TV drama casting relatives unknowns in the leads. Instead they took away most of what made the book unique, hired Anne Hathaway and convinced her that all English accents were basically the same if she said "oop" occasionally.
'Normal People' gets everything right, and I think that's what its detractors have to know about it to understand how good it is. That applies to both the book and the TV series. It's the details. The TV series looks like the book you imagine, it really does. [it's funny that one of the biggest deviations was changing Connell's sport of choice, for both playing and watching, from football to Gaelic football, as if someone whispered "we just need to make it a tiny bit more authentically Irish"].
And the book presents the life of certain kinds of young people as they really are. I'm 41 now, so you know, a bit older than ideal, but my cultural sphere is probably just about young enough, and furthermore I can remember the horrors of youth sufficiently well, to know that the extent to which Rooney is not guessing about any of this is what makes the book so poignant and overwhelming.
For example, there's a bit in the book 'Conversations with Friends' where an unnamed Joanna Newsom song on a compilation tape is mentioned and I, like a sap, felt I knew exactly which Joanna Newsom song it would be and why it would have been put on the compilation. In the TV series, in, I think, Episode 3, when Connell and Marianne go to the abandoned house, you hear a short section of 'Horn' by Nick Drake, and that was the similar "Yes!" moment for me. This. They know what they're doing. One or two of the end-credit choices were a tiny bit more on-the-nose, albeit still lovely, but the show had earned it by then.
[Re-reading this, I realise that it looks pretty odd to say the inclusion of a song from 1972 on the soundtrack shows that the creators really capture the experience of young people. But it showed, for me, the attention to detail, to something that was beautiful rather than obvious].
The leads are incredible. I might be wrong and misjudging them both, but I suspect that for Daisy Edgar Jones it's a star-making performance, while for Paul Mescal, it's the role of a lifetime. He's thoroughly perfect, in look, in manner, in everything, for the part, and there may not be that many more roles to come he's so perfect for. We'll see. That sounds like I'm doubting his acting ability. Not one little bit. I think it's an incredible piece of acting, but I just think there are not that many characters like Connell.
Connell is, for me (and this definitely is subjective and personal) the book and the TV show's indelible character, and proof of Rooney's great gift. I've been thinking about this a lot these last few days, trying to pin down what is so striking about him.
There is, in a way, nothing that surprising about him. The sensitive jock has been done before (even in films as broad as 'American Pie'). The working-class genius has been done ('Good Will Hunting' being a good, but very different, example). Connell is an almost entirely good person, almost entirely kind, and thoughtful, and sensitive, and strong, and noble, and athletic, and brilliant, and loving, and capable. How come, bearing all that in mind, he seems so nuanced, so fresh, so heartbreaking?
When Connell's depression comes in the book (and I suspect in the TV series for those that haven't read the book) it is initially a surprise, but very quickly you realise it shouldn't be. Rooney, and the show-runners, and Mescal too, have put the work in. Of course, he doesn't fit the type, but, conversely, he exactly does.
It reminded me of a time when I was at university and there was a friend of a friend of mine, a guy who I knew to nod at in the street, who I'd play football against, who was working-class English (in a Uni of a lot of Scots, a lot, lot of posh English, a fair few Irish, a lot of Americans) and, I was told, exceptionally academically gifted, who just seemed like a generally cool, nice guy, and I was told, confidentially, he suffered from regular crippling episodes of depression, and I remember thinking, I'm afraid, "really? he doesn't seem the type", even though at the time I was pretty certain I was enduring a (thankfully, very low level and, even more thankfully, transient) period of depression myself, whilst doing well in my studies, playing football every week, giving very few outward signs.
Connell's hang-ups, and the crushing mistakes he makes, can seem so trivial for an older reader - he cares about looking right, cares about his friends, cares about status, about doing the right thing by everybody, about not causing a scene and showing himself up, cares about fitting in. He, while at school, messes up his great teenage love and causes damage to an already damaged person, for what he realises pretty soon is no good reason, and then neither of them can communicate well enough to sort it out, even though it should be easy, if only, of only ... and then you remember, those concerns do rule your life when you're young, and even though you may get over them, the repercussions live on. When you're young, brief moments of social awkwardness do change the course of your life.
People like Connell are rare, but they do exist. And the fact is, even at the end of the book/series, when he's "made it", he hasn't made it at all. He's not the son of a famous connected person, he won't get his own book deal/newspaper column just like that. The chances are he'll go to New York, fail to make much impression, lose confidence, come back to Ireland, maybe go to England, find an OK job he's good at but doesn't love, mess things up with Marianne over again, probably make an unsatisfactory marriage out of a sense of responsibility, wish he'd stuck to doing law after all so he can support them properly etc etc.
The book is about more than love. It's about class and status, about shifting impressions, it's about politics, free speech, opportunities. The TV series gets that across incredibly well in a far more limiting format than the book. The supporting characters are really well drawn, particularly the horrible Jamie, initially so innocuous. You know exactly the kind of new media he'd be extremely successful and outspoken in right now.
Connell and Marianne are both exceptional people, hardly normal at all, which could very easily be pretty tiresome for the reader and the viewer - Look at these amazing people accomplish great things while shutting everyone else out of their world. But it's their exceptionalness that allows Rooney and the TV directors to, realistically and honestly, take them through several different layers, frames of mind, positions in the pecking order, shocking happenings and mundane events.
It is a sign of how much I invested in the book that I felt, at the end, like the TV series had deviated, and was a sadder ending than I remembered, but in fact, it's almost exactly the same, you just very much want these two people to be happy.
Perhaps there is a tiny bit more of something happily and successfully wrapped up with the book, while the TV, naturally enough, gives more of a hint that there is more to come ... good idea or not ... certainly that would suggest the possibility of following the lead of that other great modern romance, the "Before" trilogy, but I would very much wish, if there is to be more (I'd currently hope not), it follows another Rooney novel, rather than just a standalone TV series. We'll see. Money talks.
Tuesday 28 April 2020
Monday 27 April 2020
Song 87: Impossible
Tim Burgess’s twitter listening parties are one of the few
highlights of this situation, in case you’re missing them. Simply, the idea is
for everyone to listen to an album at the same time (8, 9 or 10 pm usually) and he and one or more of its participants
tweet about it. Often the choices have been right up my street (Midlake, SFA,
Blur, B and S, British Sea Power etc) and it is really wonderful to see, in
unadorned form, a creator’s love and enthusiasm for their own work, not to mention the shared enthusiasm of fans. eg last night I felt unembarrassed to tweet Tim Smith, formerly of Midlake, who only has a few hundred twitter followers, that I think Van Occupanther is one of the greatest albums of all time, and that is, I think, a nice thing.
Burgess, has, reasonably enough, included a couple of
Charlatans albums.
I always liked the Charlatans a lot, without ever quite
falling in love with them for any given length of time. I saw them once – third
on the bill at Fleadh behind Counting Crows and Bob Dylan. I recall, they were,
for me, the most unambiguously enjoyable hour of the day.
They’re a bit of a third-on-the-bill band, aren’t they? 3rd
on the bill at Knebworth, 3rd on the bill in the bands of their
generation, behind the Stone Roses and Happy Mondays. Truthfully, I prefer them
to those other two more storied acts.
Their run of singles from the early 90s to the early 2000s
is really very good indeed – Just Lookin, Just When You’re Thinking Things
Over, North Country Boy, Forever – this, my favourite, Impossible.
Songs that amble along tunefully …that is a bit of an unfair generalisation of
course – some, like Forever, do anything but amble … maybe that’s the point …
they seem like an ambling band. A bit like bands like Teenage Fanclub, it can
be hard to know where the “genius” comes from. That’s no bad thing. I used to love
Charlatans interviews – they combined great pleasantness with clear and unvarnished
tales of great hedonism – it was an odd juxtaposition.
It has not, of course, been an easy, ambling career for
them. Two of their founder members have died in extremely sad circumstances.
