What is your snowmageddon soundtrack? now playing RAGNAROK edition

[auto-da-fey]

I'd never even heard of Howlin' Maggie until yesterday, when a friend who shares my abiding love for mid-90s Ohio indie rock burned their 1996 debut album Honeysuckle Strange for me. It was on Sony, which seems strange, because between my fairly obsessive reading of AP/Big Takeover/assorted zines and watching of 120 Minutes etc. at that time, I'm not sure how something with what I'd imagine to be some serious promotional backing (more than, say, Scrawl, who I was listening to at the time) slipped past me.

It's completely derivative of the Afghan Whigs, so I would have hated it anyway, having not come around on all things Dulli until somewhat later. But it's quality imitation, to be sure, and I can't get their song "Slut" (see what I mean about imitation?) out of my head.

Do other people know this band? My friend was growing up in Ohio at the point, so I'm not sure how skewed her vision is (they were big in her podunk town).

[davy]

They're pretty good, I guess. I really liked one song of theirs, "Easy to Be Stupid." It was recorded for the Beautiful Girls soundtrack, which came out the same year as Honeysuckle Strange.

As for the Afghan Whigs comparison, Greg Dulli must've been okay with those guys, because he's the one who put that soundtrack together. There are two Afghan Whigs tracks on it.

[davy]

I must say, though, that I was somewhat disappointed with HS when I finally got around to hearing it. "Easy to Be Stupid" had my hopes too high.

[auto-da-fey]

yeah, I think the lead guy from HM was in the Twilight Singers, and played live backup for the Whigs, so he's definitely got the Dulli stamp of approval.

and I'll have to look that song up. I don't think the album is great, so our assessments probably aren't far apart, but at one listen over breakfast I was like, huh, yeah, I can roll with this.

[Andrew_TSKS]

Afghan Whigs are also in Beautiful Girls, and I remember the first time I saw that movie, I was with a bunch of friends who'd seen it before who were all, in preparation for the scene with the band, talking about this TERRIBLE band who played in the next scene, and comparing them to that Blues Hammer bit from Ghost World. And then the band came on the screen and I was like "You fucking ignorant assholes, that's the AFGHAN WHIGS! They're amazing!" All my friends just rolled their eyes at me, but like, I'm still kind of aghast that that happened.

[peacocks]

baaaaauuuuhaaaaaaauuusssssss is the best music to update spreadsheets to

[davy]

Afghan Whigs are also in Beautiful Girls, and I remember the first time I saw that movie, I was with a bunch of friends who'd seen it before who were all, in preparation for the scene with the band, talking about this TERRIBLE band who played in the next scene, and comparing them to that Blues Hammer bit from Ghost World. And then the band came on the screen and I was like "You fucking ignorant assholes, that's the AFGHAN WHIGS! They're amazing!" All my friends just rolled their eyes at me, but like, I'm still kind of aghast that that happened.

Yeah yeah! What kind of awesome hole-in-the-wall New England small-town bar gets The Afghan Whigs to come play in the corner?!

A fictional one, I guess, would be the answer.

Are you BACK
in my LIFE
to STAAAAY
Or is it just
for TODAAAAY
that you need me...

[fishjim]

baaaaauuuuhaaaaaaauuusssssss is the best music to update spreadsheets to

I still play "Stigmata Martyr" when I'm alone and can crank it. Makes me feel like I should check my hands for holes when I'm through.

[Andrew_TSKS]

Yeah, Bauhaus are fucking incredible, especially for the first couple of albums they did. I went back and re-listened to them a few years ago, after having spent a significant amount of time circa 2006 being obsessed with postpunk, and suddenly noticed that Bauhaus are much closer to the whole evil-reggae-punk thing that PiL were doing circa 1980 than they are to bands like Sisters Of Mercy, with whom they're usually identified. It was around then that I wrote this blog entry, which I'm actually still proud of (a rare feeling for me).

On a totally unrelated note: I'm at work, stuck listening to NPR because I didn't bring any CDs, and I want to ask a question that I figure at least a few of you will have insight into--what is the obsession in classical music with things I think of as "Bugs Bunny stealth chase scene" sequences? To elaborate, I mean those bits in Bugs Bunny cartoons where Bugs is sneaking around, and the big monster is following him, and he takes 8 steps in one direction, and on the soundtrack a flute or something goes "dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee," and then the monster takes the same steps in the same rhythm and a bassoon plays the same melody in a much lower octave: "bum-bum-bum-bum-bum-bum-bum-bum." That shit is ALL OVER classical music. I feel like I'm just sitting around listening to Bugs Bunny cartoons with no visual, over and over. It's kind of wack, and makes me feel like, contrary to what I always thought, classical music is just as easily pigeonholed as rock and R&B, shit like that, which classical snobs have always acted like are so much less complex than classical. Maybe the problem is that NPR just plays the same half-dozen composers from the same period over and over--it wouldn't surprise me if NPR was just a highbrow version of a lowest-common-denominator top 40 or classic rock station, not at all. But still, until I get some kind of answer, I will wonder--is classical music really all this boring and repetitive once you get used to it? Do classical composers really just repeat the same tropes over and over and over? Because right now, that's the way it seems.

