20) Dixie Chicks - “Not Ready to Make Nice” (Open Wide/Columbia)
Hey, remember a few years ago when the Dixie Chicks got in trouble when singer Natalie Maines said on stage in London, “We’re embarrassed President Bush is from Texas?” Yeah, me neither. But the usual close-minded country radio format never forgot, even if a majority of folks here in the grand old U.S. of A. made it clear in the mid-term elections that they ain’t so fond of W. “Not Ready to Make Nice” didn’t make a dent on the country charts, and with the sound and lyrics of this first single from Taking the Long Way, it seems as though the Chicks could care less. In fact, when I listen to this very-much-a-rock-and-not-a-country-song and such phrases as “I'm through with doubt/There’s nothing left for me to figure out/I’ve paid a price/And I'll keep paying,” I picture one Texas-size middle finger being given to the fans and the country establishment who turned on them. And being a guy who’s used his middle finger as a vehicle for expression for over 25 years, I can totally understand where the Chicks are coming from.
19) Josh Rouse - “It Looks Like Love” (Bedroom Classics/Nettwerk)
On last year’s Nashville Josh Rouse penned a song called “My Love Is Gone” which couldn’t be interpreted as anything else but a commentary about the state of his falling-apart marriage. “It Looks Like Love” could be called the flipside of “My Love Is Gone,” as Rouse sings about his new Spanish lady in almost embarrassing detail. Hey Josh, I’m happy that Paz (that’s the new girlfriend’s name) sends you pictures “She shot in the nude,” but do we really need to know that “She likes to sit on me too, yes, yes/She got me coming, baby, every night/And in the daytime too.” I swear, if this song somehow ends up in a Cialis commercial, I’m taking my copy of Subtitlo and throwing it out the window of my office. (And hoping that it hits one of the folks from Radio City Music Hall telling through megaphones that people holding tickets for the 4p.m. Christmas Spectacular to enter on 51st street.) Thankfully for us listeners, the rest of the song is a sweet message to those who have been dumped and don’t expect to discover true love again. Who these people are—cough, cough—I don’t really know, but I’m sure lines like “There goes that melancholy feeling again/It looks like love is gonna find a way/And just when you stop believing in it/It looks like love is gonna show its face” could help almost anyone heal a little bit.
18) Ok Go - “Here It Goes Again” (Capitol)
There is perhaps no better example of the power of You Tube than the resurrection of Ok Go’s career through two extremely popular videos that are low on production values yet but high on inventive choreography. The “Here It Goes Again” clip (with its use of treadmills) is absolutely one of the best videos I’ve ever seen. I’ve probably watched it a couple of dozen times, yet had no idea what this little guitar pop gem was about. (Except that it was about three minutes long. Thank you, thank you very much.) One day I happened to look up the lyrics and discovered it describes the aftermath of a one night stand almost perfectly. Who hasn’t a night like this opening line: “It could be ten, but then again, I can't remember half an hour since a quarter to four/Throw on your clothes, the second side of Surfer Rosa, and you leave me with my jaw on the floor.” I mean, I’ve heard of bands ripping off the Pixies’ sound for years, but how often does a band name check Black Francis and company? Not often enough for my tastes.
17) Justin Timberlake (featuring T.I.) - “My Love” (Jive/Zomba Label Group)
The former boy band star might have tried to bring sexy back, but he was much better at bringing marriage proposals back. It’s hard to think that Timberlake wrote this stunningly catchy song with his longtime girlfriend Cameron “Look at the Moon and You’ll See My Meteor-Ravaged Face” Diaz in mind. I mean imagine what she’s going to look like when she’s forty? That face will have more potholes on it than that one section of the BQE that makes a couple of my teeth shake loose every ride back from Shea Stadium. Okay, enough about crater-face, back to the song. Everything about “My Love” points to me hating it—it’s got one of those guest raps (from Atlanta star T.I.) that seem tacked on because the producer didn’t know what to do in the middle; it was produced by Timbaland, who’s personally responsible for two of the crappiest number-one hits of this year or any other (Timberlake’s “SexyBack” and Nellie Furtado’s “Promiscuous”) and it’s got that damned human beatbox trick that Timberlake is so fond of showing off as much as possible. And yet… yet…aw fuck it, this song is so catchy I want to get up and dance in the middle of the F train each time it comes up on my iPod. That keyboard sound that was dated 15 years ago hooks me like a candy cane to the brain. And then there’s either a human voice sped up or some interesting sample during the chorus that sounds similar to a hyena laughing that grabs me more and more with each play. Damn you Timberlake—how can I rightfully hate you when you make pieces of pop that are this good!
16) Lupe Fiasco - “Kick Push” (Atlantic)
I’ve never liked skateboarding—even when I was in high school and everyone is supposed to want a skateboard. I must admit (Cranky old man alert!) even now I hate hate HATE the two teenagers that skate almost every weekend on my block. The sound of the wheels down the street, the clickity clack when they jump off their boards and then do a bit of wiping out, the screeching of car tires when they have to stop short because these kids are dangerously close to being hit. Oh yeah, it really brings out my inner Tony Hawk. With all of this hatred, it makes perfect sense that I would like a Muslim rapper from Chicago with a great sense of lyrical flow who does a track about a skateboard kid growing up. I will now jump out my window and hope my brain returns to its upright position.
15) Paul Westerberg - “Love You In the Fall” (Lost Highway)
Oh what a joy it is to hear Paul Westerberg make a song that sounds (and was) professionally recorded. It seems like years since the former Replacement released something where I didn’t reach for the treble knob on my receiver. “Love You In the Fall” has almost all of the elements I look for in a great Westerberg song: a single guitar opens up with the riff, Paul yells out something completely unintelligible when the drums kick in; the drums are damn powerful (thank you, Josh Freese); and I can sing along with the chorus after one listen. Lyrically this isn’t a masterpiece from the Westerberg songbook, but—and I know I will hear about this from some folks—I like this song much better than the two Replacements reunion songs. (And it even had the exact same personnel as those reunion tunes, minus Chris Mars on vocals.) The line to make your complaints starts to the left.
14) The Raconteurs - “Steady As She Goes” (Third Man/V2)
I still remember the first joke I thought of when I heard the opening 30 seconds of this song—Joe Jackson called, and he’s looking sharp to sue your ass. The extremely similar bassline to “Is She Really Going Out With Him” aside, this first single from the Detroit via Nashville supergroup is a perfect introduction to this band’s strengths. 2005 list favorites Jack White and Brendan Benson sound as if they’ve been harmonizing since they were little kids. And the rhythm section knows how to rock hard when the chorus rolls around. I hope for their next album White and Benson rip off the bassline from “Steppin’ Out.”
13) Snow Patrol - “Hands Open” (A&M/Interscope)
Ireland’s Snow Patrol have scored success in the U.S. with two mid-tempo ballads—“Run” from their 2004 disc Final Straw, which I happen to like, and “Chasing Cars” from this year’s Eyes Open, a song which makes me want to get some Gray’s Anatomy DVDs and start throwing them at innocent bystanders. I had really high hopes for Eyes Open when I first heard the lead single (and sort of title track) “Hands Open.” Singer Gary Lightbody is...wait, I can go no further without writing this guy’s last name again: Lightbody. And as far as I can tell, it’s his real name! Wow, I can only imagine what kids said to him while growing up. It makes me dream of a day where everyone will be named as if they were a minor character in the Star Wars film series. Sorry, I got a bit distracted there. “Hands Open” is a rarity in the Snow Patrol world—it rocks. As a matter of fact, the opening combo of guitar and drums may be the simplest and dumbest combination these guys have created. I like stupidity in my music and in most aspects of my everyday life which explains why I enjoy it so much. Alas, the rest of the album doesn’t live up to this song’s promise, but I’m sure other tracks on it will help move along the plot development for Dr. McDreamy’s character throughout 2007. And while we’re at it, I hate that Fray song too. Wow, why am I so bitter about a show I never watch? Maybe it’s all those music video looking ads I saw over the summer. Okay, it must be time for a cold beverage to take the edge off.
12) KT Tunstall - “Other Side of the World” (Virgin)
The latest single from perhaps the most unlikely Top 20 album of the year is a tearjerker of the highest order. Heartbreak oozes out of Tunstall’s voice with every line about a troubled long-distance relationship. Again, on the surface there’s nothing different from the tons of other female singer-songwriters on the scene today. Yet I can’t resist being sucked in. And you know what? I still hate that fucking Fray song.
11) Death Cab For Cutie - “Crooked Teeth” (Atlantic)
When this song was released as the second single from Plans back in January of this year, I knew that it would be on the Top 20 11 months later. It’s always been my favorite song from that album. It’s a perfect match-up of a wickedly catchy song with some crisp production. There’s a part just before the second verse starts where a heavily processed backwards symbol crash slowly fades in, and every time I hear it I think, “How did Chris Walla (he’s the producer and band’s guitarist) know that would be perfect little trick for that moment?” The imagery that gives the song its title (“Cause at night the sun in retreat/Made the skyline look like crooked teeth/In the mouth of a man who was devouring, us both”) comes to mind whenever I’m riding the train home as the sun is setting over New Jersey. And the lines “You're so cute when you're slurring your speech/But they're closing the bar and they want us to leave” make me think frontman Ben Gibbard spent some time trailing me during his visits to New York. Hmm.
10) Christina Aguilera - “Ain’t No Other Man” (RCA)
I will now throw my credibility into a poorly cleaned toilet in Penn Station. Yes, the woman who was once voted Most Likely to Whore Herself Out to a White Trash Dancer (amazing how Miss Spears wrestled that crown away) returned this year with a double album (wtf?) that, from most accounts, isn’t half bad. “Ain’t No Other Man” is an ode to Aguilera’s husband that does go a bit overboard with the pledging o’ the love at times: “What was cloudy now is clear/Yeah, yeah/You’re the light that I needed/You got what I want boy, and I want it/So keep on givin' it up!” Oy. But D.J. Premier’s irresistible beats mixed with a snappy horn sample and Aguilera’s great pipes add up to a track that is hard to resist.
9) Kelly Clarkson - “Walk Away” (RCA)
Oh, wait, here’s where I throw away my credibility. But dammit, this song is so fucking catchy and is a worthy successor to “Since U Been Gone.” It pains me to know that Canadian singer Chantal Kreviazuk co-wrote the song with Clarkson and her husband, Our Lady Peace singer Raine Maida. Kreviazuk was one of the most arrogant people I ever had to interview in the past 11 years and to me seemed to be the least likely person to write or co-write a hit song that Top 40 stations around the country would play ad infinitum. So I’m just going to believe that Clarkson’s talent overwhelmed the Canadian crappiness that could have come through this track.
8) Brandi Carlile - “Throw it All Away” (Columbia)
The self-titled debut from Seattle’s Brandi Carlile was one of those albums that dropped through the cracks in 2005. It took a good deal of airtime on our local Triple A station WFUV for me to get the talent that Carlile packs in her incredible voice. The first time I listened to it I dismissed her as another clone in the Sheryl Crow/Lucinda Williams vein. Yet with repeated listens it’s obvious that Carlile takes her cues from the late Jeff Buckley. Her voice soars, ringing emotion from every line. “Throw It All Away” is a tearjerker that stopped me in my tracks one morning. At that point I'd already put the album in the giveaway stack ages ago, so I had to go to iTunes that day and download it. Then I proceeded to listen to it over and over that week. Something about Carlile's passionate delivery of the chorus slays me every time. I look forward to her follow-up due out next spring.
7) Gomez - “See The World” (ATO/RCA)
Ladies and gentlemen, here’s my nominee for the Most Optimistic Song of 2006. The first time I heard the song on the World Café I knew I would need to get my hands on copy of it as soon as possible. I’m not one to usually enjoy such optimistic lyrics, but even I find these simple lines from singer-guitarist Tom Gray hard to resist: “See the world/Find an old fashioned girl/And when all's been said and done/It's the things that are given, not won/Are the things that you earned.” And I don’t think I could sum up this light guitar pop confection any better than Gray does: “’See the World’ is obviously a very optimistic song. There is light at the end of the tunnel, you know. For chrissake, just stop being such a miserable so and so and get out of that rut and get on with it.”
6) Pearl Jam - “World Wide Suicide” (J)
Over the past decade I’ve come up with a good theory about how much I’m going to like a new Pearl Jam release: the less I like the first single, the more I will love the album. For example, 1996’s No Code was led off by “Who You Are,” which I didn’t like at all. No Code placed at number-five for that year. The first song we heard from 1998’s Yield was “Given to Fly,” which I disliked very much because it was a huge rip off of Led Zeppelin’s “Going to California.” Yield landed at number-one. (I did go on to like “Given to Fly,” but that was after witnessing numerous live performances.) “Nothing As it Seems” is easily the worst first single in Pearl Jam’s career, which lead to their 2000 album Binaural to also check in at number-five. 2002’s Riot Act had “I Am Mine” leadoff, and I loved that song. Hence, Riot Act didn’t even crack the Top 20 that year. “World Wide Suicide” is my favorite leadoff single from a Pearl Jam album since “Spin the Black Circle,” and might be my favorite single they’ve ever put out. So that should explain why the album doesn’t appear in this year’s Top 20. While most critics hailed the self-titled album as Eddie Vedder and company’s best album in more than a decade, I was much less impressed. Proving that you can still rock on almost every song on an album doesn’t necessarily mean quality. But damn, “World Wide Suicide” rocks hard and with a determined purpose and massage: this war is wrong. The lines “Medals on a wooden mantle/Next to a handsome face/That the President took for granted/Writing checks that others pay” spell out who is to blame—and who’s paying the price. And shockingly, this political blast ended up being Pearl Jam’s biggest radio hit since “Last Kiss.” Go figure.
5) Rihanna - “S.O.S.” (Island/Def Jam)
Dear lord, was there anything catchier on radio or MTV than this song this year? Whoever decided to use Soft Cell’s “Tainted Love” as the sample for the track is a pure production genius. I listen to it once, I want to listen to it again immediately. As a co-worker said a few months ago, “It sounds like a mash-up of two really good songs.” And at age 18, Rihanna is the youngest artist to appear on the list this year. I will now go bang my head against the wall next to my desk.
4) Mark Knopfler & Emmylou Harris - “This Is Us” (Warner Bros.)
Simply put, I believe this is the best song Mark Knopfler has written in his solo career. (Yes Hank, I know you’re probably shaking your head no right now.) Knopfler and his duet partner Emmylou Harris delivery great low key vocals in this beautiful tale of a couple sharing their memories with one another. Knopfler doesn’t use a lot of words to describe this couple’s life, but the imagery he evokes is striking in its simplicity. “Rocking at the barbecue/Yeah, when we said I do/Hand jiving on the ballroom floor/You in that wedding coat you wore/And you in that amazing dress/I was stoned on love I guess/You and me we were meant to be/This is us.” I can only imagine the amount of hip weddings over the next couple of years where this song will be a main attraction.
