March 14, 2012

Cycling Song Of the Day (03.14.12): Weezer – “Tired of Sex” – (Pinkerton)

Paying homage to my dear friend Art Morelli’s great “First Song of the Day” Tumblr, I decided to start my own song of the day column that focuses on the best song that I listened to while riding my bike to work that day.

Last night I went on a date with a 25 year old girl from Ohio. She had moved to Brooklyn only one month ago and had started her first job here less than 7 days ago. Amongst the many nuggets of wisdom that poured from her very pretty mouth- like how being rich was her number one goal in life (seriously), how much she hated cheese, her 7 year stint working retail at Victoria’s Secret, and how her ability to “pack a pretty box” is going to get her promoted soon (she works in PR)- she said something that really made me pause. While waxing on about how she wanted to do “literary stuff”, regardless of the fact that she has never written anything (“there are books inside my head”), she let this fly:

“I just want to be rich and famous so I can shun it and be done with it.”

To me, this one sentence illustrates the difference between being in your early thirties and being twenty-five: for this generation, the shunning of fame is now part of the arc of success and not a byproduct of it.

As a result, I’d like to start calling all 25 year olds the “Worst Generation”; a clear nod to the artists of the 20’s who will not be remembered since they don’t tweet. Perhaps Lady Gaga can start spreading the word on that crazy Dada movement! Let’s send Kanye a copy of “The Sun Also Rises” and hope for the best!

Generational crankiness and general stodginess aside, “Tired of Sex” is an important song for me. For one, I first heard this song when I was 16 and very, very far from being tired of sex. Unbeknownst to me at the time but it would be awhile before I experienced sex, let alone experienced it so much that it would become something I tired of. Unrelatable subject matter aside, from the opening squalls of feedback to the listing of odd/indecipherable proper nouns, to the fuzzed out chunky bass that anchors the song - this type of song has always and will always appeal to me (ahem).

Pinkerton was an important album for me in other ways: it was one of the first albums I was waiting for to come out. I bought it the first day it was released at the record store near my high school and popped it in my discman on the way to my job alphabetizing books at the NYPL. This album, along with Green Day’s Insomniac, were my first memories of feeling isolated in my enjoyment of an album, both on a critical and commercial level. With the exception of “Brain Stew”, the videos from Pinkerton and Insomniac were barely played on MTV and most reviews were middling, if not negative. Heck, Rolling Stone called “Tired of Sex” aimless and Pinkerton was rated by readers as the third worst album of 1996. As a result, the band barely toured on the record- I saw them sandwiched between the Lunachicks and No Doubt at an amphitheater just to hear them play some Pinkerton jams, which they were already shying away from.

Now, what does this have to do with the Worst Generation? Right before the release of Pinkerton, I remember reading a profile on Rivers in Spin- about how he’d gone to Harvard and isolated himself, how he found his mainstream popularity unfulfilling, about the horrible leg surgery he had to overcome. He intended for Pinkerton to tell the story of his life between the first two Weezer records and therefore, the songs were sequenced in the order they were written. In this way, Pinkerton totally holds up: the disillusionment of “Tired of Sex”, the overwhelming frustration of “Why Bother?”, the trying-to-be-confident “El Scorcho” and the self-loathing “Falling for You” (their best song by miles) all lay out the story of someone who got what they wanted, was let down and was profoundly sad. The genuineness of the sadness that runs through Pinkerton is uncomfortable- but it’s never put on or played up- it’s the reason we know Rivers is a human being, no matter how hard he has tried to prove otherwise. This album may have inspired many horrible bands to continually escalate their self-hating imagery but when Rivers, at 26 years old, bitterly snipes “First, there’s rules about old goats like me hanging around with chicks like you” it’s clear that shunning the success he had worked so hard to earn was not an intended part of his arc.

9:55am  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZeeczvHzkz8Q
Filed under: Weezer Cycling Song of the Day Green Day Pinkerton 
March 8, 2012

Cycling Song Of the Day (03.08.12): Millencolin – “No Cigar” – (Pennybridge Pioneers)

Paying homage to my dear friend Art Morelli’s great “First Song of the Day” Tumblr, I decided to start my own song of the day column that focuses on the best song that I listened to while riding my bike to work that day.

