Mark E. Smith Vs. William Shakespeare

A preview of The Filth by Grant Morrison.

Tom Scharpling and Jon Wurster have done it again – last night’s guest appearance by Tom’s “daddy” ranks among my favorite Best Show skits. Check it out here, starting just around the one hour mark. Memorial Day father-son boxing matches, rap-rock demos, “Tommy Doom – America’s Youngest Daredevil”, $100,000 worth of ice cream, “Tommy Nation”, and pro arm wrestling are just some of the topics of discussion for Tom and his sleazy dad.

“I agree with every word you said with the exception of the word ‘probably’.”

Last night’s setlist – I didn’t really do the set I had in mind, I focused on keeping people on the dancefloor, which I did pretty well. I had a solid dancefloor up til the end.

Peaches “Fuck The Pain Away”/ Le Tigre “Deceptacon (remix)”/ Michael Jackson “Wanna Be Startin’ Something”/ David Bowie “Rebel Rebel”/ The Rolling Stones “Let’s Spend The Night Together”/ The White Stripes “Hotel Yorba”/ Tiffany “I Think We’re Alone Now”/ Wham “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go”/ Gloria Jones “Tainted Love”/ Big Ella “Too Hot Too Hold”/ Bobby Byrd “Hot Pants (I’m Coming)”/ Britney Spears “I’m A Slave 4 U”/ Rob Base “It Takes Two”/ Salt N Pepa “Push It”/ Snoop Dogg “Undacova Funk”/ Stevie Wonder “Uptight (Everything’s Alright)”/ Spanky Wilson “The Sunshine of Your Love”/ The B-52’s “Love Shack”/ Aretha Franklin “R-E-S-P-E-C-T”/ Deee-Lite “Groove is in the Heart”/ Bjork “Big Time Sensuality”/ The Breeders “Cannonball”/ Dub Narcotic Sound System “Fuck Shit Up”/ Joan Jett “Cherry Bomb”/ The Ramones “Blitzkrieg Bop”/ Elvis Presley “Crazy Little Thing Called Love”/ INXS “Need You Tonight”/ The Cure “Just Like Heaven”/ OMD “If You Leave”/ Madonna “Into The Groove”/ New Order “Bizarre Love Triangle”/ ESG “Dance”/ Ol’ Dirty Bastard “Got Your Money”/ Jay-Z “I Just Want To Love You (MTV Unplugged version)”/ Nelly “Hot In Here”/ Mystikal “Shake Ya Ass”/ Notorious BIG “Hypnotize”/ Blackstreet “No Diggity” Vs. Grandmaster Flash “The Message”/ Tom Tom Club “Genius of Love”/ Depeche Mode “I Just Can’t Get Enough”/ Michael Jackson “Don’t Stop Til You Get Enough”/ Prince “Kiss”/ Peaches “Lovertits”/ Taylor Savvy “Share The Dream”/ Crossover “Extensive Care”/ Martha and the Vendallas “(Love Is Like A) Heatwave”/ Chuck Edwards “Downtown Soulville”/ Barrett Strong “Money”/ The Beatles “I Saw Her Standing There”/ James Brown “Papa’s Got A Brand New Bag”/ Otis Redding “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction”/ Eddie Bo “Check Your Bucket”/ Keith Mansfield “Young Scene”/ Eddie Holland “Leaving Here”/ The Meters “Cabbage Alley”/ Len Barry “1, 2, 3″/ Sleater-Kinney “You’re No Rock and Roll Fun”/ The Slits “I Heard It Through The Grapevine”/ Liquid Liquid “Cavern”/ Ian Dury “Spasticus Austisticus”/ Belle and Sebastian “Legal Man”.

