Sleep - "Dopesmoker"

 

Danette is on a two week cruise with her mother and friends, so in her absence I have resumed what is now a tradition when she's gone: listening to Sleep's "Dopesmoker" on repeat while doing things around the house. This is an LP I've recommended to many friends and colleagues now, so I guess I should blog about it. 

Sleep is a stoner/doom band from California, and I'm not 100% certain how I first heard of them.  They're in the same circle as Earth and Sunn O))), so perhaps I learned of them from Butch.  Or maybe I just read about them online -- it's all appropriately fuzzy, given the cannabis connection.  

The story of this LP is a little bit complicated.  Recorded in 1996, their record label at the time did not want to release it because, among other things, the "album" is just an hour long single song.  In 1999, an unauthorized edited version of the LP was released as "Jerusalem", with six different tracks, all named "Jerusalem".  In 2003, a version was released as "Dopesmoker" with a single eponymous track, and in 2012 another version was released (the 2012 version on Southern Lord Records is the one I have).  

One of the best things about the doom metal genre is that they don't shy away from their Black Sabbath roots, and this LP is no exception. I mention this only because many bands seek to deny or obfuscate their influences, but doom metal is perhaps the only genre that can agree the canon is dominated by the first six Sabbath LPs. The production is cleaner and heavier at the same time (these production dimensions are often in conflict) than the early 70s Sabbath, but the through line from "Master of Reality" to "Dopesmoker" is obvious. 

So yeah, slow, plodding, detuned guitars are what you get. There are vocals, and they're borderline Cookie Monster, but not distractingly so.  They do obscure the lyrics, which is fortunate because apparently there's a story about the "Weedians" or some such; I've made it a point to not look up the lyrics because I'm sure they'd only disappoint.  Cisneros's voice works well as another instrument, and exactly what he's saying isn't important.

Regardless, it all comes together in a hazy, hypnotic, slowly evolving repetitive swirl that has to be considered a high point of the genre.  Despite, or perhaps because, being a single hour track, it holds up to listening to it on repeat all afternoon.*

Standout tracks: "Dopesmoker" 

Skip 'em tracks: The 2012 release comes with a bonus live version of "Holy Mountain", which is not necessarily bad, but clearly doesn't not fit the original artistic vision of the LP itself. 

Score: 10/10. Again, it's absolutely central to the genre, but before you listen, you've got to buy into the conceit of a single track that's 63 minutes long. 

* "Repeat all afternoon" works best when your spouse is not home.

Len - "Steal My Sunshine"

I've always liked Len's 1999 hit single "Steal My Sunshine", but I always considered it more of a guilty pleasure rather than a song I would end up writing about.  It's fun, festive, infectious, has a nice groove, sounds like summer, and I just love how Sharon Costanzo sweetly sings "L-a-t-e-r that week".  Her voice, contrasted with her brother's raspy vocals, helps craft Len's unique sound.  It also blows my mind to think that this song came out last century -- it feels like last year. 

I recently discovered, quite by accident, that there was a recent (2021) cover by LA band Bikini Trill, who seem to be channeling the same aesthetic and sound that Len did on this record some 20+ years prior.  It's a fun cover, and Bikini Trill -- who were probably not yet in grade school when the original came out -- finds a new perspective on the song while still maintaining the essence of the original.  

But what really blew my mind about "Steal My Sunshine" was recently learning the funky sample repeated throughout the song comes from the 10 second break in the 1976 song by the Andrea True Connection, "More, More, More".  I have a vague contemporary memory of this song from the 1970s, but I could not have told you that it was sung by former porn star (!) Andrea True, and I'm sad to say I did not recognize the sample from Steal My Sunshine until I learned of it from "Show Me the Sample".

So summer is just about officially here, so it's time to dust off the Len version, the new Bikini Trill cover, as well as the source of the sample.  If you don't immediately listen to all three songs, you'll miss a million miles of fun.  Enjoy.

