Category Archives: Tunes

KEXP: Belle & Sebastian (4/14).

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Very goofy band with many, many members, none of whom are named either Belle or Sebastian. I think for some unknown reason I was picturing them as the guy and girl who make up Everything But The Girl. Not sure why as I know I own one of their earlier albums (The Boy with the Arab Strap). Enjoyed the stuff they played here. Also enjoyed their cover of Badfinger’s “No Matter What.”

Paste Culture Club (1/11/2006): Brandi Carlile

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She’s had a couple songs on Grey’s Anatomy: I’ve meant to check her out. Has an odd voice; reminiscent simultaneously of K.D. Lang and Jeff Buckley. Sings to the very edges of her range, just short of breaking into falsetto. Interesting.

Also really loved a song they played earlier on: “Slow New York” by Richard Julian.

Interesting tidbits during the “Arthouse” directors segment (taken from that issue of the magazine): Gus Van Sant is going to be the director on the adaptation of Time Traveler’s Wife. (Not that I’ll be seeing it. Loved the book waaaay too much.)

Enjoyed the Pendarvis interviews Beethoven segment also.

And Nada Surf bookends the show — reminds me, I think I have an album of theirs I’ve never listened to. Probably never even taken the plastic off. Got to get to it!

Frightening, really.

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So there was this moment yesterday when I couldn’t remember whether Susannah Hoffs had been in The Bangles or in Bananarama.
And I thought “MY GOD, senility has finally set in, and I’m only 38. I have to live through (presumably) 50 more years of this crap…”

Actually I am still thinking that.

So Susannah Hoffs and Matthew Sweet (who technically I don’t like even one tiny bit*) did an entire album of goofy duet covers. It’s a little saccharine sweet to take in all in one blow — I wouldn’t say “go buy the album” — but I bought three or four songs off it and they’re all super boppy and poppy and bubbly and sweet. The perfect summer tunes for cruising around in a convertible with sand on your toes and maybe a slushy Big Gulp or frozen coke in your non-steering-wheel hand.

Susannah Hoffs has such an ’80s pop voice. It just takes me back; it’s as if there is no other kind of song she could even sing. (Even tho some of these songs go further back. I think you can understand what I mean. And if not, well…)

*I saw him open for Sheryl Crow once. He was awful. That was back when Sheryl Crow wasn’t quite so fucking annoying but she was amazingly thin. Thin like her entire body was the width of my forearm. And she kept swinging her guitar around to her back and letting it hang there and you kept wondering why her neck wasn’t breaking under the weight of it. Skinny like Nicole Richie skinny. Oh, how I dream of it… (of me being that skinny, not of stupid Sheryl Crow that skinny. Hellooooo, not my type!)

So I offered to make someone a mix for their birthday.

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And they said yes, but it must contain Scorpion “Wind of Change.”

I told them not to expect Headbanger’s Ball, but now that I’ve got Scorpion slotted in, all and I mean ALL I can think about is Whitesnake: Take me down, slow and easy…der der der der…[“der der der der” isn’t that what the guitar part sounds like to you? no?]

In a likely futile effort to get the Whitesnake out of my head, I’m now listening to the following in a vaguely repeat fashion:

  • “Something Pretty” Patrick Park (…and as for loneliness, she greets me every morning…)
  • “Halo” Bethany Joy Lenz (sung as the character Haley on the show I am too embarrassed to admit I occasionally watch)
  • “World Spins Madly On” the Weepies
  • “Wildwood Flower” (cover) Reese Witherspoon
  • “On Your Porch” The Format

Wish me luck.

This girl definitely just wants to have fun.

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My top summer CDs right now are 1) Gnarls Barkley, 2) Daniel Powter and 3) Pink.

They are not the deepest most soul searching albums around (Powter seems to be getting slammed in reviews. Hello there is nothing wrong with just being FUN!!!! stupid idiots) but they are making me happy, bouncy and almost unable to keep from at least twitching if not outright dancing.

I can go elsewhere for life lessons; this is SUMMER, yo.

New music for the plane.

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The latest albums (with my quickie impressions from one or two listens) from: Snow Patrol (like it but very much just “regular” rock, no innovations from 1st record); Pearl Jam (rocking OUT); Fiona Apple (jazzy); Dixie Chicks (haven’t sampled yet); and Paste Sampler 22 (not yet).

KEXP at SXSW: Billy Bragg (4/7)

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Billy Bragg is a riot. Proudly refers to himself as a “polemical songwriter” and points out “my politics are mostly based on mischief.” Is getting some of his thunder stolen by James Blunt, as he’s no longer the only former soldier: “He was an officer in the Royal Armed Corps; I was [just] a trooper!” Asked if he will ever go into politics: “I just look awful in a suit and tie…I look like a bank robber!” Lots of fun to hear his banter. He’s the Pete Seeger of our time. He and Woody Guthrie, some of whose lyrics he has put to music post Woody’s death.