Cold, Cold, Cold

Another decade, another polar vortex.

For the first time since Madonna, Prince and Bruce Springsteen ruled the pop charts, I was made privy to extremely cold temperatures. Wednesday, January 30^th greeted me with temps reading minus twenty-five (F), while Thursday morning—the 31st—revealed they had sunk even lower, to minus twenty-nine (F).

Ah, winter. The leaden air mass that sits upon us like a cruel older sibling evokes memories.

I share them here.

The eighties were cold. And no, that isn't a tacit reference to the Reagan administration.

For reasons known only to itself, the weather pattern shifted and brought Arctic cold to the upper Midwest on three separate occasions during the decade: 1982, 1983 and 1985. In a cosmological fusion of the real estate maxim location, location, location and the more-general one that states timing is everything, I was able to participate in all three.

Arctic cold is extremely efficient. It does in a few minutes what non-Arctic cold takes an hour to do. Sadistically, it freezes and then numbs one's flesh, providing a prickly burn as it does so. Accounts that include phrases like “a thousand tiny razors” are not far off.

Add wind and the process is exponentially accelerated. The sensations are deepened. Accountants steeped in cost-benefit analysis applaud wildly. It is very, very efficient.

My first immersion experience with Arctic air occurred on January 16, 1982. I had taken it upon myself to head into the city for some record shopping. Being young, I instinctively knew the emergency weather warnings being issued about dangerously cold temperatures did not apply to me.

They were for other people.

Dressed as I would for any other winter's day, I set off downtown. All was well until the trip home.

Waiting on the Fullerton El platform (so named because this particular conveyance is elevated above street level, thereby exposing patrons to the full effect of any and all wind), I became aware of a painful, incessant chill.

Surprisingly, the sneakers I wore did little to insulate my feet. My ears were on fire thanks to the ability polar breezes have for reducing human skin to pin cushions.

At least I hadn't inconvenienced myself by wearing a hat.

One of the more amusing qualities of Arctic cold is its ability to provoke profanity. As I stood on the El platform completely exposed to the minus forty-degree wind chill, I could do little but hop up and down and spit “Fuck!” from between my clenched teeth.

Yes, it was cold.

And thanks to a perversion of generosity, the fun wasn't over yet.

Since this was Saturday, the bus that would normally take me to within a block of my home was not in service. Which meant a one-mile walk into the same westerly winds I had combated on the El platform.

No alcoholic, no junkie and no crackhead ever went to the lengths to satiate their addiction than I did that day.

God smiles on us in many ways. On this day, he—or she—had decided to teach a young man about vulnerability. About exposed skin's sensitivity to polar temperatures. About hats.

While I had successfully avoided the social embarrassment that goes hand in hand with having the beautiful young women who frequented record stores on Saturday mornings from pointing and laughing at my hat hair, I had risked permanent (and painful) skin damage.

After arriving home, I inspected my ears for the small, white patches that indicate frostbite. Finding none, I dove into bed. I minimized pillow-to-ear contact for fear they would snap and break off.

There were other experiences, most notably December 24, 1983 (minus twenty-three with steady twenty MPH winds) and January 20, 1985, which bottomed out at twenty-seven below with similar wind speeds.

But chastened by my El platform experience, I limited my exposure. If I wasn't attending a holiday party or periodically starting my car, I was inside. The way God intended. So instructive was the Arctic cold that I only needed to suffer it once. 

Regrettably, Jack Daniels, Stolichnaya and Heineken couldn't say the same.

They Say It's Your Birthday

Happy Birthday, Mr. Springsteen.

Thank you so much for everything.

My 20 Favorite Bruce Springsteen Songs

 

I've been listening to Bruce Springsteen for a long time. I'd like to say I didn't need 'Time' and 'Newsweek' to show me the way to 'Born to Run', but that would be lying.

He's one of a handful of performers who has stayed as relevant and as interesting after forty years as he was after four minutes. Like a classic movie or a great book, his songs hold up to repeated listening because there is always something new to be found in them.

