Giles ,'Lies My Parents Told Me'
There's a lady plays her fav'rite records/On the jukebox ev'ry day/All day long she plays the same old songs/And she believes the things that they say/She sings along with all the saddest songs/And she believes the stories are real/She lets the music dictate the way that she feels.
RIP, Scottso!
There was a segment about Scott Muni yesterday on the Brian Lehrer show. Richard Neer, author of FM - Rise and Fall of Rock Radio, talked about Muni's career (and earwormed me with "FM," but that's okay I like the Dan), Jonathan Schwartz shared memories of his colleague, and listeners called in. There's a great clip of Muni talking to the bank robber who called him on the air -- the guy on whom the Al Pacino character in Dog Day Afternoon was based!
What's the second BnL album I should buy?
Gordon. It's completely stylistically different from ETE and a hell of a lot of fun. And they are wonderful in concert.
They did a cover of Public Enemy's Fight The Power on the Coneheads soundtrack.
Because of the awesomeness of my friends and Soulseek, I have the new live Me First & the Gimme Gimmes album, Me First & the Gimme Gimmes play Jonny's Bar Mitzvah three weeks in advance of its release. It is, of course, full of solid covers of classic artists.
Book launch events
10/26 BOOK RELEASE
Nov 10, Lakeside Lounge, NYC, Steve Wynn & the Miracle 3 play the Flamin' Groovies, FREE SHOW, 9pm
Nov 11, Housing Works, NYC, reading and concert, line up includes Brute Force and Bridget St. John, FREE reading 6:30pm, FREE concert 8pm
Nov 30, Book Soup, LA, readings, songs and stories from Lost in the Grooves and the record collector underground, 7:00pm, FREE
Dec 4, Mr. T's Bowl, LA, songs from the book performed by The Fleagles, Del Rey & the Sun Kings in a tribute to Monitor (feat. Jackson Del Rey from Savage Republic), The Supreme Dicks, Brooke Alberts & Dave Sawyers present a tribute to Mr. Fox and Roy Harper and more TBA
Dec 10, Harmony Gallery (next door to Counterpoint Records & Books), 5911 1/2 Franklin Ave, Hollywood, opening party for exhibition featuring Tom Neely's fab illustrations from Lost in the Grooves, 8-10pm, FREE
mid-December, Chicago reading
early January, Austin concert
tba, San Francisco concert and reading
Been listening to Brian Wilson's Smile all day. It's extraordinary. I get choked up thinking about how close the world came to only hearing this in fragments. For every passage that's stiffer than the original (and we can include the vocals on "Wonderful," "Surf's Up," and "Good Vibrations" in this category, as well as the far-less-than-insane intro to "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow" -- although all make up for it in other ways), there's a section of lyrics or music or perfect wordless harmony that just takes my breath away. I think I first grew emotional when suddenly there were new words and sounds in "Barnyard", the fourth song on the album (which was always 3rd on my homemade Smile, before - rather than after - "Do You Like Worms?," which is now retitled "Roll Plymouth Rock"). The fantastic transition from "Wonderful" to "Child Is Father Of The Man" is now filled by "Song For Children," which previously was known as the instrumental "Look". The lyrics on "I'm In Great Shape/I Wanna Be Around/Workshop" and the transition to "Vega-Tables" make it one of the darkest beautiful things that Brian Wilson or the Beach Boys ever created outside of "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times." The instrumental "Holiday" is now the pirate drama "On A Holiday." "Love To Say Da Da" has become "In Blue Hawaii," an intentionally silly ode to the 50th American state. There's no sign of "He Gives Speeches/She's Going Bald" or "Well, You're Welcome".
Listening to the completed original teenage symphony to God leads me to wonder how different American rock music would have developed if Brian Wilson had been able to finish it. Smile is such a deeply weird and wholly gorgeous slice of wholesome psychedelic Americana; it's hard to imagine what would have happened if it had been a piece of mainstream music. It's no mere concept album, like Pet Sounds or Sgt. Pepper's, but a full-blown rock opera, following the notion that albums and songs can proceed in narratively or musically linked sections but rejecting the folk-song verse-chorus-verse trope that informs so much rock music, and pre-dating the hereto recognized first rock opera, The Who's "A Quick One (While He's Away)," by two years.
mid-December, Chicago reading
w00t w00t!
RIO!
No, got nothing else. Good to see ya, though, as always.
HELLO FRANKENBUDDHA!!!
I should rilly rilly go to bed.
mid-December, Chicago reading
w00t w00t!
Yeah, check in with erinaceous, Rio, she's helping to put it together.