3) Soul Asylum - “Stand Up and Be Strong” (Legacy)
(I was going to write a new entry about “Stand Up and Be Strong,” but the Song of the Week entry from June 30th says it all. Visit it here.)
2) Electric Six - “I Buy the Drugs” (Metropolis)
Electric Six frontman Dick Valentine has a knack for making some of the catchiest—and funniest—songs of the 21st century. “I Buy the Drugs” is funny for its entire three minutes and 22 seconds. It’s hard to pick out my favorite line in this keyboard-driven romp, but perhaps it’s the bridge:
“If you ever find yourself in need
You can submit your request in writing
And this is what you do
Send in a self addressed stamped envelope
To PO Box 900
Los Angeles, California 90212
And I will fill your prescription with some degree of accuracy
And then I'll send it back to you”
The first time I heard it I laughed for the entire rest of the song. (And then discovered the address is to a P.O. Box on the Fox lot. I wonder if Rupert Murdoch had to fill someone’s valium prescription this year?) Do yourself a favor and check out the video too. College never looked like so much fun, even while I was in college.
1) Gnarls Barkley - “Crazy” (Downtown/Atlantic)
How can anyone accurately convey the juggernaut that was “Crazy” this year? Do I review each of the 21 versions of the song that I have downloaded this year? How can anyone aptly describe a song that is so different, moving, strange, creepy and ubiquitous that artists from all across the musical spectrum have covered it? (And how often do you think The Raconteurs and Nelly Furtado would tackle the same cover?) And how many songs inspire mash-ups using tracks from Supertramp, Sugarhill Gang, Donna Summer and Elton John? I can’t imagine that Danger Mouse and Cee-Lo Green ever expected such a response to a song that samples a theme from a spaghetti western and probes the deepest fears of Cee-Lo’s brain. What an amazing format crossing phenomenon. The only song in recent memory that compares would be Outkast’s “Hey Ya.” And while that song may have burned its way in and out of the collective conscience due to overplay, somehow I think “Crazy” will leave its mark for a little while longer. And hey, at least it wasn’t 26 different bands covering that fucking Fray song.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Top 10 Headlines I Hope I Don't Write in 2007
1) The release of Guns n’ Roses’ Chinese Democracy inspires the Bush administration to try democracy out in the U.S.
2) Gwen Stefani signs on to be the new spokesperson for Drake’s Cakes Yodels brand.
3) Eminem marries his ex-ex-wife Kim Mathers again, and then accidentally divorces himself two months later.
4) Rick Rubin decides to produce every album that will be released in 2008.
5) Jim Morrison comes back from the dead to record an album of standards called Dead and Singing It.
6) Chris Robinson, Kid Rock, Dave Navarro and Kevin Federline form a new supergroup called We Saw Their [Bleeps] and You Didn’t.
7) Red Hot Chili Peppers release a triple album called Taste Retardium and announce plans to have every song on it released as a single.
8) The rest of the cast from My So-Called Life start a band called 60 Seconds to Venus.
9) Britney Spears, Lindsey Lohan and Paris Hilton record a collaborative album called, Have You Seen Our [Bleeps] Yet? If Not, Please Let Us Show Them to You.
10) Hinder follow-up their hit “Lips of an Angel” with a cover of Eddie Money’s “Take Me Home Tonight.” (Oh crap, that actually is happening.)
2) Gwen Stefani signs on to be the new spokesperson for Drake’s Cakes Yodels brand.
3) Eminem marries his ex-ex-wife Kim Mathers again, and then accidentally divorces himself two months later.
4) Rick Rubin decides to produce every album that will be released in 2008.
5) Jim Morrison comes back from the dead to record an album of standards called Dead and Singing It.
6) Chris Robinson, Kid Rock, Dave Navarro and Kevin Federline form a new supergroup called We Saw Their [Bleeps] and You Didn’t.
7) Red Hot Chili Peppers release a triple album called Taste Retardium and announce plans to have every song on it released as a single.
8) The rest of the cast from My So-Called Life start a band called 60 Seconds to Venus.
9) Britney Spears, Lindsey Lohan and Paris Hilton record a collaborative album called, Have You Seen Our [Bleeps] Yet? If Not, Please Let Us Show Them to You.
10) Hinder follow-up their hit “Lips of an Angel” with a cover of Eddie Money’s “Take Me Home Tonight.” (Oh crap, that actually is happening.)
Other Musical Stuff From 2006
COMPILATIONS, REISSUES, ETC.
10) Bright Eyes - Noise Floor (Rarities: 1998-2005) (Saddle Creek)
Ever since I became a fan of Bright Eyes, lo those 18 months ago or so, I’ve slowly been building up my collection of recordings by Conor Oberst and company. I’ve discovered that while the “genius” (or annoying whiner, take your pick) from Nebraska made some good albums before 2005’s double dose of I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning and Digital Ash in a Digital Urn, Oberst’s best work was saved for EPs, compilations and singles. Many of the rarities I downloaded over the past year quickly became my favorite songs in the Bright Eyes catalog. Now a good chunk of that rare material is all in one place on Noise Floor. Tracks 2 through 5 on this disc (“I Will Be Grateful for This Day,” “The Trees Get Wheeled Away” “Drunk Kid Catholic” and “Spent On Rainy Days”) are as good a lineup of four songs as there are in the entire Bright Eyes catalog. “Spent on Rainy Days,” drawn from a collaborative EP with Spoon frontman Britt Daniel, is tremendous and makes me wish these two would record an entire album together. My only complaint about this compilation is that isn’t enough tracks. There’s at least two more albums worth of material floating out there that deserves to be placed under one umbrella, if for nothing else to save me the pain in the ass of looking for some limited compilation that came out in 2002 only in New Zealand. Or something like that, not that I’m a bitter collector or anything…
9) The Replacements - Don’t You Know Who I Think I Was? (Sire/Reprise/Rhino)
Most Replacements fans I know didn’t buy this compilation. That’s because they already own all the Mats albums and the 1997 Sire/Reprise era collection All For Nothing/Nothing For All, which was chock full of an entire disc of rarities. Don’t You Know Who I Think I Was? serves as a fine introduction for someone who’s never heard The Replacements. Most of their best songs—“I Will Dare,” “Unsatisfied,” “Bastards of Young,” “Alex Chilton,” etc.—are here, just waiting to blow someone else’s mind like mine was in 1988 when I first heard Paul Westerberg and crew. And hopefully this compilation did that trick for a few folks. But for long-term fans of the band, all we need are the two new “Replacements” songs. Now I used those air quotes around the band’s name because “Message to the Boys” and “Pool and Dive” aren’t really Replacements songs. They’re solo Paul Westerberg tunes that just happen to feature his former bandmates Tommy Stinson on bass and drummer-turned-artist Chris Mars on backing vocals. Is it really fair to call these new songs “Replacements” songs when the drum seat is being filled by the man pictured next to ubiquitous in the dictionary, Josh Freese, and Slim Dunlap (who logged four years on guitar) isn’t involved at all? You know, I’m not sure. I suppose if Westerberg, Stinson and Freese toured under the Replacements name, I would sell off body parts (mine and someone else’s) to go. And as much as I enjoy “Message to the Boys,” it sounds like a Westerberg song. A really damn good Westerberg song. And nowadays that is more than enough good news for my ears.
8) The Pretenders - The Pretenders (Sire/Real/Rhino)
Years of Chrissie Hynde making crazy statements on behalf
of PETA, cranking out subpar album after subpar album with a rotating cast of lead guitarists and bassists and being as cranky as Lindsay Lohan gets without her special Strawberry Quik powder in almost every public appearance I’ve seen pretty much dimmed my enthusiasm for The Pretenders. This jam packed two-disc reissue of their 1980 debut blew away all those negative thoughts. Damn I forgot how sexy Hynde sounded when she was pissed (“Precious,” “Tattooed Love Boys”) about boys, not about the Chicken McNuggets I just ate. And could I have gone so long without having “Mystery Achievement” on CD? Wow, I had forgotten how smoking James Honeyman-Scott’s solo is on that song until I cranked it at my office when everyone else had left for the day. Like most Rhino reissues the bonus disc is packed with great rarities, demos and some scintillating live material recorded at the BBC. Now I can understand how The Pretenders made the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Now when are The Go-Gos getting in?
7) The Monkees - The Monkees: Deluxe Edition (Rhino)
Who knew that the songs that weren’t Monkees singles could be so good? I had no idea. I think that in my entire life I’ve seen parts of three episodes and half of that trippy movie Head once on cable, so I never knew the depth of quality to their albums. “Last Train to Clarksville” is the best known song here, but “This Just Doesn't Seem to Be My Day” or “Tomorrow's Gonna Be Another Day” could have been smash hits as well by my ears. Even the obvious throwaway track “Gonna Buy Me a Dog”—with its bordering on laughter lead vocal by Mickey Dolenz—rocks pretty damn hard for 1967 pop. And once again Rhino outdoes themselves in the reissue department, packing this double disc set with stereo and mono versions of the albums, 17 rare and previously unreleased tracks and some thoroughly researched liners notes about the creation of the “Pre-Fab Four” and their debut album. Hey hey, I’m a Monkees fan!
6) Feist - Open Season (Remixes and Collabs) (Interscope)
French-Canadian singer-songwriter Feist left me unimpressed with her debut album Let It Die. Listening to Open Season, I do believe that when I first listened to that album I must have a) been in a pissy mood, b) hadn’t gotten my ears cleaned at that point in 2005 c) thought the title of Let it Die was her comment on my latest relationship or d) all of the above. Hmm, I’m gonna guess d). What a fantastic voice she has, and all of these remixes of her songs put the focus squarely on her pipes. Her cover of the Bee Gees “Love You Inside and Out,” a stripped down version recorded at the BBC, is quite possibly one of the best covers recorded in the past five years. I had listened to Open Season at least four times before I realized that she was covering the same song. Even when I read that it was a Bee Gees cover, I had to Google the lyrics just to triple check. Now that’s the sign of a cover that works. Other highlights include a great Postal Service remix of “Mushaboom” with gloriously wimpy vocals from Death Cab for Cutie’s Ben Gibbard and the lovely French ditty “Tout Doucement.” My love of Open Season is just another shining example of why I shouldn’t always listen to new albums while I’m cranky. Sorry Feist—I promise to give your next album my full and undivided attention.
5) Open Season featuring the Songs of Paul Westerberg (Lost Highway)
As much as I liked the new “Replacements” song, I like these songs Paul Westerberg wrote for this animated film even more. And since Josh Freese and Tommy Stinson play on a few of them, it makes almost as much sense to call this soundtrack the new Replacements album. (Well, except a new Replacements album wouldn’t have Talking Heads’ “Wild Wild Life” dropped in the middle for no discernable reason.) Considering my favorite solo song Westerberg ever did is “Waiting for Somebody” from Cameron Crowe’s Singles, it makes me think he should write for films 100% of the time. If watching an animated bear helps him pen a song as goofy as “Right to Arm Bears,” then let’s send this guy a bunch of kids DVDs and lock him in a studio. It’s also rather strange to see “Good Day,” Westerberg’s tribute to his late bandmate Bob Stinson, on this soundtrack. I haven’t seen the film (maybe when it comes to one of the 178 HBOs I subscribe to I’ll find the time) so I’m rather afraid to see where it’s placed in the film. I can’t imagine a bear in the film dies after a lonely life in Minneapolis, but who knows?
4) Bee Gees - The Studio Albums 1967-1968 (Rhino)
This six disc box set took me by surprise just as much as the Monkees reissue on the previous page. Who knew these first three Bee Gees albums contained so many great pop songs? (Well, my co-worker Michael did, but I never would have believed him.) The hits like “Massachusetts,” “To Love Somebody” and “I’ve Got to Get a Message to You” are all here (in mono and stereo form), as well as quirkier tunes like “Harry Braff,” “Craise Finton Kirk Royal Academy of Arts,” “Cucumber Castle” (get your mind out of the gutter on that one) and a song that could perhaps be a country hit today on its title alone—“I Have Decided to Join the Airforce.” And the loads of bonus tracks feature some genuinely weird material. “Mrs. Gillespie's Refrigerator” is pretty damn psychedelic for a three minute pop song, while “Come Some Christmas Eve or Halloween” prefaced the whole consolidation of the holiday season by a couple of decades. (And somehow I still like Thanksgiving in the midst of that calendar shift.) I don’t know if I could in good conscience recommend this box anyone expect a huge Bee Gees fan (that $74.98 list price is a bit much to pay) but who knows—you might become a big fan after giving it one spin.
3) Graham Parker & The Figgs - 103 Degrees in June: Live in Chicago (Bloodshot Records)
In last year’s Top 20 I wrote this about the second Graham Parker and The Figgs show I saw on their Songs of No Consequence tour. “[The Figgs] opening set (with guest guitarist Brett Rosenberg) was just about as perfect a 45 minutes as you’ll ever see in music. That pace didn’t let up when they came back out with GP. Every note was in the right place, all the harmonies soared, the solos were immaculate and their enthusiasm on stage was met with an ecstatic response from a packed venue.” Two weeks later Parker and the Figgs played at the Double Door in Chicago, and they were still in that groove where a band and its material mesh perfectly—and the crowd knows it. Throughout 103 Degrees in June you can people yelling at certain parts, just screaming because they are having a great time and know they are witnessing a great performance. I think guitarist Mike Gent (whose enthusiasm for Parker’s work is evident throughout the entire set) summed it up best when I emailed him to say that 103 Degrees was smoking hot—“It’s our finest work with him yet.” Indeed. We can only hope for more work between these two artists down the road.
2) Neil Young - Live at Fillmore East (Reprise)
The June 2nd, 1988 issue of Rolling Stone featured Neil Young on the cover. Young is pictured in his bluesman’s grab for the album he had recently released with The Bluenotes, This Note’s For You. I was a subscriber to Rolling Stone at the time (hey, who knew that it would start sucking later on) and had spent an entire year immersing myself in as much Neil Young music as I could during my post-high school summer and first two semesters at college. So I read and reread that entire Neil Young interview the very day it showed up at my house. One thing that struck me in the piece was when Young mentioned that he was working on another compilation called Decade II that would features songs since the first Decade was released in 1977 and a bunch more unreleased tracks. This excited me to no end, since the unreleased songs on Decade (like “Love Is a Rose” and “Winterlong”) were some of my favorites in his catalog. So I waited, figuring that within the next year we would have another multiple disc set to enjoy. And waited. And waited some more. Every couple of years Young would mention this project, which in the 90s changed to the Neil Young Archives. And then I waited some more. I WAITED FOR HALF OF MY LIFE FOR THIS. Then, out of seemingly nowhere, the first release from the Neil Young Archives appeared, with more promised soon. And the only reason I can see for it coming out now is that Young’s health scare last year made him less inclined to keep tinkering with this project. So I guess the question is this: was the wait worth it to get Live at Fillmore East, a six song live disc that features a tune (“Come On Baby Let’s Go Dowtown”) that already appeared on 1975’s Tonight’s the Night? Well yeah...I mean, fuck yeah, it was worth it. What else did you expect me to say? Words escape me while listening to these powerful performances. As a matter of fact, I’m going to end this entry here and just air guitar to the 16 minute and 9 second version of “Cowgirl in the Sand.”
