Songs I listen to a lot (actual songs included)

schnipper · October 2005

ESG - Realist Rhymin Thought I might die when I heard this first. I have posted about this so many times. IN MY MOUTH DIAMONDS GLARING/WEARING NOTHING BUT DONNA KAREN

schnipper · October 2005

Frontline - Now You Know

WHA WHAT WHATTT that's Oakland
YEE YEII IIYIII that's Richmond
HEYYY HHEYYY that's Frisco

schnipper · October 2005

Becky Stark and Lavender Diamond - You Broke My Heart

I'm listening to this right now her heart is broken like a mf

ps fuck joanna newsom

catchdubs · October 2005

ps fuck joanna newsom

i agree. she's cute and weird.

oh wait were you hatting?

(growl noise)

schnipper · October 2005

ps fuck joanna newsom

i agree. she's cute and weird.

oh wait were you hatting?

(growl noise)

She's adorable with cute clothes (except the overalls) but her voice is like the voice my ten pound male bichon frise would have if he sang

Bapt · October 2005

Oh Baby! by RHYTHM FUNK CAMPAIGN

catchdubs · October 2005

you say that like its a bad thing

more songs plaese

schnipper · October 2005

Elliott Smith - Last Call

I used to play Castlevania III and listen to this CD over and over. From his first record. Lots of that squeaky sound when you move your hand up and down the neck of the guitar that makes you know he recorded it in some living room while smoking dope and watching cartoons on mute (If anyone have this LP and wants to trade it, please let me know)

schnipper · October 2005

Kelly Clarkson - Since You've Been Gone

If this counts as a 2005 song on the scale of best singles of the year it isn't as good as Go Crazy but it's better than Stay Fly. Just chill out and let yourself enjoy it

noz · October 2005

I used to play Castlevania III and listen to this CD over and over.

JRoot · October 2005

Elliott Smith - Last Call

From JRoot ------@---.--->
Sent Wednesday, October 22, 2003 10:22 am
Subject Elliott Smith

"I wanted her to tell me that she would never wake me..."
-Elliott Smith, "Last Call"

I am very sad to report that Elliott Smith died last night of an apparent suicide at his apartment in Los Angeles. Smith's understated, lyrical songs evoke in me places I've known, feelings I've had, and people I've loved. What follows is a personal account of my encounters with and enjoyment of Elliott Smith.

It was November 1997 and I was living in a house full of young white south african racists. Now you may think you know some racists, but I'm willing to bet that you have never known (much less lived with) people who would say things like "I wish Hitler would have come to South Africa" and mean it. It was a difficult couple of months, trying to re-educate these miseducated young folks while trying not to get into fistfights or invoke vandalism of my bedroom (which thankfully locked). I was also trying to figure out how on earth I was going to accomplish my ambitious fellowship goals in a country that I felt I knew less and less about with each day that I was living there. So it was a pretty isolated period.

I got a package notice from the South African Post Office. "That's strange," I thought to myself, "------ (my future wife) didn't tell me she was sending me anything. Who else would have sent me this package?" The illegible scrawl on the label appeared to read "Fillog". I don't know any Fillog. Stumped and curious, I headed over the hill to the post office - not the post office on my way to the University that I stopped at every other day to mail a letter, but the other one up Jan Smuts Avenue from Ninth Street. I was given a large box, roughly the size of a filebox, addressed to me from my brother J-------- and our longtime friend ------- ------.

This box was a godsend. It contained most of the things I missed about home - convenience-size boxes of cold cereal, a bag of hershey's kisses, six individually wrapped bottles of Bridgeport I.P.A. (Most S. African beer is mass-markted swill), an antique version of the Uncle Wiggly board game, two letters, and three tapes. It was on the tape that ------ ------ made that I first heard Elliott Smith's music.

There were not one, not two, not three, but FOUR Elliott Smith songs on the tape (Angeles, No Confidence Man, No Name #6, and Ballad of Big Nothing, if memory serves). As anyone who has seen --------- ----- stunning first feature film would know, putting multiple songs by the same artist on a mixtape is generally a no-no. Not only that, but I believe Ms. ------ spent a precious paragraph (maybe even two) describing how she was currently "really into" Elliott Smith.

My first reaction was "He's ok, but I don't know if he's worth four songs on one mixtape." I may have even sent Ms. ------ a letter detailing as much. As I listened to the mixtape more, though, the lyrics started to grow on me. And the soft melodies and understated guitar harmonies crept into me. By the time I got back to the U.S., I was a bona fide Elliott Smith fan. This without even witnessing the peculiarity of him bowing with Celine Dion at the Academy Awards.

"Clementine" was really the first Elliott Smith song I obsessed over. It's from his second record, which is self-titled "Elliott Smith". The song takes place in a bar, where it begins: "They're waking you up to close the bar..." The lyrics are intensely personal and intensely local. They have just the right amount of detail so that the song seems genuine without seeming trapped in one person's head. If it's too personal, the listener will feel trapped in the songwriter's experience instead of being transported into the listener's own memories. You know by the second line of the song that it has been raining. "Streets wet you can tell by the sound of the cars." The bartender is whistling an olde-timey standard - Clementine. This spins the drunken groggy narrator into a circle of doubt about his relationship, which he then tries to shake off by "making an angel in the snow" or doing "anything to pass the time and keep that song out of your mind." Then the song ends with words from the song, "Dreadful sorry clementine," demonstrating the narrator's failure to get both the song and the situation out of his head.

