[As as aside: you know that I will forever ride for that first Jackson Browne record--so much so that I've never even heard of the "Rock Me On the Water" cover you mentioned.]
It's funny, back in college I had a professor whose husband wanted to get rid of all his records (it was like two or three crates' worth), and they invited me over for lunch so I could haul 'em away. I did, gladly, and though there was some real good stuff, the bulk of it was typical post-hippie stuff that was not really up my alley at the time. Nonetheless, I felt like cherrypicking would be a dick move, and that the polite thing to do would be to take everything, so a day that had started with me listening to some Foetus or whatever on dubbed cassette ended with me having on vinyl minty and comprehensive runs of Jackson Browne, David Bromberg, and the like. I eventually passed a lot of it to my man Pruitt, but in the meantime I had to stash a lot of that shit so that people wouldn't get the wrong idea when they came over. I think at one point I actually draped some canvas over them.
Anyway:
My two favorite verses ever (in order):
- The second verse of Ghostface Killah???s ???One???
- Big Daddy Kane???s verse in the demo version of ???Raw???
The two basslines I first hear in my head whenever I see or hear the word ???bassline???:
- Tyrone Thomas And The Whole Damn Family ??? ???Seven Minutes Of Funk???
- Fab 5 Freddy ??? ???Down By Law???
Two instrumental intros made remarkable by the fact that there is almost no voice???Willie Nelson, Keith Murray, Lou Reed, Carly Rae Jepsen, whoever???that I cannot imagine coming in after them:
- Prince ??? ???I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man???
- Big Star ??? ???O My Soul???
Two songs that I???ve been listening to for a long time but that still make my head spin:
- Black Merda/Mer-Da - ???Lying???
I know songs that are more desolate and more don???t-give-a-fuck than this one, but man, something about the particular nihilism of ???truth don???t mean a thing to me / and lying, it don???t mean a thing to me??? hits me as just terminal. Total black-hole, bottom-of-the-universe shit. Life so often gets to a point where we want things to be simple, to be absolute, but then you hear something like this and realize that you probably don???t want it as simple as you think. This song is a lazy free-fall into something terrifying.
- Outkast ??? ???B.O.B.???
I???m gonna tell you two things so that I can tell you a third thing:
First: A few years back I spent a long time in front of a late-model mixed-media Frank Stella wall piece???it was probably about four feet by six feet, maybe bigger, overloaded and pullulating undeniably with color and texture. What really snared me was the realization???after looking at for a good while already???that peeking out from somewhere deep in the abundantly stacked strata were a number of low-relief carvings in sheets of thick plastic or rubber, which after a minute I recognized as the plates that had been used to print all the other pieces of the construction. I just kept going around and around, taking in this glorious thing that had buried within itself the tools of its own creation, and marveling at how it was so generous but still so closed.
Second: There???s a story by Terrence Holt called ???In The Valley Of The Kings??? that???s about an archeologist who, having noticed a gap in the otherwise meticulously annotated ancient history of Egypt???s pharaohs, goes searching for the pariah who occupied that gap, this outcast ruler who???d seen every mention of his life and reign so thoroughly expunged???his name cut out of every papyrus, chiseled off of every stone, sliced off of every tongue, for centuries???and removed entirely from the words of a people for whom words meant everything. What had been his crime? What could he possibly have done to have his existence obliterated so completely? The archeologist gradually loses his sanity to this monomania, but eventually locates, of course, the tomb, where he staggers for hours or days through a vast subterranean warehouse seemingly without ceiling, wall, or end, stacked beyond counting with artifacts, riches, and corpses. Just before the end of his rope, the archeologist realizes with a mixture of reverence and horror that the king was not erased from his own world, but in fact brought that world with him into death. All of it. Every cent, every word, every splinter, every citizen, he had them all buried with him.
So, I tell you all that just to tell you this: As Andre and Big Boi each continue to make their separate steps toward complicated individual visions and away from any real level of commercial or cultural relevance, there seems to be this growing insistence among those left behind that Outkast peaked with those first two or three albums anyway. And with no disrespect to all my down-home diehards, I am saying here today that that is bullshit, and that if Outkast really is over, the tragedy will not be the loss of whatever easy and muscular and eccentric swagger you first fell in love with, but will be the loss of the kind of maximalist and possible apocalypse represented by motherfucking ???B.O.B.??? That song comes on like septuplets, and brings within itself everything it needs; it???s got bass, it???s got scratching, it???s got MPC abuse, it???s got a gospel choir, it???s got Eddie Van Hazel guitar immolation, it???s got that thing in the first chorus where the first part(???Don???t pull that thang out / unless you came to bang!???) kinda swings against the beat a little but then when the second part (???Bombs over Baghdad!???) comes in it???s right on top of the beat and this already amazingly breakneck song seems to get pushed a half step faster, it???s open, it???s closed, it is the alarm and the fire, it is the pill and the headache, it is the book and the revelation, and I like fish and grits and all that pimp shit just as much as the next guy but god damn it, soulstrut, sometimes more is more.
Two interesting bits of pre-9/11 prophecy:
- Outkast, talmbout ???bombs over Baghdad??? in like 1999
- Herman Melville in Moby-Dick, talmbout ???Grand Contested Election For Presidency Of The United States??? and ???BLOODY BATTLE IN AFFGHANISTAN??? in like 1850.
Two groups that each essentially only have one song, but cot-dam, what a song:
- Q Lazzarus ??? ???Goodbye Horses???
