On this day in 1962, Monster Mash hit #1 in the US.
We’ve come a long way. I’m not sure why.
ok-cleek
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Chili’s Menu, by Cormac McCarthy
I started reading William Faulkner’s “Absalom, Absalom”. I’m somewhere in the middle of the first chapter and I am starting to realize that the effort outweighs the joy by quite a bit. So I googled “faulkner sucks” to justify my impression (good news: I am far from alone in thinking that!). But one of the links I found a link to this old (6 years!) McSweeny’s article, which is much more fun than reading Faulkner refuse to find a point.
Chili’s Menu, by Cormac McCarthy
Southwestern Eggrolls – $9.95
In a tortilla made by the boy’s abuela he watched her, with her armfat and canvas apron, cast frijoles negros upon flecks of cilantro like ash fallen silently on a bed of rice, tiny bones chalkwhite against an avocado ranchero sauce creamy in the light of the coals like the obsidian-flecked desert where God has forsaken all life. Outside a pale starving gallena quickens a lizard to its last writhing gasps. Evening creeps in, a single lobo cries out across the mesa as the sun dips bloodred below the thin black spine of the mountain where death will come again many times in the dusty clockless hours before twilight.
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Big Mouth Southern Smokehouse Burger – $14.99
The charred black bones of the farmhouse coughed and hissed and exhaled into the early morning fog, ghosts of smoke swirling whitehot against the sun, contrast in defiance of God ordained. The sheriff rested his head on his hand and dug his foot into the soft patter of ash where all that had been lie transformed in heavenly splendor to witness the Holy wrath of all that this house had contained. Generations of violent echoes reverberated in these halls, tearing asunder those wretched institutions, consumed entire in final resolute compliance with the rich matrix which seeks to reckon all forces into balance.
Which of course reminds me of:
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Road Trip
We did a long drive through the south-eastern US this past weekend.
Let’s listen to the songs that stuck in my head on those two 9-hours drives.
South Carolina didn’t inspire anything.
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Listening To…
- The Replacements – Tim (Let It Bleed Edition)
There are 54 (!) songs in this release: two full versions of the album (a full remix and the 2023 remaster), 15 demos and alternative versions, and then 28 live tracks. Whew. So far, I have only listened to the first of the two new versions of the album: the Ed Stasium remixes. I heard two tracks of this on Spotify and knew I had to get the rest. It’s amazing. The original, like a lot of mid-80s indie records (the other Replacements’ records, Sonic Youth’s “Sister”, Dino Jr’s early albums, etc.), always sounded a bit muffled to me. But this is the complete opposite of muffled. Everything is crisp and loud. More than just a remaster (which is like adjusting brightness or color balance of a picture after you’ve taken it), this is a full remix (which is more like rearranging the objects and lighting and taking the photo again); instrument levels and their stereo positioning are different, effects applied in the original version weren’t applied here, and different editing choices were made. The drums and bass are way up front, the guitars are sharp but pushed back in the mix and the vocals are incredibly clear. Tons of things that the original recordings buried or outright muted were left in: little guitar frills everywhere, Paul Westerberg’s vocal interjections, background vocals(!). The way various parts are raised or lowered vs the original gives many of the songs very different vibes. Which I find fascinating. I had to listen very closely at first to make sure they weren’t entirely new versions that Westerberg had recorded (pulling a Taylor Swift move or something). A couple of songs are even longer: “Little Mascara” is almost a minute longer (the original faded out long before the band stopped) and “Here Comes A Regular” has a few extra seconds (including a line that was dropped) near the end. What a great thing. I wish more bands would do this. (Just found out that Robyn Hitchcock is doing this with “Globe Of Frogs”, yay).
- Horsegirl – Phonetics On And On. A couple of months ago I didn’t know I wanted to hear anything that sounded like a mixture of Stereolab’s vocals, early Pavement’s guitars all in something like The Vaselines’ or Beat Happening’s general sunny but happily-primitive vibe. Now I realize I did. And I’m better for it. Great album. Very catchy.
- The Sorcerers – Other Worlds And Habits. This modern British trio specializes in exploring the sounds of 1960’s Ethiopian jazz. And they do it very well. The only thing that would cause one to mistake this for original 60’s Ethiopian jazz is the fact that it doesn’t sound like it was recorded on sketchy gear, 60 years ago. Fun.
- Shellac – To All Trains. Losing Steve Albini last year was a huge blow to the indie music scene in general. He was a giant. And specifically, it means this was Shellac’s last album. And it’s a good one. Shellac had a very specific sound: very clean production of very loud instruments with a lot of empty space for contrast. They got a lot of mileage out of it, and yet it always sounded fresh. I would have kept buying these records forever. Alas. Fittingly, the last song is named “I Don’t Fear Hell” (“If there’s a heaven, I hope they’re having fun / because if there’s a hell I’m gonna know everyone!”).
- The Replacements – Tim (Let It Bleed Edition)
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Spoon + Pixies
A lovely late summer night, downtown Raleigh. Fazerdaze opened, though we missed most of her set because we misremembered when it started. What we heard was good, though. I think the kids call it “dreampop” ?
Then, the mighty Spoon played a nice long set. A somewhat rowdier, harder-rocking selection of songs than I’ve heard them play before. They sounded great, although the venue sounds way way too fucking loud. The sound level app on Mrs’ watch kept telling her it was dangerous.
So, I went on an epic quest for earplugs. I had some in my car, but they weren’t going to let me back in if I went to get them. After much walking around and asking I found some at a strange booth called the “Upgrade hut”, which looked like it was all about venue promotion. Whatever.
Earplugs in, the Pixies came on. They sounded like utter garbage. Frank Black’s voice was inaudible and the guitars were mixed terribly. I was sadly disappointed. Another great band cashing in on their past.
Then I took the earplugs out to test the volume situation. And the sound was amazing! The guitars were perfect, Frank Black’s voice was definitely aged, but also definitely capable of selling all the screaming and shouting you’d want. But, it was still too fucking loud. They played a long satisfying chunk (20+ songs) of old classics before getting into anything new (aka post-Kim Deal). While there will always only be one real Pixies bassist, current bassist Emma Richardson did a good job doing lead vocals on ‘In Heaven’ (from David Lynch’s “Eraserhead”) and Neil Young’s “Winterlong”. So, a good Pixies show. And a good Spoon show.
But I think I am officially old.