I went on about 3 am, and ended around 6:30. There was another DJ who went on just before me, and played just shy on one hour. There were three bands on the bill – Log Jam, The Mosquitos, and The Brite Lites. I wasn’t too crazy by the latter two, but I really loved Log Jam. They were like some kind of cross between ESG, and Pavement at their sloppiest. They were very endearing – I was talking to two of the guys from the band afterwards, and they were telling me that this was their second performance, that they are just starting out – I hope they keep at it, cos they were catchy, groovey, funny, and very charismatic. The Mosquitos played fast, loud indie pop – they might have been more enjoyable if they weren’t so fast or loud, I didn’t really pick up on any of their melodies or lyrics, and I’ve got a feeling that they maybe weren’t so bad. The Brite Lites were more or less a noise punk band with my friend Chuck on bass. I couldn’t really get into them, and I don’t think all that many other people were either. I just wasn’t feeling it.

Though I have been out of school for about six months now, I formally graduated from Parsons/New School University today. The whole day was extremely dull, mostly waiting around with a lot of people with whom I am acquainted, but not enough to have any decent conversation. The ceremony was only a bit more entertaining.

New School president, former Nebraska Senator and Presidential hopeful Bob Kerrey presided and made it clear to everyone in the room why he stands no chance of actually securing a presidential nomination in 2004. This man makes Al Gore seem charming and charismatic by comparison – he was dry and bland, and reminded me a great deal of those guys who used to narrate those high school film strips in the 50s. His speech had very little to do with the commencement, it seemed more like he was addressing a board of trustees or something like that. Ugh. I can’t remember the name of the retired historian who spoke after him, but his address was equally inappropriate – rather than saying something ‘inspiring’ or whatever it is you’re supposed to say at college graduations, he gave a detailed justification for his career. That’s it. He explained why being a historian is a good thing. Thanks, professor. I hope that made you feel better.

The ceremony ended with a brief speech by James Lipton which made Will Ferrell’s impression of him on SNL seem a lot less pompous, verbose, and pretentious by contrast. What made Lipton’s speech even more unintentionally funny to me was that he was dressed up in this ornate green, black, and yellow ceremonial gown that he was obliged to wear due to some honor from a French academy. He looked like some kind of pimped-out Pope, I tell ya. I really do wish he had used one of his catchphrases at the end of his speech, but I was let down – I was hoping for a “You are a DELIGHT“. Oh well.

Do yrself a favor and don’t bother listening to the remixes of Reveal songs on R.E.M.‘s website. They all sound so cheesy that I feel as though I need to wash the lameness off of me after having listened to them. A lot of them sound like a cross between awful 80s music (think “Mr. Mister”) and post Roger Waters Pink Floyd, and there are some very weak stabs at French house, ‘quiet storm’ r&b, and diluted Everything But The Girl style electro-adult contemporary pop mixed in too. Yuck. The only thing worthwhile in the bunch is still not very good – Her Space Holiday’s remix of “Summer Turns To High” at least starts out interestingly before deteriorating into cheesiness. Someone needs to tap Michael Stipe on the shoulder and tell him the truth: his voice is a terrible match for electronic textures. His voice is perfectly suited for folk, bubblegum, or rock – isn’t that enough?

In bootleg news, Boom Selection put up a whole bunch of new mixes yesterday, the best of which is Eminem “Without Me” Vs. Stereolab “Miss Modular”. This track is beautifully mixed, perfectly matched, and utterly essential for bootleg fans. I’m surprised more people aren’t using Stereolab tracks for boot mixes, or just for samples in mainstream hip hop.

I put up the tracklisting for one of the mix cds I’m making to send out to some Barbelith folks on the Art of the Mix site. If you asked for one, and don’t want to have it spoiled, then you should obviously not click on that link. If you want one, please contact me via the guestbook to the left, and leave your email address so I can respond to you.

Mat Honan is building up a massive collection of Attack of the Clones reviews written on personal blogs to illustrate a point.