- Juicy Bananas ??? ???Bad Man???
Two hooks I???m really feeling but am having trouble sneaking into conversation:
- ???So many nooses around my neck / as I stare at the sea waiting for the new ships???
- ???I am Damo Suzuki!???
Two somewhat revolting occurrences of music in the real world:
- I heard ???Calabria 2007??? playing out of the rolled-down windows of a black hearse.
- The last time I donated blood, I was attended by a nice Hispanic lady whose radio was playing David Lee Roth???s ???Just A Gigolo???
Two Alices:
- ??? ~ In My Fantasies??? - Funkadelic
- ??? ~ I Want You Just For Me??? ??? Full Force
Two places I wanted to go to as a kid because of incessant local TV ads:
1) Twitty City
2) Maggie Valley ("Ghost Town In The Sky")
Beautiful Mt. Airy Lodge
Yes! There was some NY-based station that somehow reached South Carolina and on which I used to watch old--and, notably, complete--episodes of Saturday Night Live, and those Mt. Airy Lodge ads had much allure. The Florida jernts, too ("When yoooo need it baaad / weeee've got it good! / Come to Flo-ruh-duh!').
Two things I sometimes unwittingly say in conversation just like they say on the record:
- Whenever I???m leading someone across a street or something, I'll say ???heeerrrre we go??? just like Slick Rick.
- When I???m shutting down a friendly argument or negotiation, I'll say ???Nah, nah???court is closed!??? just like Del Jones.
Two pieces of total mall-rat drum production that I nonetheless fuck with:
- The breakdown in Ke$ha???s ???Die Young.??? From corner to block to suburb, from figurative White Girl to actual white girl: the ???Grindin?????? beat begat ???Lip Gloss??? which begat this. Straight bleacher-stomp shit right here. Undeniable.
- The first twenty seconds of Uffie???s ???MCs Can Kiss.??? NWA???s ???Dope Man??? times Claire???s Boutique and played on 45. I feel like I need an instrumental and/or some penicillin.
Bands I used to think were the same band (US Edition):
- Psychic TV and Sleep Chamber. See, it???s like, the negative space between Sleep Chamber???s facing double E???s kinda somewhat resembled a Psychic Cross. In my teenage mind, this proved everything.
- L???Trimm and JJ Fad. I know I???m not alone.
Bands I used to think were the same band (UK Edition):
- Wee Papa Girls and Mel & Kim.
- Kevin Ayers and Kevin Coyne.
Underrated (record-related):
- Sly Stone
- Bruce Springsteen interviews. Mostly can???t really fuck with the music, though.
- Bonus Beat: Detroit???s Dave Hamilton
Overrated (record-related):
- Everyone.
- Everything.
- Bonus Beat: That one band you like.
Overrated (non-record-related):
- Juice.
- Getting drunk before supper.
Underrated (non-record-related):
- Kissing in a lawn chair.
- Fresh avocado with Crystal hot sauce.
Two non-rap phenomena that were formative to my young impression of New York City:
- Those ???I Love New York??? commercials.
- Bobby Brown???s ???On Our Own??? video.
Two excellent LP sides concerning our nation???s capital:
- Side One of Parliament???s Chocolate City.
- Side One of Dr. Buzzard Goes To Washington.
Two Canadian ladies who get props over down here:
- Alice Munro. Fuck the haters.
- Lisa Robertson.
Two subtle/unsubtle but still-cool-by-me uses of sound effects in records:
- In Dionne Warwick???s ???Heartbreaker,??? the ascending synth swell that sounds like a rocket launching just as she sings ???my love is stronger than the universe??????
- In the Candyskins??? ???Wembley,??? the crowd-roar in the background the first time the titular word is sung.
Two things I???m almost never happy to hear from two artists I really love:
- Prince???s ???rap??? voice (see ???Alphabet Street???).
- Stevie???s ???tough??? voice (see ???Living For The City???).
Two vocal noises whose allure I may never get to the bottom of:
- The exclamatory ???oh!??? halfway through every chorus of The Bobette???s ???Mr. Lee.???
- Susan Cadogan???s lilting ???uh-wah, uh-wah??? in ???Nice And Easy.???
- Lifetime Achievement: Whatever that invisible and inaudible and inexplicable thing is that happens between the two syllables of ???wai-ting??? on the intro to Madonna???s ???Get Into The Groove.???
Two intense pieces of music:
- The acapella for Frankie Goes To Hollywood???s ???Relax.???
- The Numbers Band???s ???Narrow Road???
- Bonus Beat: DJ Shadow???s ???Give Me Back The Nights???
Two really great songs that effectively function as support systems for a single transcendent and final line:
- LCD Soundsystem???s ???All My Friends.??? While the lyrics of this song definitely evoke a widely communicable feeling, I think they only make any kind of literal sense if you???re James Murphy. The thing that keeps people trying, though???keeps people trying to take these really particular lyrics about a particular type of working dj of a particular age and particular prestige and reverse-engineer them into something/anything that is at all applicable to themselves???is the pure want, so raw and so universal, in the unfinished and possibly unfinishable sentiment of the last line: ???If I could see all my friends tonight??????
