The coolest news is that my daughter found an official Daniel Johnston t-shirt in her size at a thrift store in town. She knows Daniel Johnston partially because of the "Hi, How Are You?" DJ-themed iPhone game she likes to play (she's playing it right now) and partially because her dad inundated her with his music while working on an article a couple years back. Months later she asked me, "Can we listen to that old man that sings like a teenager?" which, had it been available for swiping for my article, would've been my best line ever.
Right now I'm inundating her with Big Star for the same reason. I tried to ply her for a perfect line but no dice. I'll keep an eye on the t-shirt rack and maybe there's a Big Star shirt out there in my size (XL, in case you are looking to send me one.)
The second coolest news can be found in this week's Record Crate blog for 225, where I hype the screening of Still Bill, the excellent Bill Withers documentary at the Manship Theatre and the Mud-In celebration of Muddy Waters' birthday out at Teddy's.
Alex Chilton - Like Flies on Sherbert (lala) Pere Ubu with Sarah Jane Morris - "Long Live Père Ubu!" (lala)
I remember Like Flies on Sherbert being kind of a mess of a record at the time, but I think the Rhapsody accidental remix only messes it up further and accentuates the power of dischord. The glitch-blast of jazz disco at the beginning corrupts "Boogie Shoes" just as effectively as does the transformer meltdown guitars. There are other fuck-ups, like a bit of Bach piano showing up in another tune. None of these interruptions pop up on the lala version nor, if memory serves*, on the original. Maybe it's some hacker's joke, since nearly every memorial I've read makes mention of how much Alex Chilton loved Bach and how well he could play it. One hopes.
My outsideleft compatriot and rock writer Joe Ambrose wrote an excellent piece around "My Rival" blasphemously praising Chilton's later records in deference to the Big Star material.
An obituary in London's Guardian suggested that his solo post-Big Star work was second rate. I don't agree with this. I find Big Star's output to be Byrds-like (as opposed to being original) and sprinkled with substandard songs.
Byrds-like is not a dis in my book - the Byrds were excellent tour guides of the 60's and 70's deftly pointing out the beauty and the flaws and the beauty in the flaws, and that is what AC does quite pointedly all over Sherbert - but yes, yes, maybe, I dunno. I am working on my own Big Star re-visitation for elsewhere and am grappling with the actual vs. the revered vs. the third opponent of collective faked nostalgia.
Sherbert made me think of the corrupted pop of Pere Ubu, as did Perfect Sound Forever editor Jason Gross aka @JGrossnas's tweets from the confrontational (both internally and externally) performance of Ubu Roi by the band the other night.
Thomas channeling the real ubu character now, screaming & swearing at band- "I have to do everything myself!" #pereubu
A lot of people are laying down tracks that say Alex Chilton changed their life, and much as I love his music, I am not one of them. Alfred Jarry, the chicken-suit wearing, pistol-toting, asking-for-a-toothpick-on-his-deathbed-and-expiring-when-he-got-one, author of Ubu Roi, and godfather of all deliciously mad Frenchman and those who love them, did.
* "if memory serves" would be such a better title for this post but I've already had to change it twice because of my scatter-gun metaphoric practices.** ** I warned you the footnotes thing would get out of control once I started reading Infinite Jest.
24 Jónsi - Go(streaming at NPR) Big Star - Keep an Eye on the Sky (lala) Sun Ra and His Arkestra - Sun Ra and His Arkestra Playing "Horizon" (via ROOT BLOG)
Media announcements: My interview with justifiable populist darlings Vampire Weekend as well as a short profile about Bonnie 'Prince' Billy and his new album in preparation of his upcoming Preservation Hall appearance are online and in this month's issue of Offbeat.
In this month's Country Roads Magazine, I visit the Richard Sale Barn, an old cattle auction barn turned roots music venue in Arnaudville. It is one of the coolest places I've ever been. The photo above, of the Fellini poster next to the cow skull right by where I was sitting, is a perfect metaphoric talisman for this place. Here is a video of former Howlin' Wolf pianist Henry Gray performing "Little Red Rooster" on the stage where the auctioneer used to stand.
24 is the only show that only I in the house like, and I don't even really like it that much. It is the weak mongrel child of Wild, Wild West and a decade of cell phone commercials but it is still big fun. What is more fun is how my daughter has a running gag about trying to convince me that it is not running on any given Monday night. She'll try to trick me into missing it by saying the Olympics are on again, or instead there's "a show about man-eating babies" which I said sounded pretty good to me. I think she was more crestfallen than I was that it got canceled. My only hope is Kiefer Sutherland will "go rogue" to see the mission through in the space between television and life.