Thanks to Black Ops on WFMU, I’ve discovered The Polyphonic Spree’s The Beginning Stages Of…, which is currently making me very happy. They sound a lot like how I was imaging the next Flaming Lips LP would sound like, and since I’ve yet to hear any of Yoshimi vs. the Pink Robots yet, I might still be correct. It’s a lot like The Soft Bulletin in its lush over-the-top arrangements, its similar melodies, and its blend of cheery optimism and melancholy. To be more specific, it’s like an album long version of “The Gash” from that LP. It’s a very lovely record from start to finish, though the final track which is 30+ minutes of chopped up bits of the previous tracks is a bit too “Revolution #9” for me. I especially recommend “Section 7”, “Section 8”, and “Section 9” for those who want to get a little taste of the record. As implied by the titles (Sections 1-10), the record is meant to be one long piece of music with each song as a movement of the overall album composition. This is certainly one of my favorite records thus far in 2002, I’m looking foward to seeing them when they come to New York on tour.

NEWSFLASH I spoke too soon about the new Flaming Lips LP – I downloaded the record not long after writing the above post, and though it is much too early for me to formulate an opinion about it just yet, I can safely say that it’s BIZARRE. Most of it sounds like a soundtrack to a Japanese animated film, and it is very much a concept record about someone called Yoshimi fighting “those evil natured robots”, it rarely strays from the lyrical themes. It’s not as orchestral as The Soft Bulletin, but it’s lush in its own way. There is all manner of synthesizers, drum machines, and electro sound effects all over this record, but also a great deal of acoustic guitar strumming. A few of the songs have a breezy summertime feeling to them, but others are extremely melodramatic and bombastic. This is a very interesting record, to say the least. I was wrong to sell the Lips so short, anticipating a sequel to The Soft Bulletin instead of something else altogether.

I saw Sleater-Kinney last night. It was okay, I guess. I wasn’t feeling very well during the show, so it impaired my ability to enjoy myself too much. They played about 10-12 new songs from the upcoming One Beat LP, and I really liked most of them, they left a very good first impression on me. I’m not sure how to describe the new tunes other than that they all rock a lot harder than anything on the last two albums, Carrie sings more often than usual, and that I enjoyed them more than most of the oldies that were played. I wasn’t very satisfied with the predictable older selections, I’m getting frustrated with them always preferring to play the more obvious songs instead of the more complicated or subtle songs. For example, I’d rather hear “Burn Don’t Freeze” or “Ballad of a Ladyman” than “The End of You”, “Little Mouth”, or “Dig Me Out”, which all strike me as a bit stale by now. I wonder if it’s just because I’ve seen S-K a number of times, that if I hadn’t seen them before I wouldn’t care all that much about this. I did really enjoy “One More Hour”, “Little Babies”, “Rock N Roll Fun” and “Call The Doctor”, even though I’ve seen them before several times, so maybe it’s just that I’m picking favorites here.

Other than the new songs, this is the order that the older songs were played chronologically. They were broken up into bits between new songs, except the last four which were the encore. Call The Doctor/ One More Hour/ Start Together/ Turn It On/ You’re No Rock and Roll Fun/ The End of You/ Little Mouth/ Little Babies/ I Wanna Be Yr Joey Ramone/ Dig Me Out.

I’m really looking foward to the new LP now, there’s no question that it’s going to be great. But not as great as this or this. (Thanks Tom!)

I want to live in a world where people do not clap in movie theatres.

I just got back in from seeing Attack of the Clones – I have a lot of mixed feelings about it. In some ways, it was really fun, a good space adventure. I’m happy that things actually happened in this story, and that it was mostly true to all the things I really loved about the original trilogy as a little kid. Overall it’s pretty good, and is about as good as Return of the Jedi, but lacking in the emotion of Luke’s confrontation with his father, or any other emotion for that matter.

SPOILERS.

When I think of the flaws, my opinion of the film drops significantly.

The “romantic” scenes were poor, just absolutely horrid.

“I hate sand. It’s irritating. NOT LIKE YOU.”

(kissssssss)

What? I just feel bad for Natalie Portman, her character is so flat and dull, she has no choice but to act stiff and generally lack charisma entirely.

Was there any good reason for shoehorning Jar Jar Binks into the film, besides George Lucas’ stubborn refusal to admit that the entire planet hates that character with a deep burning passion? Well, everybody except for the guy a few rows ahead of me who kept chuckling at his lines. Something is wrong with that man.

