Here’s a woman who called the sheriff because Burger King wouldn’t give her the right hamburger.

It sounds like a Crank Yankers call, but I doubt they’d call the sheriff as a joke. I could be wrong. I hope so…

Meet Lurch.

And after Bradford Pear season, comes Sand Cherry season. These guys used to live in our back yard. Now they’re going to die in a vase in our kitchen.

Instead of just reporting the iPod’s first ten songs of the week, let’s see if we can use them to predict how the rest of the week’s going to go.

1. John Coltrane – Good Groove. Groovy little tune from Coltrane’s dance band days. If you ever need a good intro to John Coltrane, check out the compilation called “The Last Giant” – it spans his whole career, from dance bands of the 40s to his “free jazz” freakouts of the late 60′s.
2. Soundgarden – Sub Pop Rock City. Reworking of Kiss’s Detroit Rock City as a tribute to the Sub Pop record label. It appears on the “Sub Pop 200″ compilation. When this came out, in 88, “grunge” hadn’t escaped Seattle, and the bands featured here, like Nirvana, Soundgarden and Mudhoney, were practically unknown anywhere else.
3. Elliot Smith – Pitseleh. Quiet little chunk of depression from Smith’s best album:
   the first time I saw you I knew it would never last
   I’m not half what I wish I was
   I’m so angry, I don’t think it’ll ever pass
   and I was bad news for you just because
   I never meant to hurt you
4. Colorblind James Experience – Considering a Move To Memphis. This is the quintessential CBJE song. It’s one bar repeated for 6 minutes, with various instruments taking tasteful solos over the top. Every once in a while, for the choruses, the music stops and the members chant, “I’m considering / I’m considering / A move to Memphis / A move to Memphis / I’m considering / I’m considering.” The rest of the lyrics are a spoken-word tale of why the singer wants to move to Memphis:
   Memphis isn’t all that big
   It isn’t all that wide
   Still it is the kind of place
   Where a country boy can hide
5. Spoon – Jealousy. One of Spoon’s perfect little songs. The handclaps and the reverb-soaked piano break reminds me of the Beach Boys.
6. Leon Redbone – If We Never Meet Again This Side Of Heaven. The sound of the mythic elegant South.
7. Robert Johnson – Me And The Devil Blues. That other mythic South.
8. Pixies – Build High. Strange little country-fied B-side. Kim Deal and Frank Black… what a pairing.
9. Rolling Stones – Sweet Virginia. Not one of my favorites, especially out of context like this – I much prefer it smack in the middle of Exile.
10. Velvet Underground – Heroin. Fantastic song. The proper setting for hearing this one is sitting alone in a dark room, eyes closed, empty headed, riding that one organ note. The opposite of the proper setting: sitting at a computer in khakis on a Monday morning, wondering how much longer you can keep working at something you hate just because the money makes it easy to enjoy the four hours a day you don’t have to think about the job.

So, what does that tell us about the upcoming week ? I think it says: I’ll hate my job and not do anything about it.

It’s Bradford Pear season in NC. These white flowers are everywhere right now, covering the smallish trees like snow. While they look nice, they smell exactly like the air from the inside of a tire.

(this image has been resized and re-saved so many times, it’s lost most of its fine detail. but, i’m too lazy to re-scan the slide. sorry.)

Somehow, except their unavoidable hits, I managed to go 34 years completely ignoring the Kinks. I blame it on their mid 80′s stuff – that song about tearing down the dance hall, especially – I couldn’t stand it. Hated it. Lumped it in with Tina Turner and Wang Chung and the rest of the cheese-encrusted 80′s pop abominations.

A few years ago, I got the Rushmore soundtrack, which had a couple of really good, old, Kinks songs on it, and my interest was piqued – but only a bit. They were no longer just That Band With A Bunch Of Hits That Turned To Shit (no, not the Rolling Stones) – I got a hint that there might be some depth to this band. And, finally, disgusted with the state of new music these days, I turned to the past: Pink Floyd (got “Wish You Were Here”, to replace my beat up vinyl copy) and the Kinks.

So, I just got my first Kinks album: “The Kinks are the Village Green Preservation Society”. I’m four songs into it and I realize now where the Lilys, Big Star and Guided By Voices come from: they are direct descendents of the Kinks. Especially the Lilys. It’s not that they kinda sound like they heard the Kinks and nicked a bit of the sound on a lark; it’s more like they sprouted fully-formed from Ray Davies’ forehead. I really like the Lilys, but they sound so much like The Kinks that I’m thankful I heard them first, else I would’ve dismissed them immediately as mere rip-offs.

Robyn Hitchcock, last night, at The Pour House, Raleigh, NC (max occupancy ~145).

Great show, as usual. According to his website, the night before in Nashville, he recreated his current album live with Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, so last night, he did mostly mostly older songs – only two from the new record, I think. That was OK with me, since that left more room for songs I’d never heard him do live before (“Madonna of the Wasps”, “Vibrating”, “Ole Tarantula”, etc). I got a lot of pictures like the one above, and got a little MPEG movie of him doing “Vibrating”. The sound on that came out so good that I’m going to put it on my iPod – good job, little Sony P7!

At the end, he put down his electric guitar and grabbed his acoustic. Then he ripped off the pickup and cords that were taped to it, stepped off the stage and walked into the crowd to do a truly unplugged (not even a microphone) medley of George McCrae’s 1974 disco hit “Rock Your Baby” (“Woman, Take me In Your Arms / Rock Me Baby”), Dr Hook’s “When You’re In Love With A Beautiful Woman” and David Bowie’s “Sound And Vision”.

Then he signed some autographs. When we got to him, my wife asked if she could get a picture. He said “nothing personal” but he didn’t like to be photographed. Ooops. :)

First songs of the week, presented without comment:

1. In The Kingdom #19, Sonic Youth

2. Strange – REM
3. Blinded – fieldfresh
4. Young Neil – Blonde Redhead
5. Tom Courtenay – Yo La Tengo
6. I’m Set Free – Yo La Tengo
7. Tell Her Tonight – Franz Ferdinand
8. Fashion – David Bowie
9. Mistakes & Regrets – And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead
10. 86-Second Blowout – Yo La Tengo

OK, one comment: 3 YLT songs in the first 10 seems like an abuse of probability.