Japanese Breakfast - Live ACL 2018-10-06

Today's entry is Japanese Breakfast (aka Michelle Zauner) which comes via a recent recommendation from Terry, which he described as a "sort of a cross of Bjork and 10,000 Maniacs".  She/they are coming to the Norva May 2, 2019; unfortunately I'll probably be out of town that day otherwise I'd make a point of catching this show. 

Terry's description is pretty accurate, with a strong, bright guitar sound that also reminds me a bit of "Damon and Naomi with Ghost".  The concert video he shared with me is from the Austin City Limits Festival, Oct. 6, 2018.

Lisa Loeb - "I Do" (forgotten song)

Danette and I saw Lisa Loeb at the Attucks Theatre on Friday.  Although we like her well enough, neither of us are huge fans, so we went to the show on a whim, not really knowing what to expect. She was solo, with only her acoustic guitar, and gave a very good show.

We learned a few things in the course of the evening.  First, Lisa is a good story teller, and especially entertaining was the backstory about how her song "Truthfully" was constructed for the soundtrack of "One Fine Day", only to be bounced out in favor of Shawn Colvin's cover of "Someone Like You".   Second, we had no idea that Loeb has had a prolific career writing children's music, including winning a 2018 Grammy in "Best Children's Album" for "Feel What U Feel".  She performed just a couple of children's songs for us, the most memorable of which was "Disappointing Pancake".

Of course she performed "Stay (I Missed You)", the song for which she's most well known.  But she closed her set with another hit single, "I Do", from 1997's LP "Firecracker".  We both remembered the song, but neither of us could remember the last time we heard it.

Lisa Loeb - "I Do"

Queen - "One Vision" (forgotten song)

We saw the Queen / Freddie Mercury biopic "Bohemian Rhapsody" about two weeks ago.  I enjoyed it, even though Danette is a much bigger fan of Queen than I am.  I don't dislike them, and I certainly recognize their proficiency and importance, but they were never important to me.  Regardless, the movie was enjoyable and it motivates today's choice for a "forgotten song".

Even though the movie ends with Live Aid (1985) and thus did not cover the 1986 LP "A Kind of Magic" from which the single "One Vision" was released (it was also on the Iron Eagle soundtrack, if anyone still remembers that movie...).  "One Vision" received radio and MTV airplay at the time, but it's certainly not one of their better songs and has mostly faded from our collective musical radar...

So why choose this song?  Because I want to introduce you to Laibach, a band which was (is?) important to me (albeit for other portions of their canon).  What can I say about Laibach?  They're exactly what you'd think an Eastern European, martial, art-by-committee, collective would sound like.  It was never really clear if they were fascist or communist, or perhaps simultaneously both in defiant self-negation, but it was clear they were authoritarian.  I've never been sure if they're serious, or if they are just the Slovenian version of Devo and the Church of the SubGenius and it's just a long running inside joke that I lack the cultural context to process (in the same way the Chinese Government struggled to understand The Onion).

Regardless, I'm using their "cover" of "One Vision" as an opportunity to introduce them here.  Laibach occasionally did loose covers of popular Western songs, although whether they did them out of respect or disdain is not entirely clear either.  Their "cover" is appropriately renamed "Geburt einer Nation" ("birth of a nation"), and is from the 1987 "Opus Dei" LP.

Are they for real?  Or a performance art, musical version of the Colbert character?  Either way, they convey more middle-class shock than Queen ever did...

Queen - "One Vision"
Laibach - "Geburt einer Nation"


P.S. Both Freddie Mercury and "Eber" (a pseudonym; lead vocals for Laibach) are both sporting the same 70s pornstache...

Taylor Swift - "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together" (spotlight)

Earlier this week Taylor Swift came off the sidelines and endorsed a political candidate, something that she has not done in the past.  Given that a large percentage of her country music fan base is surely conservative, this is a significant act for her.  And she did not mince words either:

As much as I have in the past and would like to continue voting for women in office, I cannot support Marsha Blackburn. Her voting record in Congress appalls and terrifies me. She voted against equal pay for women. She voted against the Reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, which attempts to protect women from domestic violence, stalking, and date rape. She believes businesses have a right to refuse service to gay couples. She also believes they should not have the right to marry. These are not MY Tennessee values. I will be voting for Phil Bredesen for Senate and Jim Cooper for House of Representatives. 

 In other words, Taylor Swift just said to Marsha Blackburn and the GOP:

You go talk to your friends, talk to my friends, talk to me
But we are never ever, ever, ever getting back together

Good for her; apparently she's had an impact.  I don't know if it will be enough, but the time to be coy about who and what you support is over.  Predictably, she's been added to the list of things the GOP doesn't like: LeBron James, the NFL, Ford Motor Company, Harley Davidson, Nike, Levi's, Willie Nelson, and now Taylor Swift.  And while America is more than the sum of various companies and celebrities, as the list grows longer one can't help but think that what the GOP really dislikes is, in fact, America. 

"We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together" is a single from her 2012 LP, "Red".

