You Call Can Him… John Wesley Harding

October 21, 2011

Back when I was in high school, British folk-rocker John Wesley Harding first wooed me with an earnest acoustic guitar cover of Madonna’s (then quite recent hit) “Like a Prayer” (from an EP he called God Made Me Do It), and then with a great big horn-backed celebration (?) of the dark side of mankind called “The Devil In Me”. Although he’s been a most prolific artist for the past two decades, I lost touch with him somewhere between high school diploma and college degree. But with his latest video, he takes me all the way back to middle school, with some help from his comedian pal Eugene Mirman (better known perhaps as “The Fertility Clown”). The song is called “Sing Your Own Song”, from the album The Sound of His Own Voice, and as much as the video borrows from a Paul Simon classic, the song itself is a virtual re-write of Mama Cass by way of Sesame Street.

Oh, and did I mention you can download the song for free from Amazon? You’re welcome.

We Break Easy: Ten Songs I Was Listening to on September 11, 2001

September 10, 2011

10 years ago – y’know, before iPods and stuff – it was my general practice to keep a mix CD of my current favorite songs in my car to listen to on my way to and from work. And then, every week or so, I’d make a new CD, replacing the songs I was tired of with fresh new ones. I was listening to one such CD Tuesday morning, September 11, 2001. On my way home from work that day, I was struck by how eerie some of the songs felt in light of the day’s events – the same way the absolutely perfect blue sky of that day took a sinister cast once its perfection had become so abruptly purified of the usual air traffic.

In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, radio programmers were purging their playlists of songs that, however popular before, suddenly felt insensitive or inappropriate. The nu-metal act Drowning Pool had scored a breakout hit that summer with a song called “Bodies”, a tribute to the joyful violence of a moshpit. The song had been ubiquitous on rock radio and MTV2 all summer, and suddenly it was gone. Similarly, Jimmy Eat World’s then just-released third album Bleed American was pulled from the market, only to reappear a couple months later, euphemistically retitled as Jimmy Eat World. In the place of those “troubling” songs, came Five For Fighting’s “Superman” (at the time, a 6-month old single that had previously fizzled at radio, like it’s superior – and more troubling – predecessor “Easy Tonight”), and a new version of Enya’s “Only Time”, tricked out with 9/11 audio verite.

In the meantime, I kept my little mix CD, and while I already loved most of the songs on it, the fact is, they’d taken on a whole new dimension for me (in the same way that Five for Fighting song did for so many others). Even now, hearing any one of these songs in any context has a sort of time travel effect, and I’m back on that beautiful, horrible Tuesday morning.

Eventually Bleed American got its original title back. And “Bodies” would eventually be revived, not only as theme music for professional wrestling, but also as an instrument of torture at Guantanamo. And eventually, my little CD got a little beat-up – CD burning was still a relatively new thing at that point, and my home made mix CDs had pretty short playable lives. But I kept the tracklist, and here are ten highlights, presented with no further comment, in the order in which they appeared on my CD.

1. “Crystal” by New Order

2. “Working Girls (Sunlight Shines)” by The Pernice Brothers

3. “Sometimes” by Ours

4. “We Need a Resolution” by Aaliyah

5. “Packt Like Sardines in a Crushd Tin Box” by Radiohead

6. “Hellbent” by Kenna

Kenna – Hell Bent by Kenna

7. “Blizzard of ’78″ by Ida

[no video available]
“Fixing an eye on the hopeful in a heartless room / you’ll be done soon /
Snow is falling down and the whole damn town / is covered in white”

8. “Broke” by The Beta Band

9. “Getting Away With It (All Messed Up)” by James

10. “I Want Love” by Elton John

This Is Awesome: Fanfarlo’s New Song and Video “Replicate”

September 10, 2011

“Will it replicate inside our bodies now?” That’s the question at the center of a new song from the British quintet called Fanfarlo, and every time I hear that line, it makes me want to go back and listen to the verses to try to discern just exactly what “it” is. And I still haven’t quite got it.

Fanfarlo’s debut album Reservoir was one of the more charming records of the last couple of years – a collection of lyrical indie-folk songs, delivered in Simon Balthazar’s lilting troubadour tenor over all manner of acoustic strings, horns, piano and percussion, roughly splitting the difference between (the band) James’s most bombastic moments and the The Decemberists’ most modest, with a loving nod to the singer-songwriter pop of the 70s. Not only are they an effortlessly charismatic live act, they’ve also put out some great videos, as evidenced by last year’s Twilight Zone-ish “Fire Escape”.

Following some extensive touring behind that first record, the band retreated to a “remote slate quarrying town in Northern Wales” to record its follow-up, and are previewing the album with a video (and free mp3 download) of “Replicate”. The song is a surreal and suspenseful compendium of unanswered questions, sung over tense strings, diabolically playful little organ doodles and haunted house woodblock percussion. Its verses feel like an update on a Bernard Herrmann film score, and after asking one last time – Will it replicate inside our bodies now? – the song comes to an abrupt end without reaching any kind of catharsis or resolution. Just: over.

I can’t wait for this album.

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