Add that these songs were often rendered in front of an audience with as much fire and passion as they had been in a recording studio, and an indelible rock and roll icon was born.

Very few performers poured themselves into their concerts like Bruce Springsteen did. His concerts were hands-above-your-head celebrations of rock and roll; exorcisms of generational expectations and wage slavery which would crescendo into the orgiastic ecstasies of salvation and redemption.

It's not an abuse of poetic license to compare them to southern baptist church services—wild and unfettered.

Of course, all of this was a long time ago—I haven't been to a Springsteen concert since 1984. But the songs below live on. 

And unlike me, they remain ageless and undiminished.

1. Backstreets - Captures that sense of loss and regret when the wide-screen dreams of childhood give way to the tedium and obligation of adulthood.

2. The River – Moving portrait of a young, working-class couple expertly rendered and observed.

3. Badlands - Compelling statement of survival, will and purpose.

4. Born to Run – An anthem for anyone who ever loaded up their car in hopes of finding something better.

5. Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out - Razor-sharp tribute to the R&B of Springsteen's youth.

6. Johnny 99 - Composite of every end-of-his rope, down-on-his-luck character Springsteen ever wrote about, and sadly as true in '15 as it was in '82.

7. No Surrender - Picture-perfect reminiscence of how thrilling and influential rock and roll was to us, especially in our youth.

8. Born in the U.S.A. - Howling litany of a veteran's betrayal which unwittingly became example number-one in pop song misinterpretation.

9. Incident on 57th Street - The opus-highlight of an album rooted in beat poetry and soul music.

10. Rosalita (Come Out Tonight) - A wild and exuberant celebration of career and romance freshly bloomed.

11. Thunder Road - A song that captures the anticipation of striking out on your own.

12. Jungleland - A stylized street life ballet that rises and falls like sex.

13. Factory - This song moves like the factory clock. You can practically feel the weariness of feet in steel-toed boots.

14. Racing in the Street - A couple at the point where they realize the honeymoon is over.

15. She's the One - Glorious celebration of lust and sexual attraction.

16. Streets of Philadelphia - Haven't heard this song in years, but can still hear the haunting line "...and my clothes don't fit me no more."

17. Prove It All Night - Not for anything contained in the lyrics--just for the epic floggings it received on the 1978 tour.

18. Stolen Car - Thoughtful meditation on an album mostly dedicated to upbeat frat-rock.

19. Atlantic City - Another profile of people in desperate straits, set to a sober, haunting melody.

20. Tougher Than the Rest – An expression of eternal love, with a melody as pure and uncluttered as the thought.

My Favorite CDs of 2012

Another year. OK—so it wasn’t the greatest in history.

But what else besides music could reduce the horrors of long-term unemployment to mere eye-clawing agony? A wise man once said the only thing worse than having a job is not having one. But nothing's worse than a life without music.

On planet La Piazza Gancio, this was the year of the reunion.

Old favorites the dBs, the Blue Aeroplanes and Garbage all reconvened and released albums that were better than anyone had a right to expect. Graham Parker even reunited with the Rumour, with Three Chords Good the happy result.

Bobby Womack emerged from over a decade of self-imposed exile to release The Bravest Man in the Universe. Bonnie Raitt ended her seven-year hiatus with Slipstream, and the Rolling Stones celebrated their fiftieth year with their one-millionth best of and two pretty good new songs that had them sounding like they give a damn.

Even better, a long-forgotten documentary from a 1965 tour of Ireland was released.

Charlie Is My Darling is a powerful argument for the Stones nascent stage prowess, containing definitive versions of mid-sixties classics like “The Last Time”, “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” and “Time Is on My Side”. They proceed to tear through convincing covers of “Route 66”, “I’m Movin’ On” and “Down the Road Apiece” as well.

That Got Live If You Want It was released in lieu of this is a giant, staggering mystery. That Charlie Is My Darling is my archival live album of the year is not.