Today was my first ride of the season and my first time on my bicycle since November 30, 2011. My memory is far from photogenic but due to a near-death run in with a motorcycle taking place so late in the season, the day etched itself nicely in my frontal (?) lobe. It’s in a lobe ok? It was a great ride: breezy and confident but yet slightly unsure. While I always bemoan my bike-less winters, there is something fresh about coming back to something you love after a time away- details that will go unnoticed by June feel like massive discoveries.

To contextualize this column, you should know I ride my bike attached to an iPod Shuffle stacked with “all the hits.” Keep in mind that when I say “hits” I mean songs I loved from my younger days interspersed with more modern but equally as energetic music. Thus, while it was super fun to slow strut (in my head) through the lobby of my building listening to Big Boi’s “Shutterbug”, the song of the day goes to Swedish skate-punks, Millencolin.

“No Cigar” is probably best known for being featured in Tony Hawk’s Pro-Skater but my friends and I were actually clamoring for the release of Pennybridge Pioneers. The band’s breakout song “Bullion” and to a lesser degree, “Lozin Must” are two 90’s punk classics and endlessly blasted out of the blown speakers of our first used cars. “Bullion” holds up particularly well, notable for its simple premise (narrator turns twenty-one, takes stock of his life and vows to make positive changes) and the fact that when I first heard the song, the age twenty-one was five distant years away and now it’s ten past.

While Millencolin definitely had great hooks and chops, I’ve always loved their English-as-a-second-language phrasings (in a way, this is one reason Phoenix is also particularly compelling lyrically). The chorus of “No Cigar” is as driving and melodic as you’d expect from a 90’s Epitaph Records band, peppered with motivational/individualistic gibberish:

“I don’t care where I belong no more/What we shared or not, I will ignore/And I won’t waste my time fitting in/Because I don’t think contrast is a sin.”

Does anyone think contrast is a sin? It doesn’t really matter: like most great pop-punk songs of this era, this is a mini-anthem that heightens the mundane aspects of our lives to more dramatic levels and energizes our bike rides and morning commutes.

10:32am  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZeeczvHfUnku
Filed under: Millencolin Cycling Song of the Day 
February 29, 2012

Song of the day: The Ergs! - “Aja” (from Jersey’s Best Prancers)

After finally catching up with the new Mind Spiders record, I quickly threw on this cheekily titled EP by pop-punk classicists The Ergs! to keep the good vibes going this morning. This song had never caught my ear before but this is a speedy, perfect little song that as the title, um, suggests, is about two girls named after Steely Dan songs. As a Steely Dan apologist, the joke that the song ends on really clinches it’s greatness.

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(Notes: 1)
  
Filed under: The Ergs! Song of the Day Steely Dan 
February 24, 2012
TV Casualty (week of 02/19/12- 02/23/12)

TV Casualty is where I’ll highlight my favourite TV episode airing in previous Sunday- Thursday. This week I’ll talk about new episodes of The Walking Dead, How I Met Your Mother, Justified, New Girl, Key & Peele, Modern Family, Happy Endings, 30 Rock, Parks and Recreation, Up all Night, and Archer.

Episode of the Week: Happy Endings (s02/e15) – “The Butterfly Effect Effect”

If you’ve hung around me the last few months, the conversation has inevitably shifted to my love of two comedies, although they couldn’t be more different. One is UK cult comedy Peep Show and the other is Happy Endings. Happy Endings is a show I begrudgingly started watching at the tail end of the first season and it is now the comedy I most look forward to watching every week. I can without pause say that I think it comes the closest to the pacing and sharpness of Arrested Development, which is no surprise given that AD alums Joe and Anthony Russo produce Happy Endings. For those of you who need a slick pitch, I’d say that Happy Endings is a hang out comedy about twentysomethings much like Friends but with far more irreverence and multitudes of jokes, both visual and verbal fly indiscriminately at the viewer. Much like Arrested, it takes at least two viewings to absorb all the jokes- there are at least 3 big jokes an episode I miss on my first watch because I’m laughing right over them.