- Stevie Wonder???s ???Never Dreamed You???d Leave In Summer.??? Unlike the relative inscrutability of the above, it becomes clear pretty early on that this song is a stately march and slow build toward something. The vocals increase in volume and the track increases in complexity, setting you up for some big, baroque catharsis at the end. Nothing prepared me???and a thousand listens later there???s still nothing that can prepare me???for the gutting simplicity of ???Why didn???t you stay????, not exploded from his lungs or keened upward with all kinds of vocal fireworks, but sung strong and plain in a mid-range that feels like it could go on forever and ever, never finding a thing.
- Arguably: Van Morrison???s ???Cyprus Avenue.??? Seven inescapable and incredible minutes of grown-up obsession and image and longing, that takes a sharp turn to some other place just thirty seconds before it ends, with one of the only non-visual descriptions we are given of the object of his desire: ???fourteen years old.???
Two surprisingly affecting instrumental versions:
- The Lox???s ???Ryde Or Die B***h???.
- Pierre Perpall/Purple Flash???s ???We Can Make It.???
Two instances of weak hustle in my neighborhood:
- Evangelicals parked down the block whose efforts at ministry consist of cracking their driver-side power window like two inches whenever I walk past and trying to hand me a brochure through the slot, while they bump Keith Pringle or some shit at ear-bleed volume while talking on their cellphone with the rhinestone cross on it and not making eye contact. Fuck that--God don???t like lazy.
- This guy named Derric who runs a one-man car service, and has all these flyers up that show him posing by his all-black Navigator or whatever under the headline: ???Because Everybody Needs a Plan D.??? Like, if neither your first, second, nor third choice is available, holler at your dude, I guess. I briefly considered the possibility that maybe dude was, you know, talking in code or something???maybe talmbout drugs, or reaching out to the lonely ladies, or what have you???but I really get the feeling that he just didn???t think the shit through.
- Bonus Beat: Cross-dressers who just aren???t trying. The perennial issue.
Two beguiling sideways glances in music videos:
- Susanna Hoffs???s when she sings the title phrase in ???Walk Like An Egyptian.???
- Kim Deal???s when she sings ???I???ll be your whatever you want??? in The Breeders??? ???Cannonball.???
- Honorable Mention: Azealia Banks???s throughout ???212.???
:
- ???I am un CHIEN! (chaud!)???
- ???Slicing up hot dogs / I want you to know!
???Feel the wrath of my bombast!???:
- Patti Smith???s ???Because The Night.???
- Beginning Of The End???s ???Jump In The Water??? (not to be confused with the neutered Ray Munnings solo version).
Kindergartener dynamite, guaranteed like your man Joe Willie Namath:
- The Trashmen???s ???Surfin??? Bird???
- The Tree Stumps??? ???Jennie Lee??? played at +8
Two ways in which the ascent of Soul II Soul affected me and my circle of friends:
- We became less hostile to the idea of wearing proper trousers. My man Jones tried to perpetrate with a blazer and some houndstooth chef???s pants, but we gave him an "A" for effort.
- We kinda got off of some of our punk-rock ???Man, fuck a string arrangement!??? shit.
- Bonus beat: We were utterly entranced by the mysterious Soul II Soul Dancer Chick. On the album covers she was shown only in silhouette, and in the videos only in brief, shadowy glimpses. You never saw her in full light and all at once--she was like a sexier version of the creature from Alien.
Two fucked-up but nonetheless great bits of sentence construction:
- ???Whenever I feel like / not too great at all??? (Prince???s ???She???s Always In My Hair???)
- ???Let me tell you somethin??? / what I???m talkin??? about / I???ll bet my bottom dollar there ain???t a cherry in this house!??? (Jerry Lee Lewis???s ???Big Legged Woman???).
Two things I would totally rhyme if I were one of those smart-dumb super-scientifical rappers:
- ???Venus Hottentot???
- ???Ondes Martenot???
Two things I???m surprised that I can still listen to and enjoy in 2013:
- Foetus???s ???Butterfly Potion???
- Large portions of DJ Faust???s Man Or Myth
Two records I wanna hear doubled up:
- Ronnie Foster???s ???Midnight Plane???
- The horn break from ???Sussudio???
Two record-related trinities I am still trying to understand:
- 33, 45, and 78.
- White collectors, black genres, and Asian girlfriends.
Two girls??? names kinda buried in great songs:
- ???Kayla??? in Girls??? ???Lust For Life???
- ???Ruby??? in Billy Garner???s ???I Got Some???
- Bonus Beat: ???Donna??? in The Replacements??? ???Favorite Thing???
???You are forgiven!???:
- ???I was dreaming when I wrote this / Forgive me if it goes astray???
- ???I cried when I wrote this song / Sue me if I play too long???
Two Halloween costumes I???m considering:
- Putney Swope: I hide unseen in the bushes while my man Ernest to rings the bell and then lip-synchs while I rasp, ???Trick or treat, you sons of bitches!???
- Ninja Man: I wear a long wig and something with shoulder pads, high-step up to other people and diss them mercilessly until they are forced via crowd response to give me their candy. Mini-Zagnut pon tooth.
Two great cover versions:
- Sun City Girls??? ???Tell Me Something Good???
- Jai Paul???s ???Crush??? (I???d pay cash money to hear this dude do ???Perfect Way???)
- Dishonorable Mention: Me, deep into a thirsty evening this past summer, murdering Champaign???s ???Try Again.??? Hand gestures and everything, whoadie. Not a good scene.
HarveyCanal"a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
I'm always saying to my daughter "let's do it" in a Tone Loc voice and often follow it right up with the Alex Van Halen drums...dadada dun dun dun dun.
