Archive for the 'Music' Category

in Brooklyn

paperhaus May 25th, 2010

Today I walked down a sidewalk in Brooklyn as the last light left the sky. On one side of the road, a park, with people playing, you know, games with balls, and on the other, brick row houses, all set back enough from the road to have gardens, almost every garden full of plants full of blooms and greenery and happy spring overgrowth. I watched a speckled bird, bigger than a sparrow, smaller than a robin, hop in front of me. I couldn’t tell you what kind of bird it was, and I was focusing on it as if somehow its name might suddenly make itself known, so I didn’t notice the music at first. But as I caught up to the bird — which hopped, with some annoyance, into a sheltered pile of leaves that may have been its home — there was clearly and loudly big band music spreading out over the sidewalk. On a porch, behind the only weedy yard on the block, an old man sat listening to swing music on a boom box. It was the most perfect sound ever, and I would have stayed right there, but I feared annoying him as much as I had annoyed the bird. I continued on the sidewalk, bought beer from the bodega, and came back — and there it was again, the old man’s swing music. He had the boom box, squat and white, facing him, and the way I remember him is with his hands on it, as if holding it there in precarious balance on the brick rail of the porch, but even if he thought the music was just for him, it wasn’t. It was for me too.

A good end

paperhaus October 28th, 2009

Although yesterday began grimly, it ended well. Jonathan Lethem read at the LA Public Library’s ALOUD series, and answered questions, and was kind enough to hang out for a cocktail afterward with people who’d paid a small fee. I interviewed him on Friday for Jacket Copy, over the worst Skype connection ever, so it was nice to hear his voice without an echo and meet him in person.

I went to the cocktail thing, but the room was too sit-down-y so Chris and I headed to the bar to grab drinks, hoping people would mingle soon. I sat near a tall man, who agreed that he didn’t much like the room either. He ordered food, and then his friend showed up; as they were talking and we were talking Chris recognized the friend. We exchanged a few words with him, as he and the tall man were leaving. Which would be entirely unremarkable, really, if he hadn’t been John Taylor from Duran Duran.

The 15-year-old me is still screaming. On the outside, though, I’m going to try to be cool.

Oh noes! The bright spot on the LA radio dial just went dark.

paperhaus January 15th, 2009

Was it just this morning that I was listening to Indie 103.1 on the radio in the car while driving to work? I could have sworn it was. I heard music, I heard the news, I heard the AM DJ and the morning news chick talking about the song that was on just before her report.

Then, four hours later, I got in the car and punk rock blasted out of the radio. It was time for Jonesy’s Jukebox, and he plays whatever he feels like, including his own guitar. I don’t get to drive and hear Steve Jones much, so I was excited. But …. no. The song ended and this roboannouncement began:

Indie 103.1 will cease broadcasting over this frequency effective immediately. Because of changes in the radio industry and the way radio audiences are measured, stations in this market are being forced to play too much Britney, Puffy and alternative music that is neither new nor cutting edge.…

What will be playing over 103.1 FM in Los Angeles won’t be pop but Mexican rythmic and Cumbia music — that’s the word from Franklin Avenue, which outlines Indie’s recent history.

Back when Clearchannel owned Indie, I was mighty skeptical. There was my bitchy post at LAist, which I can’t pull up right now because their search is fubar, about just how un-indie Clearchannel was. But the corporate parent changed, and over the years I’ve been won over — particularly by Steve Jones — and when I moved back to LA, having a really fucking awesome music station to listen to on the radio was one of the things that made me truly happy.

Oh, I’ll still listen to my NPR news, to my Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, to my Marketplace. But as for music? I’m abandoning LA radio.  KCRW is no fucking consolation.

The last five things I heard on Indie, between repeats of the announcement of RoboDoom:

Black Flag - “Gimme Gimme Gimme”
Sex Pistols - “Anarchy in the UK”
Buzzcocks - “Harmony in My Head”
X - “The New World”
The Clash - “Guns of Brixton”

Michael at Franklin Avenue heard Johnny Clash and Sinatra. Put that all together and what you get is me  listening to them online (”Valley Girl” by Moon Unit Zappa, currently). But it’s not the same.

Frivolous and childish

paperhaus August 20th, 2008

If you saw a redhead drive past you today in a ridiculously large silver pickup, and this song was blasting, yes, I admit, it was me. I’m a troublemaker.

Cheap Trick, Beatles signifier

paperhaus June 29th, 2008

hollywood bowl - ian ball

If I were up on my semiotics I’d be able to fully explore the layers of sign and symbol I experienced last night at the Hollywood Bowl.