You might also want to check Graham Parker and the Rumour’s Live at Rockpalast, or Sonic Youth’s Smart Bar Chicago 1985.

As far as box sets go, The (English) Beat’s short but memorable career was at last immortalized on The Complete Beat, a five-disc offering featuring each of the band’s three albums plus a disc of remixes and another of Peel Session performances and a handful of recordings from 1982's Special Beat Service tour.

The remasters sparkle. The live recordings animate. I am overjoyed that the Beat’s honking, propulsive ska is born anew.

Finally, here are my favorite albums of 2012:

1. Wussy – Strawberry If you’ve ever flattered a piece of music with the word unvarnished, Wussy has probably already found a home in your iPod, cell phone, hard drive or CD player. They work the same vein of rough-edged alt-rock and country first mined by the Mekons on Fear and Whiskey in 1985.

Distilled to its essence, Strawberry is all about the voices. Guitarist/vocalist Lisa Walker’s is capable of vinegar-soaked caterwauling in the manner of Exene Cervenka or Hope Nicholls one moment, and the plaintive, unembellished singing made famous by Alison Krauss and Gillian Welch the next.

Wussy-founder Chuck Cleaver’s brings a whole ‘nother set of attributes to the proceedings. His sometimes wobbly voice has a knack for conveying the same fist-shaking sense of everyman outrage Joe Strummer’s did. It is highly effective, especially on Wussy’s barbed songs of betrayal.

Best of all, Walker and Cleaver’s harmonies never get within several area codes of an Auto-Tune, leaving no doubt these are the voices best to sing the songs of those left weeping in the bathroom of the bridal suite on the first night of the honeymoon—to quote “Waiting Room”.

They serve Strawberry’s forlorn beauty perfectly.

Check the aforementioned “Waiting Room” and “Wrist Rocket”.

2. Various – Time to Go: The Southern Psychedelic Moment 1981 – 86 Lying, as it does, closer to Antarctica than just about any other country definitely qualifies New Zealand as isolated. And that isolation has served its musical community well, as prevailing pop fashions arrive in a weakened state from the extended commute and submit to native influences without much of a fight.

Also in its favor is a modestly-sized population, which means conquering the New Zealand market offers similarly modest financial rewards. Without an enormous pot of gold at the end of the radio play rainbow, someone who doesn’t sound like the prevailing flavor of the month actually has a chance to be signed and subsequently heard.

Maybe Kiwis are just more creative than they’ve ever been given credit for. Maybe there’s something in the water. Maybe the Coriolis Effect has an especially powerful influence on music-making in the southern hemisphere. I don’t know.

What I do know is that Time to Go: The Southern Psychedelic Moment 1981 – 86, a collection of Flying Nun tracks recorded when it was the coolest indie label on the planet, is the first compilation I've installed on a year-end list in many, many years.

Come to think of it, it's the first one since Getting Older, which was another Flying Nun compilation.

See a pattern here?

Check Scorched Earth Policy’s hellish “Since the Accident” and the Stones’ “Down and Around”.

3. The dBs – Falling Off the Sky If it hadn’t been for Falling Off the Sky’s unsentimental opener “That Time Is Gone”, I never would have guessed it wasn’t 1982 anymore. The defining elements of the dBs converge in a perfect storm to make their early-eighties heyday seem only minutes—not decades—ago.

Sky bursts with the Beatlesque nuggets Peter Holsapple and Chris Stamey so effortlessly craft, with “Before We Were Born”, “World to Cry” and “She Won’t Drive in the Rain Anymore” the equal of anything from Stands for Decibles or Repercussion.

There was always a bit of the Lennon-McCartney dynamic in Holsapple and Stamey, and their yin and yang is in fine fettle. Stamey’s soft-focus psychedelia and Holsapple’s observant, tuneful pop combine to make Falling Off the Sky the best album Syd Barrett and Big Star never made.

I’m tempted to say it’s like finding a favorite t-shirt from your youth and discovering it still fits. But that would be reducing the dBs to relic status, which they clearly are not.

