Radio Free...ah...Office in Which I Work

Just popping in real quick to be self indulgent and post an iTunes playlist I made the other day. At work we had a thing where four people could volunteer to put together a two-hour playlist of whatever the hell we wanted and they'd play it over the speakers. The winner gets a chance to compile another playlist next Friday, so there was some incentive to make it something agreeable to co-workers; I mean, if it were totally up to me I might've just played Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of the War of the Worlds straight through and filled up the rest of the time with Revolver on repeat, but it probably would not be appreciated.

So this is what I put together. There's no real principle or theme to it other than "relatively upbeat and accessible pop songs I wanted to listen to today". It's not meant to be representative of my whole collection (Pugwash/Duckworth Lewis Method is disproportionately represented because I've just gotten into them) and it's certainly not meant to impress anyone ("Ooh, you played a song off of London Calling? Gosh, what a bold and obscure choice!").

If you have these songs at home, you can play along.

1. Requiem for O.M.M.2 - of Montreal
2. You're Going to Lose That Girl - The Beatles
3. Mr. Blue Sky - Electric Light Orchestra
4. Apples - Pugwash
5. Iron Man - The Cardigans
6. No, Not Now - Hot Hot Heat
7. Chick Habit - April March
8. Hey Bulldog (Yellow Submarine Songbook mix) - The Beatles
9. Accidents Will Happen - Elvis Costello & The Attractions
10. Underground - Ben Folds Five
11. New Town Animal in a Furnished Cage - XTC
12. You're So Great - Blur
13. Big Dipper - Built to Spill
14. Lost in the Supermarket - The Clash
15. Queen Bitch - David Bowie
16. The Age of Revolution - The Duckworth Lewis Method
17. Good Morning Good Morning (Anthology version) - The Beatles
18. The Bouncer - Electric Light Orchestra
19. Alison - Elvis Costello
20. California - Rufus Wainwright
21. F.N.T. - Semisonic
22. Fish 'n' Chip Paper - Elvis Costello & The Attractions
23. Look Inside America - Blur
24. Pancakes for One - of Montreal
25. Monorail - Pugwash
26. Crimes of Paris - Elvis Costell0 & The Attractions
27. Better - Regina Spektor
28. This Is Pop? (album version) - XTC
29. Mother Mother - Tracy Bonham
30. Summer Teeth - Wilco
31. Race for the Prize (Remix) - The Flaming Lips
32. Earn Enough For Us - XTC
33. Burndt Jamb - Weezer
34. Nothing Will Ever Change - LEO
35. Pressure Zone - Beck
36. You Never Give Me Your Money - The Beatles

Thought for Today: A Touch Can Mean So Much When It's All You've Got

I've been listening to "That Means A Lot" fairly obsessively for the past couple days since re-borrowing The Beatles Anthology CD set from my dad to stick it on my iPod. As in, it ends, and I immediately play it again, and then I think about it a third time.

If there is a better "lost" Beatles track than "That Means A Lot," I have not heard it (I guess that means you've still got a shot, "Carnival of Light").

Let no man speak ill of the Anthology when it brings us such treasures!

* * * * *

(EDITED to add links if you are inclined to listen to it yourself, and as long as I've got your attention...)

I'm trying to put my finger on what exactly I like so much about this song. It's got a couple strikes against it, actually. The mix on the Anthology is going for a kind of Wall of Sound thing but just comes off muddy. And the lyrics on the song itself I don't find quite up to the usual pop elegance of the Lennon-McCartney team of this time. That "a friend" conceit sort of sticks out and isn't used for any reason, the first verse has a redundancy that doesn't sit well (First line: "A friend says that your love won't mean a lot", last line: "But when she says she loves you, that means a lot") and the pronouns are kind of all over the place. They sound a bit like temporary lyrics, except that there's apparently twenty-plus takes out there all with the same words (although it's possible that this is all used to a secret, brilliant effect that I'm too dumb to pick up on).

The music itself, as a song rather than a performance (although the drumming is great, any take I've found on YouTube that does it differently isn't as good), I find really stirring though, maybe it's as simple as that. I looked up some tab for this song and messed about with it on piano and I really like that Am6 chord (if that's indeed what's actually being played)...

A True Conversation With My Brother (Only Very Slightly Dramatized, By Virtue Of Me Not Having Thought to Tape Record It)

JUSTIN (as soon as Zach has picked up the phone): So you know that Gwen Stefani song, “Cool”?

ZACH: Yyyeah.

JUSTIN: So do you think those lyrics are sincere or ironic?

ZACH: (Long pause.) I…

JUSTIN: Because, you know, it seems like it’s supposed to be coming from a sincere place, with all the stuff about them being totally happy for each other. But then I think, well you know, they say that if you take the time to write a whole song about how you’re totally okay with the way the relationship ended and that you’re both totally moved on … that maybe you’re not.

ZACH: Well, I…

JUSTIN: What I’m saying is I think maybe they’re not cool…

ZACH: (Long pause.) Um … I guess the lyrics sound pretty sincere to me.

JUSTIN: Yeah, I mean it is Gwen Stefani, right? It’s all heart-on-your-sleeve stuff; there’s never really many layers there. But those lyrics are kind of awful on their own, aren’t they? So I think … I think it would be a much better song if she were an unreliable narrator, that she’s really not over him.

ZACH: Hm.

JUSTIN: Next time you listen to that song, pretend that she’s just totally lying. Or, like, deluding herself. It’s a much better song that way.

ZACH: I guess. But if the lyrics are sincere, she really is deluding herself.

JUSTIN: Meta.

ZACH: (Pause.) I smell a blog post.

JUSTIN: Really? I was going to write one about the Chameleon…

You Can Dress Me Up As A ... What, Exactly?

First of all, let me say I don't like that Paul McCartney's mailing list or whatever (I am not 100% sure why I'm on it; maybe when I entered that remix contest two albums ago I sent it from that Yahoo account) addresses e-mails as being from "Paul McCartney" and not "Paul McCartney Mailing List" or "McCartney Fan Club" or whatever it is. Because for one brief, unthinking moment, I honestly thought, "Oh, Paul's written me an e-mail." You think you'd be more excited, even in that stupid half-second before figuring out what it obviously is, but there you have it.

Okay, point number two. Here's the image that came attached to the e-mail:

It's weird, isn't it? Don't get me wrong, I figure McCartney's needed some "rebranding" for some time now. The "cheeky" shots he keeps putting out -- the cover of Driving Rain leaps immediately to mind -- have become somewhat undignified for a legend of a man in his sixties. But what am I to take from that image above?

"Paul McCartney is mad as hell and he's gonna give you a piece of his mind!!"
"Paul McCartney is gonna rock your socks off like they ain't never been rocked off before!!"
"Paul McCartney is quite enthused about his new suspenders!!"

I think it's interesting, anyway. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but then again, this is the image he and his people are putting out to represent him. Paired with the "Up and Coming" name, is this meant to be some sort of hungry Paul McCartney?

Conscripted

The Onion AV Club has joined in my war against irony (in a move that I am one hundred per cent certain was inspired by my declaration of war, despite the fact that it appears to have been posted before I wrote my blog entry). Although the comments, always a dubious undertaking on the AV Club to begin with, raise the issue of "New Sincerity", which is apparently a thing already, and not one whose tenents I can fully get behind (it seems to promote the Cult of Awesome, which I'll reject as well).

But even the act of rejecting a "movement" is a movement in and of itself, which is why it seems to be difficult to talk about anything in the early 21st century.