And yet, however these stories sometimes go, rock’n’roll immortality evades
then.
It strikes me they are the Tony Cottee of English rock’n’roll
– spanning three different eras, much better and more successful than they are
believe to be – Cottee has scored more goals in top flight English football in
the last 50 years than anyone except Ian Rush and Alan Shearer. The Charlatans
have had thee Number 1 albums, 11 Top 20 singles.
Anyway, give the listening parties a try if you haven’t
already. They’ll cheer you up. As will listening to The Charlatans, I reckon.
Wednesday 22 April 2020
Bob Dylan's albums
Excited as I am by the new Bob Dylan songs, I've gone and made a list of my favourite Bob Dylan studio albums in order from Top to Bottom. Completely subjective. No attempt at objectivity.
I've obviously listened to the ones near the top an awful lot more than the ones at the bottom, so the last week has involved listening to all the bad Bob Dylan albums, which has been quite fun.
Have included the official "The Basement Tapes" and 'Dylan'.
I've also considered, if you put together compilations of the best Dylan songs which are not on albums, where they would sit. (not tempting fate, I've left the two recent songs, Murder Most Foul and I Contain Multitudes, out of that.
In some cases, I've written a few words but not many.
Start at the top, no surprises:
1. Blood on the Tracks
I used to think that this album wasn't quite as perfect as some other great albums, like Blue and Astral Weeks. But the only two tracks I was a bit down on, Buckets of Rain and Meet Me in the Morning, sound great to me now, really evocative, and they bookend Side 2 really nicely. There are other great songs Dylan wrote at the time like Up to Me, but it is arguable whether their inclusion would have improved or unbalanced the album.
And as for the other 8 tracks, it is true to say I have been enthralled and obsessed with every single one of them, in its own right, at some point. I'm not sure I can say that about any other album, by anyone.
2. The Times They are A-Changin'
This is, in some ways, the definitive Bob Dylan album, though some people don't love it, saying it's too preachy. Recorded the month before Kennedy's assassination, Dylan was never the same again.
This album is so austere, so humourless, so committed to protest and civil rights and the plight of black people in America - the selfish, joking, wildfire Dylan is barely there.
Yet I still find this album completely wonderful - Hattie Carroll, is to me, one of the truly great works of art of all time, the perfect story in a song, Boots of Spanish Leather, the album's one "love song" is so subtle, such a wolf in sheep's clothing, a heartbreaker disguised as an exercise in balladry. Even the title track, which I went off for a long time, has regained its power for me.
3. Blonde on Blonde
Would probably be most people's favourite, but it's not just Rainy Day Women, there are a few other songs it could do without, in my opinion. Minor quibbles, I guess. So many amazing songs on this.
4. John Wesley Harding
Some people are a bit sniffy about JWH, but I love it, it's so entirely of itself, so odd, so biblical and mythical. There's nothing I'd change about it.
5. Another Side of Bob Dylan
I love that this is basically just a drunk recording session and people don't call it one of his best albums, but it's got some of the all-time great songs, and you can just hear everything that's coming.
6. The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
Well, this is wonderful. I can't even say why this isn't higher. I overlistened to it when I was young, I guess.
7. Modern Times
I think maybe this is my favourite of the late Dylan - there are really lovely songs all the way through. I put it above Time Out of Mind because of how much I love Workingman Blues.
8. Time out of Mind
Probably a greater album than Modern Times, and always worth remembering Dylan was considered pretty much a busted flush at this point. I bought it on cassette at John Menzies on South Street in St Andrews in my first weeks at university. Not Dark Yet is such a definitive song in the history of rock'n'roll. The first great "getting old" song for the swinging sixties generation.
9. Bringing it All Back Home
I think, simply, I didn't come to this as an album, I'd listened to most of the songs separately before I owned the whole thing, so I never loved it like some of the others.
10. Desire
Would be higher, but Joey is really not good at all. A thought I had with this one, where there's a live version of Isis which is literally my favourite thing ever, is how common for "alternative" versions of Dylan songs to be the preferred version. It can happen with other artists, but I think the space for improvement he leaves in recorded versions makes that a rather wonderful thing.
11. Highway 61 Revisited
Whereas here, in this "Greatest Albums of All Time' book I bought in 1995 or so, this was Number 2, so when I got it, I just found it a bit … not everything. Depends how much one loves Desolation Row, which for me is not a great deal.
12. "Love and Theft"
It's a really brilliant album. I think I just always hope there's one more stately ballad on it.
13. Oh Mercy
Aah, if it had Series of Dreams ...
14. Shadows in the Night
I love this, the first of Dylan's Sinatra covers album. His singing is such a revelation, as is the production. I think the idea that Dylan is not a great musician is so ludicrous, when you think that he produces and arranges and reinvents and dictates and rules everything he does, and he's used so many many different palettes through the decades.
15. Street-Legal
Street-Legal's pretty great. I mean, really. Gets a raw deal. He's still singing great, the song's are memorable and soulful. This one is the most in need of reassessment, I think.
16. Nashville Skyline
Starts brilliantly, but gets a little throwaway, like he couldn't quite go through with the idea.
17. The Basement Tapes
I have included this as an official album - it would have been cool if they'd one day, gone into a studio and done these songs properly. Maybe it would.
18. Slow Train Coming
It's pretty rockin'. He's still singing Gotta Serve Somebody in concert.
19. Tempest
I quite like Tempest. I grew to love it more when I thought it was the last original material Dylan would ever release. Roll On John and the title track are just not super great though. His long songs are pretty hit and miss, all the way back to Desolation Row.
20. Christmas in the Heart
I mean, who doesn't love this? Who?
21. Bob Dylan
There's an impatience to the singing and the listening. But a lot of it is great to listen to.
22. New Morning
New Morning and Planet Waves are both … quite good, aren't they? They're the most quite good albums Dylan ever made.
23. Planet Waves
Quite good.
24. Together Through Life
It feels almost throwaway now, this album, but it's pretty good.
25. Fallen Angels
Second Sinatra covers album. Not much need to listen more than twice, but it's good.
26. Saved
Solid Rock is a phenomenal song.
27. Infidels
Infidels is pretty solid, but it doesn't have any real standouts on it.
28. Shot of Love
Whereas Shot of Love is pretty dodgy, but has Every Grain of Sand.
29. Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid
It's funny that Knockin' on Heaven's Door is a Bob Dylan song.
30. Down in the Groove
Funnily enough, though this is often seen as the complete low point, I have found this quite enjoyable to listen to. Some of the others of the 80s are more generally excruciating.
31. World Gone Wrong
There are two covers albums of folk songs in the early 90s which are seen as a point where Dylan got back in touch with his roots. They're both, honestly, pretty boring, but I like this one better than Good as I Been to You.
32. Under the Red Sky
There are a couple of very decent songs on this.
33. Triplicate
This album, to be fair, sounds much much better than these other ones near the bottom, it's just a bit unnecessary.
34. Empire Burlesque
Dark Eyes is good.
35. Dylan
This is quite enjoyable to listen to, in its own stupid way. I was pleasantly surprised.
36. Knocked Out Loaded
You know, even this, it's got some decent stuff on it. Brownsville Girl.
37. Self Portrait
There have been recent attempt to rehabilitate Self Portrait, but it's just not as much fun as it could possibly be.
38. Good As I Been to You.
OK. so what would be the best "non-album tracks" album. I've included non-album singles and other assorted outtakes.
Here's the First:
Blind Willie McTell
Positively Fourth Street
Series of Dreams
Lay Down Your Weary Tune
I Shall Be Released
She's Your Lover Now
Up to Me
Angelina
Moonshiner (cover)
Red River Shore
That would be amongst the 10 Greatest Albums Ever Released.