Len - "Steal My Sunshine"

Bikini Trill - "Steal My Sunshine"

Andrea True - "More, More, More" (the break is 2:20--2:29 in this 3:11 radio edit);  6:16 LP & 12" version (the break is 2:30--2:39 in this version, and then repeated at 5:20--5:29)

Ph Balance - "Ph Balance" (LP Review)

I'm betting you haven't heard of the band Ph Balance; few people outside of their original Atlanta base have.  Outside of a chance viewing of one of their videos in 1999 on the "Independent Music Network" (I've forgotten which cable channel carried it), I would not have heard of them either.  discogs.com has almost nothing on them, YouTube has two songs, wikipedia has literally nothing on them, and myspace has an outdated page. 

The summarized band history goes something like this: Pam Howe (the "Ph" in Ph Balance) and Christopher Burt have formed the basis of Cicada Sings, then Ph Balance, then Chakra Bird, then (and current, I believe) Pam Howe's Bossa Nova Jazz.  Cicada Sings was a straightforward lounge, jazz, bossa nova band, and when they incorporated a hip-hop esthetic (complete with a few new members), they changed their name to Ph Balance.

What makes Ph Balance different from the 100s of other bands that seek to achieve the prized but elusive jazz/hip-hop integration is they do it with from a solid jazz orientation: no samples, the instruments are acoustic, and the synths are rare and limited to background use (think of them as a lounge-oriented version of The Roots, or the acoustic, non-trip-hop version of Portishead).  MC Mudfish provides the adequate rapping, but the star of the show is Pam Howe: the Gen-X, hip-hop influenced torch singer.  Not unlike Blondie 20+ years earlier, while Ph Balance is technically a band the whole thing works only because of Pam. 

The sound is very much of the time, and while not every experiment works (a few songs are worth skipping), they fail while trying to do interesting things so the misses are easily forgiven.  "Soothing" was the video I saw in 1999 (it may well be their only video), and it made such an impression on me that I had to order this LP.  Their eponymous first LP was released on tiny Daemon Records (founded by Amy Ray) and although I think it is out of print you can still find new copies on Amazon. 

Standout Songs: Soothing, Flora Avenue, C'est Noire, Come Back to My Arms (And Stay), Whirl Twirl Toy, Speak To My Face, Hand Hurt, I Want to Shrink, (find these songs at grooveshark).

Skip 'em Songs: She Favors Winter, Kaleidoscope React, Back Off

Final Score: 8/10

Bonus link:  cduniverse has an informative LP review.  

The Magnetic Fields - "69 Love Songs" (LP Review)

It has taken me a while to get my head around just how remarkable "69 Love Songs" is, but the iTunes play count doesn't lie.  I've wanted to review it for a while but I've been intimidated by its scale.  Released in 1999, "69 Love Songs" is a triple LP from NPR-indie-rockers The Magnetic Fields.  I'm not sure "NPR-indie-rockers" is a legitimate music genre, but think of it is as 80s college radio all grown up with kids and a mortgage. 

"69 Love Songs" is, at first blush, a relatively simple concept LP: literally 69 songs about love.  No big deal, right? -- most songs you hear every day are about love in one way or another.  But this isn't really 69 songs celebrating love, this is 69 songs celebrating love songs.  A love song to love songs, if you will.   In fact, the entire LP can be summarized with these lines from the song "The Book of Love":

The book of love has music in it
In fact, that's where music comes from
Some of it is just transcendental
Some of it is just really dumb

Although TMF is a band with a relatively stable lineup, Stephin Merritt is the unquestioned leader, primary lead singer,  and sole songwriter for TMF.  This LP is his "book of love", covering the entire spectrum from "transcendental" to "really dumb".  Every imaginable aspect of romantic love is covered (gay, straight, unrequited, celebration, prurient, mature, etc.), along with a full range of musical styles (Celtic, world, folk, country, punk, jazz, electronic, surf rock, and surely other sub-genres that I'm forgetting).  Doing a cross product of "types of love" and "types of music" is how you get to a triple LP with 69 songs.  When you begin to appreciate the ambition and scale of the project, you wonder how he can fit it in only 69 songs.

Ok, so Merritt wrote a lot of love songs... what makes this collection work is that Merritt is a wickedly clever lyricist and songwriter (I will not spoil the several laugh-out-loud gems sprinkled throughout the LPs).  This simple concept would not work in the hands of someone less expert, in which case the songs would be closer to parody than celebration.  Some reviews (e.g., The Independent, July 2000) considered the question of the "authenticity" of Merritt covering far more experiences than any one lifetime could support, but that presupposes that personal experience is the only source for songs.  But if you accept this is a celebration of love songs, then I suppose that is actually what has happened and why this LP resonates so strongly: we've all heard these kinds of songs and from transcendental to really dumb, they are the stuff of life.