I was very offended by the return of the Watto character, this time making the anti-semitism behind that character more blatantly obvious than the last time by giving him a scraggly little beard and a small black hat, making him appear to be a Hasidic Jew. WHAT THE FUCK? When you consider this sort of anti-semitism, is the scene with the stormtroopers at the end merely a direct visual reference to Leni Reifenstahl’s Triumph of the Will, or is it a loving homage? This really troubles me, especially since the horrible Asian stereotypes from The Phantom Menace are in this film too. These characters are superfluous – Lucas clearly is adding them in because he thinks they are funny, revealing his bigotry without shame.

I think that overall the clone/droids/Dooku plot was too confusing, I know that my poor mother was confused as hell afterwards as my brother and I attempted to explain what was going on. Basically, Dooku was acting as a double-agent, tricking the Trade Federation/Separatist folks into creating a crisis that Palpatine’s clone army could stop, after giving him dictatorship of the Republic. The scheme also seemed to deliberately force Anakin and Amidala together, and kill a whole bunch of Jedi. The story was clear moment to moment, I don’t think there were parts where the audience was thinking “huh? what?”; but as a whole, it seems like a big mess of events that seem important but have little resonance. This film is incredibly insular, it certainly is only trying to appeal to its core fanbase at the expense of reaching out to a wider audience. It suffers from the same problems that most mainstream comics have for the past twenty years, and it’s a shame.

I’m not sure what I think of Lucas deliberately recycling his own themes/motifs/iconology. There’s so much of it throughout the film, sometimes it seemed like a hermetic vacuum of self-reference. Most of the time it felt like the goal was to make the audience feel safe in its familiarity, either that or Lucas was just throwing his hands up in the air and saying “well, I’ve run out of new ideas! I’d better go back to the greatest hits!”. Being less cynical and giving Lucas the benefit of the doubt, I can imagine that it’s his attempt at making the series something like a palindrome of motifs and events, that it all adds to the consistency of the series.

I did like a lot of it too, but my misgivings about the film are what linger in my mind after having seen it. I enjoyed the scenes in the beginning with Anakin and Obi-Wan in pursuit of the bounty hunters on Coruscant, the subsequent duel between Obi-Wan and Jango Fett was a lot of fun and visually exciting as well. There were a lot of good action adventure bits, little fan-pleasing tidbits scattered throughout. That’s all cool with me. With the exception of some awkward looking alien characters, the film looked really beautiful. I know a lot of people really like the Yoda vs. Dooku duel, but I think it was very anticlimactic even if it was sorta neat to see the little guy jumping around Matrix-style. Whatever.

If I have to pick a side in the Attack Vs. Spidey debate, I’m definitely siding with Spider-Man. It’s so much more fun, clear, inspiring, and audience-friendly. Still, I think that Attack of the Clones is a pretty satisfying Star Wars movie. Outside the context of Star Wars, it’s not much at all.

My 14 year old brother’s theory: “If Attack of the Clones is really bad, they probably won’t make another one even if it makes a lot of money cos no one’s going to see Episode III if everybody hated the last two consecutive movies.”

So young, so naive.

I’m seeing Attack of the Clones with him tomorrow night. I have a lot of mixed feelings about it – my expectations are low, but every time I see an ad for it on tv, I get all “Oooh! Lightsabres! Robots! Spaceships!”, so hopefully the film will be enjoyable as far as that goes. I’m pre-disappointed, so I won’t be in denial about its quality as I was with The Phantom Menace after I saw it the first time.

I am very happy with how the Cassandra storyline ended in NXM 126. Perhaps part of why I’m not very interested in Attack of the Clones is because I know there’s no way it could possibly touch the pure geek excitement that came from anticipating the ending of that story, and my satisfaction in how Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely pulled it off. The ending turned out pretty close to how I imagined it would turn out, but the execution was something I just couldn’t map out in my mind in advance, which is rare for this sort of fiction. Normally I can predict the conclusion of sci-fi/superhero stories just from having read so many over the years.

Without saying too much and spoiling things for those who might not have read it yet, I do want to mention that the scene with Cassandra in the school room with Charles and Jean is one of my favorite scenes of all the visual fiction I’ve ever seen. Brilliantly conceived, perfectly illustrated.

