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Music
I've had a pretty complex relationship with music over the years... ought to write about that sometime. Anyways: I listen to a lot of it, in genres like "rock" and "pop" and "folk", and play some of it, primarily in the genres "old-time" and "classical".
That's what Robyn Hitchcock's grandma used to say, or so he told us this evening -- he said nobody ever turned into his grandma, so he dedicated "I'm Only You" to her. This was the second song, after "The Museum of Sex" -- I was happy to hear him open with this song after I had opened my mix tape with it.
"I'm Only You" was followed by a long digression on digestion, and whether and under what circumstances we would feel comfortable discussing our digestions, leading into "a digestion song", viz."The Cheese Alarm", which made Ellen (and me) laugh out loud with its urgency. "Please! Somebody ring the cheese alarm!" Robyn conducted a dialogue with the audience after, asking if WALL-E is any good -- "Yeah!" -- "That's good to know... Can you all hear this?" -- "Yeah!" -- "That's good to know -- it's reassuring to think this is all not just going on in here..." and played, with much dancing during the solos, "I Got the Hots for You" and "Glass Hotel".
"Thank you --" and as he started playing "Idonia", "This is about someone who left a hole the shape of themselves in somebody else's life." As he was retuning to play his next song, people in the audience were calling out requests, and he said with just enough of an edge to get them to stop, "You know there's a thin line between a devoted admirer and a creep... To be a slave to love -- what a thing!" and sang "The Idea of You".
A long digression about the Victorians -- "It's possible that the Victorians were frightened by sex... Victorians wrote mostly in longhand, no e-mail. But biologically they were much the same as us..." reflecting on the possibilities of interbreeding between modern humans and Victorians, getting particularly interesting if the Victorians in question are your own ancestors; "Screw your great-grandparents! Whole empires have been founded on worse. But this song is not really about that:" and launched into the hilarious "Victorian Squid". "Thank you -- it's all true."
The next song, "Creeped Out", went out to "a friend of mine -- it's her birthday on Monday. Happy birthday, friend!" and while he tuned up for the next song, he said: "There's something insanely simple about watching somebody perform songs he's written -- it's like somebody sending you YouTube videos of cats..." and dedicated the song, which was "I Feel Beautiful", to "Michèle and our cat". Ellen thought this was a really smart lyric, and I agree.
"How many people find the idea of eternity relaxing?" Not many -- mostly we want finitude. Robyn played "Oceanside", which was maybe the only song of the evening that really had me wishing for a band behind him. "This isn't exactly about Arthur Lee -- it's just around him..." and sings "The Wreck of the Arthur Lee", which I guess I had not realized was about a person. "It's a funny thing about eulogies -- essentially it's sad -- ... what really makes people cry at a funeral is the jokes," by way of explaining why he had written "Underground Sun" so upbeat -- it's about a friend who died, who was "definitely not a dismal person." "When people are dead they don't have an age."
"I'll leave you with a blast of folk-rock sound," Robyn tells us as he dons his harmonica, and plays "Only the Stones Remain" with a downright amazing harmonica part. But we clapped and clapped, and he came back out to perform a long encore -- wearing his purple shirt with iguanas rather than his orange shirt with dingbats. "You've Got Heaven"* was the first song in the encore, and Ellen's favorite song of the evening. Then a song I don't know (and can't find at The Asking Tree), with the chorus "I'm gonna see you in the afterlife." And finally, after a long digression about cones (during which he wished us all "an incredibly long rest of your lives"), Olé Tarantula.
Nice -- a totally satisfying evening. The level of energy he projects from the stage just takes my breath away.
*Wow! "Heaven" is from the early eighties -- somehow I had got fixed in my head that it was from a recent record. I think it sounds much more like late-nineties Hitchcock than do any of the other songs on "Gotta Let This Hen Out".
These tickets have been burning a hole in my pocket for a couple of weeks now -- tonight Ellen and I are going up to Ridgewood, to listen to Robyn Hitchcock! I'll be wandering around in an expectant haze all day, more than I usually am I mean. The venue is a place called Blend -- looks like a good place to hear music.