Check “That Time Is Gone” and “She Won’t Drive in the Rain Anymore”.

4. The Bamboos – Medicine Man Melbourne has never been confused with Memphis or Detroit as a source of great R&B, so the fact that the perfectly-formed Bamboos originate from that Australian metropolis comes as a fairly large surprise.

But in the sound the truth is found, and Medicine Man stands up to any criteria you care to apply. Sublime, soulful and firmly in the pocket, the Bamboos’ fifth album is a triumph.

Artists plying their trade in classic genres like soul run the risk of being confined by them in equal measure to the degree that they are liberated by them. But in the Bamboos’ talented hands, soul is a launching pad—not a straitjacket.

This is 2012’s leftfield delight.

Check “Eliza” (which features a great vocal from Megan Washington) and album-closer “Window”.

5. Bruce Springsteen – Wrecking Ball After several mediocre efforts, it was a joy to have Springsteen release something as vital as Wrecking Ball. At an age when most men are checking their retirement portfolios, Springsteen rails against our fraud of a democracy and calls out those responsible.

But the radio-friendly production doesn’t always deliver the grit these songs demand, and as a consequence Wrecking Ball at times sounds strangely divorced from its lyrical content. It also couches its indignation by closing with two feel-good songs that feel tacked on at the suggestion of a focus group.

But like Neil Young’s Living with War, just hearing an arena-sized artist rail against the ruling class and their status quo and ask provocative questions with no easy or popular answers is enormously refreshing.

If only our elected representation were as brave.

Check “Death to My Hometown” and “Wrecking Ball”.

6. Garbage – Not Your Kind of People The curious 21st century odyssey of Garbage continues, with their fifth album finally appearing seven years after the fourth.

To longtime consumers of pop music, this is usually a red flag. Conflicting egos, writer’s block and disinterest are usually to blame for extended hiatuses, and none of them point the way to good records.

But this is Garbage’s best since 1998’s Version 2.0. Go figure.

Maybe it’s the lowered profile. (Not to be snarky, but it’s not 1998 anymore, is it?) Maybe it’s the lack of record company pressure. (Not Your Kind of People was released independently on their own label.)

Whatever the reason, People abounds with hooks, insistent sing-along choruses and Garbage’s trademark assortment of guitar flourishes and squiggly electronic bits.

Check “Blood for Poppies” and “Felt”.

7. Gary Clark, Jr. – Blak and Blu Gary Clark, Jr. is a prodigiously-talented guitarist and singer, the latest in a long line from Texas. Blessed with a voice that falls somewhere between John Legend and Stevie Wonder and the ability to scorch a fret board like the bastard son of Jimi Hendrix and T-Bone Walker, his future appears unlimited.

But as evidenced on Blak and Blu, such overweening talent can sometimes be a liability. When you can perform soul, hard rock, pop, blues and hip-hop, it’s a powerful temptation to do all of them—all the time. Where Clark’s major-label debut stumbles is in its embrace of this scattershot approach.

For every “Ain’t Messin’ Round” or “Numb” there’s “The Life” or “Things Are Changin’”. And over the course of a seventy-minute disc, the stylistic (and qualitative) diversity becomes wearying.

Still, it’s hard not to feel Clark has a very bright future.

Check album-opener “Ain’t Messin’ Round” and “Bright Lights”.

8. The Blue Aeroplanes – Anti-Gravity Bristol’s Blue Aeroplanes have mostly been flying under radar since a late-eighties, early-nineties flirtation with, if not quite fame, at least becoming less unknown. 1989’s Swagger and 1991’s Beatsongs briefly exposed them to college radio and things like MTV’s 120 Minutes, but by the release of 1994’s follow-up, Life Model, Nirvana had changed the landscape.

Gerard Langley has soldiered on, releasing albums, EPs and the odd compilation all along. Anti-Gravity, originally a 2011 vinyl-only release, doesn’t technically qualify as a twenty-twelve release, but the staff at The Square Peg are willing to take last year’s compact disc release date under advisement.

