No More Monkees Business, or Perhaps a Bit Less Than a Full Barrel:

By late 1967 the Monkees craze had died down a bit. At least for me. I was, after all, ten years old!

But the rest of the world was also getting a bit tired of it all. It could have had something to do with that other group putting out Sgt. What’s His Name or the Summer of Love, but who’s to say?

Having experienced an album-challenged childhood, back then I heard of Sgt. Pepper more than I heard it. And the Summer of Love? What the hell did they mean by that? So why did I lose interest in the Monkees? After all, I loved Headquarters, which came out earlier that same year. And wasn’t “Pleasant Valley Sunday” fantastic?

Peer pressure, I guess. And a lack of funds. So while my friends were getting Jimi Hendrix albums, I couldn’t be caught spending paying what little money I had on a Monkees album.

But now, via the anonymity (and crazy inflated user ratings) of amazon.com I can, and then brag about it via the anonymity of this blog.

Monkees - Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, Ltd.

On Headquarters they played all the instruments themselves, with great results, but no hits. So I guess they had to compromise a bit on this one. Relying mostly on others to do the playing and almost exclusively on others for songs, they were back (almost) to square one musically.

Not a terrible thing, really. As much as Mike Nesmith may have hated it, and as much as anyone else may hated the idea of it, More of the Monkees was actually pretty great. It was the epitome of manufactured pop music, so I should (at least now) hate it on principal. And I do - on principal. But I love it in reality.

Speaking of Michael Nesmith, he really shines here, singing better than ever on most of the best songs. Mickey is his usual self contributing great vocals. But Peter is almost absent. And Davey hides behind a good Harry Nilsson song, and is at his smarmy worst (Sorry Davey! RIP!) on another.

So Headquarters is far more consistent, but this one does have the aforementioned “Pleasant Valley Sunday” - one of the greatest pop records ever - and “Words” (no slouch, either), which give it the higher peaks.

.

But I’m a consistency guy and much prefer Headquarters. But it is nice to know that they were still trying long after I stopped listening.

I was moving ever further onward in my musical explorations.

I was nearly eleven, you see.

B+

“The Door Into Summer”

That Is the Question!

We do these things sometimes. We rebuy “lost” records because they bring back a specific time.

CD or Not CD:

This used to be a big question - which of your vinyl records would you replace with the better sounding CD?

There was a lot to consider:

1. Do you still have it? Some records disappear mysteriously… You know who you are.
2. If you’ve still got it, what shape is it in?  Did you accidentally step on it when you dropped it on the filthy floor (Beggar’s Banquet), or did that penny you put on the Victrola’s tone arm dig a new groove, thus creating your own unique version of the album (Revolver), and you’d maybe like to hear it the way it was recorded?
3. Would the CD version make a marked difference in sound quality? I tried to convince myself of this but I can’t think of a single example where this turned out to be true.
4. Oh, and how good is the record? I”ll admit this matters.
5. Does it have anything left for you? Ah, the most elusive question of all! The question of the record’s half-life, which I covered in my 8 track posts link.

It's kind of funny to see all the young folk considering these same questions except that they’re going in reverse - from CD to vinyl.

Friend Mike Strikes Again:

So anyway, Friend Mike got this record back when we were roommates. When he moved away he left his records with me. I eventually gave them back. This in marked contrast to me when I moved out of my parent’s house. I sure as hell took all of my records - plus the stereo! - leaving my Brother Pat hanging.

The contents of Friend Mike’s Record Collection are somewhat blurry now. Which is a shame since there were many shared experiences in there.

But this one I remember well.

It was 1981, and Friend Mike and I were were sharing an apartment, and sufficiently pulverized by Television to risk getting the dreaded post-breakup-solo-album-by-the-former-front-man. (See Little Feat and Lowell George for an egregious example.)

So Mike picked it up, and it immediately made it onto our 3am Philosophical Discussion After Bar Hopping playlist. 

But before you knew it Mike upped and left for Germany. And Italy. And Japan. And Egypt. And f*cking Mars for all I know.

And me? Oh, I did my share of traveling. From Southwest Brooklyn to slightly more easterly Southwest Brooklyn to even more slightly eastward Southwest Brooklyn. Yeah, ladies, I was a real ramblin’ man!