Basically, I just want to know at what point we can stop acting like 90s "alternative" rock was some kind of blight upon culture and re-evaluate it as guitar pop under a somewhat misleading name.

Build Your Own White Album: Part Two - A Doll's House

Long version here, summary here: You know how people sometimes say The Beatles’ White Album would work better as a single album than a double (“people” in this context actually includes Ringo Starr and George Martin)? In a fit of madness, I decided to try and construct what that might look like. The first part of this series was just my 15 favorite tracks, but for this one I tried to bring some actual discipline to it. I was taking the position that it’s 1968, the Beatles have given me 30 songs for consideration on their new album, and I’ve had to whittle it down to 15.

Now what criteria do you use to do this?

- Quality. Obviously that’s the first step, but it’s not just what I think are the 15 best songs (different than my 15 favorite songs).

- Art vs. commerce. The balance is important. This is a Beatles album and a canonized masterpiece, but it’s also a pop record.

- Band politics. I’ve stated before my belief that this is the best album John Lennon has ever put his name to, Beatle, solo or otherwise. But this is a Beatles album, so Paul’s got to have his tracks, George has got to have his tracks, and yes, SPOILER ALERT, Ringo gets his. Although Paul is still going to be pissed.

- Reduce duplication. The Justice League has this same rule on their charter. Basically, if there are two songs that have a similar sound, I should really only pick one in the interest of variety, which as far as I’m concerned has always been the key ingredient in Beatles releases. At the same time…

- A sense of unity. Not in theme or sound (although I did sketch out a “Revolution”-themed concept album, and it’s as dumb as you’d expect), but in, I don’t know, feeling. “Savoy Truffle” is a year or so too late to fit in on this. “Mother Nature’s Son” would have probably fit in better on a McCartney solo release. Basically, I’m looking for tracks that embody “White Albumyness,” and no, I don’t know what that means either.

- Sequencing. It’s sequenced the way I would sequence an album. I’ll get more into that on the track-by-track stuff.

Without further ado, here is The Beatles’ ninth LP studio album: A Doll’s House. If you like, follow along by jumbling up your White Album on iTunes or whatever – it’s what I did.

SIDE ONE

1. Everybody’s Got Something To Hide Except Me And My Monkey (2:25)
2. Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da (3:09)
3. Julia (2:54)
4. Piggies (2:03)
5. Happiness is a Warm Gun (2:44)
6. The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill (3:14)
7. While My Guitar Gently Weeps (4:48)

SIDE TWO

1. Birthday (2:43)
2. Dear Prudence (3:54)
3. Blackbird (2:19)
4. Glass Onion (2:18)
5. I’m So Tired (2:03)
6. Don’t Pass Me By (3:46)
7. Back in the USSR (2:44)
8. Long, Long, Long (3:05)

And now I shall explain myself.

1. Everybody’s Got Something To Hide Except Me And My Monkey
The main motivating force behind me even taking on such a crazy project, and the thing that kept me going when it seemed impossible, was my absolute belief that this would be the perfect song to open the album with. It’s a powerful track with a lot of energy to kick things off with, and it’s welcoming with the guitar lines and drums giving way to the barreling distorted textures, which build up energy and release it with the chorus. It also nicely introduces the album musically. It says, a little more definitively than “Back in the USSR” does, I think, that this is what the album is about. Still complex structurally, but returning to a more direct arrangement with guitars, bass and drums.

2. Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da
I think piano-driven white ska is a good counter to “Monkey”; I like having a pair of tracks at the front that are both muscular but in different ways. And it’s commercial and a good song, so a prominent position is important. And, politically, since Paul does not appear again on Side One, it’s good to get him out there right away.

3. Julia
Perhaps too obvious to follow up two strong, energetic songs by taking it down a notch? Ah well, I like the effect anyway. I wanted something quieter and simpler; could have been “Blackbird” or it could have been “Mother Nature’s Son,” but I wanted this for its purity.

4. Piggies
And then picking it up, but not so much as to be jarring, we have George Harrison’s first of three tracks. This was in direct competition with “Martha My Dear”; I contend that you don’t actually need both, that although the arrangements are very different they have a similar thing going on. “Martha My Dear” I think is the better song musically, but I balked at removing Harrison’s social commentary in favor of McCartney’s pure whimsy, and anyway Paul can always put it on Ram or something.

5. Happiness Is A Warm Gun
Although “Happiness” is, I think, the best song on the album, you can’t deploy it too early; you’ve got to ease into this stuff, and I think after "Piggies with" the harpsichord and the dark lyrics/whimsical sound and pig noises, you’re about ready for it. Still wanted it to be on Side One so it’s prominent.

6. The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill
The Spanish guitar at the beginning of this transitions well from “Happiness” – for a moment you might almost think it’s a new “movement” – and then goes off into its own thing. Counters the structural weirdness of “Happiness” with something direct, warm, and inviting, but still unusual and worthy in its own way. This is a track that I don’t think “needs” to be on the album, but makes it stronger anyway for exactly that reason.

7. While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Kept the “’Ey oop” transition because I could not improve upon it. The longest song on the album rounds out the first side, and I think it’s a good track to close the halfway point on. It’s big and grand – you need to work up to it, but I don’t think it’s the sort of thing you want to hold to the very end.

8. Birthday
Works both as an opening to a record side (again, I can’t improve upon this idea, nor does it need improving upon), and works as a lighter, more energetic antidote to “Weeps” if you’re listening on CD. Refocusing on rock ‘n’ roll, and too pure and energetic not to include.

9. Dear Prudence
Okay, I made this playlist on iTunes, but the problem is that I don’t have the equipment, know-how or inclination to remove the jet airplane sound from the end of “Back in the USSR” on the original. So we’ll just pretend it’s not there, and we’ll also pretend that “Birthday” crossfades with “Prudence” in a similar way, because I think this song does benefit from being led into like that. Starts off much more stripped down than “Birthday”, obviously, but by the end becomes almost as full, so I think this fits well here, and you do need this song on the album.

10. Blackbird
I’m no fool – even if I didn’t have the benefit of 40 years telling me “Blackbird” is a classic in the halls of popular music, I’d like to think I’d’ve been able to spot it at the time. If I had my druthers, I’d probably sub this out for another Lennon tune – “Sexy Sadie” – but Paul needs his tracks, and this is toe-tapping and commercial while still being poignant. Discipline: I has it.

11. Glass Onion
I think this hits really nicely after Blackbird. The transition is jarring, but the song kind of demands it – the song itself is jarring. We get our quota of bluesy rock with this song.

12. I’m So Tired
The laziness of the strings on the outro of “Glass Onion” segues well into “I’m So Tired,” which I didn’t mean to do but turned out anyway. I guess I’m just a genius. Takes the tempo down after some toe-tapping numbers. Again, I was tempted to say that this song didn’t “need” to be on here, but it does – it’s a very affecting oddball.

13. Don’t Pass Me By
This is maybe a little gimmicky, but the backwards Lennon mumbling on the end of “I’m So Tired” could be made to flow into Ringo’s piano noodling, artificially suggestion a sort of “live performance” link between the two. Okay, so the song itself – yeah, maybe this doesn’t need to be on here, and maybe this doesn’t deserve to be on here with so much other great material that doesn’t make the cut, but Ringo gets to do a song on an album. And I’m not going to tell him the first song he’s written himself doesn’t get to go on. And I’d just replace it with another Lennon song, and McCartney’s going to have a fit as it is. But I’m being too hard on “Don’t Pass Me By,” because it’s not like this is anything less than a good song (better recording than a song, though).

