I grade my moods on a daily basis and after spending the first half of the year have been around the 5 to 6 out of 10, have managed to deep to the 4 to 5 out of 10. The study of thanatology will do that to you! Time to shuffle dem songs:
1. Stupid Girl – The Rolling Stones – An extended act of misogyny or is that gyneacology?
2. Starlit Summer Sky (demo) – Marshall Creshaw – Wonder why he held in pocket for a decade or so? Pure pure romance.
3. Deeper And Deeper (7 Edit) – Madonna – Sometimes I forget how perfect Madonna was. If this was a new performer, Helen would be complaining I was writing about her every other post: a deep, bass heavy dancefloor thrill that could teach Lady Gaga -er, did teach Lady Gaga, a thing or two.
4. Tomorrow – Ryan Adams – Deep, soft, troubling, a lull of infinite pain.
5. Love Is A Stranger – Martha Wainwright – Her and her brother went from perfect pop purveyors to renessance guys and high culture humbugs. From martha’s last album and I bet the next one isn’t a rock-pop, and I bet if the next rhymes “stranger” with “danger” it doesn’t mean it.
6. Lively Up Yourself – Bob Marley – From the Songs Of Freedom box set and may I just say Marley is the only musician I am aware of whose death in and of itself brought a musical form to its knees.
7. Beeswax – Incesticide – An obstreperous falling apart except for the drumming which I have been obsessing about since Live At Reading.
8. Trouble Comes Running – Spoon – This is the generic, performa, blue print for every other Pitchfork approved rock band. The Protestant work ethic personified up to and including its length, raw whinge vocal, hard rock anti-poduction and functioning verbology and gosh after nearly a decade they have run into some success. Congratulations. Now fuck off.
9. Masqualero – Miles Davis – Off Live At Filmore East – circa Bitches Brew and not in the same league as Black Magus: skronking sax and doodling like a cousin of On The corner with Wayne Shorter all over it. Davis was opening for the Steve Miller Blues Band and Neil Young & Crazy Horse and blowing em off stage to the bewilderment of all. Still, I’ve heard a lotta Davis in the early 70s and this aint killer.
10. Sheep – The Housemartins – This band was so good you didn’t even notice how condescending the politics was.
11. A Well Respected Man – The Kinks – I’m not sure what Ray Davies has against the bloke? A grown up David Watts and, like you, me, everyone, doing the best he can. Davies is acting like a little shit and all the compassion of a “Oklahoma USA” And it is such a great song,
12. Chimes Of Freedom – Bob Dylan – “And for every messed up person in the whole damn universe…” Way to be inclusive, Bob. I think I took it more seriously at the time.
13. Enola/Alone – Manic Street Preachers – Whever you hear the word Enola you think of things banging and breaking and this song, off the second act MSP’s irreprochable Everything Must Go -though the politics are a little fuzzy again.
14. Piece Of me – Britney Spears – And speaking of second acts, after the meltdown Britney returned with this extended sneer at the price of fame. And saved her career. Go figure.
15. Out Of the Blue – Roxy Music – Off he live Ladytron and the answer remains unanswered: can any so dramatic be true?
16. I’m In The Mood For Love – Smokey Robinson – That perfect voice and a great American standard… coulda done with less orchestration.
17. Prodigal Son (Live) – The Rolling Stones – I was never such a huge fan of Ya-ya’s. You would think the Stones would kill live but they never have at all. A whatever version of a great song from another whatever live album: no, it isn’t Love You Live or Still Life, nothing could be rotten, but what is good?
18. Me & Bobby McGee – The Grateful Dead – Dag. Five minutes of complete crap.
19. Close The Door – Teddy Pendergrass – If the chicks wanna feel like fools, let them imagine what their Grandma’s had with teddy and what they have with Trey Songz.
19. Hey Ya – Booker T – The cover of covers by the uncomparable keyboard man from the comparable Potato hole.
20. Neighborhood Bully – Bob Dylan – This was one of my fave periods in Dylan’s history -for one reason I was just about alone in loveing him and for another, there was an edgy anger about him, especially in this apology for israel (just like “Property Of Jesus” a coupla years later as it happens)
21. Like A Movie I’ve Seen before – The Drifters – As harmony disco band -er? They had some great songs in the early 70s but this aint one of em.
22. Spanish Castle Magic – The Jimi Hendrix Experience – Sometimes I think Hendrix was a misunderstood Chuck Berry -not form, not even style, execution.
23. On The Other Hand – George Jones – Jones covers some great country hits for other people. As singers go this guy is just about unbeatable. Off Hits I Missed -an ok nothing special album with unbeliebable singing.
24. Know Your Rights – The Clash – You heard dem double guitar riffs? Everybody from the Misfits to Sublime to Obamanation have made a living off em.
25. Halo Round The Moon – Steve Earle – Was this Steve’s last hurrah. The album was nothing great but nothing lousy either -I feel the same about the song. Bet he never plays it live.
26. I Live Off You – X-Ray Specs – Sure jac Airport was no Lora Logic but who cares? X-Ray Specs were everything punk shoulda been and too often wasn’t. And guess what? The fucking thing hasn’t aged a day.
27. Princesita – Elvis Crespo – This fucking horns (off Crespo’s biggest album) are unreal: three of em plus rhythmic vocals and back up on the verses and everything EVERYTHING a slave to the beat.
28. Why You’d Want To live Here – Death Cab For Cuties – I think the bigger bands get, the faster they trip over their ego. Were Death Cab every really as good as this song off the daytrotter session?
29. Art Of Dying – George Harrison – yeah, the vocals kinda sucked in retrospect but also in retrospect “nothing in this life that I’ve been trying can equal or surpass the art of dying”.