1) eels - With Strings-Live at Town Hall (Vagrant)
Ever said to a friend, “yeah, I really wanted to go see _____ at _____, but I couldn’t because something came up. Oh well, I’m sure they’ll be back?” Fill in the first blank with eels and the second with Town Hall, and that’s the exact line I said to a friend back in mid-July 2005. I missed this eels show because I was going to Philadelphia to help out with our coverage of the Live 8 concert. (Yeah, I don’t remember what it was about either.) I had three friends tell me in no uncertain terms that the gig was amazing because it wasn’t a standard rock show—the strings supplied a bulk of the instrumentation. I though that as much as I liked the eels and their latest album Blinking Lights and Other Revelations, I wasn’t sold on a show dominated by strings being that good. And then I downloaded With Strings, and proceeded to curse Bob Geldolf and Bono quite loudly for their damn good intentions on my train ride home. I interviewed that dude from Linkin Park and missed this concert? I will now slam my keyboard against my ears. This stunning document of eels mastermind E’s inventive idea to shun a proper rock band for his 2005 tour is one of the best live albums I have ever heard. Simply put, it’s a must have for any fan of good pop songs that lay life’s emotions bare. (And for those downloaders, the iTunes version features three bonus tracks, including a great cover of Prince’s “I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man.”)
CONCERTS
10) Marah - Austin City Limits Festival, Zilker Park, Austin, TX 9/16
I’ve got two commandments about rock shows—I should be able to grab a cheap beer at the venue and they shouldn’t happen anytime before lunch. Marah’s set at the second day of ACL violated one those rules—they went on at 11:45 a.m. My friend Stacy and I remarked that the guys in Marah looked like they hadn’t bothered to go to sleep the night before. Singer-guitarist Serge Bielanko confirmed just as much for us, saying “I guess you had two choices this morning—it was either go get a coffee and a breakfast burrito or come see the Marah. We appreciate you coming out this early here in the morning. To me, this is the equivalent of 4:30 in the morning. Me personally, I would have been having the breakfast fucking burrito.” Of course, this being Austin, Serge would have been having a breakfast fucking taco, not burrito. Yet even with all the talk of yummy Tex-Mex food, Serge and singer-guitarist-brother David Bielanko sure didn’t act as if was before noon. Their energy crackled off the stage and into the crowd at the start of the set and didn’t let up for 45 minutes. They ran around as if it wasn’t 90 degrees, jumped off the stage into the photo pit to get closer to the fans and even busted out a crowd-pleasing, fist-pumping verse of “Baba O’Riley” in the middle of one of their Springsteen-like tales of life in blue collar Philly. Next year I think Marah should kick off the festival at 9:00 a.m., and I’ll bring breakfast tacos enough for everyone.
9) The Minus 5 - Southpaw, Brooklyn, NY, 3/26
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again and I’ll write it in this paragraph right now: Scott McCaughey writes some of the catchiest songs ever. Any time I get to see him play in either of his bands, the Minus 5 or the rarely- ever-touring-outside-Seattle Young Fresh Fellows, I know that 90 minutes to 2 hours later I will have laughed a whole lot, bobbed my head and sung along to a bunch of songs. McCaughey is also one of the few people that I would go see perform on a Sunday night when there are new episodes of The Simpsons and Family Guy to be had. This first Minus 5 show out of two in New York was the most fun I had on a Sunday night in 2006. McCaughey joked about all the new songs with guns (which made me think about how the area where Southpaw is located used to be dangerous years ago) and made some very odd crack about being stalked by a woman. Alas, I was the only person that laughed at the joke, which caused everyone around me to sort of give me a look like I should be put in jail. After the show my odd sense of humor was appreciated by none other that the Minus 5’s bassist, Peter Buck, who also plays in some other big band whose name I can’t quite recall. Buck said to me, “Thanks for coming. I'm glad you enjoyed it. And I especially liked the fact you enjoyed the stalker comments.” Somehow I felt just a tiny bit better after that.
8) Robyn Hitchcock & the Venus 3 - Hiro Ballroom, New York, NY 11/17
I’m not the only person who appreciates the greatness that is the Minus 5—Robyn Hitchcock likes them so much he used them as his backup band. The Venus 3 configuration sees Peter Buck back on the Rickenbacker guitar (and it sounded oh so good), Scott McCaughey on bass and harmony vocals and Bill Reiflin on drums. This trio formed a rock solid foundation for Hitchcock to explore his entire catalog of quirky pop songs. It might be blasphemy to say this, but I believe that the Soft Boys songs Hitchcock and the Venus 3 did this night (“Queen of Eyes,” “I Wanna Destroy You”) were even better than when I saw the Soft Boys reunion tour a few years ago. And to hear Buck’s classic chiming 12-string on cuts like “Flesh Number One” and “Madonna of the Wasps,” well, it brings out the old “reminiscing about his college radio days” guy in me. Another highlight of any Hitchcock show is his ability to go on these extended soliloquies that can be puzzling and painfully funny—usually at the same time. He was his talkative self this night, spinning tales about Mick Jagger, elephants, God, Jesus and what seemed to be hundreds of other topics. I anxiously look forward to the day when someone finally releases a Hitchcock version of Having Fun on Stage with Elvis.
7) Mark Knopfler & Emmylou Harris - Radio City Music Hall, New York, NY 6/22
I must admit, I didn’t expect much from this show, as Knopfler and Harris’s collaborative album All the Roadrunning didn’t do too much for me. It did start out a little rough (especially vocal mix-wise) but settled down after a few tunes. And then Knopfler pulled out the Dire Straits classic “Romeo and Juliet” and it was, in a word, breathtaking, and somehow much, much better than the previous Knopfler solo tour I saw back in the late ’90s. When Knopfler and Harris started singing “This is Us” something clicked—between them, between their band, between themselves and us in the audience. It was that tangible feeling in the air when you just know that the moment you’re in is pretty damn good and you want to bottle it up for future reference. The song clocked in at probably at a little over five minutes, and I wished that it could have gone for another 10. The set closer “Why Worry” was a great surprise, and showed just how well Knopfler and Harris’s distinctive voices work together. Hopefully their brief tour will encourage them to work together in the not too distant future.
6) Nada Surf - Hiro Ballroom, New York, NY 11/27
In scoring tickets for this show I felt like part of the...well, what is this Generation of 20 year olds who text message all the time and make sentences that look like Prince song titles called anyways? Generation Y? Z? AA? Whatever they’re called, I was one of them for a night. I text messaged some number I saw on Nada Surf’s website for what they called a “Flash Concert.” That’s apparently a play on “flash mob,” where those Generation AA’s get together at a public place after getting a text message. Usually it’s done as some sort of civil disobedience or some crap like that, I’m not sure. All I know is that I had to show up at the Hiro Ballroom, show the text message saying I was on the list and I got in. I wasn’t sure if the band would give it their all for a free private show, especially after they’ve been off the road for a while. But they flat out rocked. At one point drummer Ira Elliot kept having a problem with the snare. During “Popular” Elliot hit his snapping point—he started hitting the drums so hard it looked like he wanted to break all of them in half. Afterwards singer-guitarist Matthew Caws said, “Wow dude, you went all Tommy Lee at the end of that.” It was awesome. (And yes, I did yell out for “Shout at the Devil.”) They did every single song in their catalog that I love. I could haven’t been happier singing along with “Killian’s Red,” “Inside of Love” and especially “Blankest Year” and “Do It Again.” During the latter track I started really pogoing and screaming the words to the last refrain: “Maybe this weight was a gift/Like I had to see what I could lift/I spend all my energy/Walking upright.” All those 20-somethings quickly cleared out so the old man could act like a kid again. Again, it was awesome. (And thankfully my new New Balance sneakers did the job and saved me from walking like an 80 year-old man the next day.)
5) The Figgs - Maxwells, Hoboken, NJ 6/16
With all The Figgs shows I’ve seen over the past decade (60 plus now), I’ve discovered one thing that never fails to kick the intensity up a notch—when guitarist Mike Gent is ticked, they rock harder. Now Gent might dispute this claim (and I’m sure he’ll tell me one way or another if I’m wrong), but I’ve seen it a few times and believe it to be true. The event this evening that got his annoyance level up a bit was when the act on before them went well past when The Figgs were supposed to hit the stage. We’re talking at least an hour later than it was supposed to be. Heck, Mike had to be getting ticked, because I certainly know I was. So indeed, the rock was brought when they finally got on the stage. They played seven songs that ended up on the great Follow Jean Through the Sea, did my favorite unreleased track (“Who’s Your Mother Out With Tonight”) and blasted through the venomous true story that is “Fucks Off.” All in all, it was well worth getting back to Brooklyn after 3 a.m.
4) World Party - Irving Plaza, New York, NY 9/9
I must publicly thank my co-worker Dave Schulps, for if he hadn’t raved about the World Party gig he saw in Los Angeles, I never would have finagled myself a spot on the guest list. I’d been a big fan of the band since I first heard “Ship of Fools” yet had only seen them once before back in 1993 when it seemed Karl Wallinger was going through the motions while opening for 10,000 Maniacs. This jaunt was much different, as it was Wallinger’s first full band tour since he had a brain aneurysm over five years ago. I can't even imagine what it must feel like to get a second chance after staring down death, but I can say I’ve seen how it can impact a person’s take on their own songs. Wallinger had a grin etched on his face for 90 minutes straight. The pure joy the man got from playing with what is a kick ass band came through in every song he sang. Wallinger's vocals on the studio versions of his songs such as set opener “Put the Message in the Box” and “Is It Like Today” always seemed to me a little bit detached, as if he needed to put some distance between himself and his words. Not on this night. Wallinger's passion for these songs rang through loud and clear. The set went deep on Goodbye Jumbo songs, with seven cuts played. And with many lyrics in those songs about not letting life pass you by ("See the world in just one grain of sand/You better take a closer look/Don't let it slip right through your hand") it was obvious that the meanings to many of his own words had changed for Wallinger. Even "Way Down Now," which is not the most uplifting song, came across now as anthem of carrying on. And damn, this audience was glad Wallinger carried on. Irving Plaza wasn’t sold out, but the rapturous ovation Wallinger and company got throughout the evening was so loud I thought I was at the Garden. And it was obvious that Wallinger was touched by all of it. Someone left him a bouquet of flowers at his feet, and I could have sworn that he looked a little choked up when he went to the mic to thank the anonymous fan who had left them. Overall, it was stirring example of the healing power of music. Wait, did I just write something that New Age-y? Fuck, I am going soft…
3) Gnarls Barkley - Austin City Limits Festival, Zilker Park, Austin, TX 9/15
I thought I had seen some sweaty people in clubs before, but nothing could compare to the oceanic waves of perspiration coming off of Cee-Lo’s head during this late afternoon set. Even though we were pretty far away from the stage, the video screen left no doubt as to the hotness up there. Whew, I’m starting to wipe my own forehead thinking about it. Somehow that didn’t stop Cee-Lo and company from delivering the most surprising performance of 2006. Sure, I loved “Crazy,” but after a couple of listens St. Elsewhere seemed to pale in comparison to that gem. Heck, my friend Stacy and I half-heartedly went to that stage with very low expectations. I figured we’d bag it after a couple of tunes. Yet we stayed all the way through, becoming more and more impressed with each tune. Live, all of those moody songs take on a much bigger life. The claustrophobic and paranoid tone that carries through the album is replaced by one of pure exhilaration on stage. The band that Cee-Lo and Danger Mouse put together stick to the basic arrangements yet add enough, well, let’s call it ooompf, that 40-thousand people in 97 degree heat can jump around and dance. Somehow I don’t think Nickel Creek (our other option) would have given me the energy to stand for an hour on that day.
2) The Minus 5 - Mercury Lounge, New York, NY 3/28
The Minus 5 show I mentioned at number-nine was just as much fun as this show, which came two nights later. But that show didn’t have a smoking guest appearance by Lenny Kaye on guitar, and it didn’t have the surprise performance of one of my favorite songs ever. Singer-guitarist Scott McCaughey walked up to the mic at one point and said, “This next song is a cover. It’s by one of the best bands you'll ever see, and this song is probably one of the best you’ll hear this year.” Then McCaughey kicked off that killer riff that starts off the Young Fresh Fellows’ “Hillbilly Drummer Girl.” I started jumping up and down, screaming “yeah, YEAH!” All of the people around me at the front of the stage gave me some extra space for the rest of the show after that little display. And then two people came up and asked me, “Who does that song originally?” “Ugh,” I thought, “How could these people not one of the best Fellows songs ever?” After the show was over I went up to Scott, gave him a hug and thanked him for breaking out that song, telling him he had no idea what it meant to me. The Minus 5 have covered a Fellows track before—“I’m Not Bitter” from 2003’s Down With Wilco was first released on a rare Fellows LP—but I never expected this song to ever make a Minus 5 set. Hey, the Fellows have played New York only three times in the past 12 years, so I'll take what I can get. And for it to be this song, well, it was almost too much.
1) Soul Asylum - Irving Plaza, New York, NY 8/3
I can’t exactly explain why this Soul Asylum show was slightly better than the gig I raved about in last year’s list. Perhaps it was that I knew every single one of their new songs this time around. Or the fact I was able to drink copious amount of Rolling Rock. Or that when my friend Eric said to me, “Do they ever do that ‘Summer of Drugs’ song anymore,” and then a couple of songs later they did it, completely blowing our minds. Or that each gig seems like a New Orleans style funeral/celebration of their late bassist Karl Mueller. Or that “Cartoon” is still one of the best co-lead vocal songs ever. Or that approximately 18 guitarists joined them on stage to do this year’s anthem “Stand Up and Be Strong.” I just don’t know and I can’t explain it. All I know is that I never felt better coming out of a show this year than I did that night.