Two surprisingly affecting instrumental versions:
- The Lox???s ???Ryde Or Die B***h???.
Always loved that beat. Pretty sure Timbaland jacked the drums (or at least the snare) from the Pharcyde's "Runnin'" but fuck it--he used them well. Is that guitar riff a sample? I always wondered about that.
Also, that song has one really strange line from Jadakiss: "She miss him so much that she peein' the bed." Wait, what? Is that a thing that happens?
- Large portions of DJ Faust???s Man Or Myth
That's my man throwin' down! I haven't listened to that in a while, but there were parts that I absolutely played to death.
Two obvious signs that I'm on the wrong side of the "Am I officially old?" question:
1) I wake up every morning with back pain. Fun!
2) Afternoon drinking absolutely obliterates the rest of the day for me.
Big_Stacks"I don't worry about hittin' power, cause I don't give 'em nuttin' to hit." 4,670 Posts
Hey,
I'll give the two's a whirl:
Two songs with choruses that make my cry because of their beauty:
-"Earth, Wind, & Fire" by Earth, Wind, & Fire.
-"Footsteps in the Dark" by The Isley Brothers.
Two songs I hate to admit that I love:
-"Sky & Sea"-The Fifth Dimension.
-"Chuck E's in Love"-Rickie Lee Jones.
Two songs that epitomize good blue-eyed, modern-ish soul:
-"Let it Go" by Pages
-"Georgy-Porgy" by Toto.
Two songs that lead to happy endings:
-"Hold On, I'm Coming"-Sam and Dave
-(Hot Pants) I'm Coming"-Bobby Byrd
Two songs that were made to blend together on the mix:
-"Tour de France"-Kraftwerk
-"Egypt, Egypt"-The Egyptian Lover.
Two sisters in vocal (to me, anyway):
-Grace Slick
-Genya Ravan
Two great songs about travel by train:
-"Hitchcock Railway"-Jose Feliciano.
-"Back Up, Train"-Al Green.
Two great songs with 'court' in the title:
-"Court of Love"-The Unifics
-"Court's in Session"-KAOS.
"God Make Me Funky" never sounded so good (looped or programmed) except in:
-"Kick the Ball"-The Krown Rulers.
-"They Call Me Puma"-Puma.
These two songs are inextricably linked in my head:
-"Mother Beautiful"-Sly & the Family Stone
-"The Beautiful Ones"-Prince.
Two songs I give passes to despite having lead vocals that blatantly bite Michael Jackson:
I'm always saying to my daughter "let's do it" in a Tone Loc voice and often follow it right up with the Alex Van Halen drums...dadada dun dun dun dun.
Can't not do it actually. Help. Me.
I do this same exact thing. When texting though, I just respond like so:
Two Skateboard Company Names I've Never Been Comfortable With:
Uncle Wiggley- Uncle. Wiggley. It was weird. Lots of plaid, if I remember correctly. Seems a creepazoid name.
Hook-Ups- unless it's a Jeremy Klein anime reference, I don't get it. Hook-Ups. Is it like sexing hook-ups? Product-flow bro hook-ups?
Two surprisingly affecting instrumental versions:
- The Lox???s ???Ryde Or Die B***h???.
Always loved that beat. Pretty sure Timbaland jacked the drums (or at least the snare) from the Pharcyde's "Runnin'" but fuck it--he used them well. Is that guitar riff a sample? I always wondered about that.
Yeah, I've wondered about the guitar riff as well. My feeling is that it was played live and then sampled. One, it's very very clean and very very present sounding, and two, I remember that around the time it came out it was for whatever reason (the threat of litigation? wanting to be seen as a "real" producer?) very important for Timbaland and his coterie to make people in the media understand that Tim was not a big record dude, was not reliant on sampling, that he sampled hardly anything at all, actually, and on and on. I remember at least a couple interviews with Tim and even one with Danjahandz where they made extra effort to get across that Tim was not some dude sitting somewhere with a room full of records (in the words of Lou Reed, "Is that bad? Apparently that seems to be bad"). I'm not sure how much of all that is true or needs to be true, but in this particular case I'm inclined to believe it; I really don't get that sampled-off-a-record ambience here.
Also, that song has one really strange line from Jadakiss: "She miss him so much that she peein' the bed." Wait, what? Is that a thing that happens?.
Oh, man. When it comes to nastiness--and I don't mean "nasty" like "Talk Like Sex" or "Wildflower," which at least have little bit of energy or emotion or whatever, but "nasty" like straight-up dead-eyed cruelty--Jadakiss is pretty tough to beat. I'm not gonna pretend like I don't enjoy anything he's done, but that dude just sounds so fucking mean. The nature of his boasts in that verse are just so specific, so surgical, and, when you think about it, so psychologically fucked-up--like specifying that he made his girl use a fake credit card twice in the same store--that it kinda makes my skin crawl. As does the way he says (here and elsewhere) the word "whore," steadfastly refusing to slur it or shorten it to "hoe" or hurry over it; dude clearly wants whoever's listening to feel his absolute disgust.
As far as that particular line, you know, children pee in the bed when they're anxious, and I think his main point in this verse is making clear just how far he's got this chick broken down. Part of his making that point is underlining this particular childlike vulnerability she's got, right before he kicks a couple lines about fucking her in the car.
There's a reason I kinda prefer the instrumental, you know?
Two Skateboard Company Names I've Never Been Comfortable With:
Uncle Wiggley- Uncle. Wiggley. It was weird. Lots of plaid, if I remember correctly. Seems a creepazoid name.