The Jónsi record is a jittery, twittery wonder of a thing, like a breathtaking surprise ending to the Neverending Story. When did NPR get hipper than us all? I have heard more good new music first from them in the past year than through my carefully maintained underground channels. Those guys should do a radio show!
ErykahBadu - "Window Seat" (video, NSFW, click on the ankh) Breaking Bad (website) David Foster Wallace - Infinite Jest (Amazon) The Fall - Your Future, Our Clutter (out soon)
The new ErykahBadu video is at the node connecting Maya Deren, historical appropriation, Shawn of the Dead, fine-assedness of the booty, and quick draw conceptualism. In other words, a few of my favorite things. The Fall is that mangy, barking dog that makes my hair stand on end no matter how many times I pass that yard. On the fence of that yard hangs one of Badu's discarded garments.
I'm guessing no one watches Breaking Bad because it either looks boring (it does a little but it isn't AT ALL) or you don't want to bone everybody on there (anybody) or you hate everybody on the show (you're supposed to) or you don't watch TV (good for you) but it is the best thing on TV right now, occupying a similar node of high art, camp, and mirror sharpness that I can't quite get my metaphor around.
I should put all this into a spreadsheet like I suggested most of the science fair kids do with their projects this afternoon. The good ones realize that the point of inquiry is not to know but to find out what else you find out.
Infinite Jest took a surprising turn toward the sweet around page 190-something, which kinda saved me from putting it down. It was starting to seem like a elaborate and artful scaffold around the Emptiness Inside, but no, there is life squirming around in there.
Edited to add: There's a ballad on the new Fall album, like a convincing one. That is a surprising turn toward sweetness.
20 SciFi Disco Videos That Were Made By Insane People (link)
I want to be Dee D. Jackson's backup singer and watch her fly around like a dove from within my robotic shell. You say insane, I say visionary. For instance, this is what's it gonna be like in my house all the time in the future, applause included.
The Droids - "The Force'
And if you want to know how I stay so fit...
Koto - "Jabdah"
OK I'll stop. It does bring me once again to the greatest all-time synthesizer medley from the 1985 Grammys featuring Thomas Dolby, Howard Jones, Stevie Wonder, and Herbie Hancock. I do plan, in the future, to control things with touch pad portables while wearing an Amadeus wig, along side Stevie Wonder if he's down.
(1) My official birthday portrait from Maya. (2) I broke out the infinite boogie machine from its case (3) to pry open my third eye on the eve of my 41st birthday. There is no quibbling allowed as to when things start now; I am officially in my forties, which is fine by me. I can't wait until I can start wearing those kick-ass cable knit sweaters and loafers all the time. Fortified by a sausage, cheese, and jalapeño kolache from Ambrosia (4) ,we high-tailed to the Audubon Zoo, that place where famously you were "aks'd" for by all, and almost got eaten by awesome animatronic dinosaurs (5). We flaunt our geographic privilege and new car by hopping over to New Orleans two days in a row. Then back home for (6) homemade goat cheese and sausage pizza and (7) a stellar strawberry cake also from Ambrosia. Today, on the real day, I get to perform my favorite ansillary work task, judge the state science fair (8). It is a lucky man whose life is filled so richly filled with sausage, dinosaurs, and the scientific method.
Suicide - The First Album (lala) Alex Robinson - Too Cool to be Forgotten (Amazon) Uncle Tupelo - Anodyne(lala) Wilco - A.M. (lala)
To all, but particularly Lori, poutine queen of Los Angeles, behold! The fries with gravy at Parkway Bakery & Tavern in New Orleans, with the equally mindbending roast beef poboy behind it. This meal quickly becomes a crime scene. The gravy on the fries is the same roast beef. Repeat that sentence as your new mantra. Jerri and I set out on a day of museum-going, but after this we decided to motor back on the belly of this wondrous carnage.
Underneath are the farmer's market bounty of near-translucent creole and grape tomatoes and an orgy of strawberries.
I walked the dog to Suicide this morning and thought a John Waters-suburbia fetish video would be perfect for this music. Mink Stole taking out the trash. Patty Hearst walking a terrier.
I'm sure a million others share this sentiment for a million reasons: Uncle Tupelo should have never broken up. They could have grown apart/together in the stupid auspices of a stupid band and pushed and pulled in their own directions. My wife rightly points out they sound like angels on Anodyne.
Not that Wilco is exactly a slouch band in my opinion. I salute their nebulous expansion, but man, nothing sounds as good as their first record on the highway.
