January 2007 Archives

Continuing a meandering path through the early 90s... I'm trying to get more contemporary (as I did last time out), but sometimes you have to go back to get ahead.

• World of Pooh -- "Someone Wants You Dead" (K, 1990)
  

San Francisco-based World of Pooh was where many people (including me) first heard of Barbara Manning.  This recording comes from an early entry in the K Records "International Pop Underground" series of singles.  I love this song because it's a hummable, perfect little minor-key ditty with dark lyrics that cut without causing a bloody mess.  Belatedly (as ever), I'll join the chorus of those hoping for a World of Pooh retrospective release.

• Adorable - "Homeboy" (Creation, 1992)

This song is a throbbing blast of britpop that never hit as big as it should have.  Maybe it just missed its moment ... we were still recovering from the trauma of New Fast Automatic Daffodils and Ned's Atomic Dustbin and Madchester wankery, Blur were still convinced that "there's no other way," and Oasis hadn't yet begun its assault on the Beatles discographies of well-meaning listeners.  Adorable combined a bass line too powerful for pop with lyrics and vocals too weak for rock, in a package that might be too derivative of The Wedding Present's "Dalliance."  I don't mean to damn this song with faint praise -- it's stuck with me long after its exile from the main library of my old stomping grounds. 

• The Fall -- "Kimble" (Strange Fruit, 1993)

The Fall reinvented Lee "Scratch" Perry's "Kimble the Nimble" in a 1993 session for John Peel. The original is early reggae (not a dub plate), while the Fall version is drenched in reverb -- perhaps borrowing from the Skatelites' "Kimble Dub."  I remember this song as a monster standout on one of the first episodes of "Peel Out In The States," a 30-minute radio program that was offered to US college radio to bring a touch of class in the person of John Peel and his impeccable BBC programs.  While there's better reggae, better dub, and better Fall, there's no better combination of the three.

Righting Past Wrongs:

• GOD -- "My Pal" (Au Go Go / Lance Rock, 1989)
  (and a bonus -- YouTube live performance)
• The Gravel Pit -- "Focusing On One Specific Goal And Achieving It" (Turn of the Century, 1991)
• Green Magnet School - Windshield (Stanton Park, 1989)

Perhaps "oversights" is a better word than "wrongs" ... I wrote about each of these songs way back in Coursing #3 and #4 without posting the music.  Circumstances (and my thinking about the musicsphere) have changed a little, and in this case, "late" really is better than "never."

Current Rotation:

• The Velterelles -- "Shut Up The F***" (self-released, 2005)

Damn.  This is what JSBX should have been -- raw, rough, rockin, dirty, fun, vibrant -- check out the photos for more proof.  I like to think of this tune as the theme song for Gerard vs. Bear.  I hope these kids from northeast England (Middlesbrough, to be precise) get back in front of some microphones soon... there's too much goodness for only two songs in rotation on the MySpace.

• Strange Idols -- "It's No Fun" (Chris Rotter Mix) (Shady Lane, 2006)

I mentioned Strange Idols briefly in Coursing #11. This track is from the limited edition 3-song remix CD-R enclosed with some copies of their new self-released 45, "It's No Fun" b/w "Old Times."   Currently streaming on MySpace, the original of "It's No Fun"  shows a steadier hand and fuller sound from their first releases ("Berlin" -- also on MySpace) but continues mining familiar and enjoyable territory -- if there were such a thing as a "new wave revival" in London in 1987, Strange Idols would be at the forefront.

• Lucky Soul -- "One Kiss Don't Make A Summer" (self-released, 2006)

Lucky Soul has just released its third single on its own Ruffa Lane label, "Ain't Never Been Cool" -- vinyl may be scarce here in the US, but the songs are also available for download on eMusic or streaming on MySpace.  My one complaint about their studio recordings is that they sometimes get lost in a high-gloss finish that overwhelms the delicacy of the music.  By contrast, "One Kiss..." is a live acoustic recording from summer 2006 that brings the songcraft to the forefront.  There's a full-length release coming later this spring, and I'm already excited about it.

Try reading through the following, with either "Subterranean Homesick Blues" or "It's The End of the World as We Know It" as the backing track.  In the spirit of e.e. cummings, I've made no effort to change the original spelling -- I've only inserted some stanza breaks for legibility.

==================

Dylan Beach

Traveling oldies circuit swhere, paid cash local ammunition.
Overruled, inspired homesick thunders.
Coat wasnt working gunjust.
Top us school day, sweet little sixteen.

Although some establish san jose,
california his birthplace third.
Third child family six grew up.
Contains, original movie, bonus material.
Thing gettin need objections overruled.

Musicsweet roller jo gunne bsidemerry boy
almost grown!
Musical resurgence due many, british invasion?
Parking kokomo safety belt
lonnie mack rivers built.
Ten, crossed have strong impact pop.

