“Bad Girl” Garage Rock = WNBA

 Posted by
Aug 162010
 


This is not a politically correct opinion I’m proud to share, but I was listening to that Little Steven digital radio station now and then in the car we rented on our trip to New Mexico and just about every modern-day “bad girl” garage rock band that came up for play made me feel like I was watching the WNBA. Garage rock, to me, is such a dude’s domain. Hearing women try to cop that certain garage rock stance strikes me as highly awkward and lacking in…something. Likewise, I know the women who compete at the WNBA level could kick my ass on the hardwood, but there’s something unnatural about them playing basketball. There are other sports that women can play as naturally and gracefully as men, such as tennis (which I actually prefer to watch played by women thanks to their ability to maintain a volley), but women rarely have the natural motions that I come to expect from years of watching NBA games. Maybe it’s all the ponytails flopping around as they battle for a rebound and I’m simply a horrible person. (The Goldie and the Gingerbreads clip, on the other hand, is more like traditional girl group music, which I think fits women as well as tennis. This was one good band I heard on Little Steven’s show that I did not previously know about.)

More importantly, listening to that Little Steven station confirmed my belief that neo-garage is one of the hardest neo-genres to do well. The attitude copped by the original wave of garage bands is so outdated in this day and age. Hearing a modern crop of dumpy guys bitch about the fact that some girl won’t give them the time of day is played out, isn’t it? Why don’t these guys take up one of the new genres that invite dumpiness?

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Pop Rocks?

 Posted by
Aug 132010
 

Where is the line between “rock” and “pop”? To start on the same page, consider “rock” to be music in a guitar band format that knowledgeable music heads (or “Townsmen/Townswomen”) would consider worth listening to and discussing, especially 5 or more years after its release. Consider “pop” as hit-driven product that is only fresh until its sell-by date.

I think we can all agree that all ’50s, most ’60s and some ’70s music (like The Beatles and The Eagles) fill the rock requirements while being huge pop hits. For The Eagles, note that I didn’t say it had to be good, but I don’t think many would argue that they are not “rock musicians.”

At some point these 2 categories broke apart. Consider Counting Crows. I know a number of folks who own and will listen to August & Everything After (myself included). After they did the big pop hit from Shrek, they went to the pop bin never to be taken seriously again. This may have something to do with the realities of marketing movies to children.

Wait, it gets worse. Continue reading »

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Severe Embarassment.

 Posted by
Aug 132010
 

Why, oh why do some of us feel compelled to dance and sing in front of others? And why does that desire frequently force us to act, you know, really stupid?

In college, I was in a band with townsman kcills, in which we wrote music with no words. By which I don’t mean that it was instrumental music — it was just music to which I would make words up, on the spot. If they were good, they might make it to the next show — or they might not, if I forgot them between one gig and the other.

Now: I was madly in love with a girl on the crew team at the time (oh, Emily! If you only knew how I pined for you! If you only knew how I yearned to kiss you! If you only also knew how disgusted I was when I discovered my best friend had plowed your bean field in a drunken stupor at a frat party!)

Anyhow — because I was a seething cauldron of pain and romantic confusion, I would frequently get up on stage and, for lyrics, just shout out some unintelligible nonsense about how tortured I was by my unrequited love for this girl. It was absolutely, completely pathetic. One day, it dawned on me that the only thing separating me from a screaming lunatic in a tinfoil suit was that I had a guitar and a microphone in front of me. I started getting a bit more serious about lyrics after that.

But I can’t be the only one with an embarrassing story to tell. Do share. I ask you: Musicians! Tell us your most embarrassing moment on stage or in studio. Listeners! Please share the most excruciating musical moment you’ve ever witnessed. Let the healing begin!

Oh, Emily!

HVB

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REM = Neil Diamond

 Posted by
Aug 132010
 


I’ve always thought classic REM sounded like Neil Diamond in a minor key with added twinkly guitar bits. Until the other night, I had not heard more than a single REM song at a time in a good 15 years. One of the friends we’re renting a place with in New Mexico played a half dozen or more REM songs from his or her iPod, and my old thoughts about REM and Diamond were revived.

Michael Stipe has similar phrasing and vocal tone to Diamond. He projects a similar “solitary manliness,” laying into the opening phrase of almost every line. The choruses of REM and Diamond have a lot in common too, sweeping upward and pouring on the solitary manliness established by the verses.

Listen to almost any classic REM song and see if you can’t sing the lyrics and melody of one of Diamond’s big hits. You may have to pause between verses now and then to allow Peter Buck to play one of those twinkly parts, but it’s not that hard to hear the similarities in songwriting and structure.

Like Diamond, Stipe and company abandoned their “forever in blue jeans” Look and gussied themselves up to project “larger than life.” For the last 20+ years Stipe has felt compelled to act out some larger drama for a loyal, aging audience. Diamond perfected this approach 20 years earlier.

I’m not holding this comparison against REM; in fact, I’ve always had the slightest of soft spots for Neil Diamond. Thinking of REM in this way helps me like them more than when I think of more common comparisons, like how they used to be compared to The Byrds because of the twinkly guitar parts and folky vibe. I think that comparison has always sold the band short.

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