"Bled White", from his major label debut XO, also wormed its way deep into my consciousness. This isn't one of Smith's more acclaimed tracks, but living in New York for three years made "Bled White" seem pretty real. As with Clementine, Bled White conjurs a particular space. But where the space in Clementine is a small bar with a bartender and rain (almost certainly Portland, where the song was written), the space in Bled White is unmistakably New York City. And the only way to know it is by knowing that the New York city subway system has an F train (and a 4 train and a 9 train, if you follow the backup vocals). (Deep fans might also know it by following where Smith was living, which was Brooklyn at the time of XO.) More often than I'd care to admit, I would start singing the second stanza quietly to myself on the subway platform. "While I wait for the F Train and hook up with a friend of mine." I only took the F train to hook up with friends, so maybe it would be different if, like my then-girlfriend now-wife, I took it to work. Lyrically and musically, the song teeters on the brink of despair, with minor chords underlaying a major key melody and a generally fast tempo (for Smith at least). At the end of the song, the listener gest a naked look at what's going on: "I may not seem quite right, but I'm not fucked, not quite, Bled White."

I could go on like this about a lot of Elliott Smith's songs, but I'm sure we all have other things to do. Plus, I don't want to get too sappy. Clementine and Bled White, like a lot of Elliott Smith's songs, struck me as true in some personal way. People deal with things in their lives that they try to escape from, but unless they deal with them honestly (drinking, making snow angels, etc. are fun, but not exactly honest ways of dealing with doubt about a relationship), the things won't go away or get better. OR even if they do go away, you won't feel better about it because you didn't do anything to make it go away. So you'll find yourself drunk, in a bar, where it's raining outside, and the bartender is whistling a song that puts you right back into the mess which drove you to the bar in the first place. So you're a lot better off with honest self-assessment - you may be a little off but as long as you're "not quite" fucked, you'll be ok.

The untimely death of Elliott Smith has caught me very much off-guard. I expect I will listen to the music he produced during his lifetime for the rest of my life. I doubt there can be a greater tribute.

"I better be quiet now, I'm tired of wasting my breath, carrying on, not over it yet."

XO,
J-----

JATX · October 2005

ESG - Realist Rhymin Thought I might die when I heard this first. I have posted about this so many times. IN MY MOUTH DIAMONDS GLARING/WEARING NOTHING BUT DONNA KAREN

yo man ESG is the shit. i threw my Sailin Da South lp on the other day. dope Houston shit. anyone here collecting Houston vinyl? i need to fill a few gaps in the collection. Some of that shit is sooooo hard to find. i couldnt find half the records im looking for now when they first came out.

schnipper · October 2005

Matthew Dear - Dog Days

My second favorite thing on Ghostly second to James Cotton PRESS YOUR BODY which is so hard. This song is a little shake your shoulders pleasant but you can still tell it's techno

schnipper · October 2005

Elliott Smith - Last Call

From JRoot ------@---.--->
Sent Wednesday, October 22, 2003 10:22 am
Subject Elliott Smith

Jroot - who was this email addressed to? Though I am sure you left that off on purpose...

schnipper · October 2005

Pineapples - Come On Closer

For those of you who heard me bemoan the lack of gayness of the Jackmaster Dick 12", it was only because I'd spent the day before listening to this song over and over through very loud PA speakers in a basement in Poughkeepsie.

schnipper · October 2005

D4L - Laffy Taffy

I didn't hear this until late last week on the radio when a girl called up and it was her birthday request. The DJ was so bummed to play it and the MC mad fun of it and said it was made by like a third grader. The synths are SO GOOD. The first dude's voice reminds me of Meatloaf in Rocky Horror

jdeez · October 2005

anyone here collecting Houston vinyl? i need to fill a few gaps in the collection. Some of that shit is sooooo hard to find. i couldnt find half the records im looking for now when they first came out.

for instance???

JATX · October 2005

anyone here collecting Houston vinyl? i need to fill a few gaps in the collection. Some of that shit is sooooo hard to find. i couldnt find half the records im looking for now when they first came out.

for instance???

Lil Keke- Dont Mess With Texas
Fat Pat-Ghetto Dreams(i supposedly "just missed" the last copy Wreckshop had when i called the label to find it. they sent me a few other things though)
Botany Boys-Thought of Many Ways
5th Ward Boyz-Gangsta Funk
DJ Screw-3 in da Mornin(always heard rumors this was pressed on vinyl)

if anyone has any of these holler [email]Thedustywon@yahoo.com[/email]

schnipper · November 2005

Delia Gonzalez and Gavin Russom - 13 Moons

I downloaded this not super long ago but didn't listen to it, or half listened, until today. I have their 12" on DFA that sounds vague Steve Reich+Italo to me, but this is like super uber duper chill out with the piano and lack of drums. Now that I found a job I don't have much to occupy my time with during the day (not that refreshing mediabistro is all that awesome) so today I just sat around and stared at the wall, pet my dogs, and listen to this. I also almost finished the NY Magazine crossword. But not quite. Also this is eleven minutes long. So I have spent 88 minutes listening to it so far today.

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Songs I listen to a lot (actual songs included)

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