rock/pop | music clip of the day

Wednesday, 10/13/10

Today, celebrating our 400th post, we revisit a few favorites.

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street music

Whatever it is, this guy’s got it.

(Originally posted on 8/25/10.)

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take two (or is it one?)

Following up on Vijay Iyer’s take (6/30/10), here’s the original.

M.I.A., “Galang” (2005)

One of the things I love about M.I.A. is that she doesn’t let any of the usual stuff get in her way. Take her dancing, for instance: she’s, uh, not real good at it—at least not by the usual standards. Does that stop her? Nah.

(Originally posted on 7/2/10.)

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Guitar, drums—that’s all it takes.

Bambino (AKA Bombino), live, Niger (Agadez), 2010

Part 1

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Part 2

(Originally posted on 8/9/10.)

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2010

Friday, 10/8/10

Things going wrong?

You’ve come to the right place.

This’ll make you feel all right.

Them (with Van Morrison), “Mystic Eyes,” “Gloria,” live (TV broadcast), France, 1965

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2010

Thursday, 10/7/10

How many tracks this terrific have engendered videos this nutty?

Rosanne Cash, “The Wheel” (1993)

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2010

Monday, 9/27/10

Something new to sing in the shower.

Felix del Pilar Perez Castro, “Amor Loco,” Soy Cuba (I Am Cuba, 1964)

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lagniappe

Paul Anka, “Crazy Love” (1958)

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mail

In response to yesterday’s clips:

Amen!

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2010

Friday, 9/17/10

Many years ago, when I was younger than my sons are now (22, 19), I listened to this album (Forever Changes) day after day after day.

Arthur Lee and Love, “Alone Again Or,” “A House Is Not A Motel,” England (London), 2003

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2010

Friday, 9/10/10

Elvis—blues singer

Elvis Presley, “Stranger In My Own Home Town,” live (rehearsal), 1970

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lagniappe

Percy Mayfield, “Stranger In My Own Home Town” (1964)

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art beat

Stranger in Paradise: The Works of Reverend Howard Finster, Chicago Cultural Center, through 9/26/10 (in the gallery next to The Jazz Loft Project, W. Eugene Smith in NYC, 1957-1965, there through 9/19/10)

Mr. Coke (1988; tractor enamel on wood)

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My work is scrubby. It’s bad, nasty art. But it’s telling something. You don’t have to be a perfect artist to work in art.

—Reverend Howard Finster

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Matthew Arient’s Angel (1987; tractor enamel on wood)

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Howard Finster Vision House

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2010

Friday, 9/3/10

Mr. Excitement

Jackie Wilson, “Higher and Higher,” “Lonely Teardrops,” live (TV broadcast), introduced by Roy Orbison and (I think) Del Shannon, 1974

More? Here. Here. Here.

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lagniappe

art beat

While at the Art Institute the other day, I wandered into a small room of paintings by this guy—who, in his early 20s (in the 1950s), moved to New York to study music with Lennie Tristano.

Robert Ryman, from The Elliot Room (Charter Series), 1985-87

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radio

Looking for something different?

How ’bout an hour of NYC traffic reports, uninterrupted?

(I stumbled onto this last night—Kenny G’s Hour of Pain—while waiting for Sinner’s Crossroads.)

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2010

Tuesday, 8/31/10

When your kids go back to college (as my older son Alex did Saturday and my younger son Luke ten days ago), it’s not just their voices you no longer hear around the house; it’s also the voices they listen to—like this guy, for instance (a Luke favorite).

Mike Posner, “Cooler Than Me,” live, Los Angeles, 2010

More? Here. Here.

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lagniappe

M.I.A.—the new Sun Ra?

So where would she [M.I.A.] live if visas and tour plans weren’t a factor? She pauses for a moment, then says, “Space. I’m over Earth.” She laughs. “Earth is so 2000-and-fucking-9.”

—M.I.A. (Rolling Stone, 8/5/10)