what’s new
an occasional series
I’ve got a song for you to listen to . . .
—my (23-year-old) son Alex
tUnE-yArDs, “Bizness”
take 1: live, Austin (SXSW), 3/18/11
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
take 2: recording & video, 2011
Vodpod videos no longer available.
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lagniappe
reading table
John Ashbery, “Interesting People of Newfoundland”
(Skip the gaseous intro; the good stuff starts at 1:02.)
There’s nothing quite like riding a train that feels like it’s going to run off the rails and yet, somehow, it doesn’t.
Mike Watt + the Missingmen (MW, bass & vocals; Tom Watson, guitar & vocals; Raul Morales, drums), with guests (Joe Biza, guitar; Bob Lee, drums), “The Red and the Black,” live, Los Angeles (Safari Sam’s, Hollywood), 3/31/07 (benefit for musician Richie Hass)
Vodpod videos no longer available.two takes
“Will You Love Me Tomorrow” (Gerry Goffin & Carole King)
This could go wrong in so many ways. But it doesn’t.
Bryan Ferry, live, TV broadcast (Later with Jools Holland, BBC), 1993
Vodpod videos no longer available.*****
The Shirelles, 1960
Vodpod videos no longer available.**********
lagniappe
sight seen
In Cambridge, Massachusetts, sitting on a brick sidewalk in Harvard Square, a panhandler with a large sign:
I HAVE A
DREAM
OF A
CHEESEBURGERHold the Pickle
favorites
(an occasional series)
Here—with a shout-out to my brother Don, with whom (at the age of 15) I saw the MC5 in Chicago’s Lincoln Park during the 1968 Democratic Convention (when nobody outside the Detroit/Ann Arbor area [including us] knew who they were)—is an awfully good cover, from what might seem an unlikely source, of one of their “greatest hits.”
Jeff Buckley, “Kick Out The Jams,” live, Chicago, 1995
And here, courtesy, apparently, of the Department of Defense, is (silent) footage of the scene in Lincoln Park on August 25, 1968—the day the MC5 (who appear here fleetingly) played.
(Originally posted 9/7/09.)
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lagniappe
on the road
Last night, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where I’ve been since Sunday, I heard a concert, on the Harvard campus, of contemporary music featuring two different groups (Oberlin Contemporary Music Ensemble and Ensemble SurPlus) and works by six different composers, including Morton Feldman and John Luther Adams (who was present). Virtually every time I hear live music—last night was no exception—I leave thinking that I really need to do this more often. I love recordings, but live music breathes.
*****
Tonight, in Boston, I’ll be in the front row for this production of Merchant of Venice. Tomorrow I’m seeing a series of short works by Samuel Beckett, directed by the legendary Peter Brook. So that’s three straight days of live music. (What’s theater, after all, if not musical speech?)
Vodpod videos no longer available.
four takes
“Everybody Needs Love” (Eddie Hinton)
Drive-By Truckers, live, Ashland, North Carolina, 2010
Vodpod videos no longer available.*****
Eddie Hinton, live, c. 1982
Vodpod videos no longer available.*****
Eddie Hinton, recording, 1982
Vodpod videos no longer available.*****
Drive-By Truckers, live (TV broadcast [Conan]), 3/8/11
Vodpod videos no longer available.**********
lagniappe
overheard
Sunday morning, on a plane from Chicago to Boston, a young girl in the row in front of me:
I just don’t get how air is bumpy.
***
Do people in Boston have accents?
Original?
Nah.
But, uh, who cares?
The Hives, “Hate To Say I Told You So,” live, France (Belfort), 6/30/07
*****
Many of my most vivid musical experiences were the product of serendipity. A few years ago, I spent a long weekend in Oxford, Mississippi, where, as it turned out, these guys had just finished recording an album. Saturday night, as a farewell, they played a little club off the Square. Floor-rumbling, bone-rattling loud they were—and a whole lotta fun.
Proud Larry’s, Oxford, Mississippi
*****
Don’t try to tell me there’s anything incongruous—anything at all—in loving Beethoven and loving Chopin and loving Del Shannon.
Del Shannon, December 30, 1934-February 8, 1990
“Runaway” (with Burton Cummings [Guess Who], piano), 1982
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
“I Go To Pieces,” 1988 (?)
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
“Sea of Love,” 1982
Vodpod videos no longer available.**********
lagniappe
One of the best ever [Ornette Coleman, 3/9/11].
I am so glad I am on this list!!
If making mindless music is so easy, how come so few do it well?
Ramones, live, London, 1977
#1
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
#2
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
#3
Vodpod videos no longer available.*****
lagniappe
reading table
Life on Earth is quite a bargain.
Dreams, for one, don’t charge admission.
Illusions are costly only when they’re lost.
The body has its own installment plan.—Wislawa Szymborska, “Here” (excerpt; trans. Clare Cavanagh & Stanislaw Baranczak)
The other night, near the end of his big show at Madison Square Garden,
after bringing his opening act back onstage, the little guy played this.
Prince & Cee Lo (Cee-Lo?) Green, “Crazy,” New York, 2/7/11
Vodpod videos no longer available.Like a lot of great music, this song first reached my ears (shortly after its release) through my younger son Luke, who, one day as I’m driving him across town to a friend’s house, says he has something to play me and slides this into the CD player, cranking the volume way up.
You weren’t there Saturday (neither was I); but, hey, we’re here now.
North Mississippi Allstars (Luther [guitar] & Cody [drums] Dickinson [sons of the wonderful Jim Dickinson]), “Let It Roll,” “Ain’t No Grave,” live, Atlanta (Criminal Records), 2/5/11
Vodpod videos no longer available.**********
lagniappe
Keys to the Kingdom (new album)
Vodpod videos no longer available.*****
reading table
Country Fair
If you didn’t see the six-legged dog,
It doesn’t matter.
We did, and he mostly lay in the corner.
As for the extra legs,One got used to them quickly
And thought of other things.
Like, what a cold, dark night
To be out at the fair.Then the keeper threw a stick
And the dog went after it
On four legs, the other two flapping behind,
Which made one girl shriek with laughter.She was drunk and so was the man
Who kept kissing her neck.
The dog got the stick and looked back at us.
And that was the whole show.—Charles Simic
Simic reads this here, beginning at 2:08:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
music clip of the day 