Here's the Second:
Percy's Song
Paths of Victory
Mama, You Been on My Mind
Love is Just a Four Letter Word
Dignity
Things Have Changed
Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window
Who Killed Davey Moore
Abandoned Love
He Was a Friend of Mine
Tomorrow is a Long Time
If You Gotta Go, Go Now
This would be in the Top 10 Dylan albums.
Here's the third:
Let Me Die on My Footsteps
I'm Not There
I'll Keep It With Mine
Walls of Red Wings
Mixed Up Confusion
Caribbean Wind
Baby I'm in the Mood For You
Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues
Only a Hobo
Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie
This would probably sit just outside the Top 10.
I may have missed something, but still. Pretty good.
I've obviously listened to the ones near the top an awful lot more than the ones at the bottom, so the last week has involved listening to all the bad Bob Dylan albums, which has been quite fun.
Have included the official "The Basement Tapes" and 'Dylan'.
I've also considered, if you put together compilations of the best Dylan songs which are not on albums, where they would sit. (not tempting fate, I've left the two recent songs, Murder Most Foul and I Contain Multitudes, out of that.
In some cases, I've written a few words but not many.
Start at the top, no surprises:
1. Blood on the Tracks
I used to think that this album wasn't quite as perfect as some other great albums, like Blue and Astral Weeks. But the only two tracks I was a bit down on, Buckets of Rain and Meet Me in the Morning, sound great to me now, really evocative, and they bookend Side 2 really nicely. There are other great songs Dylan wrote at the time like Up to Me, but it is arguable whether their inclusion would have improved or unbalanced the album.
And as for the other 8 tracks, it is true to say I have been enthralled and obsessed with every single one of them, in its own right, at some point. I'm not sure I can say that about any other album, by anyone.
2. The Times They are A-Changin'
This is, in some ways, the definitive Bob Dylan album, though some people don't love it, saying it's too preachy. Recorded the month before Kennedy's assassination, Dylan was never the same again.
This album is so austere, so humourless, so committed to protest and civil rights and the plight of black people in America - the selfish, joking, wildfire Dylan is barely there.
Yet I still find this album completely wonderful - Hattie Carroll, is to me, one of the truly great works of art of all time, the perfect story in a song, Boots of Spanish Leather, the album's one "love song" is so subtle, such a wolf in sheep's clothing, a heartbreaker disguised as an exercise in balladry. Even the title track, which I went off for a long time, has regained its power for me.
3. Blonde on Blonde
Would probably be most people's favourite, but it's not just Rainy Day Women, there are a few other songs it could do without, in my opinion. Minor quibbles, I guess. So many amazing songs on this.
4. John Wesley Harding
Some people are a bit sniffy about JWH, but I love it, it's so entirely of itself, so odd, so biblical and mythical. There's nothing I'd change about it.
5. Another Side of Bob Dylan
I love that this is basically just a drunk recording session and people don't call it one of his best albums, but it's got some of the all-time great songs, and you can just hear everything that's coming.
6. The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
Well, this is wonderful. I can't even say why this isn't higher. I overlistened to it when I was young, I guess.
7. Modern Times
I think maybe this is my favourite of the late Dylan - there are really lovely songs all the way through. I put it above Time Out of Mind because of how much I love Workingman Blues.
8. Time out of Mind
Probably a greater album than Modern Times, and always worth remembering Dylan was considered pretty much a busted flush at this point. I bought it on cassette at John Menzies on South Street in St Andrews in my first weeks at university. Not Dark Yet is such a definitive song in the history of rock'n'roll. The first great "getting old" song for the swinging sixties generation.
9. Bringing it All Back Home
I think, simply, I didn't come to this as an album, I'd listened to most of the songs separately before I owned the whole thing, so I never loved it like some of the others.
10. Desire
Would be higher, but Joey is really not good at all. A thought I had with this one, where there's a live version of Isis which is literally my favourite thing ever, is how common for "alternative" versions of Dylan songs to be the preferred version. It can happen with other artists, but I think the space for improvement he leaves in recorded versions makes that a rather wonderful thing.
11. Highway 61 Revisited
Whereas here, in this "Greatest Albums of All Time' book I bought in 1995 or so, this was Number 2, so when I got it, I just found it a bit … not everything. Depends how much one loves Desolation Row, which for me is not a great deal.
12. "Love and Theft"
It's a really brilliant album. I think I just always hope there's one more stately ballad on it.
13. Oh Mercy
Aah, if it had Series of Dreams ...
14. Shadows in the Night
I love this, the first of Dylan's Sinatra covers album. His singing is such a revelation, as is the production. I think the idea that Dylan is not a great musician is so ludicrous, when you think that he produces and arranges and reinvents and dictates and rules everything he does, and he's used so many many different palettes through the decades.
15. Street-Legal
Street-Legal's pretty great. I mean, really. Gets a raw deal. He's still singing great, the song's are memorable and soulful. This one is the most in need of reassessment, I think.
16. Nashville Skyline
Starts brilliantly, but gets a little throwaway, like he couldn't quite go through with the idea.
17. The Basement Tapes
I have included this as an official album - it would have been cool if they'd one day, gone into a studio and done these songs properly. Maybe it would.
18. Slow Train Coming
It's pretty rockin'. He's still singing Gotta Serve Somebody in concert.
19. Tempest
I quite like Tempest. I grew to love it more when I thought it was the last original material Dylan would ever release. Roll On John and the title track are just not super great though. His long songs are pretty hit and miss, all the way back to Desolation Row.
20. Christmas in the Heart
I mean, who doesn't love this? Who?
21. Bob Dylan
There's an impatience to the singing and the listening. But a lot of it is great to listen to.
22. New Morning
New Morning and Planet Waves are both … quite good, aren't they? They're the most quite good albums Dylan ever made.
23. Planet Waves
Quite good.
24. Together Through Life
It feels almost throwaway now, this album, but it's pretty good.
25. Fallen Angels
Second Sinatra covers album. Not much need to listen more than twice, but it's good.
26. Saved
Solid Rock is a phenomenal song.
27. Infidels
Infidels is pretty solid, but it doesn't have any real standouts on it.
28. Shot of Love
Whereas Shot of Love is pretty dodgy, but has Every Grain of Sand.
29. Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid
It's funny that Knockin' on Heaven's Door is a Bob Dylan song.
30. Down in the Groove
Funnily enough, though this is often seen as the complete low point, I have found this quite enjoyable to listen to. Some of the others of the 80s are more generally excruciating.
31. World Gone Wrong
There are two covers albums of folk songs in the early 90s which are seen as a point where Dylan got back in touch with his roots. They're both, honestly, pretty boring, but I like this one better than Good as I Been to You.
32. Under the Red Sky
There are a couple of very decent songs on this.
33. Triplicate
This album, to be fair, sounds much much better than these other ones near the bottom, it's just a bit unnecessary.
34. Empire Burlesque
Dark Eyes is good.
35. Dylan
This is quite enjoyable to listen to, in its own stupid way. I was pleasantly surprised.
36. Knocked Out Loaded
You know, even this, it's got some decent stuff on it. Brownsville Girl.
37. Self Portrait
There have been recent attempt to rehabilitate Self Portrait, but it's just not as much fun as it could possibly be.
38. Good As I Been to You.
OK. so what would be the best "non-album tracks" album. I've included non-album singles and other assorted outtakes.
Here's the First:
Blind Willie McTell
Positively Fourth Street
Series of Dreams
Lay Down Your Weary Tune
I Shall Be Released
She's Your Lover Now
Up to Me
Angelina
Moonshiner (cover)
Red River Shore
That would be amongst the 10 Greatest Albums Ever Released.
Here's the Second:
Percy's Song
Paths of Victory
Mama, You Been on My Mind
Love is Just a Four Letter Word
Dignity
Things Have Changed
Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window
Who Killed Davey Moore
Abandoned Love
He Was a Friend of Mine
Tomorrow is a Long Time
If You Gotta Go, Go Now
This would be in the Top 10 Dylan albums.