Traveled chicago met muddy.
Babyjaguar talking you come go you tell
little landdear dadit meramona say?
Junky land cross journey norfolk virginia.
Bside you me school daysoh, dollrock musicsweet.
Landedit, albumsrock moonglows flamingos,
session hops jukebox.

I've mused about indecency and obscenity in the broadcast arena before... whether warranted or not (in the minds of the few and proud commenters in this space).  Things are getting out of control again, however, which leads me to pipe up.

1.  Just this weekend, Fox Sports stepped into the continuing mess with its strategic decision to show a woman at the Superdome wearing a homemade t-shirt with the slogan "**ck Da Eagles."  Some tried to argue that the shirt said "Pluck Da Eagles," but Fox has now admitted its error.  Poor timing, gang, especially since it wasn't a live reaction shot (by your admission) ...

2.  WFMU's Liz Berg recently attended oral arguments at the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City, in which Fox apparently made a strong challenge to the inane FCC policies currently in place.  I appreciate Liz' reveling in the judges' eagerness to use the word that, according to the FCC's infamous "Golden Globes" ruling, "invariably calls to mind a coarse sexual image."  I can't say that I ever expected Nicole Richie to be a champion of First Amendment principles, but bad law is often made on bad facts -- and the history of broadcast indecency is a continuous string of bad facts, starting with the original complainant in the Pacifica case over 30 years ago.  I would also be remiss if I didn't point everyone back to the analysis of the last round of absurd FCC rulings by WFMU's broadcasting counsel and a fine scholarly paper on the F-word that I have finally downloaded and will read.

3.  In the Dec. 22 edition of "Fierce Mobile Content," Jason Ankeny (better known to some of us as a former indie-music contributor to AllMusicGuide.com) offered a slightly different take on broadcast indecency and the "most important player" in that space.

Instead of analyzing the year that was or forecasting the year that will soon be, let's stay in the here and now to talk about a man whose every action seems to shake the foundations of popular culture as we know it. A man instrumental in shepherding that culture into its darkest age -- and who now carries the torch of freedom lighting our way out of the shadows. A man who still found time to date Britney Spears in all her pre-Federline glory. That man, of course, is Justin Timberlake -- pop idol, teen pin-up and herald of a new era in digital content.  Hear me out.

First let's go back to February 2, 2004, and Janet Jackson's notorious Super Bowl halftime wardrobe malfunction ... the event set in motion an FCC crackdown on broadcast decency standards that also continues to this day, severely limiting the creative latitude of terrestrial television and radio content. And whom do we have to blame for all this? Jackson's duet partner Justin Timberlake, who ripped the costume from the R&B diva's chest in the first place.

Fast-forward to December 16, 2006. Timberlake is now a guest star on NBC's long-running sketch comedy series "Saturday Night Live," and appears alongside cast regular Andy Samberg in a three-minute digital film spotlighting an unbelievably raunchy holiday song performed by a fictional pop singing duo. NBC censors bleeped an offending word in the song's chorus no fewer than 16 times, but almost immediately after the network broadcast concluded, NBC posted an uncensored version ... on its NBC.com website as well as on video aggregator site YouTube. In doing so, "SNL" became the first scripted network comedy to employ the Internet as a means of circumventing the FCC, which maintains no jurisdiction over online content, further cementing the web as a safe haven for creative thought and expression. And once again, there was Timberlake at the center of it all, pointing the way out of the mess he created almost three years earlier.

The Timberlake connection is cute, even if the Bono/Golden Globes incident came first and has had a greater legal impact to date.  More importantly, however, I worry that the end game of NBC's maneuver will be FCC regulation of the Internet. 

A little while back, Jon visited me in DC and was somewhat surprised to see that I still had a copy of a demo tape from Fudge, the one-time indie pop stars of Richmond, VA.  Andrew Beaujon has already written about Fudge far better than I ever could, so I'll jump straight to the payoff... one never-released track from that demo, plus my favorite Fudge song (from the Simple Machines "Neapolitan Metropolitan" 3x7" set) and one tune from a "precursor" to Fudge called Engine No. 9.

• Fudge - Do I?
• Fudge - Montpelier Train Station 1934
• Engine No. 9 - Waterfall

Continuing with the "fuzz-pop-inspired moments of the early 1990s" ...

• Hum - Pewter

Part of the Champaign/Urbana, IL scene, Hum spun its underlying pop sensibilities into loud, crunchy rock -- a direction that Fudge sadly missed with the fuzz-sludge of Southside Speedway (named for an actual short-track raceway in Richmond). On its early releases on the 12 Inch label, Hum was a poor man's Smashing Pumpkins, at least back in the days before Billy Corgan lost his mind and decided orchestral double albums and a video where he looks like Uncle Fester were a good idea. 

Yes, "Pewter" is a prime example of "dynamic" rock music, a genre also typified (in ridiculous manner) by a promo sticker declaring the record to be "slow and interesting."  It truly did bring down the house live, second only to the subsequent (and similarly-paced) alt-radio hit "Stars" -- transcending the cliches and reaffirming the prospect of being emotional but not "emo."