Megachurches as Mini-Towns.

“People are longing for morals, values and ethics,” Dr. Kallestad said. “It’s not isolation. It’s insulation.”

In other news, I’m really interested in seeing how Tina Fey turns this New York Times Magazine article into a feature film – it sounds so promising, especially since her best comedic moments are those that fuse female issues with cruelty…

Thanks to folks like Chris and Rizla, I’ve been exposed to some very interesting new Brit punk bands, most notably Ikara Colt and McLusky

For all of the McLusky tunes I’ve heard, the one that stands out the most is “Whiteliberalonwhiteliberalaction”, which has got to be one of the most vicious punk songs I’ve heard in a long while. It gives off a strong, contagious feeling of bitter resentment and loathing, though I’m not certain exactly who their target is. I would think that they are going on about self-satisfied and arrogant white liberals and political correctness, the title and the sing-song mantra “cos everyone’s a hero” clue me in as much. The singer’s voice is amazing, I love the way this guy sneers, and when chorus is screamed, it is incoherant but communicates his frustration very well. The guitars in this song sound great too, they sound more like electronic shrieks and machine noises than guitars, always a plus. Nothing on McLusky’s newest record Does Dallas quite matches that song – I think it’s a better record than the one “Whiteliberalonwhiteliberalaction” is from, My Pain and Sadness Is More Sad and Painful, but only a few songs really grab me. “The World Loves Us And Is Our Bitch” and “Gareth Brown Says” are both mean, catchy, and funny, but most of the others are samey and aren’t all that interesting.

Ikara Colt’s “Sink Venice” seems to be all about incoherant desperation – I have no idea what the singer is on about, other that they seem very intent on having Venice sink. The song is overflowing with defiance as it speeds along on a bassline that sounds suspiciously like “Negative Creep” by Nirvana. The singer reminds me a lot of Mark E. Smith while sounding nothing like him – I think it’s just a similarity in attitude and lyrical style. The Ikara Colt record is a lot better than the two McLusky LPs I’ve heard – they are a lot more consistent, have a slightly wider range, and better songs overall. The record is called Chat and Business, and is like one long nervous twitch. “One Note” and “Video Clip Show” match “Sink Venice” for it’s speed, and urgency – they sound determined and impatient. The quiter songs share the same intensity though I think those songs (“May B 1 Day”, “City of Glass”) are a bit more typical of heavy indie rock bands.

In other news: it is official, Igor Kordey will not be drawing any NXM after his upcoming (groan) three issue storyline over the summer. Thank god Mark Powers was fired – Kordey was ruining everything.

Tomorrow night’s GBV show has been cancelled due to Bob Pollard getting a back injury over the weekend, which is bad for Bob and convenient for me. That show was going to throw off my schedule for the whole week, I’m glad to see it get pushed back a bit. I will be seeing Sleater-Kinney this Friday, which should be a lot of fun. I’m interested to hear what the new songs sound like, especially the one they’ve titled “Combat Rock”. Why would any punk band name a song after a Clash record? Weird.

Also: On opposite ends of the design spectrum, Andrew and Helen have new websites online.

Yes! NXM 126 is out next week, and I can finally know how the whole Cassandra story will end…PopCultureShock has some preview pages up. They’ve also got preview pages from the final issue of Mark Millar’s Authority up too – next week is all about geek closure, I suppose.

I’m pretty disappointed about Will Ferrell leaving SNL in two weeks. I saw it coming all of the last season, but that show just won’t be the same without him. At least they’ve got my beloved Tina Fey there to pick up his slack. I shudder to think who might become the new George W. Bush though – hopefully they’ll get someone new on the show instead of having Chris Parnell do a lame impression…

I’m very fond of this op/ed piece in today’s New York Times about the myths of the “heartland”.

In other news: I am baffled why the people at Matador are choosing to make “Everywhere With Helicopter” the single for the new GBV record, and not “Back To The Lake”. Sometimes I get the impression that Matador really does not want to sell their own records.