1. 41st Anniversary of Sgt. Pepper’s
2. Sgt. Pepper’s performed live at the Hollywood Bowl
(2a. Although the Beatles twice performed at the Hollywood Bowl, both shows were before Sgt. Pepper’s)
3. Sgt. Pepper’s performed by Cheap Trick with the LA Philharmonic
(3a The Beatles broke up in 1970. Cheap Trick formed in 1971).
4. Guest vocalists joining Cheak Trick: Ian Ball (Gomez), Simone (daughter of Nina) and Billy Corgan (despite all his rage, he’s still a Smashing Pumpkin).
(4a - where to begin? I’m overwhelmed.)

Cheap Trick and Ian Ball and Billy Corgan seemed driven by a true love of the original music. Ball’s performances were incredibly winning, combining a personal spin with a respect for the originals. Corgan was good, too, if nasally/whiny in that classic Corgan way. But Rick Nielsen made the night, with occasional admonishments to the audience and general onstage enthusiasm.

The thing is, as much as seeing Cheap Trick fulfilled some latent schoolgirl dream, there’s nothing that wonderful about seeing Cheap Trick cover the Beatles. It’s kind of a (forgive me) cheap trick. If I’m going to see them live — and believe me, part of me is ashamed to admit this — I want to hear Surrender. I want to hear I Want You To Want Me. The only Cheap Trick song they played last night was an old buried track that wasn’t even a B-side — which is fine, in the midst of a show when the goods are delivered, but here they stuck to being the Beatles. But there’s no changing the fact that they’re Cheap Trick — if they were just a group of aging musicians doing Beatles covers, they wouldn’t be on stage at the Hollywood Bowl.

What’s more, in a Beatles cover show — and I am a lesser person for having been to one, let’s agree on that — there’s something unseemly about having the same guy sing both the Paul McCartney and John Lennon parts. Their two individual personalities brought an electric tension to the band, especially circa Sgt. Pepper’s in 1967. Not that Robin Zander didn’t make a valiant attempt — he hit the notes, generally — but his bombastic style flattened almost all the songs into a high gloss rock, lacking the nuance of either original Beatle (let alone them both).

As for how the George Harrison songs were handled, let’s just skip the guy best known for his performance in Beatlemania, and the sitar group who are probably great musicians but looked like extras from that new Mike Meyers’ movie. As for Simone — she’s a performer. That’s as nice as I can be.

The Hollywood Bowl is a wonderful place to see and hear music — outdoors, most everyone carrying in their own bottles of wine and delicious snacks — and last night, not too hot or cold, was almost sold out. Apparently Cheap Trick did Sgt. Pepper’s last year, for the 40th anniversary, and it went over so well they brought it back for this year. Do people love the Beatlesness of it? It’s only Beatles-ness — no Ringo in the house, and no Sir Paul. Are people so mad for the Beatles, so many years later, that even a simulacrum brings them joy?

If so, why am I such a spoilsport. Above, the Hollywood Bowl with excellent Ian Ball singing, although too teeny for you to tell; below, same thing, with Billy Corgan.

billy corgan at the hollywood bowl

Have you seen my wig around?

paperhaus June 24th, 2008

Tod Goldberg posts some fantastic photos of a 1990 Jane’s Addiction show. One really captures the dynamism of Perry Farrell’s movement and the crunch of the crowd into the band. I saw them live in a small show about this time, maybe earlier, and after drinking two 40s of malt liquor was asked to tend the door because I was the most sober person the organizers knew. I didn’t have a camera with me, and if I did, I wouldn’t have had the sense to use it or hold onto it during the massive property destruction that followed. But even in that state, I had more sense than Dave Navarro — dude, please don’t do the ratted mini-dread thing again.

Author Rabih Alameddine creates a playlist for his book The Hakawati at Largehearted Boy, and it’s far from Hollywood fare: “Oum Kalthoum, the voice of the Arab people, is the more famous. Five million Egyptians attended her funeral in 1975. The second is Munir Bashir, (1930-1997), the great Iraqi oud player, who single-handedly revived classical Arab music.”

Beck and Dangermouse. Important? Cool? Geniusy?

UPDATE: the headline is from “Jane Says,” a song by Jane’s Addiction. Me, I don’t own a wig.

Also from the annals of proto-hipster Silverlake music scene lore

paperhaus June 11th, 2008

Stew’s play, the semi-autobiographical Passing Strange, is up for seven Tony Awards, including Best Musical. The real bigtime Tony Awards for Broadway shows. The real bigtime humdinger of them all, Best Musical.

And that would be Stew (aka Mark Stewart) who led The Negro Problem, a band that was never as punk as its name might have you believe. In fact, it was pretty poppy. Some called it psychedelic pop. Others called Stew a Black Bacharach, which has a nice kind of rhythm. Anyway, The Negro Problem was never an outstanding band, although it had its fans, and most everyone praised Stew’s talents. But the band was too dorky — it was compared to Randy Newman and to Hootie & the Blowfish — with songs too round and pretty and polished to be played in rock clubs full of beer and angst.