14. Back in the USSR
On here for commercial reasons. We do need our McCartney rockers (and rockers, period), and it’s not like this isn’t a great song. Why I’m putting it second from the end is so that it functions as what appears to be the climax. You get a big, bombastic song to be the sort of public finale – and we know it works because I stole the idea from the Sgt. Pepper reprise going into “A Day In The Life.”

15. Long, Long, Long
And like “A Day In The Life,” it starts out unassumingly, almost disappointingly after the bombast of the previous track if you didn’t know any better (and as a record producer in 1968 I am counting on you not knowing any better) before building into something grand of its own. But I wanted to play a trick; as the “official” followup to Sgt. Pepper, “USSR”/”Long” mirrors “Reprise”/”Day” but also goes in a different direction – where Pepper ends on that massive, legendary chord, this more stripped-down album ends on that bare, angular guitar chord (well, and a drum hit, but I’ll probably edit that out).

So that’s how it turned out. A few of the obvious things to point out:

1. Lennon dominates this album. Seven Johns, three Pauls, three Georges, a Ringo and a Lennon/McCartney in “Birthday.” I don’t feel too bad about this, though, and I will tell you why. First, McCartney has taken over as defacto leader of the Beatles at this point – Pepper was largely his show, and Abbey Road will be again, so why not let Lennon have this one? Second, it puts George and Paul on equal footing; this is a good boost for George, who has absolutely blossomed as a songwriter by this point, and perhaps a wakeup for Paul, whose numbers on the White Album are, I think, his weakest since the early Beatles albums.

2. Where the hell is “Sexy Sadie”?! I know, right? But this is DISCIPLINE. Another John song means one less George or Paul (or Ringo), and I tell myself that the last “movement” of “Happiness is a Warm Gun” sort of covers the same territory but more succinctly. Can I issue this as a single or something? A double A-side with “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da”?

And finally…

3. This is, I think, a pretty good condensation of the White Album (I would gladly challenge anyone else’s attempt to go down the same rabbit hole I been down), and if it had been this way all along, I don’t think anyone could say it was anything less than an excellent album. But it’s just not as good as the existing White Album. Comparatively, it’s a bit charmless. Yes, you don’t really “need” “Why Don’t We Do It In The Road,” but what kind of heartlessness is that? Honestly, there are maybe five or six tracks I could say “Yes, we could lose these,” but that’s still an incredibly strong twenty-five track album. Man, I’ve even developed an appreciation for “Rocky Raccoon,” and that’s for real.

So this debate is over, right? (Or wrong?) I have rigorously tested the “Should’ve been a single album” hypothesis. It is demonstrably false.

Pass it on.

A List That I Started Writing And Gave Up On Finishing Almost Immediately

BEATLES SWIPES/RIFFS/TRIBUTES IN ELVIS COSTELLO SONGS:

1.) "...And In Every Home..." - Orchestra plays similar riff to "Here Comes The Sun" (also Cream's "Badge") at :33 and elsewhere. Arrangement supposedly contains numerous musical allusions to George Martin arrangements and other pieces.

2.) "Blue Chair" - Costello sings same "Oh ho ho ho ho ho" as Lennon on Beatles' cover of "Anna"

3.) "20% Amnesia" - Guitar break at :48 recalls "I Feel Fine"

4.) "Pony St." - Bass bit at 1:48 recalls McCartney-style bass on "Paperback Writer" and "Rain"

And then I kind of lost interest.

XTC vs. Elvis Costello ... Content vs. ... um ... MORE Content?

More silliness at Mightygodking.com.

Why? Because when Chris Bird gave me the ability to post on his blog, he never explicitly made me promise to use it wisely.

Build Your Own White Album: Part One - The Subjective List

Long version here, short version here: What if you had to make the Beatles' White Album into a single album by cutting half of its thirty tracks?

Part One is based entirely on my own subjective preferences. The songs that make it won’t necessarily be the “best” songs, or the most “important” ones. I’m not going to try and get an even number of John and Paul songs. These are just the songs I like the best.

How I did it: I listed all 30 songs in a Word document and whittled them away one by one until I was left with 15. Not an easy task. I think I’d got as far as six without too much agony, but then I had 24 incredible songs left and I had no idea where to begin trying to get rid of nine more.

But eventually I did. The songs I picked aren’t necessarily the cool picks, but it has been well-documented that I am not a cool guy, so I’m fine with that. We’ll just go through the album track-by-track and say CUT or KEEP and, briefly, why.

Back in the USSR – CUT
Okay, you see why this is so hard. I mean, Back in the USSR – wonderful, classic, a triumph on most other albums, but it’s up against some real stiff competition here. The bar is essentially set at unfuckingbelievable. So in light of that … well, you make the hard decision and you have to say yeah, musically at least, it’s Another McCartney Rocker, although it is one of the better ones. This one held on to nearly the end of the “culling,” and one of the reasons for that is conceptually, lyrically, it’s effortlessly funny in a way you don’t always see out of McCartney. The borscht-and-Beach-Boys thing is all a joke, of course, but McCartney sounds like he’s keeping a straight face. No mugging to be found here. So don’t think I wanted to cut this, but my crazy self-imposed challenge is my crazy self-imposed challenge.

Dear Prudence - KEEP
Right, this one was never in any danger of not making it. That middley bridge bit (“Look around round round … Look arowwww-owwwww-owwwww-ounnd”) conveys an almost religious awe (which I suppose is appropriate for where it was written). Love the blooping bubbling bass part that kicks in at the second verse, and that fantastic messy lead guitar on the third.

Glass Onion - KEEP
A funny little throwaway it may be, but the energy is fantastic. Lennon’s vocal on “Fix-ing a hoooole in the o-sheann” is sublime, one of my favorite performances of his. But it’s really all about that second at the end of the chorus where everything stops, you get a bit of ring from the piano, and then that papery Beatles drum sound I love so much.

Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da - KEEP
Don’t pretend you don’t like this song! Here’s a track that (based off the alternate take on the Anthology) is only “quite good” until, according to Beatles legend, Lennon comes into the studio, stoned and irritated that McCartney is still working on it, and demands that it be played with loud, pseudo-ska piano; Paul made a Snickers bar, and John said “Hold on, deep fry that thing and then we’ll talk!” Also: “Hap-ply ever after in the mahketplace.”

Wild Honey Pie - CUT
This was a pretty easy decision, but you know, I like Wild Honey Pie.

Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill - KEEP
What I really like is how immediate this song feels; it sounds put together in about ten minutes with the first mocking words Lennon could think of, and then sung outside Rik Cooke’s window in another ten. You hear a tiny sliver of proto-Elvis Costello in the lyrics if not the melody, too, right? ("So Captain Marvel zapped 'im right between the eyes") And for absolutely no reason I can fathom, I adore that breeeeet of the mellotron or whatever after the final verse.

While My Guitar Gently Weeps - KEEP
There are Beatles Harrisongs that I like better, but I think this is probably George’s most epic Beatles recording, if you are into that sort of thing. Love that high, screechy organ.

Happiness Is a Warm Gun - KEEP
An incredibly bizarre song when you stop to think about it (I don’t know enough music theory to even begin to parse the time signatures of this thing), but you don’t always realize it because it feels so natural. Is it the best song on the album(s)? It might well be, although it has strong competition I’ll get to later.