I’ve watched a few episodes of Buffy The Vampire Slayer on FX the past couple days, and I think I’m finally warming up to the show after being put off by it for so long. I find that if I just watch it expecting the best, it really makes all of the difference. It’s pretty good, it’s about as good as a mediocre comic, I guess.

Newsarama has a very nice interview with John Romita, Jr. today – it’s really nice to hear what he has to say, he comes off as a real gentleman and a total pro, although I’d already figured as much from him. The one thing that really made me go “what?” was his admiration for the Kubert Bros., which baffles me to no end. I can’t see what a master of the form like JRJR might see in those two, I think the Kuberts are both erratic and verge on being total hacks. I think I’m going to go to Times Square and buy one of those sketches he’s doing to raise money for his neice – it’s a really nice thing for him to do, and I’d love to have a piece of original art by him.

I’ve become very interested in the Amazon reviews of one Henry Raddick – it’s hilarious, and meticulously crafted. Read as single reviews it is merely funny; but read as a body of work it plays out into storylines, recurring characters and themes; it’s fucking brilliant. The writer veers wildly between high and lowbrow humor, keeps many characters and situations constant while changing crucial things like Henry’s age and occupation.

Not counting the oddball contradictory review, it seems that Henry Raddick is a morbidly obese conservative British expatriate with a glass eye, a wife named Marjorie, a 16 year old son named Jonathan, and a 14 year old daughter named Stephanie. He had a 12 year old spaniel named Barry, who died recently and was replaced by a disagreeable pug named Grendal. He is a very, very sad man; and at the same time, “cheeriness personified”.

I love this guy.

I can’t describe the intense joy that I get when I hear “Karen Revisited” from the newest Sonic Youth LP. It just…shimmers. It starts off as a pop song with Lee Renaldo’s voice floating around over this wonderful riff, noise swirling around in the background. It builds up to a chorus, slows down, then moves along to this huge climax around the 2:23 mark with Lee singing “ask me if I care/ miscommunication/ Karen”. The song rides out on that wave and then crashes, turning into this droning blast of percussionless noise. After a minute and a half of that it mellows out and begins a reverb heavy passage which reminds me a lot of the ending of “Expressway To Yr Skull” from EVOL. The song ends by melting into a live recording of the band doing a very Sun Ra-ish improvisation, fading out into applause.

They really should be proud of themselves, especially Lee Renaldo – he certainly steals Murray Street for himself with this song. This man really needs to sing lead more often – his voice is just so lovely over that riff, his lyrics about revisiting an old stoner love really suit the motif of the music very well.

All hail the glory of Boom Selection, who have solicited bootleg mixes of the new Eminem single, “Without You”. They’ve started posting the best of what they’ve been getting – and some of them are really fab. I can say without hesitation that the best of the bunch is the one over the music of “Come On Eileen”, because it’s just so perfectly done and boppy and joyous. I’m pretty keen on the Led Zepelling “Wanton Song” mix, which is cut up just right, and just rocks like crazy.

The obligatory Kylie mix starts off pretty strong, and is generally pretty good, but wears me out a bit. The Human League “Don’t You Want Me” mix is an interesting failure – the mixer slowed down the vocals too much, and is sloppy with matching up Eminem with the beat. The one pairing it up with Michael Jackson’s “Burn This Disco Out” is marred by slowed-down vocals too, but does win some points with me for being a less-than-obvious MJ tune to bootleg. There’s a good electro bootleg (mixed with FC Kahuna) which is musically good, but the vocals are slowed down too… ah, what are you gonna do?

I still haven’t actually heard the original version of “Without You” just yet, so the mix with the X-Ecutioners which only uses the instrumental and not the a cappella is an interesting one – it just sounds like a good hip hop song to my ears without knowing either song. It sounds like Dre did a good job on this track, I wonder how the original compares to all these boots.

