After attending five separate Christmas gatherings among family and friends this year I'm pretty much partied out. So although the FOMO was hard to shake off entirely, it was an overall easy decision to turn down the 3+ New Year's Eve celebrations I was invited to in lieu of a quiet night with my immediate family and some good books. That's why I saw the following song by Courtney Barnett, from her debut LP Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit released April of this year, as an apt alternative to Auld Lang Syne (apart from being one of my favorites from the record).
"Nobody Really Cares If You Don't Go To The Party (Live)" by Courtney Barnett
It is with great joy that I share the musical debut of Dear Other, the brainchild of Marc Barnes (of BadCatholic fame) and his cohort from Steubenville, Ohio. Their EP titled The Exitus and Reditus of Andrew Darkside Parrish is a poetic exposé of the search for both the meaning of one's life and the meaning of the meaning of one's life. Delivering a baroque-folk-slash-progressive-punk-mini-opera-of-sorts, the band leaves no philosophical stone unturned in its challenge of modernity's apathy towards moral autonomy. My favorite cut from this is the middle track, featured below. And if you happen to be feeling particularly charitable this time of year, half of the Bandcamp sales for this $4 record go to support the Harmonium Project, an initiative to revive the art culture in Steubenville.
Last week I started watching the BBC psychological/crime drama series Luther and its pilot episode featured "Gun" by Emilíana Torrini during a scene where the titular character went in search of a weapon which was key to solving an exceptionally clean homicide. The song's brooding atmosphere and the sweet-and-jerky vocal delivery are reminiscent in style to Björk, another Icelandic musician, albeit with a peculiar approachability like that of adult contemporary. This led me to listen the album where this song is from, 2008's Me and Armini, which I thoroughly enjoyed.
I have been struggling for some time with finding approaches to update this blog with brief, meaningful and regular posts. I have experimented with different article formats (7 Quick Takes and shorter band bios are examples of this) but all that has resulted are numerous drafts for awesome themed posts that take too much of my time to write.
So for the sake of keeping this project alive, I am looking to post weekly at minimum not ten things or seven things but one thing... just one song or story with accompanying text that takes less time to read than listening to a typical track. I want this blog to serve as an avenue of musical encounter where you stumble upon an interesting tidbit that intrigues you enough to search out more on your own (which is the typical mode of discovery for me).
And without further ado, here's "Learned to Surf" by Superchunk (also featured in a previous post) from their 2010 album Majesty Shredding (an indiepunk record well worth listening through in its entirety).
Those familiar with the psychological thriller / slasher film American Psycho (based on the novel of the same name) will recognize Patrick Bateman as the sociopathic yuppie protagonist of the story who tries so desperately to fit into high society but finds it increasingly difficult to control his baser tendencies. As part of this mask he puts on to seem normal, he frequently entertains guests at his home with very detailed monologues centered about popular 80s musicians and their more well-known songs. Although the content of his dissertations are more shallow than they are insightful, these monologues provide an unexpected comedic respite in the midst of a macabre plot. So without further ado, here are Mr. Bateman's takes on three pop artists and their "hits".
Their early work was a little too 'new-wave' for my taste, but when Sports came out in '83, I think they really came into their own - commercially and artistically. The whole album has a clear, crisp sound, and a new sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the songs a big boost. He's been compared to Elvis Costello, but I think Huey has a far more bitter, cynical sense of humor. [...]
In '87, Huey released this, Fore!, their most accomplished album. I think their undisputed masterpiece is "Hip To Be Square", a song so catchy most people probably don't listen to the lyrics - but they should! Because it's not just about the pleasures of conformity, and the importance of trends, it's also a personal statement about the band itself!