You're tripping. Uncle Wiggily stayed fly with the sweet ride that had a turnip for a steering wheel and tires made from sausage. Fucking sausage, holmes!
You're just mad because your deck's not sittin' on links.
HarveyCanal"a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
Last 2 songs that have had me using the repeat function on my cd player in my truck:
Comments
1. On that note: www.sadyoutube.com
2. Bravo
Anyway:
My two favorite verses ever (in order):
- The second verse of Ghostface Killah???s ???One???
- Big Daddy Kane???s verse in the demo version of ???Raw???
The two basslines I first hear in my head whenever I see or hear the word ???bassline???:
- Tyrone Thomas And The Whole Damn Family ??? ???Seven Minutes Of Funk???
- Fab 5 Freddy ??? ???Down By Law???
Two instrumental intros made remarkable by the fact that there is almost no voice???Willie Nelson, Keith Murray, Lou Reed, Carly Rae Jepsen, whoever???that I cannot imagine coming in after them:
- Prince ??? ???I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man???
- Big Star ??? ???O My Soul???
Two songs that I???ve been listening to for a long time but that still make my head spin:
- Black Merda/Mer-Da - ???Lying???
I know songs that are more desolate and more don???t-give-a-fuck than this one, but man, something about the particular nihilism of ???truth don???t mean a thing to me / and lying, it don???t mean a thing to me??? hits me as just terminal. Total black-hole, bottom-of-the-universe shit. Life so often gets to a point where we want things to be simple, to be absolute, but then you hear something like this and realize that you probably don???t want it as simple as you think. This song is a lazy free-fall into something terrifying.
- Outkast ??? ???B.O.B.???
I???m gonna tell you two things so that I can tell you a third thing:
First: A few years back I spent a long time in front of a late-model mixed-media Frank Stella wall piece???it was probably about four feet by six feet, maybe bigger, overloaded and pullulating undeniably with color and texture. What really snared me was the realization???after looking at for a good while already???that peeking out from somewhere deep in the abundantly stacked strata were a number of low-relief carvings in sheets of thick plastic or rubber, which after a minute I recognized as the plates that had been used to print all the other pieces of the construction. I just kept going around and around, taking in this glorious thing that had buried within itself the tools of its own creation, and marveling at how it was so generous but still so closed.
Second: There???s a story by Terrence Holt called ???In The Valley Of The Kings??? that???s about an archeologist who, having noticed a gap in the otherwise meticulously annotated ancient history of Egypt???s pharaohs, goes searching for the pariah who occupied that gap, this outcast ruler who???d seen every mention of his life and reign so thoroughly expunged???his name cut out of every papyrus, chiseled off of every stone, sliced off of every tongue, for centuries???and removed entirely from the words of a people for whom words meant everything. What had been his crime? What could he possibly have done to have his existence obliterated so completely? The archeologist gradually loses his sanity to this monomania, but eventually locates, of course, the tomb, where he staggers for hours or days through a vast subterranean warehouse seemingly without ceiling, wall, or end, stacked beyond counting with artifacts, riches, and corpses. Just before the end of his rope, the archeologist realizes with a mixture of reverence and horror that the king was not erased from his own world, but in fact brought that world with him into death. All of it. Every cent, every word, every splinter, every citizen, he had them all buried with him.
So, I tell you all that just to tell you this: As Andre and Big Boi each continue to make their separate steps toward complicated individual visions and away from any real level of commercial or cultural relevance, there seems to be this growing insistence among those left behind that Outkast peaked with those first two or three albums anyway. And with no disrespect to all my down-home diehards, I am saying here today that that is bullshit, and that if Outkast really is over, the tragedy will not be the loss of whatever easy and muscular and eccentric swagger you first fell in love with, but will be the loss of the kind of maximalist and possible apocalypse represented by motherfucking ???B.O.B.??? That song comes on like septuplets, and brings within itself everything it needs; it???s got bass, it???s got scratching, it???s got MPC abuse, it???s got a gospel choir, it???s got Eddie Van Hazel guitar immolation, it???s got that thing in the first chorus where the first part(???Don???t pull that thang out / unless you came to bang!???) kinda swings against the beat a little but then when the second part (???Bombs over Baghdad!???) comes in it???s right on top of the beat and this already amazingly breakneck song seems to get pushed a half step faster, it???s open, it???s closed, it is the alarm and the fire, it is the pill and the headache, it is the book and the revelation, and I like fish and grits and all that pimp shit just as much as the next guy but god damn it, soulstrut, sometimes more is more.
Two interesting bits of pre-9/11 prophecy:
- Outkast, talmbout ???bombs over Baghdad??? in like 1999
- Herman Melville in Moby-Dick, talmbout ???Grand Contested Election For Presidency Of The United States??? and ???BLOODY BATTLE IN AFFGHANISTAN??? in like 1850.
Two groups that each essentially only have one song, but cot-dam, what a song:
- Q Lazzarus ??? ???Goodbye Horses???
- Juicy Bananas ??? ???Bad Man???
Two hooks I???m really feeling but am having trouble sneaking into conversation:
- ???So many nooses around my neck / as I stare at the sea waiting for the new ships???
- ???I am Damo Suzuki!???
Two somewhat revolting occurrences of music in the real world:
- I heard ???Calabria 2007??? playing out of the rolled-down windows of a black hearse.
