Saturday, December 29, 2012

36 Songs, 36 Days (2012 Edition), Day Thirty Six: Go West by The Village People

A snapshot of a time long gone, and a band that doesn't
get the credit for its subversiveness...

Oh, boy...this is a strange little choice to close out 2012.

Doesn't matter.  I'm gonna write the stuffings outta this song, because it's actually pretty cool.

I don't think I have to explain The Village People--the bifurcated alter ego of expert disco songwriter (and poor disco singer) Jacques Morali, do I?  What I do think I have to explain to those of you who did not live through disco is how enormous the Village People were.  There was a time when these five cosplaying session musicians were everywhere.  Hell, I remember a time when I was attending Benjamin Cardoza High School in Bayside, Queens where my classmates and I were summarily hustled out of our class and into a giant tractor trailer truck kitted out by the U.S. Navy as a recruiting station.  Once inside, we were treated to a rather...aggressive recruitment film that predominantly utilized the Village People hit 'In The Navy' as part of its pitch.  I imagine that once the U.S. Military Complex figured out what the Village People were really thinking about, they dismantled that rolling recruitment station something quick.

What amazes me, and fills me with admiration for Morali, is how he was able to get all these songs about gay rights and the gay lifestyle into the American mainstream for several years.  Listening to 'Go West' and the other Village People songs now, it's hard not to see what they were about right from the start.  Even though he outfitted his singers as several idealized gay fantasies, he unwittingly created a sense of friendly fun to his group, allowing kids and families to groove to songs about meeting potential boyfriends at the Y and, in the case of this song, moving out to the more tolerant at the time west coast to live your lifestyle openly.  Hell, this was a band that a major motion picture studio felt could support an entire movie, the stunning-in-its-awful-strangeness Can't Stop The Music.

Of course, it's hard to deny that Morrell would not have been able to pull this off if he didn't know how to write a dance song, and 'Go West' is a textbook of how to make a disco tune that would get you out on the floor and moving your hips.  The bongo beats that serve as the melody line practically demand your butt-wiggling, and the vocals of Victor Willis are a perfect compliment (Ray Simpson, who is generally credited as the lead singer of the group, didn't join until the year after this single was released).  If anyone ever wondered why disco music worked during its brief ascendancy, you just have to give a listen to any of the band's late 70's output.

A version of the Village People containing only three original members (Felipe 'the indian' Rose, Alex 'the G.I.' Briley, and David 'the construction worker' Hodo) still roams the Earth, presumably playing state fairs and street festivals around the country.  And I'm willing to bet that wherever they are right now, there are young people who weren't even born when they were kings of creation dancing their asses off to their music.  God bless 'em.

Here's a video.


Thus ends the 30Ss, 30Ds cycle for 2012.  When I meet you on the other side of this year, what I'm going to do is remove the numerical requirement and just call it 'Song Of The Day.'  You know, so I don't get stressed out if I let it go fallow for a few weeks.  See you then.

Tuesday, December 25, 2012

36 Songs, 36 Days (2012 Edition), Day Thirty Five: We Are The Fallen by Pennywise

Almost 25 years old and still standing up for the little guy...

It's a hardcore Christmas everyone!

Now keep in mind that outside of the songs on this album, All or Nothing, the only things I knew about this band was that it was named after the evil clown from Stephen King's It, and that its once and future lead singer Jim Lindberg once threatened Adam Carolla with something ominously referred to as 'Poo Poo City' during a taping of Love Lines back in the 90's.  Hell, until I heard All or Nothing, I thought Pennywise was a ska punk band, which is why I decided to sample it.

And on top of that misinterpretation, there's the fact that All or Nothing is something of an anomaly in the band's discography, as it's the only album which featured vocals by Jim Lindberg's 'permanent replacement,' Zoli Telgas--'permanent' apparently meaning only 'a year or two' in Pennywise terms, as Teglas bowed out after injuring his back and was replaced by Lindberg.  So what I experienced in this album is not the 'pure' Pennywise experience.

As for the song--this is certainly a band that wears its influence on its sleeve, in particular the band Bad Religion.  Even though Teglas' vocals have a quality that evoke no less than Dexter Holland of The Offspring (which is a band probably as diametrically opposed to Pennywise as any band can be without being pop or reggaton or something outrageous like that), the vocal phrasing of the lyrics themselves is extremely reminiscent of Greg Graffin's.  Plus drummer Byron McMakin's fills at times evokes the older band as well.  Add in that Pennywise's subject matter, social and moral injustice, is also the main part of Bad Religion's playbook and....well, you've got something really similar.  I can almost close my eyes and picture a young Graffin penning this call to activism amongst the 'warriors of sorrow' back when he was a younger man and not the elder punk statesman he is.

(Of course, to be fair, Pennywise is about to celebrate its 25th Anniversary, so maybe it's time to consider Lindberg and co. elder statesmen in their own right!)

Now I like Bad Religion, which is right up there with The Fall in my mind as one of the more cerebral punk bands ever.  Pennywise is not exactly my cup of tea, partially because they don't have the intellectual element I enjoy in Bad Religion, and partially because listening to them only makes me want you, you know, go listen to Bad Religion.  But since this is not the 'pure' Pennywise experience I would have had listening to their previous albums, maybe I should hold off on writing them off until I hear the band fronted by Lindberg.

2013 will see Pennywise hosting a show at the Hollywood Palladium to commemorate their aforementioned 25th Anniversary.  God bless them for lasting that long in a cultural world that has written off this style of music.

Here's the song.  Come back here in a few days for the wrap up of this year's cycle and news on what's in store for 30Ss, 30Ds for 2013.

Saturday, December 22, 2012

Somewhere There Is Music Playing....by Early Spring

Yes, I took this photo my ownself...but that's Early Spring...