Here's the third:
Let Me Die on My Footsteps
I'm Not There
I'll Keep It With Mine
Walls of Red Wings
Mixed Up Confusion
Caribbean Wind
Baby I'm in the Mood For You
Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues
Only a Hobo
Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie
This would probably sit just outside the Top 10.
I may have missed something, but still. Pretty good.
Monday 13 April 2020
Song 86: The Moneymaker
This post will be two things 1) a look at a certain kind of pivotal moment in any artist's career 2) a list of my favourite songs by one of my favourite artists.
So, this, 'The Moneymaker', by Rilo Kiley, was the 1st single off their 4th (and last) full album, 'Under the Blacklight', and it was altogether a baffling affair. I'd got into Rilo Kiley in a big way in 2004/5 with the release of their previous album 'More Adventurous' - I'd been listening to that and their first two albums heavily. Jenny Lewis, the singer, had also released an excellent, highly acclaimed, solo album (with The Watson Twins) in 2006 which many critics had seen as a step up from Rilo Kiley, though I still preferred the indie-rock sheen of the band to the more country/gospel sound she attempted on 'Rabbit Fur Coat'.
Rilo Kiley were, it seemed, a band ready to go big. Everything had been a steady arc of success, Lewis seemed as cut-out for fame as any indie frontwoman could be. This album was going to be the band's major label debut, they'd hired some big time producers ...
And then came 'The Moneymaker' ...
So, first, let me say that, now, out of context, I quite like 'The Moneymaker'.
But ....
as Greil Marcus famously wrote of Dylan's 'Self Portrait' ... at the time, it was ...
What is this shit?
With its squelching, almost-funky sound, its lyrics and video about the sex industry, it was not the elegant indie-rock about the perils of young adulthood we'd come to expect ... or maybe it was ...
it was something, it was just not what it might have been ...
So there's a thing that happens sometimes where a band releases a single and it feels at the time, and with hindsight, like all the momentum goes ... just like that, and they're done for.
It can happen on a big or small scale. Emeli Sande's 2012 debut album was the best-seller of the whole year in the UK - trailed by the urgent, bold, but confusing single 'Hurts', the follow-up didn't even sell 1/10 as many. Or Embrace, whose 1998 album 'The Good Will Out', whatever you might think of it, sold a lot of copies and trademarked a kind of emotive indie rock which had a big market at the time - then their first single from the next album was the utterly baffling 'Hooligan', kazoo and all. 'Solomon Bites the Worm' by the Bluetones is another good example.
The question in those cases, as with Rilo Kiley, is "Why did you release that one?" What were you thinking? For it turned out in all cases that the album was far from a barren wasteland - there would have been much better, and most importantly, safer choices.
I understand the desire from bands to show they've got new moves, to put something out there that people weren't expecting. But it is surprising how often they choose their moment to do that pretty badly.
With Rilo Kiley, they split up not long afterwards. The album had received mixed reviews, sold moderately compared to expectation, and not maintained their momentum. One suspects that there were issues within the band notwithstanding the success of the record, but it still feels like they blew it.
But, you know, maybe they didn't, after all, really want to "make it". Or didn't quite know how. At the time of their biggest almost-hit 'Portions for Foxes', which is made for pop glory, I remember various critics saying ... why didn't they just call it 'Bad News', as the chorus goes? Then it could have been a proper hit.
I'm reminded of this terribly poignant thing Kevin Rowland said in a documentary about Dexys, where, in his wilderness years, a guy came up to him in a nightclub and asked "Why didn't you just do it, Kev?" ... and he looked kind of apologetic and baffled as he recalled.
I think of some of my other favourites, like SFA, who, kind of, really did want to "just do it" but then why do they take 3 minutes to get to the chorus of 'Northern Lites' and why is there a vocoder on 'Juxtapozed with U'.
I think Jenny Lewis has never quite been able to "just do it" and her music is all the better for it. Having said that, for me 'The Moneymaker' is a bit like quite a few of the songs on a couple of her solo albums where I felt she was trying too hard, trying to tell too many stories, at too many tempos, with too many ideas and too many characters, too much seediness and squalor.
Her very best work, with Rilo Kiley and as a solo artist, is, though hardly straightforward, just somehow more settled, less hyperactive.
With that in mind. Here are! My favourite Jenny Lewis songs! In order. I've got most of what she's released in there, probably not all, it's a bit rough.
I've found, from listening back to it a few times, that the Jenny and Johnny album from 2010 is better than I remembered, 'Under the Blacklight' is much much better than given credit for, but the middle two solo albums, 'Acid Tongue' and 'The Voyager' are still really uneven.
Anyway, here goes (I've left out the ones which are mainly sung by a male collaborator - the Johnathan Rice sung ones on the Jenny and Johnny album are quite good, most of the Blake Sennett ones, apart from 'Dreamworld', would be right at the bottom of the list anyway) ...
So, this, 'The Moneymaker', by Rilo Kiley, was the 1st single off their 4th (and last) full album, 'Under the Blacklight', and it was altogether a baffling affair. I'd got into Rilo Kiley in a big way in 2004/5 with the release of their previous album 'More Adventurous' - I'd been listening to that and their first two albums heavily. Jenny Lewis, the singer, had also released an excellent, highly acclaimed, solo album (with The Watson Twins) in 2006 which many critics had seen as a step up from Rilo Kiley, though I still preferred the indie-rock sheen of the band to the more country/gospel sound she attempted on 'Rabbit Fur Coat'.
Rilo Kiley were, it seemed, a band ready to go big. Everything had been a steady arc of success, Lewis seemed as cut-out for fame as any indie frontwoman could be. This album was going to be the band's major label debut, they'd hired some big time producers ...
And then came 'The Moneymaker' ...
So, first, let me say that, now, out of context, I quite like 'The Moneymaker'.
But ....
as Greil Marcus famously wrote of Dylan's 'Self Portrait' ... at the time, it was ...
What is this shit?
With its squelching, almost-funky sound, its lyrics and video about the sex industry, it was not the elegant indie-rock about the perils of young adulthood we'd come to expect ... or maybe it was ...
it was something, it was just not what it might have been ...
So there's a thing that happens sometimes where a band releases a single and it feels at the time, and with hindsight, like all the momentum goes ... just like that, and they're done for.
It can happen on a big or small scale. Emeli Sande's 2012 debut album was the best-seller of the whole year in the UK - trailed by the urgent, bold, but confusing single 'Hurts', the follow-up didn't even sell 1/10 as many. Or Embrace, whose 1998 album 'The Good Will Out', whatever you might think of it, sold a lot of copies and trademarked a kind of emotive indie rock which had a big market at the time - then their first single from the next album was the utterly baffling 'Hooligan', kazoo and all. 'Solomon Bites the Worm' by the Bluetones is another good example.
The question in those cases, as with Rilo Kiley, is "Why did you release that one?" What were you thinking? For it turned out in all cases that the album was far from a barren wasteland - there would have been much better, and most importantly, safer choices.
I understand the desire from bands to show they've got new moves, to put something out there that people weren't expecting. But it is surprising how often they choose their moment to do that pretty badly.
With Rilo Kiley, they split up not long afterwards. The album had received mixed reviews, sold moderately compared to expectation, and not maintained their momentum. One suspects that there were issues within the band notwithstanding the success of the record, but it still feels like they blew it.
But, you know, maybe they didn't, after all, really want to "make it". Or didn't quite know how. At the time of their biggest almost-hit 'Portions for Foxes', which is made for pop glory, I remember various critics saying ... why didn't they just call it 'Bad News', as the chorus goes? Then it could have been a proper hit.
I'm reminded of this terribly poignant thing Kevin Rowland said in a documentary about Dexys, where, in his wilderness years, a guy came up to him in a nightclub and asked "Why didn't you just do it, Kev?" ... and he looked kind of apologetic and baffled as he recalled.