- The last time I donated blood, I was attended by a nice Hispanic lady whose radio was playing David Lee Roth???s ???Just A Gigolo???
Two Alices:
- ??? ~ In My Fantasies??? - Funkadelic
- ??? ~ I Want You Just For Me??? ??? Full Force
The weekend starts here.
1) Twitty City
2) Maggie Valley ("Ghost Town In The Sky")
Yes! There was some NY-based station that somehow reached South Carolina and on which I used to watch old--and, notably, complete--episodes of Saturday Night Live, and those Mt. Airy Lodge ads had much allure. The Florida jernts, too ("When yoooo need it baaad / weeee've got it good! / Come to Flo-ruh-duh!').
1. Captain OG Readmore
2. "Don't be a dummy"
Two lines from The Simpsons that I use in regular conversations:
1. "Huh, it's raining again."
2. "Yeah, they'll do that."
Two movies I'm most likely to stop everything and watch when on television:
1. Goodfellas
2. Shaun of the Dead
Two Liz Phair songs I'll never tire of, current output be damned:
1. "Divorce Song"
2. "California"
Two artists my 1-year-old GOT DOWN to tonight:
1. D'Angelo
2. The Impressions
Two artists my 1-year-old does NOT enjoy:
1. Built to Spill
2. Thee Oh Sees
(Girl likes reggae the most; simple, steady beat.)
Yes to "Divorce Song." Two choices for #2:
1. "Go West"
2. "6'1'"
"Supernova" came up on my iPod the other day, and you know what? I played it twice. Still a quality tune.
Two things I sometimes unwittingly say in conversation just like they say on the record:
- Whenever I???m leading someone across a street or something, I'll say ???heeerrrre we go??? just like Slick Rick.
- When I???m shutting down a friendly argument or negotiation, I'll say ???Nah, nah???court is closed!??? just like Del Jones.
Two pieces of total mall-rat drum production that I nonetheless fuck with:
- The breakdown in Ke$ha???s ???Die Young.??? From corner to block to suburb, from figurative White Girl to actual white girl: the ???Grindin?????? beat begat ???Lip Gloss??? which begat this. Straight bleacher-stomp shit right here. Undeniable.
- The first twenty seconds of Uffie???s ???MCs Can Kiss.??? NWA???s ???Dope Man??? times Claire???s Boutique and played on 45. I feel like I need an instrumental and/or some penicillin.
Bands I used to think were the same band (US Edition):
- Psychic TV and Sleep Chamber. See, it???s like, the negative space between Sleep Chamber???s facing double E???s kinda somewhat resembled a Psychic Cross. In my teenage mind, this proved everything.
- L???Trimm and JJ Fad. I know I???m not alone.
Bands I used to think were the same band (UK Edition):
- Wee Papa Girls and Mel & Kim.
- Kevin Ayers and Kevin Coyne.
Underrated (record-related):
- Sly Stone
- Bruce Springsteen interviews. Mostly can???t really fuck with the music, though.
- Bonus Beat: Detroit???s Dave Hamilton
Overrated (record-related):
- Everyone.
- Everything.
- Bonus Beat: That one band you like.
Overrated (non-record-related):
- Juice.
- Getting drunk before supper.
Underrated (non-record-related):
- Kissing in a lawn chair.
- Fresh avocado with Crystal hot sauce.
Two non-rap phenomena that were formative to my young impression of New York City:
- Those ???I Love New York??? commercials.
- Bobby Brown???s ???On Our Own??? video.
Two excellent LP sides concerning our nation???s capital:
- Side One of Parliament???s Chocolate City.
- Side One of Dr. Buzzard Goes To Washington.
Two Canadian ladies who get props
overdown here:- Alice Munro. Fuck the haters.
- Lisa Robertson.
Two subtle/unsubtle but still-cool-by-me uses of sound effects in records:
- In Dionne Warwick???s ???Heartbreaker,??? the ascending synth swell that sounds like a rocket launching just as she sings ???my love is stronger than the universe??????
- In the Candyskins??? ???Wembley,??? the crowd-roar in the background the first time the titular word is sung.
Two things I???m almost never happy to hear from two artists I really love:
- Prince???s ???rap??? voice (see ???Alphabet Street???).
- Stevie???s ???tough??? voice (see ???Living For The City???).
Two vocal noises whose allure I may never get to the bottom of:
- The exclamatory ???oh!??? halfway through every chorus of The Bobette???s ???Mr. Lee.???
- Susan Cadogan???s lilting ???uh-wah, uh-wah??? in ???Nice And Easy.???
- Lifetime Achievement: Whatever that invisible and inaudible and inexplicable thing is that happens between the two syllables of ???wai-ting??? on the intro to Madonna???s ???Get Into The Groove.???
Two animation sequences that kinda fucked me up as a young youth:
- The ???Bunyip??? portion of Dot And The Kangaroo
- When Aslan gets ritually shorn and killed in The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe
- Honorable Mention: Lo Cole???s back-cover and interior illustrations for the Welcome To The Pleasuredome gatefold.
Two intense pieces of music:
- The acapella for Frankie Goes To Hollywood???s ???Relax.???
- The Numbers Band???s ???Narrow Road???
- Bonus Beat: DJ Shadow???s ???Give Me Back The Nights???