Mostly I'm excited about going to a concert with Ellen, which we have not done together in too long a time.
Tonight Ellen and I watched Tin Men. This movie came out when I was 17 -- my memory of it is of it being the first movie where I really noticed the camerawork and composition of the frame. And yes, the visual effect of the movie is pretty stunning; and the characters are even more despicable than I remembered. I wasn't so persuaded, this time around, by Dreyfuss' character's growth, which I expect appealed to me as an adolescent. Levinson should totally film Something Happened, and maybe with Dreyfuss as Slocum. Or maybe the moment has passed.
What really tied the movie together for me was the soundtrack. My only memory of Fine Young Cannibals is of the "She Drives Me Crazy" video. But here they were -- exactly appropriate for this movie. The nightclub scene where they are singing "One Good Thing", one of the highlights of the movie.
I meant to say: The Fine Young Cannibals make me think about NickS's recent post about Squeeze, though I'm not sure how much objective similarity there is between the two bands. FYC rocks way harder IMO.
David Byrne's installation at 10 South Street is a really pleasant space to move through. I sat at the organ for a little while and pecked at the keys -- which I was expecting to be the really interesting part of the installation -- but what ended up engaging me much more, was walking around the different areas of the room while other people played the building.
It was not -- did not feel like -- an experience of listening to music. Really seemed much more like the art I was appreciating was architecture, like the purpose of the organ was to amplify the innate qualities of the building itself rather than to superimpose music on top of them. When I stood next to a column and felt and heard the percussive vibrations in its structure, it felt like I was assimilating into the structure of the building.
posted morning of July 6th, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about David Byrne
Fun! This afternoon we are going in to the city, and meet up with Michael. We're going to see and hear David Byrne's new project, Playing the Building. A-and maybe we'll walk up to the Brooklyn Bridge to see Olafur Eliasson's new installation of waterfalls. Or, perhaps we'll ride the Staten Island Ferry.
Hello, Hello, Hello, Hello. Bill passes along links to two covers of "Smells Like Teen Spirit". Take it away, Paul Anka!
Nice, right? But just listen to (and watch!) the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. They absolutely demolish this tune (in the good sense of "demolish", I mean):
In Bill's words, they "set a new standard for feeling stupid and contagious."
By the way: All of the Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain tracks that are up on YouTube set new standards for whatever they are doing, all that I've watched to date at any rate. There are way worse ways to spend some time, than by walking down that list.
(Mark contributes a version from Tori Amos: "I'll have what she's having...")
The new box set is now available for pre-order! Robyn Hitchcock, the Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians years. (That is to say, the non-A & M Egyptians years -- the tracks on A & M, which include two of my favorite Hichcock records, are not available for the production of box sets on YepRoc.) Gotta Let This Hen Out!, Fegmania!, Element of Light (which I think more fegmaniax list as their favorite record than any other), and loads of bonus tracks too. The three records are also available for separate purchase, I don't think the double-record of unreleased tracks is though.
Just love that singer's voice -- if I'm reading their list of band members correctly, her name is Kitty Lux. (I like the male singer a lot too, Jonty Banks I believe is his name, who has the lead in "Life on Mars"; but not in the same gut-level way. He is a technically gifted singer with a lovely voice*; she is that and also is expressive where he is sometimes emotionally flat.)
* Wait, strike that -- went back and listened to it again -- Banks is a fair singer but "technically gifted" is overstating the matter.
Tomorrow afternoon and evening, Bob and I are going out to Scotch Plains to jam. A lot of people I haven't met, and some I know; I think Doug will be there, I haven't played with him in a few years, and also the Marlow clan. Looking forward to it! The e-mail said they would be set up to record the jam, so I may get some archives out of it. (I should set up and check my pickup this evening, I haven't played electric violin since December or so.)
posted morning of June 27th, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about Fiddling
Tom Hunter has been sick with Kreutzfeld-Jacob disease; he passed away on Friday morning. Memorial service is this Saturday. Light a candle and think of him.
Fun! This afternoon we are going in to the city, and meet up with Michael. We're going to see and hear David Byrne's new project, 
The new box set is now 