What I’ve loved the most in the last few episodes (Adam Pally’s break out role as Max notwithstanding) is the unbelievable chemistry between Damon Wayans, Jr and Eliza Coupe. As the token married couple of the group they succeed in doing what I shant ever thinketh be done: make marriage look super, duper fun. Brad and Jane might be the weirdest couple on television: one scene features Brad pulling down his pants to reveal he is wearing a women’s polo style shirt dress and rather than cringe, Jane is into it. These two appreciate each other’s oddness and while there are shades of this type of relationship in Marshall and Lily on How I Met Your Mother, Coupe and Wayans are less precious/cloying.

This week’s episode is focused around Brad and Jane’s annual fight, known as Spring Smackdown, a signifier of the titular season. Max barely has a line in the entire episode- he is in hibernation mode- that is to say- communicating in grunts while bearded and in one piece bear pajamas or riding a unicycle in a vest with a bucket on his head. I’m almost hesitant to recommend an episode that doesn’t feature Max being Max since he is such a dominant personality on the show but Adam Pally really sells what is ultimately a pretty ridiculous gag. See, Max even dominates this paragraph, which I wanted to use to highlight how good Brad and Jane were in this episode! Their “fight” is the episode’s centerpiece and a brilliant if not classic comedy bit where two people are yelling in a way that would make them seem angry to observers but are saying things contrary to their behavior. My favourite is when Brad yells ““Thank you! I appreciate everything you do for me!” in a total rage.

Another great episode in what has been a long string of great episodes.

What else I’ve been watching:

Walking Dead, which I’ve demoted to “occasion viewing” is still boring the life out of me. Shane spends most of his time complaining about Rick and rubbing his shaved head while Rick spends most of his time waxing philosophical, sometimes into a walkie talkie to nobody at all. Zzzzzz.

How I Met Your Mother was surprisingly solid but probably worked for me because it covered emotional groundwork that was laid down when I liked the show the most, which is when Ted courted and dated Robin, in the first two seasons of the show. HIMYM does funny, bittersweet stories better than almost any other sitcom but the writer’s comedic sensibilities on a week-to-week basis have always been a bit lazy for my taste in the later seasons.

Justified continues it’s terrific third season with an episode that cements Quarles as this season’s Big Bad. There are still many threads of storylines that are weaving together and it’s not clear where everyone fits in, but here we have a villain that keeps a man restrained to a bed at all times to abuse physically, seemingly for pleasure. Moral rules still apply on television, even on FX, and Limehouse’s lecture to his son/monologue to the audience is definitely announcing that he isn’t a villain so much as a man of conviction… in a county full of men of convictions (some of them criminal). Justified’s transition from single minded second season (“All About the Bennetts” could have been the subtitle) to freewheeling third season reminds me very much of Breaking Bad’s transition from super focused second season (“What is with the Teddy Bear in the Pool!”) to the more frenetic/where-is-this-going third season. This is not a bad thing.

New Girl is still showing signs of promise but also underwhelming. There are some great characters (Schmidt in particular) but there is rarely an episode where one story doesn’t bother me to the point of distraction. I can tell they added the character of CeCe to bone up the femininity but she isn’t particularly funny (she’s hot and embarrassed to be with Schmidt! Crazy!) and she barely interacts with 2/3 of the cast. Lizzy Caplan is already missed! Your new show with Michael Sheen might be awesome though!

Key & Peele is a new sketch comedy show on Comedy Central. This is the fourth episode that has aired so far. It’s very much like a two person Chappelle’s Show, both in format (the hosts riff for a bit on a topic in front of an audience and then a sketch based on that topic will play) and it’s heavy emphasis on black stereotypes. It’s gotten a fair amount of praise but much like the similarly single-minded sketch show, Portlandia, the sketches vary greatly in quality. This week’s best sketch is one in which Peele plays a nerdy Key’s thuggish cousin and engages in a game of Dungeons & Dragons. It is almost as predictable as it sounds but executed wonderfully. Plus, it reminded me of the series finale of Freaks and Geeks (Carlos the Dwarf!).