I think of some of my other favourites, like SFA, who, kind of, really did want to "just do it" but then why do they take 3 minutes to get to the chorus of 'Northern Lites' and why is there a vocoder on 'Juxtapozed with U'.
I think Jenny Lewis has never quite been able to "just do it" and her music is all the better for it. Having said that, for me 'The Moneymaker' is a bit like quite a few of the songs on a couple of her solo albums where I felt she was trying too hard, trying to tell too many stories, at too many tempos, with too many ideas and too many characters, too much seediness and squalor.
Her very best work, with Rilo Kiley and as a solo artist, is, though hardly straightforward, just somehow more settled, less hyperactive.
With that in mind. Here are! My favourite Jenny Lewis songs! In order. I've got most of what she's released in there, probably not all, it's a bit rough.
I've found, from listening back to it a few times, that the Jenny and Johnny album from 2010 is better than I remembered, 'Under the Blacklight' is much much better than given credit for, but the middle two solo albums, 'Acid Tongue' and 'The Voyager' are still really uneven.
Anyway, here goes (I've left out the ones which are mainly sung by a male collaborator - the Johnathan Rice sung ones on the Jenny and Johnny album are quite good, most of the Blake Sennett ones, apart from 'Dreamworld', would be right at the bottom of the list anyway) ...
- More Adventurous - Rilo Kiley
- A Better Son/Daughter - Rilo Kiley
- Godspeed
- Pictures of Success - Rilo Kiley
- With Arms Outstretched - Rilo Kiley
- Taffy
- The Absence of God - Rilo Kiley
- The Execution of All Things - Rilo Kiley
- Breakin' Up - Rilo Kiley
- You Are What You Love
- Dogwood
- I Never - Rilo Kiley
- Just One of the Guys
- Paint's Peeling - Rilo Kiley
- Under the Blacklight - Rilo Kiley
- The Charging Sky
- Portions for Foxes - Rilo Kiley
- Spectacular Views - Rilo Kiley
- It's a Hit - Rilo Kiley
- Rise Up with Fists!!
- Give a Little Love - Rilo Kiley
- Hollywood Lawn
- Does He Love You? - Rilo Kiley
- Melt Your Heart
- Sing a Song for Them
- Late Bloomer
- On the Line
- Science vs. Romance - Rilo Kiley
- It Just Is - Rilo Kiley
- Silver Lining - Rilo Kiley
- Runnin' Around - Rilo Kiley
- Wasted Youth
- Acid Tongue
- Wires and Waves - Rilo Kiley
- The Voyager
- Heads Gonna Roll
- Slippery Slopes
- My Slumbering Heart - Rilo Kiley
- Rabbit Hole
- Little White Dove
- The Big Guns
- Red Bull & Hennessy
- Runaway - Nice as Fuck
- Jenny You're Barely Alive - Rilo Kiley
- A Man/Me/Then Jim - Rilo Kiley
- Go Ahead- Rilo Kiley
- Always- Rilo Kiley
- The Moneymaker - Rilo Kiley
- Straight Edge of the Blade - Jenny and Johnny
- Rabbit Fur Coat
- Handle with Care - with collaborators
- Big Wave - Jenny and Johnny
- Do Si Do
- Love U Forever
- Party Clown
- Capturing Moods - Rilo Kiley
- Homerun - Nice as Fuck
- All the Drugs - Rilo Kiley
- Love and War (11/11/46) - Rilo Kiley
- She's Not Me
- Dejalo - Rilo Kiley
- Teenage Love Song - Rilo Kiley
- Let Me Back In - Rilo Kiley
- Draggin' Around - Rilo Kiley
- Close Call - Rilo Kiley
- Run Devil Run
- New Yorker Cartoon - Jenny and Johnny
- Happy
- It'll Get You There - Rilo Kiley
- You Can't Outrun 'Em
- Born Secular
- 15 - Rilo Kiley
- The New You
- Emotional - Rilo Kiley
- Bad Man's World
- The Good That Won't Come Out - Rilo Kiley
- Carpetbaggers (with Elvis Costello)
- I Remember You (feat. Benji Hughes) - Rilo Kiley
- Plane Crash in C - Rilo Kiley
- My Pet Snakes - Jenny and Johnny
- Accidntel Deth - Rilo Kiley
- Scissor Runner - Jenny and Johnny
- Head Underwater
- Angel - Nice as Fuck
- Hail to Whatever You Found in the Sunlight That Surrounds You - Rilo Kiley
- NAF Theme - Nice as Fuck
- Smoke Detector - Rilo Kiley
- It Wasn't Me
- Pretty Bird
- See Fernando
- Glendora - Rilo Kiley
- So Long - Rilo Kiley
- The Angels Hung Around - Rilo Kiley
- Trying My Best to Love You
- We'll Never Sleep (God Knows We'll Try) - Rilo Kiley
- Cookie Lips - Nice as Fuck
- The Highs And Lows Of Being #1 - Jenny and Johnny
- While Men Are Dreaming - Jenny and Johnny
- Bulletproof - Rilo Kiley
- Jack Killed Mom
- Guns - Nice as Fuck
- The Next Messiah
- Patiently - Rilo Kiley
- Just Like Zeus - Jenny and Johnny
- Mall Music - Nice as Fuck
- About the Moon (feat. The Watson Twins) - Rilo Kiley
- Bury, Bury, Bury Another - Rilo Kiley
- Committed - Jenny and Johnny
- Switchblade - Jenny and Johnny
- American Wife - Rilo Kiley
- Black Sand
- The Frug - Rilo Kiley
- 85 - Rilo Kiley
- Door - Nice as Fuck
- Don't Deconstruct - Rilo Kiley
- Aloha & the Three Johns
- A Town Called Luckey (feat. Tim Kasher) - Rilo Kiley
- Higher - Nice as Fuck
- Papillon - Rilo Kiley
- Sword - Rilo Kiley
- Pelican Bay - Jenny Lewis
- Keep It Together - Rilo Kiley
- Gravity - Rilo Kiley
- Troubadors - Rilo Kiley
Wednesday 8 April 2020
Bunch of stuff
Here's a bunch of poems written fairly recently ... villanelles, sestinas and what have you, isolation blues and this and that ...
LEAVINGS
The games we quit unfinished hang bereft
In air unused, of late, to morning calm.
Stripped mattresses which cling to last night’s dreams
Are slow to shed the indents we have left
of hurried sleeps we’d wished we didn’t need.
A shaft of dust dissects the grief-struck room
We have deserted, hoovered soon enough,
Becoming just as quick a place to arrive
And settle in, a home from home to whom
We have bequeathed this palace of tall deeds.
The leavings felt, always, like final hymns
Sung with portentous hush, like spirits lost
To aging, broken bonds of hallowed trust
As each adventure left our worn-out limbs
And all we had was sunburn and cut knees.
I’d wish I’d never left that holiday,
And that one, till the next and greater one.
Each leaving took a part of me; again.
And that last dream? – just this, a brief delay.
No leaving yet. I hate the leaving. Please.
FELLOWS
They learnt, those boys, the rare and cursed power
of solidarity. They sang a song
of bloodshed gone, with locked and loaded arms.
The trumpet’s notes bounced heavy on the ground,
the full moon stamped approval on the pond -
a fellowship those boys would never shake.
They prayed for peace, but sought new hands to shake
and share the grace of this new superpower
they’d found and felt unbound by at the pond.
Their voices filled out concert halls, their song
raised rooves and burrowed deep into new ground
uncovered by the strength in their young arms.
They stored false memories of shouldered arms
that sent out rounds which made great mountains shake.
Each day, they pledged anew to break fresh ground
Still wholly giddy with the growing power
unshackled by a simple moonlight song
they’d sung one night stood round a summer pond.
They sang, and felt the very stones respond –
they sang, they preached, they stretched out sinewed arms
for a reply. They’d learnt their wall of song
could drive a rising coup to bend and shake.
