Solace

Music Music 3

Moar 4 Yew

Um

Well, this one... The Byrds are, like, overrated by the people who make music I don't like and underrated by the people who make music I like. Hmm.

Another HOUSE masterpiece, one of those divisive records, the ones whereby, if you like, you are down, if not, well, not... Summarizes so much for me...

I never really got into Erykah but I always feel like I should have.  I guess it's not too late but every time I try, I am not surprised. This track, though, as pop more than art, really connected with me when it was released...

Amusingly enough, I came up with another one that is so obscure there there is actually no Youtube video. What do I do now?

EDIT:
Whoa how could I post that Badu track and then not post this?

Music Music 2

Oh so much more.

Oh so much more.

Masterpiece:


Fuck that one is good. Seriously. Like Sentimental Education good.

More?

OK.



Oh and.



Too obvious again?

If I take all of the obvious ones, maybe you can tell me something I don't know. Because, believe, I am bored with what I do know.

I mean:

He tried pretending
our dance is just a dance
but I see

Isn't that the line that justifies every dance music critics' career choice to their parents?

Or?



Might as well post "Rock Around The Clock" but I won't.

Perpetually "Uncool"

Ok.

I may be just me and all but here's something.

Right now, Simon is soliciting your ideas regarding your favorite music about music, and, for some reason, in my brain, another idea was sparked on the back of his.

What are your favorite songs that won't be revived?

Perpetually "uncool" is how I have described it above, but I want to make a distinction between perpetually uncool and the guilty pleasure. The guilty pleasure usually involves some committed rockist admitting to loving a pop song. Perpetually uncool is something different.

I will try and explain.

Beer with me.

Ok.

So.

As far as I can tell, there are two versions of being cool. Number one is being "cool", being detached, being aloof, turning insecurity and defensiveness into virtues. Number two is being passionate, emotive, ardent, and not caring who notices or what anyone thinks.

What has been know as alternative culture has warred within itself for decades now about which definition of cool should be the predominant one. I have, and still, choose the latter, the ardent, the unashamedly passionate. But, there is no, and there has not been, for many years now, question in my mind as to which version has "won" the debate. The other one. Detached. Ironic. Superior. The qualities of the victor. My side lost.

But the war went on for a while.

And so now, what I mean to ask.

Now that "cool" means one thing (detached, defensive), what are your favorite songs from the other side? What are your guilty pleasures when guilty means rooting for the passionate, ardent side of alternative culture against the other, more detached side? When "guilty pleasure" means picking a record just as obscure as the music you are "deviating" from?

Forgive me, I am a bit drunk.

Perhaps I am not explaining myself well.

Let's try again. Never mind your "pop" guilty pleasures, what are your "alternative" guilty pleasures?

Here are two picks.

Number one is "Joey" by Concrete Blonde. A heartfelt record about alcoholism and failure that can't possibly resonate with those generations weaned on craft cocktails and micro-brewed beers as legitimate leisure options.

Number two is... well, fuck, I just forgot, because I am drunk. See above.

Actually, wait.

Number two is anything from Greg Sage's solo album. Nerds will know Greg Sage as the lead singer of The Wipers, a band fated to be perpetually underrated even as their music deftly avoided the aesthetic cul-de-sac of American punk music while establishing a creative vocabulary not contingent upon the innovations of their British contemporaries. Those first few albums are unimpeachable. Yes. And. Yes. Not really, well, loved. I mean, you can walk into any record store in Brooklyn and those Wipers reissues will be waiting for you, sealed, and yet, well, yet, I mean, to put it bluntly, loving the Wipers in 2015 will not get you laid, just the respect of the bespectacled clerk ringing up your sale. 

And as an aside. If any straight men have ever wished they were gay, it was certainly: the guy buying Youth Of America and the guy ringing him up for the sale.

...And that's still the Wipers. I'm talking more obscure, here, folks.

Way back in the early 1990s, Greg Sage put out his first solo album, and, well, I think it is great. It's ultra-earnest. And there's a drum machine. And it's not house or techno. Just a brilliant singer-songwriter doing his thing in the studio with no other live musicians there to interfere/improve. Loving this album can't be a guilty pleasure because, you know, it's fucking Greg Sage and the album in question probably only sold a thousand copies or so and yet, you know, it's not cool, not because it isn't cool, but rather because it is actually too cool for cool people. 

Yeah.

Dig this!

So what are your picks?

Make sure to leave a comment or something... I want to know your thoughts and I may not know you or your blog...

Music Music

I feel like there are a lot of these sorts of songs/tracks in dance music. I will try and think of more, but here are some obvious ones from the disco era:

RIP

How'd I miss this?

Lord-like.

Fuck.

Louis Johnson - most likely, you've never heard his name before, most likely, he's one of your favorite bass players. Certainly, I love his work.

Fuck.

RIP

Personal, sentimental favorite:

Edit: As far as I know, Louis Johnson only played bass on the above version of "Silly Love Songs", which is from the soundtrack to Give My Regards To Broad Street, Macca's weird attempt at a dramatic film/extended music video that I fell in love with as a child. The soundtrack of the film involved the re-recording of many Beatles and Wings and McCartney solo works. Ringo played on some of the tracks, and George Martin, and possibly, Geoff Emerick were involved, as well as Linda McCartney. Everyone else: crack session musicians, including some members of Toto (!) and, of course, Louis Johnson.

And, of course, the fucking masterpiece:

Slower, isolated:

Play-along:

As someone who makes music (at nowhere near this level), it's infuriating sometimes how little is understood about... it's like, we can all appreciate a good tune, but, still, what it takes to get there is not understood. In my own case, having recently completed something better than anything I have ever done (but not quite good enough, still) it's all the hours I spent mixing the track, hands trembling over faders to get certain parts to sit just right even as the music was changing dramatically over time. Just so that nobody would even notice the mix when offering their critiques. And I suck. If you really, really, have ears, if you've heard thousands of hours of r&b from 1977-1983, you should hear it: the above bass line is genius. Not black genius or music genius or pop genius or whatever bullshit qualifiers in front. Just. Genius.