TV or Not TV?:

Tom Verlaine

This is Tom Verlaine's first solo record after the breakup of Television.

And it would be ludicrous to say it compares to either of Televisions’s two studio releases. That's okay. Good TV (Tom Verlaine) doesn’t quite compare to Good TV (Television, the musical group) it beats the hell out of Good TV (the household appliance).

Tom was one of the great guitar players of the rock era. And it’s important that he come on strong instrumentally since his voice is kind of gnarly. He sounds like he’s being strangled under normal circumstances. When he strains, well…

Luckily for us, he delivers with the guitar. And his lyrics are always worthwhile. Thus each song has something to offer, whether it be imaginative playing, ideas, or general atmosphere. Sometimes all three.

So while it’s nothing monumental, it does bear the simple message that Tom was alive and kicking, though maybe not quite as hard as before. Point taken. Plus, he’d go on to make better records. Like the more in your face Dreamtime.

And although it's 2014, I'm happy to report that after a few listens everything kicks back into place, and I'm right back in 1981, feeling that Tom (and Friend Mike for that matter) was entering into his next phase, which Dreamtime would confirm in spades.  B+

“You’re Breaking My Heart”

Arcade Glow

Me and Arcade Fire go way back.

I found their first record, Funeral, Life Changing.  

Neon Bible aims for life changing, but that rarely works, and doesn’t here. But even after the initial disappointment of it, I have to admit it’s still a very strong record.

The Suburbs was calm, satisfying and reassuring in that they could come up with sixteen excellent - as opposed to NB’s ten hit or miss - songs.

But, as you might notice, there’s the "artist half-life” working here. This is when an artist first blows you away, but over the course of time, grows less inspired.  Their original, er, fire, wanes to a glow. Warm but not brilliant.

That Arcade Fire's best work may be behind them is no sin. It happens to the best of them/us.

But like any other self respecting, and formerly Life Changing band, they try something new.

Arcade Fire: Reflektor (2013)

AF does it by shifting to a more dance oriented sound, using James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem to help produce.

They risk pissing off their fans, but it’s a smart move to shake off all that alt rock adulation. Besides, no one’s expecting a masterpiece at this point.

This new sound was introduced on a TV special after their appearance on SNL. Unlike the rest of the universe, I really enjoyed it.

Now that I have the record, how does it sound after being a little more lived in? After all, whatever move you’re trying to make, you better bring along the goods, like good songs. So do they?

Kindasorta.

It’s a two CD set. Think of it as their Sandanista, though less compelling, urgent or even earnest. But that’s okay. Earnestness gets annoying after a while.

While Sandanista ran over two hours, Reflektor only goes for a little over 80 minutes, which makes me smell a rat. After all, there are only thirteen songs which, if judiciously edited, could have easily fit onto one CD.

I can hear the objections already:

AF: But that would ruin the concept!  

Me: Whatever that is. If I were more interested I’d read the lyrics to find out.

AF: But we made them longer so that people could dance to them!

Me: I’ll never know.

And yet, I can listen to all of it all the way through, and it doesn’t drag at all. 

Could I live without it? Sure. So it falls into that sad category known as Good But Unnecessary. Is the world a better place with it here? A wee bit.

But I imagine there are many other better - and just as daring - albums out there. So it’s time for me to find my new Arcade Fire. B+

"Here Comes the Night"

Songs About Puppies!

The Beauty Myth

I’m very suspicious of beauty. When it’s right there on the surface I immediately suspect it’s only on the surface, and my BS detector goes on high alert.

I also despise music that tries to make me feel like I’m supposed to like it. You know the type I mean. The ones with a big orchestras, like “My Heart Will Go On” from “Titanic” (which I don’t actually hate, but you get the idea). It’s like they’re telling me to buy the record so they can cover the cost of  orchestra’s tuxedo rentals.

Another one of my musical pet peeves involves singers who brag about how much they love someone (Then why are you hear singing to me, I think?).

Any song with puppies should be treated with utmost suspicion.

And then there are those artists who sing about virtue and spirituality after having clawed their way to the top. Yeah you, Madonna. But to be fair, I liked Ray of Light.

Okay, I’m not even convincing myself here. But I’d like to think I’m predisposed to dislike anything “solemn”.