The Eminem rhymes are nice enough – pretty standard Eminem pop stuff, it sounds like he very conciously attempting to replicate the “state of the Shady address” thing he did on “The Real Slim Shady”, right down to the dissing of high-profile celebs – Moby, Limb Bizkit, Chris Kirkpatrick. Why does he go after such weak, irrelevant targets? Does he expect them to fight back? What does anyone gain from dissing Moby? Would that make anyone think yr clever, much less hard? It’s kinda like stealing a sickly kid’s milk money, or punching little old ladies. I don’t doubt that Eminem is talented and clever, I just wish that if he was going to battle someone, he’d really go for it.

As I’ve made clear in the previous post, the Pavement covers that I found on Audiogalaxy are a pretty miserable bunch, for the most part. I’m not sure why. I don’t think it’s because of my strong sentimental attachment to the songs of Pavement, because my love of most of those GBV songs is similarly intense. I think the running thread in why most of them are bad might be because how most of the bands don’t seem to get why Pavement and all those songs were so perfect in the first place. I guess I should get right to it…

I’ll start with Grandaddy‘s version of “Here”, for both it’s ubiquity and the fact that “Here” is by far the most-covered Pavement song in my findings. Grandaddy’s version is pretty likeable, they play the song in Pavement’s live-version arrangement, ie big and loud. Grandaddy are essentially simultaneously a poor-man’s Pavement and an even-poorer-man’s Radiohead. I give Grandaddy some credit for fucking around and being a bit playful with the song, to the point of making up their own verse – that’s very SM of them. They still manage to suck a lot of the greatness out of the song, and make it sound pretty ordinary.

Still, this is preferable to the horrible crime against music that is Richard Buckner‘s version of the same song. It pains me to hear this thing – the man basically turns the song into a Smog tune, which is just inexcusable. Contrary to popular opinion, absolutely nothing about Pavement was lifeless and smug, lazy or pathetic, though everything about Smog is. I hate Bill Callahan’s drab voice, and Buckner’s impression of it is only that much worse than the real thing. This is the outright butchering of a classic pop song, and Buckner should pay for this, do some hard time in indie jail or something. His version with Calexico is only marginally better, if just because Calexico adds a bit of faux-country texture to it, and Buckner sings a bit more melodically.

I can’t say that I quite like the Tindersticks version of “Here”, but at least I can respect it. They make it sound just like a soft-rock 70’s AM radio song, sort of like a Jimmy Webb song. I suppose it’s okay as a novelty – though I’m sure that it is not, it sounds a bit like a joke to me.

Holly Golightly‘s cover of “Box Elder” is pretty nice – they speed it up, make it rock a bit more. It’s pretty average indie-pop, nothing objectionable. The same goes for The Wedding Present‘s version – it’s likable, but nothing special. One thing that I noted listening to both of these versions is how when played with distortion and standard tuning, the main riff resembles Velocity Girl’s “Sorry Again”. Hmm.

Unquestionably the most likable and personalized of all the Pave covers that I’ve found, Cat Power‘s rendition of “We Dance” is as lovely as the best of Chan Marshall’s work. She makes the song her own without compromising the song’s greatness, something none of the other artists mentioned here even come close to. Tom Barman and Friends gives the same song a shot in a live recording and pales in comparison to Cat Power – it’s not awful, but it sounds very ordinary and pedestrian. Like most of the covers, it suffers from not being played in the same tuning that Pavement originally played them in. It doesn’t take much work to find out what tunings Malkmus used online – I’m not sure why more of these people don’t put in a bit more effort and find out so that they can play the songs the way they are meant to be heard.

Certainly the worst victim of the standard-tuning curse is the Dharma Sons version of “AT&T”, which sounds like a band of Professional Musicians cleaning up a song which is meant to be intentionally sloppy and punchdrunk. It’s just not right. It’s like being at a restaurant and getting a well-done steak when you asked for it to be medium rare. You just want to ask the waiter to take it back, you know?

Thankfully, some band called The Miracle of 86 manage to get it right in their cover of “Range Life”. It’s very true to the original, to the point that they even improvise the last verse and make up their own band disses on the spot, just like Malkmus would do live. Nicely done, guys.