They’d learnt, that heady night, they had the power
to grind dissenting voices to the ground.
They built their forts on freshly hallowed ground
and set at each one’s centre such a pond
as first had echoed their communal power.
A trumpet set the rhythm of their arms
striking the earth. And if they heard it shake
they drowned the noise out with their lasting song.
But though each night still sounded out their song,
their warships, one then one more, ran aground.
No longer could they still the great Earth’s shake,
the angry sun first lowered, then drained their pond.
The muscles weakened in their aging arms,
They raged but could not summon back their power.
We gather for a song around the pond,
place on the ground our instruments and arms.
Our voices shake. It’s gone, our only power.
THERE’S A MAN, DRESSED IN BLACK, AT THE GATE
The man in black’s still standing at the gate.
You warned us he’d be there and he’s still there.
The demon you compelled us to create
was not identified until too late.
So many still can’t walk past the place where
the man in black’s still standing at the gate.
A doctrine of god’s love has turned to hate -
there’s not one with forgiveness left to spare
the demon you compelled us to create.
Oh, you, you’ve had your reckoning, your fate
is, of itself, agreeable and fair.
The man in black’s still standing at the gate,
though, waiting for the ones you’d separate
and celebrate, and order not to share
the demon you compelled us to create.
The narrative you’d nervelessly dictate
will never free the ones you did ensnare.
The man in black’s still standing at the gate -
the demon you compelled us to create.
THE INFORMATION DESK
Blues run the game, we run the blues,
you choose the winners that we choose.
We’re guns they’ve hired, we’re guns that fire,
we’re singer, song, we’re lie and liar.
You won’t believe the rules we bent,
we can’t believe how well it went -
Kenya to Henley, you the many,
we the few who spend the penny.
Push an angle, juke the stats,
shift the blame to Jews or bats
or Chinese markets if you’ll wear it.
Here’s our story if you’ll share it.
We’re the modern dogs of war
plotting what you’re fighting for,
armed with bar charts, dressed to kill,
Chartering flights to Brazzaville.
Take the price and name the gift,
shame to cast and blame to shift.
Twist it, shout it, risk it, flout it,
take the truth and double-doubt it.
Find the target, probe their weak spot;
It’s a Muslim/Catholic/Sikh plot.
It’s the Poles or It’s the Turks,
Just take turns, whatever works.
Any challenge, bug or virus,
Any thug or king can hire us,
Plutocrat or billionaire or
Or oligarch, we just don’t care.
We protect what we admire -
Money, power, brazen liar,
Bloodshed is beneath our station -
We supply the information.
NOW DISTANCE HAS A WAY
They’d never held so tight as in the space
split open by the shrinking then the bang.
They loved each lost
and freshly lonely face
Their shaking fingers
did not dare to trace,
They prayed with pride and sorrow for that gang
They’d never held so tight as in the space
split open by each escalating case.
Of romance and of fellowship they sang
They loved each lost
and freshly lonely face,
wrote paeans to pariahs, granted grace
to every man they’d happily have hanged.
They’d never held so tight as in the space
that shrunk, as each soft soul, confined to base
cried daily tears for bells that never rang.
They loved each lost and newly lonely face
they clasped in distant, desperate embrace.
Each broken heart, each joy, each pain, each pang
They never held so tight as in the space.
They loved each lost and newly lonely face.
HUNGRY THIEVES
The hungry thieves of Hunter Road
Are hiding out at home
Like frightened wolves without a prey,
Without a swamp to roam.
Now death is in the open air
The practised thief breathes scared,
The thief breathes heavy, hard, he shrinks
at every dark night shared.
The motorways lie stunned and plucked
Like running tracks at night.
Just military parties sent
With no clear foe to fight.
The lonely hearts of Kentish men
Go out to men of Kent.
They sigh “I’m sorry, distant friend,
Relent, I beg, relent”.
The soldiers shoot at seagulls stood
In taunting high disdain.
The stranded soldiers cough and cry
And shoot and miss and again.
The hungry and the hopeful buy
What time they can afford.
Each stoic house holds steady till
Disorder is restored.
KINDNESS
I’d thought I would be kind this time, outwith
St Pancras in a winter storm,
Approached, as usual, supplicated there,
Her kind eyes guarded, trained smile warm.
I’d said I would be kind next time I was
Approached this winter, ‘David you
Were kind without a qualm when you were young.
Whenever you think that you outgrew
It or it outgrew you … it didn’t. You
Know kindness doesn’t age or fade’.
And yet, I was not kind this time, again,
I grimaced, shrugged, at once betrayed
My better self, her proffered pride. Perhaps
I am no longer a kind man,
Perhaps I’ve made all the excuses one
Unkind and heartless human can.
THE MISSIONARY
It took me weeks to get those lanterns lit,
Reliant on candles and a helpful moon,
Still callow, still too prideful to admit
I wouldn’t know a pendulum from a pit
I couldn’t tell a werewolf from loon,
It took me weeks to get those lanterns lit.
I’m not sure if I ever learnt to fit
my best endeavours between daybreak and noon,
Still callow, still too prideful to admit
I didn’t have the knowhow, wits or kit
To make a brass neck from a silver spoon …
It took me weeks to get those lanterns lit,
For heaven’s sake, that was the simple bit
For any but a buttoned-up buffoon,
Still callow, still too prideful to admit
He’d landed his young self in some ancient shit.
I tried to change the world, I tried too soon …
It took me weeks to get those lanterns lit,
Still callow, still too prideful to admit.
WHISPERS
The whispers in the walls remained unheard
Until that warmest winter ever known.
“Some creature trapped within, perhaps a bird
By unkind sun from hibernation stirred,
Its plans upset, its steady senses thrown”.
The whispers in the walls remained unheard,
For all those years - the thought had not occurred
that one day he might no longer be alone.
“Some creature trapped within, perhaps a bird
Is begging from the cell where it’s interred
By pride and panic, while, within his own,
The whispers in the walls remained unheard
So long, his sturdy selfhood never erred
Nor longed his kingdom to be overthrown.
Some creature trapped within, perhaps a bird
Is calling quietly, strongly, just one word
“Atone”. He will not. Yet, it comes; “Atone”.
The whispers in the walls remain unheard.
Some creature trapped within … perhaps a bird.
LOVE AND DECAY
Love vies with decay.
Wins today.
But time chose its side
Before love arose.
If time could choose
Again,
who knows
If it would change its mind.
But it can’t, my loves,
It can’t.
Today love wins.
Decay abides.
ONE NIGHT AT A PRIVATE MEMBER’S CLUB
It’s my night to be included, to feel blessed
As I tell the girl with clipboard I’m a guest.
I’ve been signed in, for a favour, by a friend
Of a colleague who had bonhomie to spend.
No one knows me, though some smile and think they do,
I remind them of two players from Man U.
My host tells me that I’ll love this lively crowd,
but the laughter’s just a decibel too loud -
Makes you nervous, all this casual getting seen,
All these grown men trying to act like they’re nineteen,
Oh so carefree yet unfairly blessed and cursed
By a fanbase that had gathered then dispersed.
On the rooftop, in a group hug, there’s the cast
Of a kid’s show better consigned to the past -
One gets lairy, goes too often to the loo,
Takes offense at not being ushered past the queue.
Just past midnight, he’ll be forcibly removed
By the former frontman of Love City Groove …
There are cocktails, there are bottles of Czech beer
Made of plastic. So much glass breaks, so we hear
From the barman – he’s a dancer, so he says,
Not like Nureyev or Travolta, more like Bez.
It’s a fiver for a Budvar, what a joke –
But that’s half the price of one Jim Beam and Coke.
Deals are making, lines are breaking, faces glow
With the price of what they know and who they know.
Struggling actors in discussion on the stairs
With their future benefactors unawares –
It’s the long game, it’s the glam life, it’s the grind,
Taking every chance to hustle they can find.
It’s just cool to have a place where I’ve some peace
says the rock star with the girl who’s not his niece.