Martha My Dear - KEEP
Okay, this very nearly got cut. I had this and Don’t Pass Me By left, and I cut this and kept DPMB, and then I changed my mind, and then I changed it again, and then slept on it. Ultimately, I had to go with McCartney’s supreme pop craftsmanship. “Help yourself to a bit of what is all around you” is a pretty perfect marriage of melody and chords, to my mind. Throw in the goofy Yellow Submarine brass for good measure, I’m a sucker for it.

I’m So Tired - KEEP
And during my Martha My Dear/Don’t Pass Me By struggle, I suddenly thought, “Well, we could cut I’m So Tired, couldn’t we? What does it really bring to the table that, say, Happiness Is A Warm Gun doesn’t?” But the answer is atmosphere. How moody self-absorbed high school-me never adopted this as an anthem I can’t figure out. I was not unaware of this track.

Blackbird - CUT
“How could you cut Blackbird?” Well, you know what, it actually wasn’t too hard at all. Very beautiful, very well-put-together (again, this is an inferior song only by comparison to uncut awesomeness elsewhere on the album) and yet … the just-Paul-and-an-acoustic-guitar never wins me over as much as it does a lot of people. If that makes me a bad person, then I am a bad person.

Piggies - CUT
Man, I am just as surprised as you that this didn’t make the cut. Surely I love harpsichord too much to let this go…! My wife’s gonna be mad, this is one of her favorite Beatles songs. Piggies did hold on close to the end, but something just had to give.

Rocky Raccoon - CUT
HATE. No, that’s too strong, I don’t really hate Rocky Raccoon, I just … I just have no time for this, Paul McCartney; no time for these little genre pastiches that only exist as genre pastiches. I cut you twice.

Don’t Pass Me By - CUT
What gave the edge to Martha My Dear is that this is probably a better recording than it is a song. Perfectly fine song if pretty straight-up-and-down basic, but what makes it something special is the arrangement – psychedelic country and western! Oh, and Ringo, I don’t blame you saving up your best drumming for your own song, okay?

Why Don’t We Do It in the Road? - CUT
Great showcase for Paul’s voice and Ringo’s drumming, though. And it always makes my brother laugh even when he knows it’s coming.

I Will - KEEP
A notable exception to my indifference to just-Paul-and-an-acoustic-guitar, because I love the hell out of this. McCartney at his most sweet and sentimental, but it’s just so pure and warm. The “mouth bass” is goofy, but it serves to nicely deflate would could be too sweet a song without just being dumb mugging. It is, actually, what love sounds like in my head, and I don’t care what you think of me for saying so.

Julia - CUT
“No you didn’t!” Yes I did and I’m sorry and I know it’s one of the most open and naked things John ever wrote (and certainly the most up to this point in his recording career) and it is extremely beautiful, but I only have 15 tracks to work with here, and this is really frigging hard, you guys.

Birthday - KEEP
It’s -- it’s just so nice to hear everyone getting along, you know? It really shows in one of the Beatles’ most enthusiastic recordings. Also a sentimental favorite. There is video of my brother and me, maybe six years old and two years old, respectively, dancing to this. But I will not show this to you.

Yer Blues - CUT
Man, I really really like this, but to be honest? Towards the end I’m totally ready to move on to something else.

Mother Nature’s Son - CUT
Look, I’m not a monster. This song is really exceptionally beautiful. I almost believe in being a poor young country boy singing songs for everyone, just not enough to make it.

Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey - KEEP
This is the contender I told you about – the only song that might be as totally rad as Happiness Is A Warm Gun. Gives Birthday a run for its money in the energy department! Firebell clanging away. That spiky guitar sound is king, one of my favorite parts ever.

Sexy Sadie - KEEP
Perhaps a somewhat inessential song, but I adore the icy piano sound on this, with the slight delay. Wonderful recording. I like it, anyway.

Helter Skelter - CUT
Okay, here’s the thing. You can say Honey Pie is kind of an embarrassing thing for Paul to have done, but I contend this is equally embarrassing for the exact same reason. Honey Pie is mugging, and this is mugging. It sounds like a pastiche of hard rock rather than actually being hard rock; it’s Paul with a mask on (EDIT: although, of course, I know that's not exactly the case, being that Helter Skelter is in fact a major influence on the hard rock I'm accusing McCartney of imitating, but that's what it sounds like, forty years later). Don’t get me wrong, it’s a good time, but it’s the sort of thing that is supposed to sound effortless but really comes off calculated. Rubs me the wrong way.

Long, Long, Long - KEEP
Strange and beautiful, and when you listen to it, it’s weird how much it’s a prototype of Harrison’s solo stuff – you could almost put this on Living in the Material World and you’d hardly notice. That alone wouldn’t qualify it, but that absolutely terrifying conclusion…! It genuinely gets me spooked if I’m listening to it alone at night; the cabinets are going to open up by themselves and plates are going to start flying through the air and the closet door’s going to open up to reveal a vortex to hell.

Revolution 1 - CUT
Sorry John, you were wrong, the single version of this is better, no offense.

Honey Pie - CUT
Yeah, it’s mugging. It’s like When I’m 64 but not funny, and what’s the point, really?

Savoy Truffle - KEEP
Again, this is a list of songs that I like the best, not what’s most deserving. This doesn’t really fit in on the White Album (a year or so behind, might’ve been great on Magical Mystery Tour, actually), and it superficially resembles Good Morning Good Morning, but I just dig this song. Chugs along so well.

Cry Baby Cry - KEEP
I know, right, what’s this doing on here? I’ve always loved Cry Baby Cry a whole lot and I don’t know why; I guess every Beatles fan has to have his “No, seriously, you guys, you don’t even know how good this song is!” and this is mine.

Revolution 9 - CUT
I am not going to pretend I know anything about musique concrete or the state of avant garde composition circa 1968, so I don’t know if this is “good” or not. I like it; it’s neat, it’s interesting, it’s spooky (although who needs this to be spooky when Long Long Long has that covered considerably more succinctly, right?). I like to listen to it, but I like to listen to the other fifteen tracks better. I had to pick fifteen songs, and this is not really a song, so I don’t think I can be faulted.

Good Night - CUT
I get a bit sentimental about this as well. My dad used to sing it to me when I was little, and I expect I’ll do the same to my kid when he or she comes along, when nobody is looking. But, you know, everything else is just so good.

Aaaaand that does it for the White Album. So, to recap, the winners are Dear Prudence, Glass Onion, Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da, The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Happiness Is A Warm Gun, Martha My Dear, I’m So Tired, I Will, Birthday, Everybody’s Got Something To Hide…, Sexy Sadie, Long Long Long, Savoy Truffle, Cry Baby Cry.

And some of the finest losers around are Back in the USSR, Wild Honey Pie, Rocky Raccoon, Piggies, Don’t Pass Me By, Why Don’t We Do It In The Road?, Blackbird, Julia, Yer Blues, Mother Nature’s Son, Helter Skelter, Honey Pie, Revolution #1, Revolution #9, Good Night.

So the list turns out to have a pretty strong pro-John, anti-Paul vibe. Which, I assure you, is not typical of me. As Beatles, I consider them pretty near equals from Revolver on (and post-Beatles, if you average out all the good and the bad, they probably come up about the same in my estimation as well, although as a solo artist I am totally in the tank for George, warts and all). But I will go on record as saying that I believe the White Album is the best album John Lennon ever made, Beatle, solo or otherwise, and it’s Paul’s weakest Beatles effort since Rubber Soul. But don't feel too bad, McCartneyans, because about a year or so from now Paul gets his masterpiece, which, of course, is Abbey Road.