Where they belonged, apparently, was Broadway. Stew’s Passing Strange has now won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Musical, the Drama Desk Award for Best Musical, the Obie for Best Musical. And now all these Tony nominations — Stew has tied a record for nominations in a single year. Holy moley.

More literary stuff coming, after I get these LA flashbacks out of the way.

Origins of a slacker vampire

paperhaus June 9th, 2008

Long ago I sat on the floor of a dilapidated craftsman duplex on a dark street that ended abruptly at the precipice of the Hollywood freeway. In the house was a band, the Geraldine Fibbers, a band that was well-known around LA, known for its twisted punk-country sound and Carla Bozulich’s extraordinary voice, known, like so many other bands, to be independently releasing their records. Until that day. That day they’d decided to sign with a label, they told us, but they didn’t want to say who it was until they’d gone in and signed the contracts.

They told us this only after a while, and I think after a few beers.* They told us this because we were there to interview them for Fizz Magazine, me, inexperienced and really quite clueless, and Gabe Soria, who had done this band interviewing thing before and came prepared, with questions, he’d actually written down — in advance.

Today, the San Francisco Chronicle reviewed Life Sucks, a slacker vampire comic from First Second written by Gabe Soria and Jessica Abel, drawn by Warren Pleece.

Gabe Soria wrote a comic? Cool!

I had to make sure it was the same Gabe Soria, though. And I found evidence that seems to indicate it must be. In this interview, he provides a list of songs his slacker protagonist might listen to: two CDs by the band Possum Dixon, another Fizz fave (was Gabe there for that Possum Dixon interview, when the guitar player told us how to smuggle drugs into jail?), and one CD by none other than the Geraldine Fibbers.

Congrats to Gabe Soria on Life Sucks! And for being the one who’s getting interviewed these days. I bet it doesn’t take as much prep work.

* Although if you read the interview as it ran in Fizz Magazine, it starts with the news of picking a label — which was Virgin, by the way — but I recall lots of small talk and hanging out before we ever got there. The magic of editing.

Liz Phair rocks a book review

paperhaus April 5th, 2008

liz phair dean wareham

Liz Phair reviews Dean Wareham’s memoir in the New York Times this weekend. Flash back to 1994 and tell me that the Exile in Guyville girl would be writing a review of the book by that guy from Galaxie 500 for no less than the Gray Lady of the NY Times, and I would have tried to take away your crack. And yet, the review is good — I mean a good read. And it seems that the book is, too.

Freddie Mercury once said, “I want it all and I want it now.” This appetite might aptly be called the rock ’n’ roll disease, and Dean Wareham seems to have caught it. Or is in recovery. Or is somewhere along the road. Part confessional, part unsentimental career diary, Wareham’s “Black Postcards: A Rock & Roll Romance” reads like good courtroom testimony: to the point, but peppered with juicy and unsolicited asides….

He portrays himself as a surprisingly unsympathetic character. He visits a prostitute. He makes people angry. He follows girls home after the show. He snorts coke. No apologies are made because this is, after all, a rock ’n’ roll autobiography. Late nights, a lot of drugs, a little infidelity (well, maybe not just a little, but I won’t give away the ending) — that’s par for the course, right? His honesty is challenging and humbling. Yet, for an egghead (Wareham is a graduate of both the Dalton School, the progressive and prestigious Upper East Side preparatory academy, and Harvard) with an elective reading list to rival Art Garfunkel’s (Thomas Mann, Mark Twain, André Malraux, Nietzsche, to name a few), he seems perfectly happy to partake in whatever recreational opportunities come his way, with enviable disregard for the consequences. Guilty? Not guilty? What are we as a jury to think?

Wareham talked to a Canadian music website while working on the book:

It’s a self-serving memoir about what it’s like to be in a band. It’s coming along, it’s been very difficult for someone who usually writes lyrics. That is something you can hide behind, but when writing something like this, people want to know how you feel. It has to be more expansive. You can’t hide.

Since I’ve started writing a book, I’ve started reading again. Writing forces me to use a part of my brain that I thought was dead. I’m reading more, I’m reading a lot of history books — about the French Revolution, for example.

I guess I always secretly suspected the indie rockers were erudite. Although I hadn’t known, until I read it in the New Yorker, about Art Garfunkel.

I’ll make this quick

paperhaus August 29th, 2007

If 800 words is not enough for Heidi Julavitz, its not enough for Mark Sarvas, either.

Punk is dead, part 2007: Hilly Kristal, founder of legendary punk club CBGB’s, died of lung cancer yesterday.

One of the bands known for playing CBGBs was The Ramones. Their 2.5 minute song “Beat on the Brat” has all of 45 words (only 21 if you don’t count repeats - and that’s counting “uh-oh” as two).

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