DISCOVERY OF THE YEAR
The Long Winters
How was I to know that cleaning my desk one fateful Friday would lead to one of my favorite new quirky pop bands? Frontman John Roderick’s creative wordplay and knack for memorable melodies sucked me in on Putting The Days to Bed and inspired me to buy the entire catalog and then write an entry for Trouser Press. Think about it—I liked this guy’s music so much I spent my own money on it and volunteered to do extra work for no pay. What am I, an asshole? (Don’t answer that, we all already know what the correct response is to that rhetorical question.) I spent a couple of weeks listening to only their three albums and one EP on my commutes back and forth to work. I was amazed by the interesting characters I found throughout Roderick’s lyrics. The debut Worst You Can Do Is Harm captures people on the seedier side of life: common thieves, murderers (“Government Loans”), drunks and junkies (“Medicine Cabinet Pirate”). The follow-up When I Pretend to Fall features insanely catchy songs that border on the nonsensical at times (“Shapes” opens with the line “Rice won’t grow at home and the Moon doesn’t favor girls”—huh?) The only problem about discovering a band’s entire catalog at once? The wait for their next album seems to take fooooorever.
REDISCOVERY OF THE YEAR
Nada Surf
I’m not sure that this technically counts as a rediscovery, since I only discovered how much I truly liked this band in 2005. But it’s my list and I’ll do whatever the hell I want. I did like Nada’s 2003 album Let Go when I initially played it, but I had no idea how much I loved it until I put it on the iPod and was dumbstruck one night at the Clean Rite (the name of my local laundry joint) by the power of “Inside of Love.” I won’t rehash what I wrote about the song earlier this year (because it’s too damn long). However, I will say that seeing the band play it twice in two months and encouraging people to two-step while they performed it somehow turned “Inside of Love” from a “feeling sorry for yourself” song into a “c’mon, smile and have a laugh about yourself and your pathetic life and maybe grab a drink” song. And that’s a lot more fun than being depressed for four minutes and 58 seconds. At least I hope it is.
10) Bright Eyes - Noise Floor (Rarities: 1998-2005) (Saddle Creek)
Ever since I became a fan of Bright Eyes, lo those 18 months ago or so, I’ve slowly been building up my collection of recordings by Conor Oberst and company. I’ve discovered that while the “genius” (or annoying whiner, take your pick) from Nebraska made some good albums before 2005’s double dose of I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning and Digital Ash in a Digital Urn, Oberst’s best work was saved for EPs, compilations and singles. Many of the rarities I downloaded over the past year quickly became my favorite songs in the Bright Eyes catalog. Now a good chunk of that rare material is all in one place on Noise Floor. Tracks 2 through 5 on this disc (“I Will Be Grateful for This Day,” “The Trees Get Wheeled Away” “Drunk Kid Catholic” and “Spent On Rainy Days”) are as good a lineup of four songs as there are in the entire Bright Eyes catalog. “Spent on Rainy Days,” drawn from a collaborative EP with Spoon frontman Britt Daniel, is tremendous and makes me wish these two would record an entire album together. My only complaint about this compilation is that isn’t enough tracks. There’s at least two more albums worth of material floating out there that deserves to be placed under one umbrella, if for nothing else to save me the pain in the ass of looking for some limited compilation that came out in 2002 only in New Zealand. Or something like that, not that I’m a bitter collector or anything…
9) The Replacements - Don’t You Know Who I Think I Was? (Sire/Reprise/Rhino)
Most Replacements fans I know didn’t buy this compilation. That’s because they already own all the Mats albums and the 1997 Sire/Reprise era collection All For Nothing/Nothing For All, which was chock full of an entire disc of rarities. Don’t You Know Who I Think I Was? serves as a fine introduction for someone who’s never heard The Replacements. Most of their best songs—“I Will Dare,” “Unsatisfied,” “Bastards of Young,” “Alex Chilton,” etc.—are here, just waiting to blow someone else’s mind like mine was in 1988 when I first heard Paul Westerberg and crew. And hopefully this compilation did that trick for a few folks. But for long-term fans of the band, all we need are the two new “Replacements” songs. Now I used those air quotes around the band’s name because “Message to the Boys” and “Pool and Dive” aren’t really Replacements songs. They’re solo Paul Westerberg tunes that just happen to feature his former bandmates Tommy Stinson on bass and drummer-turned-artist Chris Mars on backing vocals. Is it really fair to call these new songs “Replacements” songs when the drum seat is being filled by the man pictured next to ubiquitous in the dictionary, Josh Freese, and Slim Dunlap (who logged four years on guitar) isn’t involved at all? You know, I’m not sure. I suppose if Westerberg, Stinson and Freese toured under the Replacements name, I would sell off body parts (mine and someone else’s) to go. And as much as I enjoy “Message to the Boys,” it sounds like a Westerberg song. A really damn good Westerberg song. And nowadays that is more than enough good news for my ears.
8) The Pretenders - The Pretenders (Sire/Real/Rhino)
Years of Chrissie Hynde making crazy statements on behalf
of PETA, cranking out subpar album after subpar album with a rotating cast of lead guitarists and bassists and being as cranky as Lindsay Lohan gets without her special Strawberry Quik powder in almost every public appearance I’ve seen pretty much dimmed my enthusiasm for The Pretenders. This jam packed two-disc reissue of their 1980 debut blew away all those negative thoughts. Damn I forgot how sexy Hynde sounded when she was pissed (“Precious,” “Tattooed Love Boys”) about boys, not about the Chicken McNuggets I just ate. And could I have gone so long without having “Mystery Achievement” on CD? Wow, I had forgotten how smoking James Honeyman-Scott’s solo is on that song until I cranked it at my office when everyone else had left for the day. Like most Rhino reissues the bonus disc is packed with great rarities, demos and some scintillating live material recorded at the BBC. Now I can understand how The Pretenders made the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Now when are The Go-Gos getting in?7) The Monkees - The Monkees: Deluxe Edition (Rhino)
Who knew that the songs that weren’t Monkees singles could be so good? I had no idea. I think that in my entire life I’ve seen parts of three episodes and half of that trippy movie Head once on cable, so I never knew the depth of quality to their albums. “Last Train to Clarksville” is the best known song here, but “This Just Doesn't Seem to Be My Day” or “Tomorrow's Gonna Be Another Day” could have been smash hits as well by my ears. Even the obvious throwaway track “Gonna Buy Me a Dog”—with its bordering on laughter lead vocal by Mickey Dolenz—rocks pretty damn hard for 1967 pop. And once again Rhino outdoes themselves in the reissue department, packing this double disc set with stereo and mono versions of the albums, 17 rare and previously unreleased tracks and some thoroughly researched liners notes about the creation of the “Pre-Fab Four” and their debut album. Hey hey, I’m a Monkees fan!
6) Feist - Open Season (Remixes and Collabs) (Interscope)
French-Canadian singer-songwriter Feist left me unimpressed with her debut album Let It Die. Listening to Open Season, I do believe that when I first listened to that album I must have a) been in a pissy mood, b) hadn’t gotten my ears cleaned at that point in 2005 c) thought the title of Let it Die was her comment on my latest relationship or d) all of the above. Hmm, I’m gonna guess d). What a fantastic voice she has, and all of these remixes of her songs put the focus squarely on her pipes. Her cover of the Bee Gees “Love You Inside and Out,” a stripped down version recorded at the BBC, is quite possibly one of the best covers recorded in the past five years. I had listened to Open Season at least four times before I realized that she was covering the same song. Even when I read that it was a Bee Gees cover, I had to Google the lyrics just to triple check. Now that’s the sign of a cover that works. Other highlights include a great Postal Service remix of “Mushaboom” with gloriously wimpy vocals from Death Cab for Cutie’s Ben Gibbard and the lovely French ditty “Tout Doucement.” My love of Open Season is just another shining example of why I shouldn’t always listen to new albums while I’m cranky. Sorry Feist—I promise to give your next album my full and undivided attention.
5) Open Season featuring the Songs of Paul Westerberg (Lost Highway)
As much as I liked the new “Replacements” song, I like these songs Paul Westerberg wrote for this animated film even more. And since Josh Freese and Tommy Stinson play on a few of them, it makes almost as much sense to call this soundtrack the new Replacements album. (Well, except a new Replacements album wouldn’t have Talking Heads’ “Wild Wild Life” dropped in the middle for no discernable reason.) Considering my favorite solo song Westerberg ever did is “Waiting for Somebody” from Cameron Crowe’s Singles, it makes me think he should write for films 100% of the time. If watching an animated bear helps him pen a song as goofy as “Right to Arm Bears,” then let’s send this guy a bunch of kids DVDs and lock him in a studio. It’s also rather strange to see “Good Day,” Westerberg’s tribute to his late bandmate Bob Stinson, on this soundtrack. I haven’t seen the film (maybe when it comes to one of the 178 HBOs I subscribe to I’ll find the time) so I’m rather afraid to see where it’s placed in the film. I can’t imagine a bear in the film dies after a lonely life in Minneapolis, but who knows?
4) Bee Gees - The Studio Albums 1967-1968 (Rhino)
This six disc box set took me by surprise just as much as the Monkees reissue on the previous page. Who knew these first three Bee Gees albums contained so many great pop songs? (Well, my co-worker Michael did, but I never would have believed him.) The hits like “Massachusetts,” “To Love Somebody” and “I’ve Got to Get a Message to You” are all here (in mono and stereo form), as well as quirkier tunes like “Harry Braff,” “Craise Finton Kirk Royal Academy of Arts,” “Cucumber Castle” (get your mind out of the gutter on that one) and a song that could perhaps be a country hit today on its title alone—“I Have Decided to Join the Airforce.” And the loads of bonus tracks feature some genuinely weird material. “Mrs. Gillespie's Refrigerator” is pretty damn psychedelic for a three minute pop song, while “Come Some Christmas Eve or Halloween” prefaced the whole consolidation of the holiday season by a couple of decades. (And somehow I still like Thanksgiving in the midst of that calendar shift.) I don’t know if I could in good conscience recommend this box anyone expect a huge Bee Gees fan (that $74.98 list price is a bit much to pay) but who knows—you might become a big fan after giving it one spin.
3) Graham Parker & The Figgs - 103 Degrees in June: Live in Chicago (Bloodshot Records)
In last year’s Top 20 I wrote this about the second Graham Parker and The Figgs show I saw on their Songs of No Consequence tour. “[The Figgs] opening set (with guest guitarist Brett Rosenberg) was just about as perfect a 45 minutes as you’ll ever see in music. That pace didn’t let up when they came back out with GP. Every note was in the right place, all the harmonies soared, the solos were immaculate and their enthusiasm on stage was met with an ecstatic response from a packed venue.” Two weeks later Parker and the Figgs played at the Double Door in Chicago, and they were still in that groove where a band and its material mesh perfectly—and the crowd knows it. Throughout 103 Degrees in June you can people yelling at certain parts, just screaming because they are having a great time and know they are witnessing a great performance. I think guitarist Mike Gent (whose enthusiasm for Parker’s work is evident throughout the entire set) summed it up best when I emailed him to say that 103 Degrees was smoking hot—“It’s our finest work with him yet.” Indeed. We can only hope for more work between these two artists down the road.2) Neil Young - Live at Fillmore East (Reprise)
The June 2nd, 1988 issue of Rolling Stone featured Neil Young on the cover. Young is pictured in his bluesman’s grab for the album he had recently released with The Bluenotes, This Note’s For You. I was a subscriber to Rolling Stone at the time (hey, who knew that it would start sucking later on) and had spent an entire year immersing myself in as much Neil Young music as I could during my post-high school summer and first two semesters at college. So I read and reread that entire Neil Young interview the very day it showed up at my house. One thing that struck me in the piece was when Young mentioned that he was working on another compilation called Decade II that would features songs since the first Decade was released in 1977 and a bunch more unreleased tracks. This excited me to no end, since the unreleased songs on Decade (like “Love Is a Rose” and “Winterlong”) were some of my favorites in his catalog. So I waited, figuring that within the next year we would have another multiple disc set to enjoy. And waited. And waited some more. Every couple of years Young would mention this project, which in the 90s changed to the Neil Young Archives. And then I waited some more. I WAITED FOR HALF OF MY LIFE FOR THIS. Then, out of seemingly nowhere, the first release from the Neil Young Archives appeared, with more promised soon. And the only reason I can see for it coming out now is that Young’s health scare last year made him less inclined to keep tinkering with this project. So I guess the question is this: was the wait worth it to get Live at Fillmore East, a six song live disc that features a tune (“Come On Baby Let’s Go Dowtown”) that already appeared on 1975’s Tonight’s the Night? Well yeah...I mean, fuck yeah, it was worth it. What else did you expect me to say? Words escape me while listening to these powerful performances. As a matter of fact, I’m going to end this entry here and just air guitar to the 16 minute and 9 second version of “Cowgirl in the Sand.”
1) eels - With Strings-Live at Town Hall (Vagrant)
Ever said to a friend, “yeah, I really wanted to go see _____ at _____, but I couldn’t because something came up. Oh well, I’m sure they’ll be back?” Fill in the first blank with eels and the second with Town Hall, and that’s the exact line I said to a friend back in mid-July 2005. I missed this eels show because I was going to Philadelphia to help out with our coverage of the Live 8 concert. (Yeah, I don’t remember what it was about either.) I had three friends tell me in no uncertain terms that the gig was amazing because it wasn’t a standard rock show—the strings supplied a bulk of the instrumentation. I though that as much as I liked the eels and their latest album Blinking Lights and Other Revelations, I wasn’t sold on a show dominated by strings being that good. And then I downloaded With Strings, and proceeded to curse Bob Geldolf and Bono quite loudly for their damn good intentions on my train ride home. I interviewed that dude from Linkin Park and missed this concert? I will now slam my keyboard against my ears. This stunning document of eels mastermind E’s inventive idea to shun a proper rock band for his 2005 tour is one of the best live albums I have ever heard. Simply put, it’s a must have for any fan of good pop songs that lay life’s emotions bare. (And for those downloaders, the iTunes version features three bonus tracks, including a great cover of Prince’s “I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man.”)
CONCERTS
10) Marah - Austin City Limits Festival, Zilker Park, Austin, TX 9/16
I’ve got two commandments about rock shows—I should be able to grab a cheap beer at the venue and they shouldn’t happen anytime before lunch. Marah’s set at the second day of ACL violated one those rules—they went on at 11:45 a.m. My friend Stacy and I remarked that the guys in Marah looked like they hadn’t bothered to go to sleep the night before. Singer-guitarist Serge Bielanko confirmed just as much for us, saying “I guess you had two choices this morning—it was either go get a coffee and a breakfast burrito or come see the Marah. We appreciate you coming out this early here in the morning. To me, this is the equivalent of 4:30 in the morning. Me personally, I would have been having the breakfast fucking burrito.” Of course, this being Austin, Serge would have been having a breakfast fucking taco, not burrito. Yet even with all the talk of yummy Tex-Mex food, Serge and singer-guitarist-brother David Bielanko sure didn’t act as if was before noon. Their energy crackled off the stage and into the crowd at the start of the set and didn’t let up for 45 minutes. They ran around as if it wasn’t 90 degrees, jumped off the stage into the photo pit to get closer to the fans and even busted out a crowd-pleasing, fist-pumping verse of “Baba O’Riley” in the middle of one of their Springsteen-like tales of life in blue collar Philly. Next year I think Marah should kick off the festival at 9:00 a.m., and I’ll bring breakfast tacos enough for everyone.