I did something I haven't done in years this weekend.

I went to see some live music.

To be more specific, I took a trip three stops down the L line to the wilds of East Williamsburg and Brooklyn Fireproof East's modest performance space to see Early Spring, a band that includes among its number my friend James Dye and his wife Adalena Kavanagh.

Early Spring (you can stream two tracks at their bandcamp page)is a lo-fi band who specializes in painting these very dense aural landscapes, walls of noise that at times sound like early Television played through blown out speakers, other times like a much mellower Jesus and Mary Chain.  Perhaps the most unique thing about them is the tension between the music itself and the vocals of its lead singer, who actually has a throaty, Leonard Cohen quality to him that turns the songs on their ear.  This is chill out music for the perpetually paranoid; easy going, meandering but set within a clashing sonic soundscape.  I'm not saying it's for everyone, but it is certainly compelling.

Early Spring is gigging in and around the New York area, so if you're interested in lo-fi music with a bit of a bite, watch out for them.

(And if you're in a band in the New York City area and would like me to check you out, let me know; I'll plug you right here on this blog!)

Thursday, December 20, 2012

36 Songs, 36 Days (2012 Edition), Day Thirty Four: Down By The Water by The Decemberists

The umbrella Colin Meloy holds up doesn't exist...and
that's the best metaphor I can think of for The Decemberists'
music.

Given where we are in the year, this is a pretty appropriate band to be talking about, huh?

And one of the reasons I love The Decemberists is because, in their way, they are carrying on the tradition of one of my heroes, the late Warren Zevon.  Colin Meloy and his crew are storytellers first and foremost, their songs weaving elements of history and folklore to create a mystic soundscape where reality and unreality dance about in dark capers.  Even though the band's feel is more folkie than rockist, the gothic nature of much of their subject matter makes them perfect compliments to Zevon's criminals, junkies and losers.  One could easily see the likes of the Crane Wife co-existing in the same world as The Excitable Boy; The Decemberists' creations just live in the rural areas outside of Zevon City.

Of course, this song (taken from the band's album The King Is Dead) may owe more to Springsteen than to Zevon.  The lyrics seem to hit all the beats of a classic Springsteen 'I feel trapped by this town' song--the restlessness, the looking outward from the small town our POV character presumably dwells, the references to misdeeds. Although I don't recall Bruce ever making references to Leda, the woman who was seduced by Zeus who, in typical Zeus fashion, took the appearance of a swan (yep, Zeus was a kinky lil' god, he was) in Greek mythology.  But then, myths and history are Meloy's thing, and that's what makes the Decemberists so unique.

Given the Leda reference, where Meloy ties that figure to 'pier nineteen,' I wonder if what Meloy is talking about isn't a person's desire to get out of his town, but a nostalgia for a past way of life--namely, Portland's position in the 19th Century as a major port.  Leda's family in certain interpretations of the myth never quite got over her rape by, ummm, a swan, and maybe what Meloy is talking about is the way Pier Nineteen's transformation over the years from being a vital port to a recreational tourist spot--it's apparently, among other things, a skatepark according to reports I uncovered with a little Google-mining--reflects Portland's changing face over the decades.  And maybe what Meloy is yearning for when he sings these lyrics isn't an escape from his town, but an escape into the past where his hometown mattered.

The Decemberists are still out there making their brand of cerebral, intellectual indie rock right now.  And the world is better for it.

Here is a video from a 2011 performance of the song....

Friday, December 14, 2012

36 Songs, 36 Days (2012 Edition), Day Thirty Three: Baby Don't Stay (Demo) by Voice of The Beehive

Don't call them baby..because even if you wanted to, they're
long gone.

And now...yet another Obscure Band That Only Released A Few Albums I Really Liked.

The Voice of The Beehive lasted roughly a decade, founded by sisters Tracy Bryn and Melissa Brooks Belland in 1987.  They never really got the fame I think they deserved, as they drowned in the morass of similar 'led-by-two-women-who-do-harmonies' bands that flooded the music market in the late 80's and early 90's.  They even got stuck with the 'dream pop' label that was affixed to people like The Darling Buds and Lush, even though I think their work owed more to harder 60's era rockers.

And you can kind of hear it on this song, which I first heard as part of a fan-made rarities compilations (that you can still locate at the apparently now abandoned blog GirlBandGeek).  There is a chunkiness to the guitar riffs in this breakup anthem, and a definite Chrissie Hynde-like sneer to the vocal delivery...and yet, there's also a melodic nature to this band that's very flavorful especially given what's surrounding those voices.  It's the sort of thing that made them so damn appealing to me, a sort of bitter-with-the sweet that I adore.

Even though the band did have some success with their single 'I Say Nothing' and their cover of the Partidge Family's 'I Think I Love You,' they never got the proper footing in the tumultuous early 90's music industry...although apparently the band didn't implode due to The Great Signing Massacre that felled so many indie acts of the time.  It seems they simply imploded all by their lonesomes, thank you very much, with all but the Belland sisters surviving for their last album, Sex And Misery in 1996.  After that, save for a few shows where they opened for The Wonderstuff in 2003, Tracy has been teaching and Melissa runs her own company.  Do I think there might've been more music in them?  Yeah...but maybe it's best that the Sisters Belland allowed their venture to expire naturally rather then keeping the corpse alive.  At least now I have a rather nice collection of wonderfully snarky and witty pop songs to enjoy.

And you know, I wish that the little girls of today had the equivalent of a Tracy and Melissa to look up to rather than a Katy Perry or a (Am I A Man Or Am I A) Lady Gaga.  These girls rocked, they were sexy without being objects, and they actually wrote songs that had, you know, actual thoughts expressed in them.

Thus ends the editorializing.  Here's the song....