I'm going to deviate from the normal LP Review structure.  There are no bad songs on this LP, and there are too many great songs to cover.  I'm going to choose an arbitrary limit of four songs from each of the three volumes, but don't read too much into this list because I'm sure it would vary each time I rewrote it.

Volume 1:
"All My Little Words"
"I Don't Want To Get Over You"
"The Luckiest Guy On The Lower East Side"
"The Book Of Love" 

Volume 2:
"(Crazy For You But) Not That Crazy"
"Washington, D.C."
"Papa Was A Rodeo"
"I Shatter" 

Volume 3:
"I'm Sorry I Love You"
"Acoustic Guitar"
"Yeah! Oh, Yeah!"
"The Night You Can't Remember"

By my count, 11/12 of the videos linked above are from aspiring video directors, art students, fan boys, and just one is the song uploaded with a static image.  I think that says something about 1) the inspirational quality of the music, and 2) the kinds of people it inspires.


Final Score: 10/10

Autechre - "Peel Session" (LP Review)

If you don't like repetitive, electronic music you're not going to like Autechre, who are in some ways electronica's answer to Phillip Glass. Herbert turned me on to Autechre (aka Sean Booth & Rob Brown) many years ago, and their 1999 EP "Peel Session" is probably my favorite release of theirs.

At first listen, Autechre's music seems rather simple: loops of different melodies and percussion gradually introduced, combined, retracted, modified, and reintroduced (thus the comparison with Glass). Any single loop is simple enough, but their combination and the summation of their effect is surprisingly complex and hypnotic, and only reveals its full design after repeated listenings.

"Peel Session" was recorded for and broadcast by John Peel in 1995, but the EP itself wasn't released until 1999. At 25 minutes, it contains three songs in increasing length and complexity: "Milk DX", "Inhake 2", and "Drane". They're all good, but "Drane" is a hypnotic masterpiece (with some elements bordering on shoegazing). This EP has a more ambient feel than some of their more IDM-influenced releases, making it that much stronger in my opinion.

Standout songs: "Milk DX", "Inhake 2", "Drane"

Skip 'em songs: none.

Final score: 8/10. Don't play this as background music, because it will suck the air out of the room.

The Shelia Divine - "Hum" (forgotten song)

I was driving in the convertible tonight, listening to a mix CD (ca. 2002) I keep in the car that I hadn't played in quite a while. Of course, it is entirely sing-along, road-trip music: Juliana Hatfield, Weezer, The Smithereens, Beck, Frank Black, etc. On came a song that I had entirely forgotten about: "Hum", a single from the 1999 LP "New Parade" by The Sheila Divine. Clearly it's a great song or it would not have made the road trip CD.

TSD were a 90s alternative band based in Boston that generated a buzz on college radio, but never quite turned the corner to mainstream success (or even sustained alternative success, for that matter). After 2 more LPs, they eventually broke up in 2003, but reformed in 2010.

I learned of them from "Hum", which received a bit of radio airplay in 1999. I bought "New Parade", but as I recall the rest of the LP did not measure up to the strong hooks of "Hum". I suppose I should give it a listen again (it has been a long time), but in the mean time see if you recall this excellent song. Sure, it sounds like most other 90s alternative bands (expertly working the soft-loud-soft formula in a way that would make the Pixies proud), but that's alright by me.

Hum: studio version, 2001 live version

Scott Hardkiss Presents God Within - "Crucial Introspection Parts One And Two" (LP Review)

This one is going to be harder to explain than "Bunky's Pick"...

But first a story: It was my 30th birthday, and some folks were hanging out at the house where Terry and I lived. Seth Littman, an accomplished DJ and one of Terry's friends, was playing some excellent music at our house. Seth always had great music, but this one song was just captivating me. I inquired, he told me it was Scott Hardkiss, and then gave me the newly released CD and said "happy birthday". Thanks Seth.