Two really great songs that effectively function as support systems for a single transcendent and final line:
- LCD Soundsystem???s ???All My Friends.??? While the lyrics of this song definitely evoke a widely communicable feeling, I think they only make any kind of literal sense if you???re James Murphy. The thing that keeps people trying, though???keeps people trying to take these really particular lyrics about a particular type of working dj of a particular age and particular prestige and reverse-engineer them into something/anything that is at all applicable to themselves???is the pure want, so raw and so universal, in the unfinished and possibly unfinishable sentiment of the last line: ???If I could see all my friends tonight??????
- Stevie Wonder???s ???Never Dreamed You???d Leave In Summer.??? Unlike the relative inscrutability of the above, it becomes clear pretty early on that this song is a stately march and slow build toward something. The vocals increase in volume and the track increases in complexity, setting you up for some big, baroque catharsis at the end. Nothing prepared me???and a thousand listens later there???s still nothing that can prepare me???for the gutting simplicity of ???Why didn???t you stay????, not exploded from his lungs or keened upward with all kinds of vocal fireworks, but sung strong and plain in a mid-range that feels like it could go on forever and ever, never finding a thing.
- Arguably: Van Morrison???s ???Cyprus Avenue.??? Seven inescapable and incredible minutes of grown-up obsession and image and longing, that takes a sharp turn to some other place just thirty seconds before it ends, with one of the only non-visual descriptions we are given of the object of his desire: ???fourteen years old.???
Two surprisingly affecting instrumental versions:
- The Lox???s ???Ryde Or Die B***h???.
- Pierre Perpall/Purple Flash???s ???We Can Make It.???
Two instances of weak hustle in my neighborhood:
- Evangelicals parked down the block whose efforts at ministry consist of cracking their driver-side power window like two inches whenever I walk past and trying to hand me a brochure through the slot, while they bump Keith Pringle or some shit at ear-bleed volume while talking on their cellphone with the rhinestone cross on it and not making eye contact. Fuck that--God don???t like lazy.
- This guy named Derric who runs a one-man car service, and has all these flyers up that show him posing by his all-black Navigator or whatever under the headline: ???Because Everybody Needs a Plan D.??? Like, if neither your first, second, nor third choice is available, holler at your dude, I guess. I briefly considered the possibility that maybe dude was, you know, talking in code or something???maybe talmbout drugs, or reaching out to the lonely ladies, or what have you???but I really get the feeling that he just didn???t think the shit through.
- Bonus Beat: Cross-dressers who just aren???t trying. The perennial issue.
Two beguiling sideways glances in music videos:
- Susanna Hoffs???s when she sings the title phrase in ???Walk Like An Egyptian.???
- Kim Deal???s when she sings ???I???ll be your whatever you want??? in The Breeders??? ???Cannonball.???
- Honorable Mention: Azealia Banks???s throughout ???212.???
- ???I am un CHIEN! (chaud!)???
- ???Slicing up hot dogs / I want you to know!
???Feel the wrath of my bombast!???:
- Patti Smith???s ???Because The Night.???
- Beginning Of The End???s ???Jump In The Water??? (not to be confused with the neutered Ray Munnings solo version).
Kindergartener dynamite, guaranteed like your man Joe Willie Namath:
- The Trashmen???s ???Surfin??? Bird???
- The Tree Stumps??? ???Jennie Lee??? played at +8
Two ways in which the ascent of Soul II Soul affected me and my circle of friends:
- We became less hostile to the idea of wearing proper trousers. My man Jones tried to perpetrate with a blazer and some houndstooth chef???s pants, but we gave him an "A" for effort.
- We kinda got off of some of our punk-rock ???Man, fuck a string arrangement!??? shit.
- Bonus beat: We were utterly entranced by the mysterious Soul II Soul Dancer Chick. On the album covers she was shown only in silhouette, and in the videos only in brief, shadowy glimpses. You never saw her in full light and all at once--she was like a sexier version of the creature from Alien.
Two fucked-up but nonetheless great bits of sentence construction:
- ???Whenever I feel like / not too great at all??? (Prince???s ???She???s Always In My Hair???)
- ???Let me tell you somethin??? / what I???m talkin??? about / I???ll bet my bottom dollar there ain???t a cherry in this house!??? (Jerry Lee Lewis???s ???Big Legged Woman???).
Two things I would totally rhyme if I were one of those smart-dumb super-scientifical rappers:
- ???Venus Hottentot???
- ???Ondes Martenot???
Two things I???m surprised that I can still listen to and enjoy in 2013:
- Foetus???s ???Butterfly Potion???
- Large portions of DJ Faust???s Man Or Myth
Two records I wanna hear doubled up:
- Ronnie Foster???s ???Midnight Plane???
- The horn break from ???Sussudio???
Two record-related trinities I am still trying to understand:
- 33, 45, and 78.
- White collectors, black genres, and Asian girlfriends.
Two girls??? names kinda buried in great songs:
- ???Kayla??? in Girls??? ???Lust For Life???
- ???Ruby??? in Billy Garner???s ???I Got Some???
- Bonus Beat: ???Donna??? in The Replacements??? ???Favorite Thing???
???You are forgiven!???:
- ???I was dreaming when I wrote this / Forgive me if it goes astray???
- ???I cried when I wrote this song / Sue me if I play too long???
Two Halloween costumes I???m considering:
- Putney Swope: I hide unseen in the bushes while my man Ernest to rings the bell and then lip-synchs while I rasp, ???Trick or treat, you sons of bitches!???