Modern Family was a pretty standard affair: Phil and Luke Dumphy are still the two best characters and they were given some pretty great material this week. Sometimes I wish Cam and Mitchell would move away though.

30 Rock was a little more amusing than usual but really, I pay more attention to subway ads than I do to this show. The ultimate check your e-mail show.

Parks and Recreation is another show, like Happy Endings and Justified, that has had a great run of episodes but this one felt a little too plot driven and within the show, overdone. We knew the end of the episode from the very first line about Leslie having to spread herself between her job at the Parks and Rec department and as a candidate in a local election. Thus, we had to spend an entire episode knowing Leslie was going to try valiantly to do both but ultimately focus on her campaign more. It was just a matter of getting there. Andy and Chris are continuing to hit all the right notes and have a great chemistry together (and with Champion, their adorable three-legged dog). Donna was also given some room to shine this episode and she really nailed it. My one problem lately is that while I love Aziz’s portrayal of Tom, it’s clear that the writers noticed that people grasped onto his baby talk food names (“Chickie Chickie Parm Parm”) and have infantilized him in a way that is getting kind of grating and is not so endearing. The fact that this character would have an absurd romantic deal breaker list is plausible- the fact that he publicly calls it an “oh no no” list is a bit creepy.

Finally, Up All Night and Archer delivered solid episodes in what have been very solid seasons for both shows, although I did think Archer was a bit of a step down from it’s typical high quality.

1:36pm  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZeeczvGyg2QO
Filed under: tv casualty Happy Endings Walking Dead How I Met Your Mother Justified New Girl Key & Peele Modern Family 30 Rock Parks and Recreation Up All Night Archer 
February 22, 2012

You Should Probably Be Listening to This: Family Portrait

Unlike the majority of East Coasters, I hold a certain proud affinity for New Jersey. I’ve spent countless hours driving down its endless parkways and magnificent turnpike. I’ve wasted days lying on shore and I’ve sweat through my shirt dancing at the Wayne Firehouse. I’ve spent more money than I’d like to admit in it’s fantastic record stores (Vintage Vinyl, Princeton Record Exchange and Curmudgeon Records (RIP), to name a few). In addition to all of these valid reasons, New Jersey gave us Bruce and frankly, that’s more than most states have contributed to my life.

Which is why I’m so thrilled that New Jersey has spawned its own indie rock scene that, with the success of Real Estate and Titus Andronicus, has begun to reveal itself to a national audience. One label in particular, Underwater Peoples, has done a fantastic job of giving these often lo-fi musicians an outlet for their work.

One such band, Family Portrait, put out their first album last year, a self-titled affair that got a smidge of love from a few blogs but quickly seemed to disappear. It’s easy to see why Family Portrait got lost in the shuffle- Real Estate, a band they are already associated with and have surface level similarities to- put out one of the best albums of the year last year. Yet, I see Family Portrait’s self titled record as the perfect foil to Real Estate’s Days. While Days is endlessly meticulous and tight (lazy strumming be damned), Family Portrait is expansive and loose while retaining the defining traits of the Underwater Peoples label- reverb drenched guitar and just the right amount of lo-fi scuff.

Family Portrait’s expansiveness can be best displayed on “Interlude 1/Never Should’ve Been There.” After about a minute of keyboard hum and flanger soaked guitar noodle, the song begins it’s fairly straight forward shuffle. But by two minutes in keyboards are tapping away melodies while horns enter (seemingly out of nowhere) and give the song both a greater weight and unexpected heft. The same guitar noodles that peppered the intro now congeal into hyper melodic loopy solos while singer Evan Brody sings the titular line over and over. Real Estate has yet to do a song this epic!

Speaking of which: “The Other Side” to my ears, is the ultimate 4 chord epic. It was my introduction to the band and probably their best entry point. It’s driving, catchy and features the perfect amount of sneering vocal melodies. It’s the type of straightforward rock song that makes descriptions superfluous and therefore it is linked above for your listening pleasure. Turn it up!

