Saturday, January 21, 2012

Cover-versies: 'Ignition (remix)' by The Corner Laughers

In the past--several times in the past--I've sneered about a particular brand of cover, namely the 'Indie Artist Does A Cover Of A Rap Song So They Can Be Praised For Being Ironic' cover.

This particular cover sub-genre was started when three artists--former Veruca Salt front woman Nina Simone, internet musician Jonathan Coulton, and much-mentioned on this blog Ben Folds--did melodic versions of famous gangsta rap classics. Simone took NWA's 'Straight Outta Compton' and turned it into a jazzy torch song, whereas Folds made 'Bitches Ain't Shit' into a strange piano ballad. Coulton's cover of Sir Mix-A-Lot's 'Baby Got Back,' which reduced its techno-funk beat to easy listening guitar riffs followed shortly after.

Now all three of these songs I cite above are not part of what I rail against. They all show a great deal of affection for the genre they're altering (Simone's, in particular, seems to be treating the song with great reverence), and are recommended. What I'm talking about is the flood of covers that followed these three--countless songs by indie bands and alt-folk troubadours who have taken countless rap and modern R&B songs and simply slowed the tempo to dirge-time and leave it at that, thinking they're proving how cool they are by being 'ironic' in this way. Those me-too'ers bug the Hell out of me. It shows that the kind of lazy songsmithing I accuse many pop acts of is not confined to them...

But recently I found a cover of a modern R&B song I truly, truly liked, and I figured I'd share it with you. But before I do that, as is the tradition with most of the Cover-versies I have posted, here's the original, R. Kelly's 'Ignition (Remix')

Yes...I am about to post an R. Kelly song right here....

....and now here's a cover by the Bay Area Twee Pop combo The Corner Laughers

Man, I like this cover. And not just because I love Karla Kane's vocals, or because of the honest transposition of a Twee Pop sensibility with R. Kelly's distinctively laid-back-to-the-point-of-sludgy tendencies. What I love about this particular cover is how the band manages to translate Kelly's style into their own without losing or destroying the original's feel one bit. Yes, The Corner Laughers do re-arrange Kelly's melody a bit, swapping out the electronic beats with that toy piano-like plinking and adding some harmonics and shout backs to the backing vocals. Hell, I swear there's a pitch change to accomodate Kane's vocals since she's, you know, female. But Kelly's original is unmistakably still there. The group isn't mocking Kelly, but--much like Simone and Folds and Kelly before them--showing a great deal of affection for his work. And I can certainly get behind that.

I do wish you could hear The Corner Laughers' studio mix of the song....wait a minute, you can! If you go here, you can download the track free and clear--or, if you have seventy-nine cents handy, you can purchase the entire single. I'd recommend that; 'Ignition (Remix)' is a b-side to 'Transamerica Pyramid,' a wonderfully bouncy love letter to San Francisco that sets a love story against its skyline. Please be sure to tell them I sent you.

(And if you like what you hear, you might want to pre-order their new album, Poppy Seeds, which is forthcoming this May.)
 

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

March Musical Madness 2012 Edition--The Worst Song! Nominees

Basketball...he's playing Basketball....
As I mentioned sometime last year, part of the problem with breaking out all my music noodling into its own blog is that I have to come up with stuff to do year 'round...and given that I want to attract more than the three guys in Germany who visit the same six entries every few days, I thought I'd try a little interactive stunt.

Now don't get me wrong--I don't care for college basketball because a) I don't care for basketball and b) I don't care for collegiate sports. But that's not going to stop me from doing a collegiate basketball style stunt!

What I want to do is take the worst songs of the last thirty-two years (why thirty-two? Because it's easier to bracket-ize them that way) and put them into a head-to-head tournament....you know how it works, you prolly filled out those office pool forms a dozen of times.

Of course, to do this, I'm going to need thirty-two songs, one for each year from 1979-2011. So I'd like you all to nominate some songs for this competition in the comments section below. Please give me:

1) The Song
2) the Year It Was Released
3) A line or two about why you think this song should represent the year of its misbegotten birth.

I'll do the tallying, and put the ones with the most votes in the pool for the competition. If I do see a nominee that perfectly embodies the worst of that year, I will swoop in and close that year. I will post the nominees for each year below once a clear winner develops. Please feel free to link to this post, so others who might not be aware of this competition can visit us and vote.  Deadline is January 30th, 2012.

Get to choosing, my friends!

1979:
1980:
1981:
1982:
1983:
1984:
1985:
1986:
1987:
1988:
1989:
1990:
1991:
1992:
1993:
1994:
1995:
1996:
1997:
1998:
1999:
2000:
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2002:
2003:
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2005:
2006:
2007:
2008:
2009:
2010:
2011:

36 Songs, 36 Days(2012 Edition), Day Three: If It Makes You Happy by Sheryl Crow

I can't hide it..and I can't really explain it. But I have a serious, serious thing for Sheryl Crow.