Taylor Swift - "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together"

Bear Hands - "Giants" (forgotten song)

Last year we got married, and this year we had another significant life event: the joint purchase of our new home in Ghent, which partially inspired the choice of this year's birthday song.

"Giants" is a single from the 2013 Bear Hands LP "Distraction".  It received a moderate amount of airplay on 96X when it came out, although I'm not sure I've heard it on the radio recently.  I liked it immediately: it works the loud-soft-loud, with a frenetic hip hop structure followed with a slower chorus and meaty, early-80s guitar riff, lots of white noise and no negative space -- but I can't remember if Danette had strong feelings about it one way or another.  However, this is another installment in a list of songs that make me think about Danette, not necessarily a list of Danette's favorite songs.

The chorus is the obvious why it makes me think of Danette, with variations of:

I said I know you love me, I am loving you more
I am loving you more

And, a little more on the nose given our recent purchase:

Give you everything that I have ever owned
Soon I will have bought us up a house and home
Up on the seventh floor

Studying the lyrics and commentary a little more closely, there is school of thought that the song is actually about co-dependent junkies ("I've been awake for days in the dusk and the dawn"), but I'm just going to pretend I didn't read that.  Besides, the last several birthday songs have embraced more metaphorical connections; the song feels joyous and we're not going to let a possible Springsteen-esque dark undercurrent ruin the song.

The deciding factor for choosing this song is the video itself: a well-executed but presumably otherwise low budget affair that features the band members posing and what are likely their girl friends in a more celebratory mood.  The director visually conveys a youthful, hedonistic exuberance, and that's how I feel about Danette -- even if we're almost old enough to be the parents of the people in the video.

Bear Hands - "Giants"

Previous birthday songs:

2017: Alvvays - "Archie, Marry Me"
2016: Molly Hatchet - "Flirtin' With Disaster"
2015: Avett Brothers - "Kick Drum Heart"
2014: Ani DiFranco - "32 Flavors"
2013: The Green Pajamas - "Kim the Waitress"
2012: The Cure - "High"
2011: Blink 182 - "Josie"
2010:  Dead Milkmen - "Punk Rock Girl"

Lynyrd Skynyrd - "Saturday Night Special" (spotlight)

Ed King, one of the original guitarists for Lynyrd Skynyrd, died last month.  He appeared on their first three studio LPs, and then left the band in 1975 (he later returned in 1987 for the post-crash reboot of the band).  Although he is best known for writing the guitar riff Skynyrd's signature song "Sweet Home Alabama" (he's also the one counting off at the beginning of the song), I also recently learned a few things about him.  First, he was originally in Strawberry Alarm Clock -- yes, the same Strawberry Alarm Clock that gave us "Incense and Peppermints" (insert "Listen to the Flower People" Spinal Tap reference here), he grew up in California and was the only member of Skynyrd that was not from the South, and obviously did not have the shared high school experience with the band's namesake, Leonard Skinner.

I had considered marking his passing using "Sweet Home Alabama", and the band's relationship with Neil Young, which despite the name checking in the song was quite positive.  As I've already introduced, Danette and I are big fans of both the band and the genre, but SHA is not our favorite song of theirs.  One of the songs that we do love and never fail to crank up and sing along with in the car is "Saturday Night Special", for which Ed King does have a co-writing credit (and he might have the count off at the beginning of this song too?).  It's a great song and was the only single from their 1975 LP "Nuthin' Fancy".  It also has the distinction of being a member of a trilogy of great Lynyrd Skynyrd songs that violate the lyrical norms of the Southern rock genre: cautioning against substance abuse ("That Smell"), running away from a fight ("Gimme Three Steps"), and being unambiguously pro-gun control ("Saturday Night Special"):

Hand guns are made for killin'
They ain't no good for nothin' else
And if you like to drink your whiskey
You might even shoot yourself
So why don't we dump 'em people
To the bottom of the sea
Before some ol' fool come around here
Wanna shoot either you or me

I recommend, based on the strength of the outstanding guitar work in "Sweet Home Alabama" and "Saturday Night Special", we forgive Ed King for "Incense and Peppermints".

Lynyrd Skynyrd - "Saturday Night Special" (studio, live 1976-03-07).

Aretha Franklin - "Freeway Of Love" (forgotten song)

Aretha Franklin, the Queen of Soul, died today.  I'm not even an especially big fan of hers, but her impact is far too significant to ignore.  I'm not going to even to attempt to review her career -- spanning 60+ years, with over 100 charting singles, and 18 Grammys, her career speaks for itself.  I do count myself lucky to have seen her perform live once: Danette and I saw her at the Ferguson Center in Newport News in 2009. 

I will mark her passing with her 1985 single "Freeway of Love", from the LP "Who's Zoomin' Who?"  It's certainly not one of her classics, but it was her last #1 single and did result in her 12th Grammy.  It's a very 80s sounding song, and features Clarence Clemons (bonus Bruce reference -- he had a 1984 song called "Pink Cadillac").  And while you hear her classics all the time, I don't recall the last time I heard this song.

Aretha Franklin - "Freeway of Love": single edit, 12" "Rock Mix" (this version also features Dez Dickerson of The Revolution)