He’s been coming since before his friend was born
(that’s before his formal warning for child porn).
It’s a prison, it’s a schism, fatal fame -
In the club, though, it’s so cool, we’re all the same.
THE CUCKOLD
I loved the boy, the matchless one,
With all my broken heart.
I loved that boy, though I admit
Not from the very start.
My name is in the shaded notes
Of every book you’ll read -
The great emasculated ghost
Your lifeblood did not need.
The tale cost me a winter’s worth
Of comfort, work and joy.
I spent my lifetime catching up
With someone else’s boy.
I lived in fear for you, my dear,
Relinquished peace for grace
My prize was the indifferent tilt
Of your anointed face.
Consigned to my own time while those
I loved live on and on.
My own line drifted off unknown,
and my life’s work … long gone.
The lover in the background, I
Was needed for an ass
And all the pangs of jealousy
A good man can amass.
The cuckold in the half-light, was
I taken for a fool?
The greatest story’s good for you,
My friends. To me, it’s cruel.
Tuesday 7 April 2020
Song 85: Runaway
I've thought about Kanye West too much.
I know I have. Rather like Steven Gerrard, Joni Mitchell and, bizarrely, Professor David Starkey, he's one of the people who has taken up residence rent-free in my brain for me to have long, involved imaginary rants about, and if anyone makes the mistake of mentioning them in real life, that dull, uncalled-for rant will be made flesh.
The even more stoopid thing is that the starting point for this obsession was indifference. I was, initially, obsessively indifferent to Kanye West. I didn't love him, didn't hate him, just thought he was kind of decent. But, of course, obsessively indifferent can't be a thing for long. And he became so real-life objectionable that perhaps that stopped being a valid position.
What really bothered me was the way he went from being a fairly acclaimed and successful rapper to, in the eyes of music critics, the reincarnation of the Beatles, Michael Jackson, Kraftwerk and Godspeed! You Black Emperor all at once.
Whatever happened to rock'n'roll, I must have thought?
Recently I realised there was one specific incident that must have gnarled at me more than I thought.
Shortly after I laboured for months over a list of 1000 Greatest Songs of All Time, the exercise in futility of which I remain unduly proud, I happened to have some drinks with people who worked in that old new media in America, and it was a perfectly enjoyable and interesting evening, and my list came up (for they were all experts in lists) but, before I had much of a chance to explain what the thinking was behind it (broadly, both an attempt to apply judgement on an accumulation of data from lots and lots of other lists, and, above all, an attempt to listen to lots of great songs and reach a greater understanding of what made a song great), I was being harangued, good-naturedly, on personal choices - which is a perfectly natural instinctive response, and all fine, but the one that bothered me was one of these gentlemen saying "What about 'School Days' by Kanye West? Is that in it?" ... erm, I hadn't heard of this song, do I bluff and pretend I have, this is embarrassing, I thought I'd covered the most acclaimed songs by Kanye West ... erm, no "What, you can't not have 'School Days' by Kanye West, that's just nonsense" and I rather lost the will to defend myself in the face of my ignorance.
Well, maybe you already know but ... there is no song by Kanye West called 'School Days'. I'm still not 100% certain what song he was referring to. There's a (fairly unexceptional) track on 'The College Dropout' called 'School Spirit', maybe it was that, he must have been thinking of something.
I guess the point is, that loud and forceful attitude came to present for me how the American press wrote about Kanye West, the relentless, pseudo-intellectual proclamation of his genius built on flimsy ground, The very essence of Emperor's New Clothes.
And his 2015 botched Glastonbury headline slot confirmed that for me. Sure, I liked 'Yeezus' a lot and a few other tracks from other albums, but the increasing grandiloquence and unpleasantness of his public pronouncements allied to what I thought were pretty mediocre releases post-Yeezus strengthened my position.
I was right about Kanye all along. Those fools, those phony cultists.
Yet his stuff was still right up near the top of end of 2010s lists from Pitchfork, Rolling Stone and the rest . The cult lived on. When will they learn?
So I listened to 'My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy', an album I'd generally found a bit much and not paid a great deal of attention to, one more time, just to confirm my position and put the argument aside.
And, of course, what's happened?
I'm hooked. Finally, wholly. Finally I'm hearing what everyone else was hearing. It's a phenomenal album, a throw-everything-in-and-everything-sticks masterpiece without a dull moment, full of memorable hooks and glorious cameos.
This is annoying for me. It's annoying too that the most acclaimed song from it, probably the most acclaimed Kanye song of all, 'Runaway', is my favourite track on it, a song of power, pathos, sadness and brilliance, everything he and his acolytes claimed it to be.
Lots of people have known this for 10 years ... Those Kanye-cultists who didn't know anything. Ah, well.
I know I have. Rather like Steven Gerrard, Joni Mitchell and, bizarrely, Professor David Starkey, he's one of the people who has taken up residence rent-free in my brain for me to have long, involved imaginary rants about, and if anyone makes the mistake of mentioning them in real life, that dull, uncalled-for rant will be made flesh.
The even more stoopid thing is that the starting point for this obsession was indifference. I was, initially, obsessively indifferent to Kanye West. I didn't love him, didn't hate him, just thought he was kind of decent. But, of course, obsessively indifferent can't be a thing for long. And he became so real-life objectionable that perhaps that stopped being a valid position.
What really bothered me was the way he went from being a fairly acclaimed and successful rapper to, in the eyes of music critics, the reincarnation of the Beatles, Michael Jackson, Kraftwerk and Godspeed! You Black Emperor all at once.
Whatever happened to rock'n'roll, I must have thought?
Recently I realised there was one specific incident that must have gnarled at me more than I thought.
Shortly after I laboured for months over a list of 1000 Greatest Songs of All Time, the exercise in futility of which I remain unduly proud, I happened to have some drinks with people who worked in that old new media in America, and it was a perfectly enjoyable and interesting evening, and my list came up (for they were all experts in lists) but, before I had much of a chance to explain what the thinking was behind it (broadly, both an attempt to apply judgement on an accumulation of data from lots and lots of other lists, and, above all, an attempt to listen to lots of great songs and reach a greater understanding of what made a song great), I was being harangued, good-naturedly, on personal choices - which is a perfectly natural instinctive response, and all fine, but the one that bothered me was one of these gentlemen saying "What about 'School Days' by Kanye West? Is that in it?" ... erm, I hadn't heard of this song, do I bluff and pretend I have, this is embarrassing, I thought I'd covered the most acclaimed songs by Kanye West ... erm, no "What, you can't not have 'School Days' by Kanye West, that's just nonsense" and I rather lost the will to defend myself in the face of my ignorance.
Well, maybe you already know but ... there is no song by Kanye West called 'School Days'. I'm still not 100% certain what song he was referring to. There's a (fairly unexceptional) track on 'The College Dropout' called 'School Spirit', maybe it was that, he must have been thinking of something.
I guess the point is, that loud and forceful attitude came to present for me how the American press wrote about Kanye West, the relentless, pseudo-intellectual proclamation of his genius built on flimsy ground, The very essence of Emperor's New Clothes.
And his 2015 botched Glastonbury headline slot confirmed that for me. Sure, I liked 'Yeezus' a lot and a few other tracks from other albums, but the increasing grandiloquence and unpleasantness of his public pronouncements allied to what I thought were pretty mediocre releases post-Yeezus strengthened my position.
I was right about Kanye all along. Those fools, those phony cultists.
Yet his stuff was still right up near the top of end of 2010s lists from Pitchfork, Rolling Stone and the rest . The cult lived on. When will they learn?
So I listened to 'My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy', an album I'd generally found a bit much and not paid a great deal of attention to, one more time, just to confirm my position and put the argument aside.
And, of course, what's happened?
I'm hooked. Finally, wholly. Finally I'm hearing what everyone else was hearing. It's a phenomenal album, a throw-everything-in-and-everything-sticks masterpiece without a dull moment, full of memorable hooks and glorious cameos.