9) The Minus 5 - Southpaw, Brooklyn, NY, 3/26
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again and I’ll write it in this paragraph right now: Scott McCaughey writes some of the catchiest songs ever. Any time I get to see him play in either of his bands, the Minus 5 or the rarely- ever-touring-outside-Seattle Young Fresh Fellows, I know that 90 minutes to 2 hours later I will have laughed a whole lot, bobbed my head and sung along to a bunch of songs. McCaughey is also one of the few people that I would go see perform on a Sunday night when there are new episodes of The Simpsons and Family Guy to be had. This first Minus 5 show out of two in New York was the most fun I had on a Sunday night in 2006. McCaughey joked about all the new songs with guns (which made me think about how the area where Southpaw is located used to be dangerous years ago) and made some very odd crack about being stalked by a woman. Alas, I was the only person that laughed at the joke, which caused everyone around me to sort of give me a look like I should be put in jail. After the show my odd sense of humor was appreciated by none other that the Minus 5’s bassist, Peter Buck, who also plays in some other big band whose name I can’t quite recall. Buck said to me, “Thanks for coming. I'm glad you enjoyed it. And I especially liked the fact you enjoyed the stalker comments.” Somehow I felt just a tiny bit better after that.
8) Robyn Hitchcock & the Venus 3 - Hiro Ballroom, New York, NY 11/17
I’m not the only person who appreciates the greatness that is the Minus 5—Robyn Hitchcock likes them so much he used them as his backup band. The Venus 3 configuration sees Peter Buck back on the Rickenbacker guitar (and it sounded oh so good), Scott McCaughey on bass and harmony vocals and Bill Reiflin on drums. This trio formed a rock solid foundation for Hitchcock to explore his entire catalog of quirky pop songs. It might be blasphemy to say this, but I believe that the Soft Boys songs Hitchcock and the Venus 3 did this night (“Queen of Eyes,” “I Wanna Destroy You”) were even better than when I saw the Soft Boys reunion tour a few years ago. And to hear Buck’s classic chiming 12-string on cuts like “Flesh Number One” and “Madonna of the Wasps,” well, it brings out the old “reminiscing about his college radio days” guy in me. Another highlight of any Hitchcock show is his ability to go on these extended soliloquies that can be puzzling and painfully funny—usually at the same time. He was his talkative self this night, spinning tales about Mick Jagger, elephants, God, Jesus and what seemed to be hundreds of other topics. I anxiously look forward to the day when someone finally releases a Hitchcock version of Having Fun on Stage with Elvis.
7) Mark Knopfler & Emmylou Harris - Radio City Music Hall, New York, NY 6/22
I must admit, I didn’t expect much from this show, as Knopfler and Harris’s collaborative album All the Roadrunning didn’t do too much for me. It did start out a little rough (especially vocal mix-wise) but settled down after a few tunes. And then Knopfler pulled out the Dire Straits classic “Romeo and Juliet” and it was, in a word, breathtaking, and somehow much, much better than the previous Knopfler solo tour I saw back in the late ’90s. When Knopfler and Harris started singing “This is Us” something clicked—between them, between their band, between themselves and us in the audience. It was that tangible feeling in the air when you just know that the moment you’re in is pretty damn good and you want to bottle it up for future reference. The song clocked in at probably at a little over five minutes, and I wished that it could have gone for another 10. The set closer “Why Worry” was a great surprise, and showed just how well Knopfler and Harris’s distinctive voices work together. Hopefully their brief tour will encourage them to work together in the not too distant future.
6) Nada Surf - Hiro Ballroom, New York, NY 11/27
In scoring tickets for this show I felt like part of the...well, what is this Generation of 20 year olds who text message all the time and make sentences that look like Prince song titles called anyways? Generation Y? Z? AA? Whatever they’re called, I was one of them for a night. I text messaged some number I saw on Nada Surf’s website for what they called a “Flash Concert.” That’s apparently a play on “flash mob,” where those Generation AA’s get together at a public place after getting a text message. Usually it’s done as some sort of civil disobedience or some crap like that, I’m not sure. All I know is that I had to show up at the Hiro Ballroom, show the text message saying I was on the list and I got in. I wasn’t sure if the band would give it their all for a free private show, especially after they’ve been off the road for a while. But they flat out rocked. At one point drummer Ira Elliot kept having a problem with the snare. During “Popular” Elliot hit his snapping point—he started hitting the drums so hard it looked like he wanted to break all of them in half. Afterwards singer-guitarist Matthew Caws said, “Wow dude, you went all Tommy Lee at the end of that.” It was awesome. (And yes, I did yell out for “Shout at the Devil.”) They did every single song in their catalog that I love. I could haven’t been happier singing along with “Killian’s Red,” “Inside of Love” and especially “Blankest Year” and “Do It Again.” During the latter track I started really pogoing and screaming the words to the last refrain: “Maybe this weight was a gift/Like I had to see what I could lift/I spend all my energy/Walking upright.” All those 20-somethings quickly cleared out so the old man could act like a kid again. Again, it was awesome. (And thankfully my new New Balance sneakers did the job and saved me from walking like an 80 year-old man the next day.)
5) The Figgs - Maxwells, Hoboken, NJ 6/16
With all The Figgs shows I’ve seen over the past decade (60 plus now), I’ve discovered one thing that never fails to kick the intensity up a notch—when guitarist Mike Gent is ticked, they rock harder. Now Gent might dispute this claim (and I’m sure he’ll tell me one way or another if I’m wrong), but I’ve seen it a few times and believe it to be true. The event this evening that got his annoyance level up a bit was when the act on before them went well past when The Figgs were supposed to hit the stage. We’re talking at least an hour later than it was supposed to be. Heck, Mike had to be getting ticked, because I certainly know I was. So indeed, the rock was brought when they finally got on the stage. They played seven songs that ended up on the great Follow Jean Through the Sea, did my favorite unreleased track (“Who’s Your Mother Out With Tonight”) and blasted through the venomous true story that is “Fucks Off.” All in all, it was well worth getting back to Brooklyn after 3 a.m.
4) World Party - Irving Plaza, New York, NY 9/9
I must publicly thank my co-worker Dave Schulps, for if he hadn’t raved about the World Party gig he saw in Los Angeles, I never would have finagled myself a spot on the guest list. I’d been a big fan of the band since I first heard “Ship of Fools” yet had only seen them once before back in 1993 when it seemed Karl Wallinger was going through the motions while opening for 10,000 Maniacs. This jaunt was much different, as it was Wallinger’s first full band tour since he had a brain aneurysm over five years ago. I can't even imagine what it must feel like to get a second chance after staring down death, but I can say I’ve seen how it can impact a person’s take on their own songs. Wallinger had a grin etched on his face for 90 minutes straight. The pure joy the man got from playing with what is a kick ass band came through in every song he sang. Wallinger's vocals on the studio versions of his songs such as set opener “Put the Message in the Box” and “Is It Like Today” always seemed to me a little bit detached, as if he needed to put some distance between himself and his words. Not on this night. Wallinger's passion for these songs rang through loud and clear. The set went deep on Goodbye Jumbo songs, with seven cuts played. And with many lyrics in those songs about not letting life pass you by ("See the world in just one grain of sand/You better take a closer look/Don't let it slip right through your hand") it was obvious that the meanings to many of his own words had changed for Wallinger. Even "Way Down Now," which is not the most uplifting song, came across now as anthem of carrying on. And damn, this audience was glad Wallinger carried on. Irving Plaza wasn’t sold out, but the rapturous ovation Wallinger and company got throughout the evening was so loud I thought I was at the Garden. And it was obvious that Wallinger was touched by all of it. Someone left him a bouquet of flowers at his feet, and I could have sworn that he looked a little choked up when he went to the mic to thank the anonymous fan who had left them. Overall, it was stirring example of the healing power of music. Wait, did I just write something that New Age-y? Fuck, I am going soft…
3) Gnarls Barkley - Austin City Limits Festival, Zilker Park, Austin, TX 9/15
I thought I had seen some sweaty people in clubs before, but nothing could compare to the oceanic waves of perspiration coming off of Cee-Lo’s head during this late afternoon set. Even though we were pretty far away from the stage, the video screen left no doubt as to the hotness up there. Whew, I’m starting to wipe my own forehead thinking about it. Somehow that didn’t stop Cee-Lo and company from delivering the most surprising performance of 2006. Sure, I loved “Crazy,” but after a couple of listens St. Elsewhere seemed to pale in comparison to that gem. Heck, my friend Stacy and I half-heartedly went to that stage with very low expectations. I figured we’d bag it after a couple of tunes. Yet we stayed all the way through, becoming more and more impressed with each tune. Live, all of those moody songs take on a much bigger life. The claustrophobic and paranoid tone that carries through the album is replaced by one of pure exhilaration on stage. The band that Cee-Lo and Danger Mouse put together stick to the basic arrangements yet add enough, well, let’s call it ooompf, that 40-thousand people in 97 degree heat can jump around and dance. Somehow I don’t think Nickel Creek (our other option) would have given me the energy to stand for an hour on that day.
2) The Minus 5 - Mercury Lounge, New York, NY 3/28
The Minus 5 show I mentioned at number-nine was just as much fun as this show, which came two nights later. But that show didn’t have a smoking guest appearance by Lenny Kaye on guitar, and it didn’t have the surprise performance of one of my favorite songs ever. Singer-guitarist Scott McCaughey walked up to the mic at one point and said, “This next song is a cover. It’s by one of the best bands you'll ever see, and this song is probably one of the best you’ll hear this year.” Then McCaughey kicked off that killer riff that starts off the Young Fresh Fellows’ “Hillbilly Drummer Girl.” I started jumping up and down, screaming “yeah, YEAH!” All of the people around me at the front of the stage gave me some extra space for the rest of the show after that little display. And then two people came up and asked me, “Who does that song originally?” “Ugh,” I thought, “How could these people not one of the best Fellows songs ever?” After the show was over I went up to Scott, gave him a hug and thanked him for breaking out that song, telling him he had no idea what it meant to me. The Minus 5 have covered a Fellows track before—“I’m Not Bitter” from 2003’s Down With Wilco was first released on a rare Fellows LP—but I never expected this song to ever make a Minus 5 set. Hey, the Fellows have played New York only three times in the past 12 years, so I'll take what I can get. And for it to be this song, well, it was almost too much.
1) Soul Asylum - Irving Plaza, New York, NY 8/3
I can’t exactly explain why this Soul Asylum show was slightly better than the gig I raved about in last year’s list. Perhaps it was that I knew every single one of their new songs this time around. Or the fact I was able to drink copious amount of Rolling Rock. Or that when my friend Eric said to me, “Do they ever do that ‘Summer of Drugs’ song anymore,” and then a couple of songs later they did it, completely blowing our minds. Or that each gig seems like a New Orleans style funeral/celebration of their late bassist Karl Mueller. Or that “Cartoon” is still one of the best co-lead vocal songs ever. Or that approximately 18 guitarists joined them on stage to do this year’s anthem “Stand Up and Be Strong.” I just don’t know and I can’t explain it. All I know is that I never felt better coming out of a show this year than I did that night.
DISCOVERY OF THE YEAR
The Long Winters
How was I to know that cleaning my desk one fateful Friday would lead to one of my favorite new quirky pop bands? Frontman John Roderick’s creative wordplay and knack for memorable melodies sucked me in on Putting The Days to Bed and inspired me to buy the entire catalog and then write an entry for Trouser Press. Think about it—I liked this guy’s music so much I spent my own money on it and volunteered to do extra work for no pay. What am I, an asshole? (Don’t answer that, we all already know what the correct response is to that rhetorical question.) I spent a couple of weeks listening to only their three albums and one EP on my commutes back and forth to work. I was amazed by the interesting characters I found throughout Roderick’s lyrics. The debut Worst You Can Do Is Harm captures people on the seedier side of life: common thieves, murderers (“Government Loans”), drunks and junkies (“Medicine Cabinet Pirate”). The follow-up When I Pretend to Fall features insanely catchy songs that border on the nonsensical at times (“Shapes” opens with the line “Rice won’t grow at home and the Moon doesn’t favor girls”—huh?) The only problem about discovering a band’s entire catalog at once? The wait for their next album seems to take fooooorever.
REDISCOVERY OF THE YEAR
Nada Surf
I’m not sure that this technically counts as a rediscovery, since I only discovered how much I truly liked this band in 2005. But it’s my list and I’ll do whatever the hell I want. I did like Nada’s 2003 album Let Go when I initially played it, but I had no idea how much I loved it until I put it on the iPod and was dumbstruck one night at the Clean Rite (the name of my local laundry joint) by the power of “Inside of Love.” I won’t rehash what I wrote about the song earlier this year (because it’s too damn long). However, I will say that seeing the band play it twice in two months and encouraging people to two-step while they performed it somehow turned “Inside of Love” from a “feeling sorry for yourself” song into a “c’mon, smile and have a laugh about yourself and your pathetic life and maybe grab a drink” song. And that’s a lot more fun than being depressed for four minutes and 58 seconds. At least I hope it is.
Video Killed the Moviegoer: 2006 in TV Land
In 1997 I went to 57 films. Not surprisingly, that was the same year I quit drinking, so I had a lot more time on Saturday and Sunday mornings than I used to have. I never hit that peak again, but it’s not because of my ability to stay out until 6 a.m.—it’s due to the quality of films and the quality of the film-going experience that have decreased over the last decade. The amount of times that I say to myself, “I’ve gotta see that movie” only happens four times a year now, maybe even less. (This year that list was Inside Man, Neil Young: Heart of Gold, Snakes on a Plane and Casino Royale.) And with ticket prices nudging 11 bucks here in New York (along with a minimum of 7 bucks for popcorn and soda) sitting at home and watching one of the 250 channels I have on my digital cable seems a whole heck of a lot more appealing. So this year I decided to take a closer look at the 10 best things to come out of my 22” TV this year.
10) Psych (USA)
USA’s slogan the past two seasons has been “Characters Welcome,” and they’ve certainly proved that when they’re not showing 2900 hours of Law & Order: SVU. Psych takes an interesting premise (a man with an eye for details pretends to be psychic to work on police cases) and surprisingly delivers a funny show. James Roday’s “psychic” detective Shawn Spencer is a total wise-ass, but not so much that you get annoyed and want to change the channel.