- Ninja Man: I wear a long wig and something with shoulder pads, high-step up to other people and diss them mercilessly until they are forced via crowd response to give me their candy. Mini-Zagnut pon tooth.
Two great cover versions:
- Sun City Girls??? ???Tell Me Something Good???
- Jai Paul???s ???Crush??? (I???d pay cash money to hear this dude do ???Perfect Way???)
- Dishonorable Mention: Me, deep into a thirsty evening this past summer, murdering Champaign???s ???Try Again.??? Hand gestures and everything, whoadie. Not a good scene.
Can't not do it actually. Help. Me.
Always loved that beat. Pretty sure Timbaland jacked the drums (or at least the snare) from the Pharcyde's "Runnin'" but fuck it--he used them well. Is that guitar riff a sample? I always wondered about that.
Also, that song has one really strange line from Jadakiss: "She miss him so much that she peein' the bed." Wait, what? Is that a thing that happens?
That's my man throwin' down! I haven't listened to that in a while, but there were parts that I absolutely played to death.
Two obvious signs that I'm on the wrong side of the "Am I officially old?" question:
1) I wake up every morning with back pain. Fun!
2) Afternoon drinking absolutely obliterates the rest of the day for me.
I'll give the two's a whirl:
Two songs with choruses that make my cry because of their beauty:
-"Earth, Wind, & Fire" by Earth, Wind, & Fire.
-"Footsteps in the Dark" by The Isley Brothers.
Two songs I hate to admit that I love:
-"Sky & Sea"-The Fifth Dimension.
-"Chuck E's in Love"-Rickie Lee Jones.
Two songs that epitomize good blue-eyed, modern-ish soul:
-"Let it Go" by Pages
-"Georgy-Porgy" by Toto.
Two songs that lead to happy endings:
-"Hold On, I'm Coming"-Sam and Dave
-(Hot Pants) I'm Coming"-Bobby Byrd
Two songs that were made to blend together on the mix:
-"Tour de France"-Kraftwerk
-"Egypt, Egypt"-The Egyptian Lover.
Two sisters in vocal (to me, anyway):
-Grace Slick
-Genya Ravan
Two great songs about travel by train:
-"Hitchcock Railway"-Jose Feliciano.
-"Back Up, Train"-Al Green.
Two great songs with 'court' in the title:
-"Court of Love"-The Unifics
-"Court's in Session"-KAOS.
"God Make Me Funky" never sounded so good (looped or programmed) except in:
-"Kick the Ball"-The Krown Rulers.
-"They Call Me Puma"-Puma.
These two songs are inextricably linked in my head:
-"Mother Beautiful"-Sly & the Family Stone
-"The Beautiful Ones"-Prince.
Two songs I give passes to despite having lead vocals that blatantly bite Michael Jackson:
.
Peace,
Big Stacks from Kakalak
I do this same exact thing. When texting though, I just respond like so:
Her: Dinner at 8p?
Me: Tone Loc.
Uncle Wiggley- Uncle. Wiggley. It was weird. Lots of plaid, if I remember correctly. Seems a creepazoid name.
Hook-Ups- unless it's a Jeremy Klein anime reference, I don't get it. Hook-Ups. Is it like sexing hook-ups? Product-flow bro hook-ups?
Oh, man. When it comes to nastiness--and I don't mean "nasty" like "Talk Like Sex" or "Wildflower," which at least have little bit of energy or emotion or whatever, but "nasty" like straight-up dead-eyed cruelty--Jadakiss is pretty tough to beat. I'm not gonna pretend like I don't enjoy anything he's done, but that dude just sounds so fucking mean. The nature of his boasts in that verse are just so specific, so surgical, and, when you think about it, so psychologically fucked-up--like specifying that he made his girl use a fake credit card twice in the same store--that it kinda makes my skin crawl. As does the way he says (here and elsewhere) the word "whore," steadfastly refusing to slur it or shorten it to "hoe" or hurry over it; dude clearly wants whoever's listening to feel his absolute disgust.
As far as that particular line, you know, children pee in the bed when they're anxious, and I think his main point in this verse is making clear just how far he's got this chick broken down. Part of his making that point is underlining this particular childlike vulnerability she's got, right before he kicks a couple lines about fucking her in the car.
There's a reason I kinda prefer the instrumental, you know?
You're tripping. Uncle Wiggily stayed fly with the sweet ride that had a turnip for a steering wheel and tires made from sausage. Fucking sausage, holmes!
You're just mad because your deck's not sittin' on links.
Rolling Stones - Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)
Raekwon - Knuckleheadz
When 2 secretaries are better than 1:
Only 2 artists I was interested in seeing at ACL Fest (had I gone):
Shuggie Otis
Kendrick Lamar
2 quarterbacks on my fantasy team bench who did better than my starter Andrew Luck this past weekend:
Sam Bradford
Terrelle Pryor
2 musicians I was happy to hear in deep conversation with each other just recently:
Mark Arm
Tim Kerr
2 political parties equally at fault for being assholes by design:
Republicans
Democrats
2 favorite 12" bonus beats of the moment:
Unknown DJ - Basstronic
Dynamix II - Purple Beats
2 favorite broccoli salads from Whole Foods:
Broccoli Crunch
Thai Broccoli Salad
2 world explorers I've been reading up on lately:
Ibn Battuta
Ferdinand Magellan
2 kinda cheesy 80's songs I always want to play at parties but don't:
Ronnie Milsap - There's a Stranger in My House
Cheap Trick - I Don't Love Here Anymore