This is annoying for me. It's annoying too that the most acclaimed song from it, probably the most acclaimed Kanye song of all, 'Runaway', is my favourite track on it, a song of power, pathos, sadness and brilliance, everything he and his acolytes claimed it to be.
Lots of people have known this for 10 years ... Those Kanye-cultists who didn't know anything. Ah, well.
Thursday 2 April 2020
Song 84: The Funeral
I think of this song by Band of Horses as one of the last I loved unself-consciously. Hard to know exactly what that means or why that is. There was a period it seemed so easy for bands like this. Stay skinny, grow a patchy beard, big guitar, quiet guitar, Neil Youngish vocal, play early evening in mid-size festivals, sell a few hundred thousands, soundtrack an emotional scene on a glossy but thoughtful TV drama ... keep the ball rolling.
And I and lots of others lapped it up. Then it seemed to get really hard for all of them. I don't know if it was them or us, but Fleet Foxes, Band of Horses, Iron and Wine, Midlake, The National, The Decemberists, The Shins, they stopped hitting the spot quite so much. They changed, music changed.
But I loved this song, and, when I choose to, I still love it. I have various fondnesses for it.
Going to see Band of Horses at Brixton Academy in courtship's early days - a slightly peculiar, but great gig.
Ben Bridwell (the singer) began the show with a possibly ill-advised close harmony with another band member, and a guy shouted, loud as anything, from the audience "get the fuck on with it" as if he was entirely intent on ruining the night for everyone and I wouldn't have held it against Mr Bridwell if we'd packed up and gone home at that point or if he'd played a surly, desultory gig.
But it was a great gig after that, and they ran through those happy/sad Band of Horses numbers which are almost famous like 'No One's Gonna Love You', 'Is There a Ghost', Weed Party', 'Laredo' etc, and then in the encore came their biggest, most well known number 'The Funeral' and yet, as if to cement London's reputation as a dreadful city of dreadful gig goers (which I have not found generally to be the case) two girls behind us started engaging loudly in an utterly banal loud heart to heart, and, to my surprise, I managed neither to dig myself into an angry hole nor snap wildly, but turned round and found the words "look, you can have this conversation later, you'll regret not listening to the encore" which seemed to do the trick.
This was about five months after I'd been listening to the song a great deal as a kind of pep talk soundtrack for the literal-minded, as I was engaged with organising my father's funeral.
The song is, I think, about a romance gone sour rather than an actual funeral but nevertheless I found the lyric "At every occasion, I'll be ready for the funeral, Every occasion, once more, it's called the funeral, Every occasion, know I'm ready for the funeral" was pointing me in the right direction to getting all the arrangements in place.
There were a few issues to iron out, but we got there - it was to be a Catholic requiem mass. I contacted the priest, and probably unwisely took it upon myself to deliver the homily. This priest was a funny one, as we'll get to. It was decided we wanted hymns, and he thought this quite a bad idea and tried to persuade against it, and then when it came to the ceremony, didn't introduce the hymns, so to be honest they weren't sung all that heartily and he probably felt he was proved right.
It was one of those unusually sunny London October days that have become the norm this decade but back in 2010 were still a surprise. I remember getting off my tube train and seeing a man walking along the platform and thinking "I bet I'm related to him" and he was indeed a cousin on my father's.
The day went well and was all rather fun - the contacts book had been gone through and it was quite a treat seeing this parade of London Irishers popping along for one more booze-up.
I had calmed down after the service, where quite the most hilarious (in retrospect, not at the flippin time) thing happened. As I went up to deliver my carefully crafted words, the priest said "Now Paddy's youngest son David will say a few words. Now I think you'll agree with me that David bears a striking resemblance to the footballer Wayne Rooney" ...
Well, I do ... certainly did then ... but there's a time and a place. I later learned members of my family needed to be restrained from lamping him ... anyway, he attempted to make another telling intervention when I briefly faltered near the end of the speech (probably still reeling from the blow he'd dealt me) and tried to "guide" me away from the pulpit. Jesus, this guy. I also knew at that point I'd be ending with a recitation of 'The Parting Glass' which I'd thought quite a genius touch but was informed later was pretty bog-standard sappy cack for an Irishman's funeral.
Anyway, there we go. Throughout this time, I had Band of Horses playing in my head. I'm not sure if they helped or not, but I continue to think fondly of them.
And I and lots of others lapped it up. Then it seemed to get really hard for all of them. I don't know if it was them or us, but Fleet Foxes, Band of Horses, Iron and Wine, Midlake, The National, The Decemberists, The Shins, they stopped hitting the spot quite so much. They changed, music changed.
But I loved this song, and, when I choose to, I still love it. I have various fondnesses for it.
Going to see Band of Horses at Brixton Academy in courtship's early days - a slightly peculiar, but great gig.
Ben Bridwell (the singer) began the show with a possibly ill-advised close harmony with another band member, and a guy shouted, loud as anything, from the audience "get the fuck on with it" as if he was entirely intent on ruining the night for everyone and I wouldn't have held it against Mr Bridwell if we'd packed up and gone home at that point or if he'd played a surly, desultory gig.
But it was a great gig after that, and they ran through those happy/sad Band of Horses numbers which are almost famous like 'No One's Gonna Love You', 'Is There a Ghost', Weed Party', 'Laredo' etc, and then in the encore came their biggest, most well known number 'The Funeral' and yet, as if to cement London's reputation as a dreadful city of dreadful gig goers (which I have not found generally to be the case) two girls behind us started engaging loudly in an utterly banal loud heart to heart, and, to my surprise, I managed neither to dig myself into an angry hole nor snap wildly, but turned round and found the words "look, you can have this conversation later, you'll regret not listening to the encore" which seemed to do the trick.
This was about five months after I'd been listening to the song a great deal as a kind of pep talk soundtrack for the literal-minded, as I was engaged with organising my father's funeral.
The song is, I think, about a romance gone sour rather than an actual funeral but nevertheless I found the lyric "At every occasion, I'll be ready for the funeral, Every occasion, once more, it's called the funeral, Every occasion, know I'm ready for the funeral" was pointing me in the right direction to getting all the arrangements in place.
There were a few issues to iron out, but we got there - it was to be a Catholic requiem mass. I contacted the priest, and probably unwisely took it upon myself to deliver the homily. This priest was a funny one, as we'll get to. It was decided we wanted hymns, and he thought this quite a bad idea and tried to persuade against it, and then when it came to the ceremony, didn't introduce the hymns, so to be honest they weren't sung all that heartily and he probably felt he was proved right.
It was one of those unusually sunny London October days that have become the norm this decade but back in 2010 were still a surprise. I remember getting off my tube train and seeing a man walking along the platform and thinking "I bet I'm related to him" and he was indeed a cousin on my father's.
The day went well and was all rather fun - the contacts book had been gone through and it was quite a treat seeing this parade of London Irishers popping along for one more booze-up.
I had calmed down after the service, where quite the most hilarious (in retrospect, not at the flippin time) thing happened. As I went up to deliver my carefully crafted words, the priest said "Now Paddy's youngest son David will say a few words. Now I think you'll agree with me that David bears a striking resemblance to the footballer Wayne Rooney" ...
Well, I do ... certainly did then ... but there's a time and a place. I later learned members of my family needed to be restrained from lamping him ... anyway, he attempted to make another telling intervention when I briefly faltered near the end of the speech (probably still reeling from the blow he'd dealt me) and tried to "guide" me away from the pulpit. Jesus, this guy. I also knew at that point I'd be ending with a recitation of 'The Parting Glass' which I'd thought quite a genius touch but was informed later was pretty bog-standard sappy cack for an Irishman's funeral.
Anyway, there we go. Throughout this time, I had Band of Horses playing in my head. I'm not sure if they helped or not, but I continue to think fondly of them.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)