You'll frequently see mistakes made in listing the metadata for this EP, so I'll break it down for you. Scott Hardkiss is a DJ and one third of Hardkiss, along with brothers Gavin and Robbie. "God Within" is a pseudonym that Scott also uses (introduced for the first time with these songs, I believe). "Crucial Introspection Parts One And Two" is a four song EP that collects the two prior releases: 1998's "Crucial Introspection" and 1999's "Crucial Introspection Part Two" (note how the cover art for the former two releases is merged for "Parts One and Two"). The EP is released on Sunburn Records, which is loosely affiliated with Hardkiss (see also the Hardkiss label).

"Part One" has the two songs "Why, Why, Why? (Technosoul Remix)" and "Indian Summer". Both songs are unremarkable: neither bad nor good. But "Part Two" is what makes the EP great: "Why, Why, Why? (Olympic Terrorist Original Mix)" is a very good song (much better than the "Technosoul Remix"), but "Infinitely Gentle Blows (Infinite Aural Hallucination Remix)" is an amazing song. This is the song that prompted Seth's gift. 9:28 minutes of pure bliss. If you like electronic music, you must listen to this song. And if you don't like electronic music, well... maybe this will change your mind.

But the story doesn't end there... Scott Hardkiss only remixed "Infinitely Gentle Blows"; the original is a 3 minute version by Alte)ring, of whom I know almost nothing. The original version of the song (said to sample "Little Red Corvette", but I'm not sure I hear it in the Scott Hardkiss remix) appeared on the obscure compilation LP "The Event Horizon Tau". I've never even heard the Alte)ring version -- Googling turns up only the 9+ minute Scott Hardkiss remix, even when the metadata credits say it "Alte)ring". The Scott Hardkiss version was also featured on the sound track to 2000's "Groove".

Standout Tracks: "Infinitely Gentle Blows (Infinite Aural Hallucination Remix)", "Why, Why, Why? (Olympic Terrorist Original Mix)"

Skip 'em Tracks: None.

Final Rating: 8/10. Part One would rate a 10/10, but Part Two would probably rate a 5/10. Round up the average based on the strength of "Infinitely Gentle Blows".

Dr. Octagon / Handsome Boy Modeling School / Dan the Automator - "Bear Witness I, II, III" (forgotten song)

Is it really a "forgotten song" if very few people heard it to begin with? In this segment, I step away from obscure videos I recall from the early days of MTV to bring to your attention what is really three songs that are apparently by three different artists, span seven years yet share a single title: "Bear Witness", parts I, II and III.

"Bear Witness" is on the 1996 release "Dr. Octagonecologyst" by Dr. Octagon (aka Kool Keith). "Holy Calamity (Bear Witness II)" is from the 1999 release "So... How's Your Girl?" by Handsome Boy Modeling School. "Bear Witness III" is (as far as I can determine) a 2002 12" only release by Dan the Automator.

The common thread is Dan the Automator. He's the producer on the Dr. Octagon LP and he's 1/2 of HBMS (on the left in the photo above; the other 1/2 is De La Soul affiliate Prince Paul). The Dr. Octagon LP is critically acclaimed. I don't have a copy, but in the few samples I've found online it appears to be an extended joke that I don't find very funny. Perhaps if I listened to it start to finish, but I doubt it. The HBMS LP is also critically acclaimed; it's on my list to get but I just haven't done it yet.

Since I have none of the associated LPs, I "discovered" this song because "Bear Witness II" is featured on DJ Shadow's "Live! In Tune and On Time" LP. Dan the Automator and DJ Shadow are frequent collaborators; in fact DJ Shadow guests on "Bear Witness II" (see also: "Bombay the Hard Way: Guns, Cars, and Sitars").

Ok, so that was a confusing and possibly unnecessary explanation of the pedigree of this song cycle. They represent some of the best in largely instrumental hip hop: big beats, hooks, great samples, fun vocal fills ("create rap music cuz I never dug disco"), etc. I guess they're old enough to qualify as "forgotten", so give them a listen whether it is for the 1st time or not.

Links: All three songs nicely edited into a single track: YouTube.
Bear Witness I: YouTube.
Bear Witness II: YouTube.
Bear Wtiness III: YouTube.