Okay, the totally subjective business is out of the way. Now, onto trying to compile that “proper album” I promised. It probably won’t be ready this week. Maybe after Christmas. Maybe after my child is born and has been in school a few years. But eventually … I will the attempt that which probably oughtn't be attempted. Be here then!

Build Your Own White Album: Introduction

So I’ve finally got my hands on the remastered White Album in mono (I could be cool and insist on calling it The Beatles, but I am not cool). And on my first listen of it, I did something I sadly do not usually have the time or inclination to do much anymore – I put it on the stereo in the afternoon, lay down on the couch, and gave it my undivided attention the whole way through. That’s slightly over ninety minutes, which I think is a fairly sizable investment for popular music, but the White Album really earns it.

Obviously it’s a big mess (though I think the degree to which it's a mess is actually exaggerated in popular lore), but that is, as the cliché goes, exactly what is so interesting about it. Because of the conditions in which it was made, of course. It is 1968 and you are a Beatle, and you have nothing to prove to anybody anymore – not the public, not music critics, not George Martin, not even your bandmates … so what do you decide to do? The title The Beatles and the plain white sleeve works so well in light of that – there’s no quote-unquote concept like Sgt. Pepper’s, no movie tie-in, no attempt at even making a cohesive album (although it does make the White Album, in some way, uniquely suited to the post-album iPod era of popular music, if you believe in such a thing). The Beatles is just The Beatles, unfiltered. And it’s a testament to their talent that their most self-indulgent, uneven record is still considered one of the finest ever made by anyone ever despite all that. There are boring bits, and there are embarrassing bits, but it’s fascinating nonetheless; this is the breakup record, not Let It Be.

But not everyone goes in for that. I recently went through The Beatles Anthology (the book, not the TV series or CD set) again and Ringo Starr and George Martin apparently both feel to one degree or another that yeah, maybe they should’ve just made one really good album. To which, on any other day, I scoff and wave my hand dismissively…

…but then I think, what if?

What if you had to cut down the White Album to one album? There’s thirty tracks in all (I’m counting, as most everyone does, the Can You Take Me Back fragment as a part of Cry Baby Cry), so let’s say you get fifteen tracks. That means you have to take fifteen really good Beatles songs and say these are not good enough. What a horrifying proposition!

Well, you know, I had to try it...

So here’s what I’m doing, and if anyone wants to do the same, we can make this a meme, but I’m happy to let this be my private folly (though I’m sure somebody’s already done this before). I am, in fact, going to do this twice.

The first one will be just my 15 favorite songs on a purely subjective level. Not based on “importance” or interest or quality, just the 15 I would rather listen to than the other 15. I’ve made that list, and it wasn’t easy.

But even more difficult is what I’m going to attempt next, and that will be to try and assemble a “proper” single album. Subjectivity has to give way to objectivity. I am going to play Fantasy Producer in my Fantasy Studio; the Beatles have given me 30 tracks but I have to pick 15 based on quality, 15 qui vont tres bien ensemble, if you'll indulge, and I suppose trying to keep everyone in the band happy. And then I have to resequence it as well.

So this is my mad idea. My 15 favorites, coming soon. New album (let’s call it A Doll’s House, eh?) coming probably after much more thought (if ever; might just drive me insane instead).

It'll be grrrrreat!

Shuffle ‘n’ Write for 5/21/09

All right, let’s try that again. Full explanation here, short explanation thus: I’m going to hit the shuffle on my iPod and write my immediate reactions to the songs in real time, hopefully to weed out any overthinking and just get to the heart of what this song means to me. First ten songs, even if they repeat artists or albums, even if they’re the most embarrassing things on my player.


1.) The Beatles – “If I Needed Someone”: A Harrisong. I wonder if the heavy harmonies from John and Paul indicate a lack of confidence in George’s vocal? I really enjoy the unorthodox sentiment of the song, suggesting there is maybe more than one “suitable” person for everyone. There’s a slightly bashful, apologetic tone to it that’s interesting, and separates it from anything John or Paul would’ve done (John would never apologize, Paul would never think to).

2.) George Harrison – “Isn’t It A Pity?”: Well, okay, I’ve got seven minutes to write about this one. This kind of borrows the na na na na sequence from the end of “Hey Jude,” and I have the same problem with this song as that one: there are very few pop songs I think really need to be longer than five minutes, much less seven. And like in “Hey Jude,” the part that repeats endlessly is the less interesting part. The front part of this song is a really beautiful sounding piano song (but not too lugubrious), with a nice chord change in there somewhere that kind of drops out from under you. In fact, I like the front bit to this song better than the front bit to “Hey Jude” (although this may partially be because you hear “Hey Jude” all the time, and this is a little fresher from less exposure.) And actually, that first four-and-a-half minutes do fly by nicely. But at the end, that callback to “Jude” just drags. Seriously, we could fade at the five-minute mark. Man, this is a great song, though. I heard a quote somewhere (can’t remember if it was a critic or one of his contemporaries) that said Harrison keeps rewriting this song, and I can see that; “Just For Today” off Cloud Nine is kind of a weaker attempt at recapturing that combination of weariness and power.

3.) Ming Tea – “BBC”: A song from Austin Powers (first one, I think) done by Mike Myers and friends in the style of a 60s tune. I like pastiches that don’t specifically quote songs, but make a whole new one, and I think this qualifies (unless this is riffing on a song I’m not familiar with). A bit of fun.

4.) Groove Armada – “Edge Hill”: Ha! Another (nearly) seven-minute song! There’s not a whole lot of Groove Armada I’m into; I actually got this song off of the soundtrack to the first Tomb Raider, which I bought because I was working in a movie theater when that movie came out, and I heard Basement Jaxx’s “Where’s Your Head At?” over the end credits while cleaning up popcorn and spilt soda about a hundred times, but still decided I needed to own that song. Not a lot on the soundtrack that I dig, but this song alone is worth the price of the disc. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the actual whole movie, so I don’t know where they use this song, but it’s absolutely beautiful, and in contrast to what I said about “Isn’t It A Pity?”, this really does need to be as long as it is. The beats-‘n’-bass at the beginning are steady but repetitive, almost to the point that it’s too much, and so just when you wonder if the song is going anywhere (don’t you dare look at the time to see if it’s coming!), this incredible string section comes in. There’s something awe-inspiring and mysterious in it, like you’ve made contact with aliens or have found a doorway through time or just saw Superman for real. “Uncanny” is the word. If I ever have an out-of-body experience, I want it to be to this song.

5.) Something To Do – “Something To Do”: This is a ska band from my home state of Wisconsin that I saw play in college once. They did a cover of “Get Off My Cloud” that was pretty cool. I don’t listen to whole lot of ska; I like it in theory, but I’ve got a pretty untrained ear for it, so it tends to get same-y in my head. I bought this CD EP to, y’know, support local bands and all that. It’s solidly enjoyable, although the buzzy guitars are a little bland. There’s a repeating line at the end that builds and builds with harmonies and instrumentation, and I always like the effect. It seems like a mission statement -- “Another day goes by / And still I wonder why / It seems this same shit / It happens to me all the time” -- for an album that I am not sure exists.