[peacocks]

Now, I don't know too much about classical music but I was in band for 7 years and we played a lot of it. In high school especially I really started to enjoy and get into the selections our instructor and my private lessons teacher had me/us play and even more what I got to play solo or in a woodwind ensemble. When I would listen to the public radio station here back then I always thought they were playing "pop classical" and what I considered (wrongly) to be chamber music. It all seemed so light and airy and repetitive, where as the stuff I was playing seemed to have more depth and emotion. I think you have a point, but maybe things take on a different feel when you are performing than just listening passively. Gaddis kind of wrote a whole book on that feeling with Agape Agape but anyway. As soon as you started talking about bugs bunny and the movements matching with the music I thought of Peter and the Wolf, which I absolutely love! I don't know when that was written compared to the stuff they play on your classical station but maybe they influenced one another?? Hmmmmm?

Also I will read that article because I never considered bauhaus to be that goth because I always lumped them in with nowave and post punk, like you said. I guess Suicide is kind of similar to Bauhaus in terms of creepy dark sounds- they are like the goth doo wop, but I still always considered it more post punk than say, Christian Death.

[fishjim]

I've got to leave for clinical right now, but I'd love to see more on this topic. My response to classical is very similar to yours, TSKS, though I don't think I can put words to it yet.

Maybe start a new thread? "Classical. WTF."

[clare]

Where's thermo when we need him? Myke?

I dunno, I haven't listened to NPR when it plays music (we stream All Things Considered when the bloke is home for it) but I'd guess they're playing Classical-lite, you know? All the well-known accessible stuff, not quite lcd classical, but close. Certainly the classical stations here do a lot of that, especially at the times of day when a lot of people are going to be listening, but only peripherally (driving, cooking dinner). They don't have hours to sit down and listen to a Mahler symphony, and not everyone likes Mahler symphonies anyway. It's a situation of trying to keep everyone happy and not lose listeners for large swathes of time....

Here's a program for today http://www.abc.net.au/classic/daily/stories/s3116188.htm and yeah, it's full of Mahler, interestingly.

I couldn't find one on the NPR site (I guess it's different for every local station, hey?) and got distracted by an article on breastmilk icecream in London. Sorry. All I could find out was that they seem to play a lot of jazz.

[Nick Ink]

Throwing Muses - still my favourite band.

So far tonight, facilitated by soju'n'cranberry juice, and accompanied by sporadic bursts of air-drumming: Mania, Soap & Water, Somebody To Love (50 Foot Wave), Firepile, Juno, Handsome Woman, Manic Depression, Jak, Hook In Her Head, Pandora's Box, Vicky's Box, Colder, Devil's Roof, Snailhead....coming soon, thorwign up nooooo!

[Nick Ink]

Throwing Muses are known for performing music with shifting tempos, creative chord progressions, unorthodox song structures, and surreal lyrics.

^^^^^all true ^^^^^^^

[Daniel]

Nisennenmondai, Destination Tokyo.

[Nick Ink]

Taylor Deupree - Shoals, Snow (Dusk, Dawn), Live 1: Mapping, Live In Tokyo, 4+2_Live., 1AM, Invisible Architectures #8 (with Christopher Willits), Transcriptions (with Stephan Mathieu - so good. 12K-tastic.

[ellaguru]

I've decided that I do like the new Akron/Family.

Also, it amuses me that side four, which is just wankery noodling, is labelled as being playable at either 33 or 45 RPM. I'm playing it at 45 for the first time right now, and yeah, it's pretty much wankery noodling either way.

[davy]

Haha, that's cute.

[fishjim]

This one's hitting the spot right now:



Skeleton Blues by Simon Joyner

Joyner's 10th album, it came out in 2006. Loved it then but was mildly put off by what sounded like a voice wavering between middle-Dylan and angry Leonard Cohen. I just figured he needed more time to work the influences into his system.

This morning, that voice is exactly right. "Medicine Blues" is the centerpiece. Can't think of a better example of where sad friends should be directing bad energy.

     What color is the ocean after the oil?
     It's the color of the sky cooked up in aluminum foil.
     But the Shakespeare's cape with the tattered seams
     Suits a prince just fine when he's suicidal and mean.

Full lyrics here:

"Medicine Blues"
http://www.thepoetryforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=14102

[auto-da-fey]

yeah, that's a pretty great album, possibly my favorite of his.

which is to say, I might nominate Hotel Lives as his best, but that's an album where I always feel I need to be all in to play it, the whole way through, so this gets more spins.

[davy]

Holy shit, where has this album been all my life?

[auto-da-fey]

oh hell yeah dude! glad to be gay!

[davy]

An emphatic raised fist to all that, but also: it's just really fucking good rock and roll music.

[auto-da-fey]

oh word, I meant this, but I guess a) it wasn't an album track (?), and b) it's a far better idea than song.

in any case, that album rules, yes.

[davy]

Oh I don't know, I think it's a pretty good track!

The version of Power in the Darkness I'm listening to has an EP of singles tacked on the end, which contains, among other things, "Glad to Be Gay," "Right On Sister," and their best song of all, "2-4-6-8 Motorway." Looks like it may be the definitive version at this point.