And I do acknowledge on some level it's the 'She's Hawt, So She Must Be Good' principle that all men seem to operate on--how else can you explain the thoroughly befuddling career of Katy Perry?--but there's more to it than that. This is a woman with some legitimate chops; much as Fiona Apple was Tori Amos if Tori studied jazz as opposed to classical music, Crow can be seen as Bonnie Raitt if she studied country and western instead of the blues. Not to say that there isn't some blues in Sheryl's blood--many of the songs off the eponymous album this came from and especially the one that followed it, The Globe Sessions, bear overpowering echoes of Crow's then-paramour Eric Clapton...but Crow's original flavor is the flavor of Opryland mixed with the best qualities of MOR-tinged pop.

Of course, I do find it amusing that in this phase of her career, before she decided to go wandering blind through the corridors of pop rock history (I'm sorry, Ms. Crow, but there was just no excuse for Detours), there is such a sharp divide in her song-smithing. You can almost reorder all these early albums into a 'rock' side and a 'easy listening' side. In spite of its somewhat laid back orchestration, I'd like to think this would end up on Sheryl Crow's 'rock' side. There's a stinging indictment that runs throughout the song's lyrics (and one that I can't help but think is directed at Clapton, even if the song as a whole is ostensively about the music business as a whole) that certainly plays off of the fuzzy-but-melodic guitar riffs.

To me it's weird looking at this in the context of where Crow's career will go after its follow-up. Given how she's sneering here about how bellyaching musicians (she's looking at you, Eric) need to shut up if they also talk about how great it is to play music, the very pop turn she takes beginning with Cmon! Cmon! that just degrades until we get, yes, Detours* seems a touch cynical. And looking at the video now, depicting Sheryl as an example of a vintage rocker in a museum full of extinct creatures is downright hilarious in retrospect. Don't take my word for it...look.

I admit, I look upon this song with some nostalgia; it evokes memories of cracking open this one and The Globe Sessions and feeding the CD into my computer at work so I could experience it, like, right now. And I further admit that even if she continues to churn out stuff like Detours, I will still buy it because there's still enough 'She's Hawt So She Must Be Good' running through my blood that I will put up with half-assed psuedo-Warren-Zevon storytelling about future gas riots. But taking this song in and of itself...it's got the stuff.

*--I know Ms. Crow has released another album since Detours--hell, technically two, since she followed up 100 Miles From Memphis with a live album of...well, stuff from 100 Miles From Memphis.  And I do own it, but I have not listened to it yet.  Make of it what you will.

Saturday, January 14, 2012

36 Songs, 36 Days (2012 Edition), Day Two: California Sex Lawyer by Fountains of Wayne

And here we are yet again with what has to have become the Patron Band of Singalong Scriptures, my favorite modern power pop combo, The Fountains of Wayne.

This is a cut from Out-Of-State Plates, the two-disc collection of rarities, b-sides and unreleased tracks the band put out in 2005, and according to Adam Schlesinger, it's literally a load of nonsense inspired by seeing a copy of the magazine California Lawyer in the boardroom of the band's lawyer.

And to be fair, it is nonsense--the lyrics really are light-weight and borderline incoherent, the song boiling down to 'I'm going to Cali, I'm going to bust things up with my girl and my German Shepherd named Doug, then I'm going to sleep.' And at no point does Adam even hint at what being a California Sex Lawyer entails (outside of the obvious answer of being lawyer-ly and having sex). But what drives this song is not the lyrics but the arrangement, which is pure-d Left Coast. The band manages to create this laid back guitar rift that is occasionally punctuated by synth-twinks that seem to make our POV character's contentions seem entirely plausible. Hell, with that crunchy bridge, I'd be willing to drop everything for an L.A. position as a California Sex Lawyer.

Damn, that phrase just makes me silly every time I write it. Which may have been the whole point of the band writing the song.

(And incidentally, have I ever not done one of these yearly song cycles without a FoW song in the mix somewhere?)

I promise sometime soon to get back to my 'Me And...' series dissecting how I came to love this band so much soon. Until then, here's the song itself.

Sunday, January 1, 2012

36 Songs, 36 Days, Day One (2012 Edition): The Siamese Survived by Slim Twig

Can you see me now?
And so we start a new cycle with an overflow, but a smaller one than last year...and a peculiar indie song from Toronto that sounds like it belongs in another era.

Slim Twig is the musician persona of actor Max Turnbull, and said persona seems very heavily rooted in the weird neo-noir music tradition that briefly flowered in the mid-to-late 80's; this song, with its skronking rockabilly melody, mannered vocals and story-song structure all evoke the work of Nick Cave, middle period (Giant-era) Warren Zevon and especially post-Wall of Voodoo Stan Ridgway. Hell, you could see this easily fitting on Ridgway's third, most experimental and problematic album, Partyball, or on one of the albums he recorded as part of the Drywall project. It's quirky and a little off-putting, but also on some level compelling, as if we're listening to the soundtrack to a long-lost spaghetti western we're never going to see.

And I wish I could tell you more, but Turnball's vocals are so overmannered that I can't interpret them clearly. There is certainly a story here about, well, someone called The Siamese surviving something he shouldn't, but beyond that I can't tell you much. What I can tell you is that the EP this song is from, Spit It Twig Volume Two, is still available for free at bandcamp. I wouldn't say Slim Twig is for everyone, but those people who appreciate a vocalist who isn't conventional might get a kick out of him. I will point you to another song on this EP, 'Norma Jean,' which is softer in nuance but no less outre.

No video for this song, but here's one for another song of his, so you can decide if he's for you.