6.) Elvis Costello – “Kinder Murder”: Brutal Youth is probably my favorite EC album, although I think you’re not “supposed” to like it because it’s overproduced? (I like heavy production, though, and nothing on this record is what I’d call intrusive.) It’s got this great thing where the main verse just alternates between these two threatening-sounding chords. I feel bad that I get so wrapped up in Elvis’ incredible gift for melody that sometimes I lose track of the lyrics (which is again, what we’re all “supposed” to be listening for in Elvis Costello).

7.) The Cars – “Good Times Roll”: I love the sound on the guitar; you know, the one at the beginning coming in through the right channel. You hear it on other Cars songs and on other things Ric Ocasek has produced, so I wonder if he’s doing anything specifically to get that sound or if it’s just something I’m imagining. This song itself I guess isn’t anything real special; I didn’t dance to this in kindergarten or anything (see "Shake It Up"). Not my favorite keyboard sound, I suppose; seems to make a big difference on my affinity for one Cars song over another, actually.

8.) The Beatles – “Strawberry Fields Forever”: This is the Love version. Does a neat trick where a stripped-down version blends into the “proper” version (the vocal isn’t slowed down on this one), which is an interesting experiment. Is the song what it is because of all the showy production, or because it’s a good song? Love itself is mostly interesting as an experiment; Beatles songs are so ingrained into our heads that hearing these altered versions forces you to recontextualize them; take the world’s most famous songs and make them unpredictable again. The bit at the end with the fadeout and the “Piggies” harpsichord part and the “In My Life” triple-speed piano and the “Hello, Goodbye” outro vocal is showy, but a neat trick nonetheless, particularly when it drops out to just the vocals and the drums.

9.) The Moody Blues – “Voices In The Sky”: True fact: I am named after Justin Hayward of The Moody Blues. As a kid, this always seemed significant to me, and so I was likely one of few children in my age group to listen to this. It’s difficult for me to critically assess The Moody Blues because it’s so tied to my childhood and nostalgia, but hey, I’m not doing criticism here. I still think the bridge/middle-eight/whatever it is with the soaring “caaaaalling toooo … *snare hit* … meeeeee!” is neat, and makes up for whatever I care for about it less in the gentle acoustic pastoralism (why do I like that sort of thing better when it’s XTC?)

10.) Weezer – “O Girlfriend”: The Green Album gets a lot of crap, but truth be told, I never thought the Blue Album was all that magical. I guess you had to be there, and I got this album first. Okay, this song doesn’t really mean anything, but did the early Beatles song mean anything either? I see this CD as a kind of modern stab at "Let’s write a lot of good, hooky, straightforward guitar-pop songs that people will like." The intent is so up-front to me that I don’t think you can hold it against them. What’s wrong with simple songs people like? Okay, maybe you could swap out the guitar solo for one that wasn’t just the vocal melody (that is a genuinely weird choice).

Hm, I think this second batch turned out a little better, a little more focused. Should probably stop using the phrase “neat trick,” though. Also, look Zach, I wrote about Weezer; finally something on this blog that you would care about! I’m ready to have a long, drawn-out discussion in the comments about the relative merits of Rivers Cuomo both in the 90s and today if you are…

An Experiment: Shuffle 'n' Write for 5/20/09

I tried my hand at reviewing music for my college newspaper only very briefly before I realized I wasn’t cut out for it. (True fact: I own zero albums by Bob Dylan and almost no hip-hop or rap, which probably ought to have instantly disqualified me). Basically, I realized I just wanted to listen to music that I would like, and that is absolutely not an attitude a proper critic can afford to have. Really, I'll have to admit I'm not even all that “knowledgeable” about music and the critic's canon, I just think music is awesome. So I never looked back.

I like reading about music, though, but I’m more interested in how people relate to music -- their personal relationship with certain songs, albums, and artists -- than analysis and critique. So here’s what I’m gonna try: You know that meme from a couple years ago where you hit shuffle on your iPod and list the first ten songs that come up? (Back when that was a thing, I had neither a blog nor an iPod.) It’s like that. I’ll write a little something about each one -- what the song means to me, or why I like it, or where I heard it, or whatever comes to mind -- as I’m listening to it, in real time. That’ll prevent me from overintellectualizing, hopefully. And if this turns out well, I’ll start doing these every so often.

Here goes. The actual first ten songs when I hit shuffle, even if it repeats albums or artists, and no matter how lame or embarrassing they may end up being.

Play.

1.) Elvis Costello – “Let Them All Talk”: I’ve really dug EC ever since my wife introduced me to him. This is from Punch the Clock, and the sound is extremely dated. That horrible synthy piano and thin, processed drums. But it’s a good song, despite all that. I really like the melodramatic opening with the driving horns even if it is goofy.

2.) the pillows – “Instant Music”: From the Japanese OVA FLCL/Fooly Cooly. I don’t watch much anime, but I love Cowboy Bebop and FLCL, and not coincidentally, both rely on music heavily for emotional resonance. I’m never quite sure how to describe the pillows. It’s 90s guitar-based alternative rock by Japanese people.

3.) XTC – “Helicopter”: From Drums and Wires. XTC is something else my wife introduced me to; she was into them casually, and I latched onto them and am now one of those obsessive fans who has all the albums and knows all the behind-the-scenes stories (I stop short at tracking down all those demo albums, though; there’s like a dozen of them). Oh, the song, right. When people say someone is “influenced by XTC” they usually mean XTC from this period, not the later, more pastoral kind of stuff. I probably prefer the latter, but their early herky-jerky stuff is infectious and charming where a lot of bands doing the same thing can just come off as annoying to my ears.

4.) Coldplay – “Yellow”: Man, I am telling you, Coldplay used to be a cool thing to be into. My friend in high school told me about this little British band that sounds like the lead singer’s a puppy that’s been kicked down a flight of stairs and it’s great. So I bought this album, and soon after this song took off. I still like this song and this album, no matter what anyone says. It’s just so earnest, is what it is, where everything from A Rush of Blood to the Head on just seems calculated; trying too hard. I still like listening to this on rainy days; in college it was great music to listen to on headphones and get all self-indulgent (I am not too proud to admit).

5.) Paul McCartney – “Another Day”: The first word that comes to mind to describe this song is “pleasant,” but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. McCartney was probably the solo Beatle my dad listened to most when I was a kid, so there’s a strong nostalgia association with this. Sometimes (in contrast with Coldplay) I feel like McCartney doesn’t try hard enough, but this song has a few nice little idiosyncratic things to keep you hooked.

6.) XTC – “Boarded Up”: The acoustic guitar is really beautifully recorded. That’s all I really have to say about this song. Kind of boring. It’s about an old music venue closing down, but it doesn’t feel real emotionally invested, just sort of a “Shame about that, huh?” sentiment. Colin Moulding has supposedly kind of lost interest in songwriting in recent years, and I think it shows on all his songs on the Wasp Star album.

7.) Ben Folds Five – “Alice Childress”: This is the version off the Naked Baby Photos album of rarities, live performances and B-sides. This is actually the first Ben Folds Five album I bought (you’re not supposed to buy this first, though, I guess) just because I wanted to buy an album with “Philosophy” on it on my first night of my first year of college, but I couldn’t find the Ben Folds Five album. Anyway, I think this is Ben Folds at his lyrical best. Conversational lyrics without slipping into that sort of immature or lecturing tone he does a lot these days. (Weird how he can be both at the same time, or is that not weird?) I also love the unusual harmonies. They kick in on “Dreh-ehhhsss” on “Childress”. It’s just interesting.