But once I’m convinced the beauty goes deeper, then I’m beauty’s little bitch. And I end up liking even the most shamefully manipulative songs. The bridge from "Lost in Love" by Air Supply is one of the more embarrassing examples of this. Just ten seconds, but I'll forever live in shame.

And this will come to explain a big chunk of what will eventually end up on my Top One Or Two Hundred Whatevers.  

Beck: Suspected Singer of Puppies

Which brings me to Beck. Not Jeff Beck you old geezer you! Beck Hansen. C’mon! You know who I mean!

He started out as one of the coolest people on earth and then slowly (d)evolved into a boring person, just like the rest of us.

The first Beck was the guy who threw everything AND the kitchen sink onto a record. He sampled, he rapped, he even played guitar. He was good at it, and I was good with it. I came to love his first record, Mellow Gold

even though the first time I heard it I though the neighbors from hell had just moved in next door.

Unlike the rest of the world, I didn’t love the even noisier “classic”, Odelay. It was a case of lots of sounds, but none of them sounding great. I’m right, and the world is wrong, of course.

But he got me good with the weird left turn of Mutations. The music was laid back, bluesy and otherworldly. I’d say it was out of character for him, but I wasn’t sure he had any. And it was barely out before he was calling it an anomaly, signaling a quick reversal back to where he was before, wherever that was.

He was clearly a hit or miss kind of guy, and anyway there were plenty of other artists worth checking out, so I figured we were done. I skipped Midnite Vultures.  

But then came Sea Change, which I only caught up with a year or two back, where the young smart aleck was now thirty and heart-broken. The music is spare, sometimes enervated, hinting at substance abuse as a means of dealing with the pain.

And everybody - well the old folks with the money anyway - loved it, and he started getting played on Americana stations. But then he was gone yet again, and so was I.

It must have been tempting to replicate the success of Sea Change. So it shouldn’t have come as too much of a surprise when he announced that he was making a companion record for it. Plus, he was getting older, and after all the genre experiments and noise, didn’t he deserve to make a killing?

Or, to be less cynical about it, maybe he’s just older and wiser, and sees the value in just going for beauty.

On a purely practical level, it sounded promising. But after four CDs I wasn’t sure I’d bite.

Beck: Morning Phase

Well, my son did it for me, giving it to me for Father’s Day. And I’m glad he did.

Not gritty, not overwhelmingly sad, and with less pain, less need for numbing it. In other words, real  pretty.

So what’s wrong with that? Not a whole lot.

But gone is the razor sharp wit. (No lines like “She’s got tofu the size of Texas”)

And when he dispenses with all the noise, you notice he’s got a surprisingly narrow bag of tricks.

And dissonant strings are getting a bit tired. Thankfully he limits them to the short theme cuts. “Wave” does get a little out of hand, though.

And you can’t help but notice that the first song begins exactly the same way as the first one on Sea Change, so you prepare for the worst.

But it doesn’t come. It’s almost as if he’s telling you that although he could be starting from the same point as Sea Change, this time he wants to go in a different direction.

And I have to admit, he’s good at deploying those limited tricks - a banjo, pedal steel, piano and especially those echoey Buffalo Springfield guitar chords - where they’re needed..

Hard core Beck fans who didn’t care for Sea Change, won’t like this even more conservative work. Beck should be re-inventing music, they say. Well, maybe he should, but I’ll take what I can get.

So I won’t judge this record on what Beck is “supposed” to be doing. If I did, Morning Phase comes up way short in that it's nothing new under the sun other than Beck being happy.

If I simply judge it on it's own merits, I have to conclude it's a beautiful record from an unexpected source. Although with Beck I should know by now to expect the unexpected.

Does it really matter that he used to be an innovative twenty-year old? Why can’t he just make a pretty record? It is what it is. Like Nashville Skyline.

So let the young folk scoff. They probably have the time to hunt down more adventurous music than this, but I don’t.

On a weird side note, it wasn’t a great summer fun-wise, but I had all these beautiful songs to go with my malaise. The effect was not unlike the deep bittersweet painful days of Push Barman to Open Old Wounds.

Thanks a lot Beck!  

But, seriously, thank you. A-

“Blackbird Chain”