9) The West Wing (NBC)
Is it wrong that I started liking this show long after most people said it started sucking? Or that the TV genius Aaron Sorkin (don’t get me started on how that man has botched the potential of Studio 60, arrgh) wasn’t even involved in its last season? As much as I enjoyed Sorkin’s brilliant SportsNight, The West Wing never really appealed to me. Too much high and mighty bantering about political maneuverings seemed like the perfect prescription to end my bi-annual battles with insomnia. This last season of The West Wing I stumbled upon looking for something else to watch when The Simpsons was over. The election battles between Alan Alda and Jimmy Smits characters’ to become the next president were crisply written and grounded in reality. The show got so interesting over its last few episodes that I started taping The Simpsons and watching The West Wing in real time. D’oh!
8) Lost (ABC)
Hmm, this was a difficult show to place. I debated on making it higher because of the great end to the second season or dropping it from the list because of the rather annoying and highly uninteresting third season that went for seven episodes this fall. Could this show have jumped the shark already? I did find myself fast-forwarding through chunks of flashbacks during three episodes this fall. Perhaps that’s because the flashbacks don’t seem to be required this year. There are enough loose plot threads to be explored (or better yet, wrapped up) that it seems a waste of the 44 minutes in each episode to be doing more flashbacks at this point. I discovered a website that listed the Top 50 Lost unresolved plot lines. Top 50! Come on Lost producers, let’s get some other stuff wrapped up before we introduce 18 new characters.
7) Directed by John Ford (TCM)
Turner Classic Movies is one of the best channels around, and that’s not because they always seem to show Operation Petticoat in widescreen once a month. The channel also puts on some of the best documentaries about movies and filmmakers anywhere. The latest documentary, Directed by John Ford, is a fascinating overview of the legendary director’s career. Peter Bogdanovich—a damn fine director is his own right—made the film in 1971 but it didn’t get shown beyond a few PBS fund raisers. So Bogdanovich recut the film over the past year, adding in new interviews with Clint Eastwood, Steve Spielberg and Martin Scorsese to compliment ones done 35 years ago with Ford, John Wayne, Henry Fonda and James Stewart. Bogdanovich even kept the original narration from mister frozen peas himself Orson Welles. The result is a highly entertaining and intelligent look at the man who directed some of best westerns to hit the big screen.
6) Family Guy (FOX/TBS/CN)
I hated this show when it first debuted on Fox one year after the Super Bowl. So when it was canceled in 2002 I didn’t care at all. Then Cartoon Network paired it up with Futurama on Adult Swin and I slowly became hooked on this show’s bizarre humor and always spot on parodies of TV classics from the past four decades. Add in working with a couple of guys who know how to manipulate YouTube to find every great clip that aired on the show during its first four seasons and now I have to catch every new episode on Fox Sunday nights. Then I anxiously await highlights to show up on YouTube the next day. No wonder why productivity seems to be down on that first day back in the office.
5) The Tube Music Network
Hey, do you remember when VH1 Classic played all types of great videos 24 hours a day? Yes, those were great days, but they’re long gone. Those idiots at MTV Networks have taken a perfectly good channel and made it look like the VH1 of the late ’90s. Now all I see is Behind the Music: Guns n’ Roses and Classic Albums: Phil Motherfucking Collins Face Motherfucking Value. What a fucking joke. Where are my weird clips from Echo and the Bunnymen and Love and Rockets? Well, some of them seemed to have moved to The Tube. It’s not a copy of VH1 Classic, it’s something a bit odder. When a video block goes The Doors’ “Roadhouse Blues,” Death Cab For Cutie’s “I Will Follow You Into the Dark,” Dido’s “White Flag” and then Led Zeppelin “Communication Breakdown,” you know that this is not a cookie cutter music video channel. I like the fact that never ever know exactly what I’m going to get when I put the Tube on.
4) Entourage (HBO)
This show about a superstar actor and his leaching pals keeps getting better and better. Emmy winner Jeremy Piven keeps perfecting the role of a lifetime as crazed agent Ari Gold, and the loads of guest stars (Martin Landau, Beverly D’Angelo, Ed Burns, Seth Green) playing themselves or charactures of other Hollywood types can sometime make your head spin with all the inside Hollywood chatter. And it didn’t hurt that a major plot point hinged on the making of a Ramones movie. Next summer can’t get here fast enough.
3) Sportsnet New York
Let’s see, a channel that does the Mets games that look better than they ever did before, has great announcers (Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez, Ron Darling), includes extensive pre-and-post game coverage and shows great Mets games from the past? Sign me up. Seriously, how could I not spend 20 hours a week watching this channel? Sportsnet New York also allowed Keith Hernandez to morph into the most talked about analyst in baseball. Where else could I hear such crazy tidbits like he can’t drink Kaluha anymore because of one spring training with Ron Hunt; Hernandez stating he liked Eddie Vedder better as a solo artist; or repeatedly hear that the Mets had a reliever named Jose Feliciano. In 2007 I’m looking forward to Hernandez starting to booze it up in the first extra inning game he has to sit through.
2) 24 (FOX)
How does a show in its fifth season come up with its best work yet? It’s unheard of. Yet season 5 of 24 was one of the best 24 episodes of television I’ve ever watched. Every hour I kept getting more and more tense, sitting on the edge of my futon and wondering what crazy evil scheme was going to burst onto my screen. How the producers will get Jack Bauer get out of China and back to the U.S. to once again save us from terrorists should be interesting.
1) When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (HBO)
Years from now, when we look back on how the American government completely let down the folks of New Orleans, I believe this stunning four hour document will be used in classrooms around the country as a tool to explain how a great city was abandoned by it’s elected officials. Spike Lee might not ever make as important a film as this one. If you’ve seen it and it didn’t make you upset at all, then you must be and even colder son of a bitch than I am. Or you must be George W. Bush.
10) Psych (USA)
USA’s slogan the past two seasons has been “Characters Welcome,” and they’ve certainly proved that when they’re not showing 2900 hours of Law & Order: SVU. Psych takes an interesting premise (a man with an eye for details pretends to be psychic to work on police cases) and surprisingly delivers a funny show. James Roday’s “psychic” detective Shawn Spencer is a total wise-ass, but not so much that you get annoyed and want to change the channel.
9) The West Wing (NBC)
Is it wrong that I started liking this show long after most people said it started sucking? Or that the TV genius Aaron Sorkin (don’t get me started on how that man has botched the potential of Studio 60, arrgh) wasn’t even involved in its last season? As much as I enjoyed Sorkin’s brilliant SportsNight, The West Wing never really appealed to me. Too much high and mighty bantering about political maneuverings seemed like the perfect prescription to end my bi-annual battles with insomnia. This last season of The West Wing I stumbled upon looking for something else to watch when The Simpsons was over. The election battles between Alan Alda and Jimmy Smits characters’ to become the next president were crisply written and grounded in reality. The show got so interesting over its last few episodes that I started taping The Simpsons and watching The West Wing in real time. D’oh!
8) Lost (ABC)
Hmm, this was a difficult show to place. I debated on making it higher because of the great end to the second season or dropping it from the list because of the rather annoying and highly uninteresting third season that went for seven episodes this fall. Could this show have jumped the shark already? I did find myself fast-forwarding through chunks of flashbacks during three episodes this fall. Perhaps that’s because the flashbacks don’t seem to be required this year. There are enough loose plot threads to be explored (or better yet, wrapped up) that it seems a waste of the 44 minutes in each episode to be doing more flashbacks at this point. I discovered a website that listed the Top 50 Lost unresolved plot lines. Top 50! Come on Lost producers, let’s get some other stuff wrapped up before we introduce 18 new characters.
7) Directed by John Ford (TCM)
Turner Classic Movies is one of the best channels around, and that’s not because they always seem to show Operation Petticoat in widescreen once a month. The channel also puts on some of the best documentaries about movies and filmmakers anywhere. The latest documentary, Directed by John Ford, is a fascinating overview of the legendary director’s career. Peter Bogdanovich—a damn fine director is his own right—made the film in 1971 but it didn’t get shown beyond a few PBS fund raisers. So Bogdanovich recut the film over the past year, adding in new interviews with Clint Eastwood, Steve Spielberg and Martin Scorsese to compliment ones done 35 years ago with Ford, John Wayne, Henry Fonda and James Stewart. Bogdanovich even kept the original narration from mister frozen peas himself Orson Welles. The result is a highly entertaining and intelligent look at the man who directed some of best westerns to hit the big screen.
6) Family Guy (FOX/TBS/CN)
I hated this show when it first debuted on Fox one year after the Super Bowl. So when it was canceled in 2002 I didn’t care at all. Then Cartoon Network paired it up with Futurama on Adult Swin and I slowly became hooked on this show’s bizarre humor and always spot on parodies of TV classics from the past four decades. Add in working with a couple of guys who know how to manipulate YouTube to find every great clip that aired on the show during its first four seasons and now I have to catch every new episode on Fox Sunday nights. Then I anxiously await highlights to show up on YouTube the next day. No wonder why productivity seems to be down on that first day back in the office.
5) The Tube Music Network
Hey, do you remember when VH1 Classic played all types of great videos 24 hours a day? Yes, those were great days, but they’re long gone. Those idiots at MTV Networks have taken a perfectly good channel and made it look like the VH1 of the late ’90s. Now all I see is Behind the Music: Guns n’ Roses and Classic Albums: Phil Motherfucking Collins Face Motherfucking Value. What a fucking joke. Where are my weird clips from Echo and the Bunnymen and Love and Rockets? Well, some of them seemed to have moved to The Tube. It’s not a copy of VH1 Classic, it’s something a bit odder. When a video block goes The Doors’ “Roadhouse Blues,” Death Cab For Cutie’s “I Will Follow You Into the Dark,” Dido’s “White Flag” and then Led Zeppelin “Communication Breakdown,” you know that this is not a cookie cutter music video channel. I like the fact that never ever know exactly what I’m going to get when I put the Tube on.
4) Entourage (HBO)
This show about a superstar actor and his leaching pals keeps getting better and better. Emmy winner Jeremy Piven keeps perfecting the role of a lifetime as crazed agent Ari Gold, and the loads of guest stars (Martin Landau, Beverly D’Angelo, Ed Burns, Seth Green) playing themselves or charactures of other Hollywood types can sometime make your head spin with all the inside Hollywood chatter. And it didn’t hurt that a major plot point hinged on the making of a Ramones movie. Next summer can’t get here fast enough.
3) Sportsnet New York
Let’s see, a channel that does the Mets games that look better than they ever did before, has great announcers (Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez, Ron Darling), includes extensive pre-and-post game coverage and shows great Mets games from the past? Sign me up. Seriously, how could I not spend 20 hours a week watching this channel? Sportsnet New York also allowed Keith Hernandez to morph into the most talked about analyst in baseball. Where else could I hear such crazy tidbits like he can’t drink Kaluha anymore because of one spring training with Ron Hunt; Hernandez stating he liked Eddie Vedder better as a solo artist; or repeatedly hear that the Mets had a reliever named Jose Feliciano. In 2007 I’m looking forward to Hernandez starting to booze it up in the first extra inning game he has to sit through.
2) 24 (FOX)
How does a show in its fifth season come up with its best work yet? It’s unheard of. Yet season 5 of 24 was one of the best 24 episodes of television I’ve ever watched. Every hour I kept getting more and more tense, sitting on the edge of my futon and wondering what crazy evil scheme was going to burst onto my screen. How the producers will get Jack Bauer get out of China and back to the U.S. to once again save us from terrorists should be interesting.
1) When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (HBO)
Years from now, when we look back on how the American government completely let down the folks of New Orleans, I believe this stunning four hour document will be used in classrooms around the country as a tool to explain how a great city was abandoned by it’s elected officials. Spike Lee might not ever make as important a film as this one. If you’ve seen it and it didn’t make you upset at all, then you must be and even colder son of a bitch than I am. Or you must be George W. Bush.
99 Degrees And Loving It: Steve Goes to the ACL Festival
Prologue
In the 11 years I’ve had my current job (yes, 11, I know, I know, I must be insane) I’ve covered all types of music festivals throughout the country—The HFStival in Washington, Farm Aid outside Chicago, Ozzfest in lovely (cough, cough) West Palm Beach, Florida, The Furthur Festival in Atlanta, the H.O.R.D.E. Festival in Somerset, Wisconsin and the Fleadh Festival on Randall’s Island here in New York. Overall, I’ve reported on over 20 festivals—and they all pretty much sucked. There was no easier path to crankiness than a couple of days wandering around in the summer heat with a heavy DAT machine trying to get backstage to interview someone who would turn out to be an insufferable prick. Ugh. Even when I went to festivals as just a fan (starting with the 1992 edition of Lollapalooza) I would be really excited at the beginning of the day. By the time the last act rolled around, I usually wanted to lie down and go to sleep. I would wear myself out too quickly by rocking out and jumping around, and even when I was a kid I never had the stamina to do that for hours at a time. So when we cut back a bit on festival coverage, no one was happier than me.
In the 11 years I’ve had my current job (yes, 11, I know, I know, I must be insane) I’ve covered all types of music festivals throughout the country—The HFStival in Washington, Farm Aid outside Chicago, Ozzfest in lovely (cough, cough) West Palm Beach, Florida, The Furthur Festival in Atlanta, the H.O.R.D.E. Festival in Somerset, Wisconsin and the Fleadh Festival on Randall’s Island here in New York. Overall, I’ve reported on over 20 festivals—and they all pretty much sucked. There was no easier path to crankiness than a couple of days wandering around in the summer heat with a heavy DAT machine trying to get backstage to interview someone who would turn out to be an insufferable prick. Ugh. Even when I went to festivals as just a fan (starting with the 1992 edition of Lollapalooza) I would be really excited at the beginning of the day. By the time the last act rolled around, I usually wanted to lie down and go to sleep. I would wear myself out too quickly by rocking out and jumping around, and even when I was a kid I never had the stamina to do that for hours at a time. So when we cut back a bit on festival coverage, no one was happier than me.
Over the past five years a new type of festival has sprung up across the country—a multi day event in one central location, with an eye on having spaces where fans can rest or cool off in between bands. I started to hear so many good things about festivals like Coachella in California and Bonnaroo in Tennessee with great diverse lineups. I started thinking that I might even be able to make it through a few days as long as I was able to get some downtime between bands—and I didn’t have to lug around recording equipment and spend most of my time trying to track down publicists.
Enter my friend Stacy who lives in Austin, Texas. For the past couple of years she kept saying I should come down and cover the Austin City Limits Festival in Zilker Park. “You have a place to stay for free,” she kept telling me. I kept brushing it off until one day in May when I got an email announcing this year’s lineup. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers? Willie Nelson? Nada Surf? The Raconteurs? Gnarls Barkley? Son Volt? Guster—and 95 other bands? That sounds pretty damn good to me. I’m not sure what overcame me (I don’t even think I was hungover, so I can’t use that readily available excuse), but armed with a bank account that had a tiny bit of extra money in it I did my most impulsive deed in years and bought a pair of three day passes to ACL and emailed Stacy that I hoped her offer of a place to crash was still good, because I was coming to Austin.