8.) The Hives – “The Hives Declare Guerre Nucleaire”: I like The Hives in small doses, and this is probably my favorite song of theirs. I love the rhythm, but the BEST BEST BEST part of this song is the way it opens. It’s these real villainous-sounding chords and oh this is a short song.

9.) The Beatles – “Dig It”: It’s only like 45 seconds long, so I don’t have much time to write, but luckily there is not much to write about it.

10.) The Cars – “Shake It Up”: I used to love this song as a real little kid, like elementary school. Dancing in the living room and all that. Looking back, I suppose this song inaugurated what was to become a lifelong love affair with the square synthesizer.

Whew. And that’s the first one. The time crunch forces you to be real rough and disorganized; it comes off a bit like drunk writing but with better spelling and grammar, but I like the effect. It’s funny, I really thought listening to the songs the whole way through would be too much time, but I was consistently surprised with how quickly that three or four minutes would go by. Until I got to “Another Day” or so I was talking mostly about the artists and not the songs themselves; I utterly failed to say anything about “Instant Music” at all, and too bad that “Helicopter” did not get the exploration it deserves.

Well, that was either kind of interesting or kind of asinine. U-Decide, True Believer! And if anyone wants to talk about these songs further (Zach, I know you at least would have something to say about The Hives, and if I keep doing these we’re going to come to Trip Shakespeare eventually), we can chat it up in the comments.

Sideburns #18: "Karaoke Supernovae"

Lo-fi webcomics by Justin Zyduck. Every Monday.

Superheroes and their music: DC (Part 2)

Green Lantern Alan Scott: Alan’s a stern old geezer and always was. All business—he was an engineer who somehow came to own a radio station (is that right?). It’s all classical for him. Everything else is noise. I hear Ayn Rand was into Rachmaninoff…

Green Lantern Hal Jordan: I’d say Bob Seger and some Credence. Bruce Springsteen, though like Hawkman, he hates when politics and popular music mix (is it generally accepted that Hal Jordan is a card-carrying Republican?). But remember: Hal was a traveling salesman and a truck driver for a number of years. I bet you don’t spend that much time on the road without getting acquainted with country music on your AM radio.

Green Lantern John Stewart: Don’t ask me why, but I strongly feel that he digs 80s electronica, and still plays the original CDs. Kraftwerk, Gary Numan, Brian Eno, Depeche Mode—hell, Devo.

Green Lantern Kyle Rayner: Kyle just goes to Pitchfork and buys whatever they recommend off iTunes so as to seem hip. Also, he will buy pretty much any CD at a coffee shop if there’s a cute barista working the counters. This is how he ended up with three copies of Corinne Bailey Rae’s album—and then he gave them away as Christmas gifts.

Nightwing: Dick Grayson has really broad tastes, I’d imagine. Part of this goes with what I said the other day in Wally West’s entry—the notion that the Teen Titans would hang around and talk about music all day. Dick just keeps up with things better than Wally. He likes obscure artists—it’s part of that detective mentality to root out what nobody else knows about. However, I am reminded of this panel from 1997’s Flash Plus Nightwing one-shot:



So we know Dick Grayson listens to White Zombie. Or at least, as somebody with very broad horizons, he is trying it out. He may like bands nobody’s ever heard of, but he won’t shun the popular stuff. I suspect he is a huge Foo Fighters fan, in fact.

Robin II: Remember how I said Wally West was probably a little into the Electric Light Orchestra? Well, Wally hangs out with Dick Grayson, and Dick hangs out with Tim Drake, and they all probably hang out together sometimes. Seeing as how Tim hangs out with a lot of adult superheroes (superheroes over the age of 18, not … well, never mind), he probably gets into older music than your average teenager. Makes him seem a little more mature, I guess is what he’s thinking. Anyway, Tim got a little taste of ELO from Wally and now he has every album. The early to middle-period stuff in particular is big and grandiose; since Tim began his career as essentially a Batman fanboy, “big and grandiose” is something we know he’s into.

Batgirl I: Barbara Gordon takes strong, kind of authoritative stances on certain musicians—Fiona Apple is a tremendous songwriter, Rufus Wainwright is egregiously underrated, Alanis Morrisette is awful. She also likes bands that are kind of funny and upbeat; she shared a deep love of They Might Be Giants with Ted Kord (the late Blue Beetle), and she liked Barenaked Ladies when they were popular. She’s very focused on lyrics—you can just strum three chords over and over as long as you’ve got something insightful or interesting to say.

Batman: Bruce Wayne doesn’t listen to music on his own time. I’m not a subscriber to the dark, tortured, brooding borderline psychopath version of Batman, but I can’t even really see the well-adjusted avenger from those 70s Steve Englehart/Marshall Rodgers comics sitting around grooving on his hi-fi. Bruce is certainly cultured—that’s part of his playboy persona—and knows, even appreciates, opera and Russian composers. But recreational music is something I imagine he never really had time for. Obsessive loner or consummate professional—with either interpretation you prefer, Bruce wouldn’t have much time for it. Musical tastes are generally formulated and solidified in your youth, but Bruce Wayne committed his life to his mission (or war, if you prefer) from an early age. I guess it’s another piece in the tragedy of Batman—the music doesn’t move him.

Next week: Image superheroes! What does Spawn have on his iPod? Is Grifter into vinyl?

...

Kidding.

Well, these last two weeks' worth of posts were very interesting, and by that I mean "aggresively nerdy." I just hope somebody dug these, or else on my deathbed one day I am going to demand whatever amount of time I spent on this back.

Superheroes and their music: DC (Part 1)

As promised, we follow up on last week’s examinations of the musical tastes of Marvel superheroes with the DC Universe. Like last time, these are scientifically accurate down to three decimal points and are based on in-story “canon” (the only word a geek needs to know), gut feelings, and “I think it would be great if…”

Assigning the DC heroes their favorite bands and musical styles isn’t as easy as doing the same for Marvel, I found. This may be partially because while Marvel’s schtick early on was to give their superheroes distinct personalities, DC heroes tend to be more conceptually based (and what some people—and we can debate the appropriateness of this—call “iconic”). Also, DC tends to revamp and reboot far more often.

Take Superman, for example. He requires two separate entries:

Pre-Crisis Superman: The Man of Steel you see in Silver Age comics, Superman: The Movie, and All-Star Superman. This is admittedly my favorite version of Superman: the pseudo-messiah “sun god” sent to Earth and raised as a human, who upon reaching adulthood re-embraces his alien heritage, while never forgetting what it’s like to be a common man (via the Clark Kent persona). This is a Superman in love with humanity, as well as being a scientist’s son. He experiences as much music as he can to learn the workings of the human heart through it. There is therefore a certain intellectual remove, and he is less interested in specific bands, genres, etc. than is he is with capital-M Music. This Superman also appreciates the great works of Kryptonian culture (whatever that would sound like—thought-controlled violins, harps played via holographic interface, Phantom Zone pan-flute) and music from other alien civilizations. What a rad guy.

Post-Crisis Superman: If Superman is, on some level, a metaphor for the immigrant experience (in addition to being a colorful trademark found on children’s lunch boxes), John Byrne’s rebooted version is the ultimate assimilationist. He spurns Kryptonian culture where his pre-Crisis equivalent embraced it (though in his defense, Byrne turned Krypton into a cold, rather unlovable society). The post-1986 version thinks of himself as Clark Kent—a mild-mannered, but urbane and self-confident reporter—first, and as an alien second. So what would a Kansas farmboy who grows up to be a sophisticated Metropolitan like? I suppose Pa instilled a love of classic country and a little bit of bluegrass in him; maybe some classic rock—John Mellencamp and the like. Out on the town in Metropolis, however, I see him going to small-venue shows by classic rock artists, usually solo acts (Peter Gabriel, latter-day Elvis Costello, maybe the guys from Steely Dan if they still tour).

