In honor of Mick Hucknall‘s birthday, whenever that may be, let’s give hope to aspiring rockers with red hair by gathering all rockin’ redheads under one Last Man Standing competition. Dye jobs don’t count. “Strawberry blondes” need to be clearly containing some ripe strawberry coloring—I’d need convincing, for instance, on young Joni Mitchell’s qualifying in this contest. Because this is not a Battle Royale, in which we would be seeking the reddest of rockin’ redheads, birthday boy Mick is only our first entrant. Happy birthday, Mick. Keep it red!
Bowie makes the effort to don an eyepatch, but no one thinks to pack a guitar strap for this promo shoot? Was this guy’s priorities straight, or is this an awkward attempt at holstering?
More importantly, though, I’ve been meaning to ask if anyone else too often feels let down by David Bowie’s choruses? Clearly he’s got nearly 30 winning choruses to his credit, including this one, but I wonder how many more Bowie songs I’d like if he didn’t climb up to the dramatic heights he so often attempts to climb. I thought of this a couple of weeks ago, while listening to The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars. I was digging the verses on “Starman,” as I always do, then feeling like I was getting my chain yanked during the long, sweeping choruses, also as I always do. It sounds like an advertising jingle until that great guitar riff gets the song set up for the next verse.
“Soul Love” is another song from that album with a chorus that seems to try too hard. Station to Station, with one of my favorite Bowie songs, “TVC15,” is loaded with overblown choruses. Don’t get me wrong: I’m well aware that writing a great chorus one of the hardest things to do in songwriting, but there are times I wish Bowie would keep it simple. Following, however, is a cool performance I’d never seen before of a song of his that I think nails his goal of a grandiose, climbing chorus:Continue reading »
I’m sending the above clip to Townsman Hrrundivbakshi, in particular. I think there’s much he will enjoy about it, or at least much he will enjoy analyzing.
Next, I will encourage HVB to comment and pass it on, posting a new video directed at another Townsperson—a performance he feels will hold particular appeal to that person.
That person will then comment and pass on a performance video to yet another Townsperson…
This is an exercise in knowing one’s fellow Townsperson. Challenge yourself! There’s probably some regular you’ve never met before that you know more about than you think.
If someone gets stuck down the line, I’ll gladly jostle the logjam by passing on another clip to a Townsperson who has not yet handled a passed-on clip. Others, of course, may comment on whatever clips are being passed along.
They have often been compared to My Bloody Valentine, and are sometimes referred to as shoegaze musicians.
As you surely guessed, Townswoman ladymisskirroyale set up this Mystery Date. It turns out she’s old friends with the band’s bassist, Andy Bernick. They met at their college radio station, at which point ladymiss reports Bernick and his cofounders were big fans of Mission of Burma and punk rock. ladymiss saw many of the band’s early shows, and the track she provided, “Tall Ships,” had some special meaning for her, as she wrote:
This track is the first one that I played on my first “grown up” stereo.
Much later ladymiss learned that the band initially formed with the intent of being a Go-Gos cover band, in which, coincidentally, our old friend Townswoman Sally Cinnamon is currently playing (a Go-Gos cover band, that is, not Swirlies).
Following their initial meditations on MBV, Swirlies would evolve/devolve into more noise. Here’s a later track that ladymiss recommends:
Swirlies continue to play periodically; in fact, Bernick recently wrote ladymiss to let her know they may be playing NYC or DC shows in July. If so, she’s there!
Bernick is currently making music with the DC band Wild Fruit. Ron Rege, who did some of Swirlies’ artwork, went on to Lavender Diamond, who have been pretty popular recently. Each of the members has been doing interesting side music projects. Shauna Carmody, for instance, was with Sugar USA. The band went through many drummers, sort of like Spinal Tap.
I’d like to try a new, quick-hit topic that might lead to a useful, occasional series: 1-2 Punch. Top 10 lists are too much; Top 5 lists invite too many opportunities for throwing in a hipster, obscuro choice to distinguish oneself from the raging masses. What I’d like to know is what TWO (2) songs you would choose from an artist’s catalog to say as much about that artist that you believe represents said artist’s core as possible? In other words, if you could only use TWO (2) songs from an artist’s catalog to explain all that said artist is about to a Venutian, what TWO (2) songs would you pick to represent said artist’s place in rock ‘n roll?
I’ll pose two artists and you—love ’em or leave ’em—give me each artist’s representative 1-2 Punch. Dig? Here goes!Continue reading »