Since I’m that kind of guy who likes to ramble on about his adventures, I figured keeping copious notes about my reentry to the world of rock festivals would be a good move. So join me as I attempt to transcribe my sweaty notes about rocking out in Texas from September 14th through the 18th, where I quickly found out the summer heat doesn’t end until late October.
September 14th: The Best Type of Ribs? The Free Ones.
When I walked out of the gate into the Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, I could smell them. Ribs. LOTS of juicy, succulent ribs. My previous time in Austin in 2001 I was told I had to go to one place to get ribs—The Salt Lick. The 25 minute drive outside town was totally worth it, as the ribs just melted down my gullet. It was food perfection. Before this trip I decided not to have ribs or barbeque for three months, so I was literally drooling when I got off the plane and smelled the ribs available at the airport Salt Lick outpost. It took a lot of willpower to not just head to their stand and skip getting my suitcase altogether. But I knew I had a great reward awaiting me—Stacy’s boyfriend Donnie was one of the managers of the new Salt Lick branch in Austin proper, called The Salt Lick 360. I was pretty sure that would give me the inside track on the best ribs they had to offer. So after making pit stops to pick up our three day pass wrist bands (more on this later) and a tasty margarita at the Hula Hut overlooking Lake Austin, we went to the Salt Lick 360.
As we stepped in, the food smell almost brought me to tears. I had thought—no, I had obsessed about eating these ribs for three months, and now I was going to finally sink my teeth into them. Stacy and I sat down at the bar just across from where Donnie (who is one fluid jazz guitarist) and his friend/keyboardist Papi were playing some of the best dinner music I’d heard in ages. A couple of Stacy’s friends were supposed to be joining us for dinner, so I kept my rib hunger in check by ordering some beef brisket queso and a cheap draft beer.Oh my.
It was so good. I’d never sampled such a divine mix of cheese and beef ever. (And yes, it tasted 
better than any hamburger I’ve ever had, trust me.) I’m pretty sure the very cool guy behind the bar must have been a bit scared when let out a low growl of “mmmmmm” when I took my first bite of a queso covered chip. Yet that didn’t deter him from suggesting that in addition to the regular ribs I wanted to order, I get some babyback ribs as well. And he totally got a kick out of me taking a picture of the ribs when they showed up. He said, “We need to get a shot of you eating those.” (I particularly love the animalistic way I’m ripping the meat off the bone—and my obviously sweat-styled hair.) And our friendly bartender was so right about adding the babyback ribs to my order. It was a sticky slice of meat heaven. Everything that I had remembered about their ribs was spot on—they were very moist, the meat came off the bones very easily and the barbeque taste was second to none.
better than any hamburger I’ve ever had, trust me.) I’m pretty sure the very cool guy behind the bar must have been a bit scared when let out a low growl of “mmmmmm” when I took my first bite of a queso covered chip. Yet that didn’t deter him from suggesting that in addition to the regular ribs I wanted to order, I get some babyback ribs as well. And he totally got a kick out of me taking a picture of the ribs when they showed up. He said, “We need to get a shot of you eating those.” (I particularly love the animalistic way I’m ripping the meat off the bone—and my obviously sweat-styled hair.) And our friendly bartender was so right about adding the babyback ribs to my order. It was a sticky slice of meat heaven. Everything that I had remembered about their ribs was spot on—they were very moist, the meat came off the bones very easily and the barbeque taste was second to none.(I’m sorry; I need to go get a napkin because I’m drooling on the keyboard right now. That’s better.)
After the meal was done I got the best news of the day—my meal was free. It indeed pays to know a manager’s girlfriend. So Stacy and I said goodbye to the incredibly friendly staff (I predict I will say friendly a whole lot in the next couple of pages), picked up some beer at local gas station and went back to the very quaint home she shares with Donnie. As I sipped a Rolling Rock I thought, “This trip has been a success already, and we haven’t even heard a note.”
September 15th: So Where Are You Two Going?
My other food goal of my trip was to chow down on some top-notch Tex-Mex. Stacy asked me if I was in the mood for breakfast tacos, which is kind of like asking a junkie if they’re in the mood for another fix. Papi the keyboardist also ran a little taco stand about a 10 minute walk from where Donnie and Stacy lived and she said that these tacos were (I’m paraphrasing here) “amazing.” And damned if she wasn’t right. The mix of eggs, chorizo, cheese and pico were all in the exact right balance. And it could be eaten in the way breakfast is meant to be had—with your hands. No forks necessary.
We hopped in Stacy’s car for the drive downtown to catch the shuttle bus to Zilker Park. Now 
this is where I thought the whole festival layout would hit a snag. How many people out of the 65-thousand attending everyday would be parking downtown? Half that? More? I expected to be riding around all day looking for a spot. Yet we drove around for just five minutes, found a parking garage that was free, walked six blocks to the bus pick up point and immediately got on board. 15 minutes later we got off the bus, walked through the back gate and were immediately immersed in music. The ease of it all left me dumbfounded. Everything up to this point was almost too simple. Something bad had to happen, right? Right?
this is where I thought the whole festival layout would hit a snag. How many people out of the 65-thousand attending everyday would be parking downtown? Half that? More? I expected to be riding around all day looking for a spot. Yet we drove around for just five minutes, found a parking garage that was free, walked six blocks to the bus pick up point and immediately got on board. 15 minutes later we got off the bus, walked through the back gate and were immediately immersed in music. The ease of it all left me dumbfounded. Everything up to this point was almost too simple. Something bad had to happen, right? Right?Since the first band I really wanted to see—Guster—wasn’t on for an hour, we walked over the grounds to get the lay of the land. From the get go I could tell that these folks knew what worked on this site. The stages were set apart far enough so there wasn’t that much competition sound-wise. The screens were big enough that if you were really far back you could at least catch some of the action. There were places to buy water (which was only 2 bucks, much cheaper than any concert I had been to lately) everywhere, and finding the free water fountains took very little time as well. The merch area was well designed and was big enough to accommodate a huge amount of people, as was the food court. And what food it was. (Yes, I did eat a lot on this trip.) The Salt Lick had a booth with beef and pork sandwiches (both of which were great), while this fancy restaurant called Hudson’s on the Bend served up these chicken wraps that they made only for the festival. They were so good I wanted to start a franchise here in New York just to sell those wraps. And there was the Sweet Tea booth, which sold the best iced tea I’ve ever had that I didn’t make myself.
Let me speak for a moment about something else all the food and beverage booths had in common—all of these folks were exceedingly nice. It’s almost 100 degrees, there’s tens of thousands of people wanting water or beer or food, these lines are moving quick to serve all these folks, and I never once heard someone have an attitude or be condescending to a dumbass that deserved a beatdown. This friendly attitude was evident in every single person I saw working at ACL. People working at rock festivals are supposed to have a general disdain for the fans in attendance. Honestly, this great vibe kind of freaked me out for a while. I kept waiting for someone to peg somebody else with a beer bottle or yell about the food not coming fast enough or call a security guard a moron. Nope. Nothing. I couldn’t help but get swept up in the friendly vibe the entire weekend.
After all of the great non-music parts of ACL, I’ve almost forgotten to mention the music we saw on that first day. We scoped out some space next to the soundboard to watch Guster’s set that leaned heavy on their two recent great albums, Ganging Up on the Sun and Keep It Together. From our vantage point we were doing okay in the heat until the last two songs when the sun decide to burrow directly through my hat and into my spinal column. Stacy beat me to the punch by saying, “I think I need to get out of the sun.” So we walked a short way down the hill to the Rock Island Hideaway, a huge tented area sponsored by a local wine company. I grabbed up a bunch of waters and iced teas (the very nice cashier called me “darlin’” twice) and miraculously a couple of seats opened up. After some rest, we decided to give Gnarls Barkley a shot, and wow, were we glad we did. They hit the stage all dressed in medical uniforms, frontman Cee-Lo announced that they were called John Nash and the Beautiful Minds and the broke into a verse of “She Blinded Me With Science.” Right then I had a good feeling that our streak of luck was going to continue. Cee-Lo has such a powerful stage presence that you couldn’t help but watch him the entire show, even with the extremely attractive string section dressed in glasses and short skirts. It was such a good time I even started doing a bit of moving and bobbing my head, completely forgetting the oppressive heat.After Gnarls we went and watched the second half of Okervill River, who were also surprisingly good. After a look at the schedule, we realized we did not want to sit through Ray LaMontagne or John Mayer to get to Van Morrison, so we beat a retreat to the exit. And once again, it took no time at all to get on a nice A/C filled bus and get back to downtown, Then Stacy helped to fulfill my dream of a Tex-Mex doubleheader with a great meal at a well-known joint called Maudie’s Café. With it being a Friday and all, we somehow mustered up the energy to hit a couple of my favorite types of places—dive bars with cheap beer. Our first stop was the 
Horseshoe Lounge. I wanted to take a picture inside of this joint, because the bar itself was horseshoe shaped. But they had a sign up as you walked in stating, “ABSOLUTELY NO PHOTOGRAPHS ALLOWED.” I wondered why there was such a stern warning about cameras. I slowly figured it out as our bartender kept complaining about going out back to smoke—they had recently gotten busted for allowing patrons to smoke in the bar by a local undercover TV reporter. The bartender’s bitterness about the whole incident stopped me from asking where he had gotten such a great shirt—it read, “I F’in Heart Texas.” (We later spent a good deal of time on the internet looking for that exact shirt, to no avail.) And after Stacy played Tina Turner’s “Private Dancer” on the jukebox, we figured we might not be welcome in there for too much longer.
Horseshoe Lounge. I wanted to take a picture inside of this joint, because the bar itself was horseshoe shaped. But they had a sign up as you walked in stating, “ABSOLUTELY NO PHOTOGRAPHS ALLOWED.” I wondered why there was such a stern warning about cameras. I slowly figured it out as our bartender kept complaining about going out back to smoke—they had recently gotten busted for allowing patrons to smoke in the bar by a local undercover TV reporter. The bartender’s bitterness about the whole incident stopped me from asking where he had gotten such a great shirt—it read, “I F’in Heart Texas.” (We later spent a good deal of time on the internet looking for that exact shirt, to no avail.) And after Stacy played Tina Turner’s “Private Dancer” on the jukebox, we figured we might not be welcome in there for too much longer.After the Horseshoe we hit Deep Eddie, which had their own little run in with the smoking ban. They were raising funds for “the Deep Eddie Six”—six bartenders and patrons who got fined for flaunting the smoking ban. I enjoyed our time there, until this weird dude decided he wanted to buy beers for both of us. I wasn’t sure if he was a) trying to pick me up; b) pick Stacy up; c) pick us both up; d) hit us up for a ride home or e) tell us about the amazing products Amway has to offer. We were pretty sure it was choice d), but fortunately he stumbled out first and left us to drink the beer he bought for us in peace.
September 16th: Turn It Up Willie!
Once again the efficiency gods were with us, as we left Stacy’s house at 11:10 and got to the grounds just in time to hear Marah hit the stage at 11:45. Now rock music before noon can’t be anyone’s idea of fun, yet the guys in Marah played as if their careers depended upon it. Guitarist Serge Bielanko made a great crack about the abundant sunshine (which then went behind clouds for most of the day, cooling us all) by looking up at the rock show lights above them spinning around like it was pitch black out. “I took 8000 dollars of my savings and spent it on this light show—hope ya enjoy it.” By the time both Serge and his brother had climbed into the crowd during their last song we were totally won over.
The next band we heard, Ghostland Observatory, drew the complete opposite reaction. We were sitting in the food court area, but we could hear their horrible dance-inflected rock and see the big screen—and both sight and sound scarred me. I don’t think I’ve ever said the phrase, “They even dance pretentiously,” and I hope to never again. (Postscript to this set—I later discovered that the lead singer was actually a man. I was convinced—CONVINCED—that we were watching a female cavort on stage. Damn. Look at that pic to the left!)
Ben Kweller was scheduled after Ghostland Observatory on the stage directly opposite them. Up until that point that stages ran like a smoothly oiled machine—one band ended, the stage opposite them started music started immediately. Yet we had to wait 10 minutes until Kweller came on stage. He explained that he had a doctor looking at his nose, since the dry weather had given him a “double nostril nose bleed.” It took only one song for nose to open up again. Blood went everywhere—on his guitar, on his hand, his shirt. It was disgusting. Finally at one point he yelled, “Does anyone have a tampon.” And it was as if dozens of women knew exactly what he was going to ask, as the air in front of the stage suddenly became blur of flying tampons. He shoved a couple in his nose, declared “We’ve gotta rock out now,” and then led his band into a raucous version of “This Is War.” And I tell you, it looked like he’d been in a war when he pulled out one tampon during the song and blood went flying. He attempted one more song at the piano, but you could hear portions of the audience go “eeeeeew” when the camera focused in his face and you could see blooding running down his lip onto the microphone. Kweller had to quit after that, but not before leaving the most lasting impression of the festival.Kweller’s quick set gave us enough time to get back for all of Nada Surf, who once again were great. The Texas two-step they got the crowd to do during “Inside of Love” must have looked great from above. And the having the two trumpet players from Calexico blast out the riff to “Blankest Year” was a stroke of genius. Nada Surf’s set started a run where we went from stage to stage to stage with no break. When they were done, we went up the hill to watch most of Los Lobos, and then skipped their last two songs to catch the unusually funny Aimee Mann. (She introduced “Save Me” by declaring, “You may remember this song lost out on the Oscar to Phil Collins’ ‘Young Man Monkey Love’ tune.”) When she was done, we turned around and bam—The Raconteurs were playing. As good as their debut album is their set proved that this band has only gotten better the longer they’ve played together. As they finished, I thought of how good their next album would be—and how good a sandwich from the Salt Lick would taste.
After waiting through the sandwich line that moved surprisingly fast, we attempted to get a place on the hill to see Willie Nelson. I say attempted because this was easily the most crowded spot of the entire festival. We had seen a lot of folks who brought sets of chairs and would set them up and mark their spot with a flag so their friends could find them. Well, I think every folding chair in the greater Austin area was on the grass in front of the stage waiting for Willie to come on. When Stacy said to me on Friday, “Texans are used to tailgating, and can sit around for hours,” she wasn’t kidding. We finally found a place to stand and a huge roar came up when Willie walked on stage. Then another roar of people yelling “Turn it up” started coming from behind us. And these folks were right. The sound at every other stage was perfect, but Willie and the family sounded like they were playing in Fort Worth. I was afraid to say a single word for fear of drowning out “Crazy.” We finally gave up after an hour and headed for the bus. This time the bus line was as long as I expected—when 30-thousand folks are leaving via one mode of transport, it’s going to take a while to get there. But I must say it was the quickest 30 minutes I’ve ever spent in a line for transportation. They line never stopped moving forward because they obviously had brought more than enough buses to keep the shuttle going non-stop. And once again, every single person working on the line was so nice, apologizing for the lengthy delay. And I might have been a bit tired by then, but I believed every word they said.