The Aeroplane’s alt folk-rock remains unique and unhurried, with the odd bit of cello or trumpet thrown in to good effect. It's not just their small-but-dedicated fan base that have kept these Aeroplanes aloft.

Check “Oak-Apple Day” and “My Old Haunts (Laughing With a Mouth of Blood)”.

9. Jack White – Blunderbuss Blunderbuss should’ve been an EP. What else to think about a thirteen-track collection that crashes like an over-leveraged hedge fund halfway in?

On the upside, those first seven tracks represent White’s most-inspired songwriting and playing in years. “Sixteen Saltines” and “Freedom at 21” crackle like fire. Ditto the staccato guitar that knifes its way through “Weep Themselves to Sleep”.

White is on such a roll here that even the clarinet which weaves through “Love Interruption” works.

But an awful cover of “I’m Shakin’” and a string of country-ish ballads that fall strangely flat (especially given White’s demonstrated affection for the genre) follow the prickly blast of what would’ve been—in the vinyl age—side one, doing them no favors in the process.

Check “Freedom at 21” and “Missing Pieces”.

10. Jessie Ware – Devotion This young singer made a pretty fair impression in her native England, where Devotion went to number-five on British LP charts. She’s also been nominated for two BRIT award as British Breakthrough of the Year and as British Female Solo Artist of the Year.

Even if you’re not the type who’s swayed by music industry awards, Devotion has plenty to offer.

Refreshingly devoid of the sort of hyper-arranged and hyper-produced product flooding the marketplace, Ware’s debut consists simply of one voice and spare, understated backing. Serving the song, and not adolescent attention spans, no longer seems to be a felony—at least in the UK.

Check “Wildest Moments” and “Taking in Water”.


Honorable Mentions:

Graham Parker & the Rumour - Three Chords Good

Knife & Fork – The Higher You Get, the Rarer the Vegetation

Dr. John – Locked Down

The Twenty Year Rule

I am the newly-appointed Minister of Cultural Affairs for the State. I have decreed that no pop band or artist may record for more than twenty years.

Because of the power accorded me, this means there is no Bob Dylan after 1982. No Rolling Stones after 1984. No Bruce Springsteen after 1993. No U2 after 2000.

This also means Green Day has bid us farewell. That Pearl Jam is in the process. And that the Dave Matthews Band has just two years left.

This raises questions. Who would lose the greatest portion of their legacy? Does a band or artist even contribute to its legacy after twenty years? And whose career would end on the highest note?

What I’ve done below is list five artists each from the sixties, seventies and eighties, and placed their careers in the context of the twenty-year rule.

I list the artist, what would be their final album, some significant albums that never would have been as a result and the number of studio releases which followed their twentieth anniversary:


Bob Dylan
Shot of Love (1981)
Infidels, Oh Mercy, Time Out of Mind, Love and Theft
12

The Rolling Stones
Undercover (1983)
Bridges to Babylon
5

The Kinks
Word of Mouth (1984)
none
3

The Moody Blues
The Present (1983)
none
5

Neil Young
This Note’s for You (1988)
Freedom, Ragged Glory, Living With War, Chrome Dreams II
14

Aerosmith
Get a Grip (1993)
none
3

Bruce Springsteen
Human Touch, Lucky Town (1992)
none
6

Tom Petty
She’s the One (1996)
Mojo
4

Prince
Crystal Ball (1998)
Musicology
9

The Cure
Wild Mood Swings (1996)
none
3

U2
All That You Can’t Leave Behind (2000)
none
2

R.E.M.
Reveal (2001)
Around the Sun
3

Metallica
St. Anger (2003)
none
1

The Red Hot Chili Peppers
By the Way (2002)
none
1

Green Day
21st Century Breakdown (2009)
none
0


Granted, the third category (significant albums made after a band’s twentieth anniversary) is highly-subjective. But it’s my blog and I can do whatever I want. You are free to quibble with Around the Sun and Mojo until the recession is over for all I care.