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(Notes: 2)
  
Filed under: Family Portrait Titus Andronicus Real Estate Underwater Peoples The Boss You Should Probably Be Listening to This 
February 21, 2012

A Record of Records #1

Welcome to the first in what will be an ongoing series of posts in which I listen to/invest myself in/reminisce the origins of my 7” record collection. While my fascination with the single format probably originates from my teenage adoration of punk rock and hardcore, my first memories of thinking 7” records were cool dates back to when I was in junior high school and Pearl Jam starting sending singles out to fanclub members every Christmas (a tradition, that unsurprisingly, Pearl Jam still adheres to).

Fun fact: The very first 7” record I ever bought was Billy Ocean’s “Get Out of My Dreams and Into My Car.”

While there is a masochistic desire to review my collection of singles chronologically, in the order they came into my possession, this survey will be conducted completely at random. I will work through my singles in the order they are currently stacked- that is to say- no order at all. Let no one say I am not a man who throws caution to the wind. Also, someone explain to me how to throw caution at all.

Record #1 – Husker Du/Green Day “Don’t Want to Know if You are Lonely” (2011)

Obtained from: Sound Fix Records, Brooklyn, NY.

Statistics: Purchased on Record Store Day 2011, this record was both pricey and pretty ($6.99 for two archival songs on bright orange vinyl). While I adore both bands and the notion of Green Day covering Husker Du is pleasant enough, this was most definitely purchased because I had shown up to Record Store Day late and wanted to make the deeply unpleasant experience justifiable.

Note: Sound Fix is a terrific store but Record Store Day feels the most like work that record buying ever has for me. The decades I’ve spent with friends casually rifling through old records is nothing like the experience of being herded around a tiny record store like cattle with Panda Bear records booming at deafening levels while a record store clerk is shouting over the music he just turned up about the diminishing amounts of records left- records that, for the most part, if these people had been actual fans of vinyl for more than 15 minutes, would have already been in their collection.

Review: If it wasn’t immediately obvious, this is a record where you have the original Husker Du song on one side with Green Day covering it on the flip. Thankfully, the label (and production of the song) indicates that Green Day recorded this song way back in the year 2000, which means it’s recording falls somewhere between Nimrod and Warning. As I read the aforementioned label, it felt good to know that Mr. Armstrong, Mr. Dirnt and Mr. Cool wouldn’t be adding any operatic bombast to Grant Hart’s beautifully straightforward 80’s power pop punk classic.

For reasons unclear to me, I’ve never bothered to check out the Husker Du album Candy Apple Grey and know “Don’t Want to Know if You Are Lonely” primarily from it’s usage in the underrated film Adventureland, a film that instantly secured my approval by opening with fellow Twin Cities 80’s punkers, the Replacements, playing over the title card.

Turn it up and make your move, Jesse!

Up until now, I’ve stuck mostly to the trifecta of great Husker Du albums (Zen Arcade, New Day Rising and Flip Your Wig). Needless to say, I’ll be obtaining Candy Apple Grey as soon as possible. This song reminded me that Husker Du, regardless of their wet 80’s drum production, are unimpeachable, especially when leaning on their pop sensibilities. Grant Hart’s voice always sounds bittersweet to me and “Don’t Want to Know If You Are Lonely” exemplifies this pretty well. The song’s narrator clearly cares about the person he is singing to even if the titular sentiment is pretty mean spirited. Hart doesn’t sounds like a jerk though- he’s been jilted and his feelings are a clear defense mechanism. A phrase like “don’t want to know if you are less than lonely” means nothing - except to overemphasize how much you don’t care, which in this case, comes off like overcompensation for hurt feelings. It’s also unendingly catchy and fun.

The b-side is Green Day covering “Don’t Want To Know If You are Lonely” but there is not much to say except that it’s basically the same song with more modern production. Clearly, Green Day was trying to pay homage to one of their most obvious influences but I can never see the point of recording such straightforward cover songs. I highly doubt Green Day is sitting around listening to the Offspring cover the Buzzcocks when they could just listen to the Buzzcocks.

11:23am  |   URL: http://tmblr.co/ZeeczvGnhu7O
Filed under: A Record of Records Adventureland Green Day Husker Du Pearl Jam Billy Ocean