September 17th: Mary Jane’s First Rain
The last day of festival we knew we were going to stay to the end of Tom Petty and the 
Heartbreakers set, so we decided to skip a good chunk of the afternoon rock and plan our entrance to right before Son Volt’s set. Stacy and I are both huge fans of the band, so we kind of wanted to get close. But damn, we had no idea we would get so close. When we walked up to the stage, most people had just cleared out after country singer Jack Ingram’s set. So we walked right up to the barrier and set up shop. I knew that the sound was going to be loud, but I had no idea how powerful the low end would be when Jay Farrar and company started playing. At one point I thought the rumbling had stopped my heart, and then restarted it again on a totally different beat. At one gap between songs Stacy leaned over to me and said, “My uterus is contracting.” Thank goodness nothing horrible medical-wise happened to us (and I was able to get some nice up close shots).
Heartbreakers set, so we decided to skip a good chunk of the afternoon rock and plan our entrance to right before Son Volt’s set. Stacy and I are both huge fans of the band, so we kind of wanted to get close. But damn, we had no idea we would get so close. When we walked up to the stage, most people had just cleared out after country singer Jack Ingram’s set. So we walked right up to the barrier and set up shop. I knew that the sound was going to be loud, but I had no idea how powerful the low end would be when Jay Farrar and company started playing. At one point I thought the rumbling had stopped my heart, and then restarted it again on a totally different beat. At one gap between songs Stacy leaned over to me and said, “My uterus is contracting.” Thank goodness nothing horrible medical-wise happened to us (and I was able to get some nice up close shots).We slowly made our way towards The Flaming Lips when they started, and I have to say they were the most disappointing set I saw out of the 20 bands I watched over the three days. It seemed like they were trying too hard to make their set seem like the biggest thing ever with the dozens of dancing girls and people in Santa Claus costumes jumping around at the back of the stage. It had the air of a forced celebration about it, as if everyone was required to party when the Lips came to town. I found myself wishing they would end soon some of the crowd would clear out.
Finally the Lips did end, allowing us to stake out some space for Petty. Alas, some thunderstorms also staked out some space over Zilker Park. During Petty’s set the clouds put on a free light show to accompany “Mary Jane’s Last Dance” and “Saving Grace.” During the latter song the clouds opened up and started drenching us, sending thousands of folks scrambling for the nearest exit. Petty then came on mic and said they had to stop until the storm passed. We weren’t that confident they were going to be able to come back, so we took our seven song mini set and hiked for the bus line, which yet again didn’t seem that long even though we were wet. When we got back to Stacy’s house, we had a ceremonial cutting of the three day wristbands, which felt great. I never wear any jewelry, so every time I rolled over in my sleep during those two nights I would feel the piece of plastic on my arm and try to rip it off. Fortunately I would wake up in time before I threw 130 bucks down the drain.
September 18th: A Windfall Breakfast
Before I left town, I had to have a little bit more Tex-Mex, so on the suggestion of my friend Paula we ate at Los Manitas in downtown Austin. While we were chowing down yet another amazing breakfast we saw two members of Son Volt sit down to eat. I wanted to go up to them and say, “I’ll be sending you my dentist’s bill for the teeth I have to have replaced,” but I didn’t want to ruin their meal.
When I finally boarded the plane back to Newark, I was sure of four things:
1) I would gain a ton of weight if I lived in Austin full time;
2) The Austin City Limits Festival was the best run rock event I’ve ever been to;
3) I had just finished what might have been my best vacation ever;
4) And I was definitely going to come back again.
I’ve already marked off September 14th through the 16th on my 2007 calendar—and I plan on not eating any ribs until then.
The Section to Thank People Without Whom...
Thanks again to April for the camera that captured the great scenes of Austin. And special thanks to Stacy and Donnie for making my trip down to the heart of Texas this fall a great one, for indulging my weird obsession with ribs and the great Salt Lick shirt. I wear it every week. See you next September.
Things that made this year better: every Geico Caveman commercial, shots made with Strawberry Quick, roulette, the Wheel of Fortune slots, 220 bucks in credit at Amoeba, Gary Cohen on TV—and not Fran Healy, “Surrender” for Paul’s birthday, “Rock n’ Roll” with Michelle, Derby Day, Tony Paige on WFAN, Lobo after really annoying actresses, Indian River Light, Nada Surf’s “I Like What You Say,” The Tide doing Definitely Maybe, batting practice at Shea, the Salt Lick 360, The Horseshoe Tavern, Batman Begins, “Highway to Hell” with Joe on guitar, Bryan Adams duets at Shenanigans, Casino Royale, slow dancing and more to “Thirteen,” Logan’s Run in Reverse, The O.C.’s funny comeback
This year’s list took took one pitcher of iced tea, two Starbucks Iced Venti Chai, 15 20oz bottles of Diet Coke, two steak fajita burritos; one bag of chips and salsa, four pieces of sugarless peppermint Bubble Yum; 12 trips on the F Train, one meatball sub, one steak and cheese sub, one bag of M&M almonds, four cups of Swiss Miss hot chocolate, one Starbucks Venti Hot Chocolate, two coffee rolls, one Pepperidge Farm Saulsolito cookie, one pint of chicken fried rice, three 7/8 of a ounce bags of Bugles, one Ziploc container of leftover chicken and broccoli, one Werthers butterscotch candy and one bottle of Robitussin.
Things that made this year better: every Geico Caveman commercial, shots made with Strawberry Quick, roulette, the Wheel of Fortune slots, 220 bucks in credit at Amoeba, Gary Cohen on TV—and not Fran Healy, “Surrender” for Paul’s birthday, “Rock n’ Roll” with Michelle, Derby Day, Tony Paige on WFAN, Lobo after really annoying actresses, Indian River Light, Nada Surf’s “I Like What You Say,” The Tide doing Definitely Maybe, batting practice at Shea, the Salt Lick 360, The Horseshoe Tavern, Batman Begins, “Highway to Hell” with Joe on guitar, Bryan Adams duets at Shenanigans, Casino Royale, slow dancing and more to “Thirteen,” Logan’s Run in Reverse, The O.C.’s funny comeback
This year’s list took took one pitcher of iced tea, two Starbucks Iced Venti Chai, 15 20oz bottles of Diet Coke, two steak fajita burritos; one bag of chips and salsa, four pieces of sugarless peppermint Bubble Yum; 12 trips on the F Train, one meatball sub, one steak and cheese sub, one bag of M&M almonds, four cups of Swiss Miss hot chocolate, one Starbucks Venti Hot Chocolate, two coffee rolls, one Pepperidge Farm Saulsolito cookie, one pint of chicken fried rice, three 7/8 of a ounce bags of Bugles, one Ziploc container of leftover chicken and broccoli, one Werthers butterscotch candy and one bottle of Robitussin.
Saturday, December 09, 2006
Song of the Week 12/8/06
Bruce Springsteen - "Born to Run"
Read this. That will explain the choice fully. More details to come in this year's list. But enjoy this photo until then:
Read this. That will explain the choice fully. More details to come in this year's list. But enjoy this photo until then:
Saturday, December 02, 2006
Song of the Week 12/1/06
Beyonce - "Irreplaceable"
Dear music gods and overseers,
Please get the line "to the left to the left" from "Irreplaceable" out of my head at some point. When I woke up at 5:40 a.m. this morning and the first thing I heard besides the radio was that line, I knew I was in trouble.
Much thanks,
Steve
PS: How could an album have two such crappy lead singles and then a brilliant third one? Someone at Columbia certainly messed up the start of B'Day.
Dear music gods and overseers,
Please get the line "to the left to the left" from "Irreplaceable" out of my head at some point. When I woke up at 5:40 a.m. this morning and the first thing I heard besides the radio was that line, I knew I was in trouble.
Much thanks,
Steve
PS: How could an album have two such crappy lead singles and then a brilliant third one? Someone at Columbia certainly messed up the start of B'Day.
Friday, November 24, 2006
Song of the Week 11/24/06
Big Star - "Thirteen"
One of my favorite songs from one of my favorite albums of all time, I discovered this week that "Thirteen" can be quite, well, how do I put it...intoxicating on many levels. Yeah, that's all I'll say about that.
I did a quick search today, and discovered there are at least 10 covers of this song, including this cover by Jon and Ken from the Posies, who are in the current edition of Big Star:
But nothing tops the original, which has such simple and effective lyrics:
"Won't you let me walk you home from school
Won't you let me meet you at the pool
Maybe Friday I can
Get tickets for the dance
And I'll take you, ooo ooo ooo
Won't you tell your dad, 'Get off my back'
Tell him what we said 'bout 'Paint It Black'
Rock 'n Roll is here to stay
Come inside where it's okay
And I'll shake you, ooo ooo ooo.
Won't you tell me what you're thinking of
Would you be an outlaw for my love
If it's so, well, let me know
If it's 'no,' well, I can go
I won't make you ooo ooo ooo."
Perfect. Just perfect. It made my favorite holiday of the year even better.
One of my favorite songs from one of my favorite albums of all time, I discovered this week that "Thirteen" can be quite, well, how do I put it...intoxicating on many levels. Yeah, that's all I'll say about that.
I did a quick search today, and discovered there are at least 10 covers of this song, including this cover by Jon and Ken from the Posies, who are in the current edition of Big Star:
But nothing tops the original, which has such simple and effective lyrics:
"Won't you let me walk you home from school
Won't you let me meet you at the pool
Maybe Friday I can
Get tickets for the dance
And I'll take you, ooo ooo ooo
Won't you tell your dad, 'Get off my back'
Tell him what we said 'bout 'Paint It Black'
Rock 'n Roll is here to stay
Come inside where it's okay
And I'll shake you, ooo ooo ooo.
Won't you tell me what you're thinking of
Would you be an outlaw for my love
If it's so, well, let me know
If it's 'no,' well, I can go
I won't make you ooo ooo ooo."
Perfect. Just perfect. It made my favorite holiday of the year even better.
Saturday, November 18, 2006
Song of the Week 11/17/06
Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians - "Madonna of the Wasps"
I spent a good deal of this week listening to Robyn Hitchcock in anticipation of his show with the Venus 3 (a.k.a. 3/4 of the Minus 5 -- Peter Buck, Scott McCaughey and Bill Reiflin) at the Hiro Ballroom. The show did not disappoint. Hitchcock was his usual talkative self in between songs, spinning tales about Mick Jagger, elephants, God, Jesus and what seemed to be hundreds of other topics. This show also featured a guest appearance by Soft Boys/Egyptians drummer Morris Windsor, who added some fine backing vocals to the last third of Hitchcock's set. Included in that portion was "Madonna of the Wasps," which I have loved from the first moment I heard it on WICB back in college.
I was looking for Hitchcock clips on YouTube this week, and stumbled across the original video:
Somehow the song has a completely different (and longer) intro than the album version. I have no idea why, and can't seem to find any explanation about it on this here world wide web. And then I happened upon this performance from Letterman in 1989:
Now THAT's a weird intro. I can only imagine the look on Dave's face.
And just for kicks, here's the title track to Hitchcock's new album, Ole! Tarantula:
I spent a good deal of this week listening to Robyn Hitchcock in anticipation of his show with the Venus 3 (a.k.a. 3/4 of the Minus 5 -- Peter Buck, Scott McCaughey and Bill Reiflin) at the Hiro Ballroom. The show did not disappoint. Hitchcock was his usual talkative self in between songs, spinning tales about Mick Jagger, elephants, God, Jesus and what seemed to be hundreds of other topics. This show also featured a guest appearance by Soft Boys/Egyptians drummer Morris Windsor, who added some fine backing vocals to the last third of Hitchcock's set. Included in that portion was "Madonna of the Wasps," which I have loved from the first moment I heard it on WICB back in college.
I was looking for Hitchcock clips on YouTube this week, and stumbled across the original video:
Somehow the song has a completely different (and longer) intro than the album version. I have no idea why, and can't seem to find any explanation about it on this here world wide web. And then I happened upon this performance from Letterman in 1989:
Now THAT's a weird intro. I can only imagine the look on Dave's face.
And just for kicks, here's the title track to Hitchcock's new album, Ole! Tarantula:
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Song of the Week 11/10/06
Journey - "Don't Stop Believin'"
Sometimes corporate rock is fun. Especially after a few drinks. After seeing someone sing this song with the band, then a bunch of people sing along to the original at a great party, and then a couple of folks duetting on it at a bar in my neighborhood, how could I pick anything else?
Wow, check out how short those shorts are on the drummer:
Sometimes corporate rock is fun. Especially after a few drinks. After seeing someone sing this song with the band, then a bunch of people sing along to the original at a great party, and then a couple of folks duetting on it at a bar in my neighborhood, how could I pick anything else?
Wow, check out how short those shorts are on the drummer:
Friday, November 03, 2006
Song of the Week 11/3/06
Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes - "I Don't Want to Go Home"
As I've written many times in the past, thank you WFUV. I randomly decided to listen to their stream at the office yesterday, and this track came up in the mid-afternoon. And my, it sounded so good. Myself and my co-worker Dave both started bobbing our heads along. I quickly downloaded it, and then listened to it once again just before we left for the day. And today the song inspired me to make a mix of songs with "home" in the title. And I do believe I will have to listen to that mix on the way home before I drop it off at one of my favorite haunts, Sample.
This evening I was trying to recall when I first heard this song, and I think I never heard it until I moved to New York. That seems kind of odd, since Albany definitely was open to Springsteen's fellow Jersey-ities. But I'm positive I heard it first on WNEW. (Ah, I remember those old call letters.) I also had no idea until Dennis Elsas back sold the song that Steve Van Zandt wrote it.
(Please don't tell the Springsteen fraternity I didn't know that--they'll throw me out in a heartbeat.)
As I've written many times in the past, thank you WFUV. I randomly decided to listen to their stream at the office yesterday, and this track came up in the mid-afternoon. And my, it sounded so good. Myself and my co-worker Dave both started bobbing our heads along. I quickly downloaded it, and then listened to it once again just before we left for the day. And today the song inspired me to make a mix of songs with "home" in the title. And I do believe I will have to listen to that mix on the way home before I drop it off at one of my favorite haunts, Sample.
This evening I was trying to recall when I first heard this song, and I think I never heard it until I moved to New York. That seems kind of odd, since Albany definitely was open to Springsteen's fellow Jersey-ities. But I'm positive I heard it first on WNEW. (Ah, I remember those old call letters.) I also had no idea until Dennis Elsas back sold the song that Steve Van Zandt wrote it.
(Please don't tell the Springsteen fraternity I didn't know that--they'll throw me out in a heartbeat.)
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