Next, a couple of things become clear. One, very few bands or artists have released a career-defining album after their twentieth anniversary. Or even many good ones. And two, solo artists fare better than bands.

What does it say that Bridges to Babylon is the best Stones album of the past twenty-seven years? This from a band that once released Beggar’s Banquet, Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers and Exile on Main Street in a space of less than four years.

Or that U2 haven’t released a powerful album in over a decade? You could argue it’s been twice that for the Cure and Metallica. It might be more for Bruce. Prince has released one.

There’s a pattern here.

It’s interesting that soloists age better than bands. Fewer people equal fewer agendas. And fewer agendas mean less time wasted, which streamlines the creative process. However hard it may for a solo artist to find artistic inspiration twenty years down the road, it’s far-more difficult to get four or five people to even look for it at that point.

A band is marriage times five. Think about that.

Another thing. Even given the better odds for solo performers, the output of Dylan and Neil Young in their third and fourth decades is astonishing. They are rock and roll’s George Blanda. They are (if you’ll pardon the expression) musical freaks. Let’s face it. No one has a right to be making albums like Love and Theft two years away from being eligible for social security benefits.

It’s just not fair.

So you see, while my proposal may at first seem severe and even undemocratic, in the end it should be obvious that it couldn’t be more egalitarian.

Or is it?

Comments welcome.

An Appreciation of Clarence Clemons

It had been, at the time, a while since I listened to Bruce Springsteen. When I did, the giant piece of my young adulthood that was tied up in those songs came pouring out of me in a torrent.

It was impossible to listen to a song like Badlands without remembering the certainty and the resolve I once felt, and without realizing how drastically life had changed.

No wonder it produced a giant lump in my throat.

Lights out tonight
trouble in the heartland
Got a head-on collision
smashin' in my guts, man
I'm caught in a cross fire
that I don't understand
But there's one thing I know for sure girl
I don't give a damn
For the same old played out scenes
I don't give a damn
For just the in betweens
Honey, I want the heart, I want the soul
I want control right now
talk about a dream
Try to make it real
you wake up in the night
With a fear so real
Spend your life waiting
for a moment that just don't come
Well, don't waste your time waiting

CHORUS
Badlands, you gotta live it everyday
Let the broken hearts stand
As the price you've gotta pay
We'll keep pushin' till it's understood
and these badlands start treating us good

Workin' in the fields
till you get your back burned
Workin' 'neath the wheel
till you get your facts learned
Baby I got my facts
learned real good right now
You better get it straight darling
Poor man wanna be rich,
rich man wanna be king
And a king ain't satisfied
till he rules everything
I wanna go out tonight,
I wanna find out what I got
Well I believe in the love that you gave me

I believe in the love that you gave me
I believe in the faith that could save me
I believe in the hope
and I pray that some day
It may raise me above these

CHORUS

mmmmmmmm, mmmmm, mmmmmm

For the ones who had a notion,
a notion deep inside
That it ain't no sin
to be glad you're alive
I wanna find one face
that ain't looking through me
I wanna find one place,
I wanna spit in the face of these badlands

CHORUS

No small part of Springsteen’s appeal was the saxophonist that accompanied him. In the E Street Band, the saxophone frequently assumed the role of lead guitar, underscoring the majesty, the salvation, or the sadness in many a Bruce Springsteen song.

It was like punctuation; an italics or bold-faced font. I can’t imagine Born to Run, Backstreets or Jungleland without Clarence Clemons. If ever one musician belonged with another, it was Bruce and Clarence.

In twenty-first century America, we often use the word legacy. Probably too much. We want to be remembered for something. For having influenced someone somehow. Clarence Clemons has no such concerns. He left an indelible stamp on some of the most singular music of his era.

I hope you were happy, Clarence. I hope you realized how the nameless, faceless throngs that filled those arenas thrilled to your playing. I hope you know what it meant to them. And to me.

I hope it meant something to you.

Rest in peace. And thank you.