Let's do this "Goofus and Gallant" style:

Pre-Crisis Superman is reverent of popular culture.


Post-Crisis Superman does not appreciate your taste in music.

Lois Lane: Who do you think introduced post-Crisis Clark to all those classy classic rock artists? But her favorite band? Creedence Clearwater Revival; perfect for an army brat with a healthy disrespect for unquestioning authority.

Wonder Woman: This is a tricky one, too. What does a goddess listen to? I’m going to cop out and say “world music” here.

Green Arrow: Okay, this is pretty easy. Bob Dylan, Rolling Stones, Neil Young, John Lennon (“What about Paul McCartney?” you ask. “Paul?” comes the reply; “That hack?!”), Phil Ochs. Rock ‘n’ Roll, belligerent and/or political. Of course, with the sliding timescale, this would probably include at least some early punk, but … I don’t know, maybe it’s the way Ollie’s been portrayed as sort of an ageing radical, but I really can’t imagine him enjoying much musically after about 1976. Maybe the Clash and Sex Pistols, but anything more than that he’d just say “Well, I appreciate what you kids are tryin’ to do, but you should learn to play your instruments better.”

Hawkman: Some sort of austere Thanagarian chamber music? Or is he a human man now? See why this is so hard with DC continuity? Anyway, I’m sure Carter Hall, as a conservative foil to ultra-liberal Green Arrow, likes classic rock, but he just hates it when artists get too political. “We pay you to play music,” he says, “not push your agenda!”

Aquaman: I went out to lunch with my brother, and he said it would be real funny if Aquaman buys those “Sounds of the Oceans” kind of new age CDs you can get at Target with whale calls and ocean sounds. He listens to the dolphin clicking and is all like, “These lyrics are idiotic!” Haw haw.

Martian Manhunter: See the pre-Crisis Superman entry, except J’Onn listens to Earth music less out of affection and curiosity, and more to further his ability to blend seamlessly into our culture(s).

Flash I: Jay Garrick was a college student in 1940. He’d take his best gal Joan dancing and really cut a rug before the evening wound down with some Perry Como-kinda pop ballads.

Flash II: Barry Allen was huge into swing. He was briefly fashionable during the 90s revival craze, but he had no clue whatsoever. He thought everybody was just coming around to his taste in music. Now that he's alive again, he's going to be very disappointed.

Flash III: I’m a big Wally West fan; Mark Waid’s Flash run of the '90s is what got me into DC Comics in my early teens. The thing about Wally is he’s a full-time superhero and has been since he was a kid. The Teen Titans were probably passing whatever music was cool back then around, so Wally probably still looks back on that pretty fondly as a reminder of simpler times. He doesn’t pay attention to trends as an adult because, well, there’s a crisis in the 64th century, and it’s not going to stop itself; Wally has no idea what’s been going on in popular music for about ten years. Also, Waid wrote him as '90s cynical, but with a romantic edge. I imagine he quietly likes Peter Frampton and Electric Light Orchestra. Geoff Johns wrote him a little Midwestern conservative, so we’ll throw in some John Mellencamp.

Part 2 will have to wait till after the Thanksgiving holiday. So come back here Friday for the Green Lanterns of Earth and the Batman Family.

Superheroes and their music: Marvel (Part 1)

I am somebody who thinks a lot about superheroes. Probably too much. My partner-in-comics Josh will confirm this, having sat through more than a few telephone conversations in which I start rambling on and on about the Elongated Man or Deadpool, or the nuances of Grant Morrison’s dialogue in All-Star Superman (theatrically expository, yet humanized with idiosyncracies).

So you can understand that when I see a panel like this one from New X-Men #121…

…I am immediately struck by the burning question: “What does Scott Summers listen to on his iPod???”

The whole thing kind of snowballed from there, and I drew up a list of not only what kind of music particular superheroes listen to, but also in some cases their listening habits. There’s no specific criteria. A rare few of them have actual in-story precedents I know about (under the influence of the Purple Man, Spider-Man once sang “Oliver’s Army” by Elvis Costello, so I guess it’s canonical that Peter Parker knows all the words to that song). Others are based on the admittedly dicey game of analyzing a person’s personality and matching it to certain genres and formats. Some are just gut feelings, or my own interpretations that I desperately want to be true in a total fanboy way.

Here’s part one of the Marvel list. Part two tomorrow, DC next week:

Spider-Man: Peter Parker has broad tastes (well befitting his “everyman” role, I suppose), but is a fairly casual music fan. I can’t imagine Aunt May letting him out to many concerts or picking him up anything at a Sam Goody’s, so everything he knows probably comes from the radio and stuff his friends have loaned him. His CD collection is made up almost entirely of Greatest Hits compilations, which appalls a music snob like Harry Osborn. But Peter’s a busy guy, so he doesn’t have time to sit down and really listen to an album; he just wants the songs he knows and loves, and skip the deep cuts. He really likes Ben Folds, though, particularly with the Five; the early stuff in particular has a certain “smartass outcast” vibe that probably speaks to a guy like him.

Daredevil: Matt Murdock goes to jazz clubs. In college he liked jauntier piano-based stuff, but ever since Frank Miller put him in a pseudo-noir milieu, he’s had his heart and his life broken too many times not to give in to the allure of the sad, slow saxophone. He might like a little bit of slow blues, too. Nothing real loud — his hearing’s too sensitive to enjoy that sort of thing.

The Thing: Ben Grimm and Matt Murdock could probably get into a long conversation about jazz, although Ben’s all about Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk* and doesn’t have a lot of time for the new stuff. He’s an old-fashioned guy and truly believes vinyl sounds best but, but as he’ll tell you, “when ya got big rocky mitts like these, yer gonna get a few scratches on yer record.”

Human Torch: Johnny Storm grew up watching TRL. He likes all that is trendy and current, be it pop, rock, R&B, rap, or anything else. Ben, of course, insists Johnny has no taste, to which the Torch replies, “If this music wasn’t good, it wouldn’t be so popular.” He’s not above listening to a certain singer just because she’s hot; he gravitates toward blonde pop stars and country singers, but secretly has a thing for the Lisa Loeb type.

Invisible Woman: With the sliding timescale the Marvel Universe uses, she’s a child of the 80s (right?), and I could see her having been really into Joan Jett with fashion to match, which she is today extremely embarrassed by. She loves the Police and had a huge crush on Sting. She once dated a New Romantic kind of guy who she broke up with because he spent more time on his band than her. Hmm…

Mr. Fantastic: Reed Richards isn’t really into particular artists or genres (though he hums Talking Heads songs without realizing it), but he likes music in general. He enjoys “challenging” experimental pieces but also appreciates the structure of I-IV-V three-minute pop songs and hip-hop beats. He’s the king of the shuffle mode. As a sensory-overload kind of guy, he plays music in random combinations in his lab to stimulate thought. One time he heard a Cake song immediately followed by Yanni; that was the day he discovered the Negative Zone.

Tomorrow: The X-Men and the Avengers

* — Author's note: I am dropping these names to cover for the fact that I know next to nothing about jazz.