Mallow is another band that I know nothing about, they sound like a garage band, and do a pretty straight-foward cover of “In The Mouth A Desert”. They sound like they could be a pretty good Pavement tribute band, really. If they were, I’d hire them to play at my birthday party, if I had one. This goes for Phish as well, though I’m sure they are way out of my price-range. Their live version of “Gold Soundz” feels just about right, but still has a nice feeling of amateurishness about it that brings to mind that of a tribute band. Trey Anastasio messes up the lyrics in the middle, but covers them up in a nice Malkmus-esque way, which wins them some bonus points in my book.

I’m not sure what to make of Bettie Serveert‘s cover of “Trigger Cut” – it straddles a fine line between being a nice personalized version of the song, and just being boring and average in a way specific to the band itself. I suppose I like their arrangement, but the personality of the band doesn’t work for me. My feelings about The Wedding Singers version of “Major Leagues” isn’t far off – it’s fine enough, I guess, but I just don’t like these guys. The Wedding Singers do get points for picking a song from Pavement’s least popular LP to cover, though.

Finally, I’ve got some nice things to say about Static Ritual‘s live cover of the song that gives this blog it’s name, “Flux = Rad”. Yes! This rocks! You guys rule! They did it right! Even Pavement themselves couldn’t pull this one off live – kudos, whoever you are!

On a whim, I decided to find as many Guided By Voices covers as I could on Audiogalaxy. Overall, it’s a competant bunch of covers (unlike the Pavement covers which I found, most of which verged on outright blasphemy – I’ll talk about them later), but nothing that really knocked me out.

One of the best of the bunch is Jon Auer‘s rendition of “Gold Star For Robot Boy”, which essentially answers the question “What if Elliot Smith wrote and recorded “Gold Star For Robot Boy”?” It’s a pleasant, melancholy version of the song; Auer’s voice sounds really lovely. You can tell that Auer must really love the song just by hearing it. Nicely done.

Local H‘s version of “Smothered In Hugs” is a lot cleaner than the GBV original, which I think is to it’s credit. I’ve always felt the Bee Thousand version was noisey/sloppy to the point that it obscured the loveliness of the melody. Still, the singer’s voice is kind of unpleasant, I much prefer Sparklehorse‘s version, if just because the melody of the song sounds a lot better when a guy who sounds like a half-asleep Michael Stipe sings it.

I’m pretty fond of Kitty Badass‘ cover of “Game of Pricks”, for a few reasons – one, because they just do a competant girl-punk version of the Alien Lanes original; two, because the lead singer’s voice has a really nice snarl to it; and three, because I appreciate the gender reversal of the lyrics. Kitty Badass do a nice job of picking up on the punk aspects of the tune, while Jim Adkins‘ solo acoustic version captures the early Beatles-ishness of the song. His version is pleasant, but a bit forgettable. Jimmy Eat World‘s cover is a version of the Tigerbomb/live arrangement, which earns them big GBV geek points even though I don’t really care for the unnecessary intro on that version. It’s such a faithful cover that it really does just sound like current line-up GBV with some other guy singing lead instead of Bob. My Vitriol‘s version is also the Tigerbomb arrangement, but they play it with a more ethereal intro, and heavier Nirvana-esque soft/load dynamics. I imagine that if Kurt Cobain wrote the song, this is how he would have played it.

Deus‘ “Motor Away” is a nice acoustic version with some pleasantly warbling vocals – it captures the sadness of the lyrics more than the original GBV version, but still doesn’t do much for me. Superdrag‘s version is a lot like Jimmy Eat World’s “Game of Pricks” – just like the original, but with a lesser singer. They do project a genuine love for the song in the recording, though. The Salteens, on the other hand, do a distinctive twee indie pop version that is cute, but maybe a little too cute for its own good.

Unquestionably the most amusing and unique GBV cover that I found is Kompressor‘s vaguely disturbing faux-German electro version. The synth arrangement is cute, and the angry-mad-scientist vocals are really funny. I like it a lot more than Join’R‘s straight-ahead garage band version, even though it’s nice and earnest enough. Join’R certainly embrace the big-giant-anthem nature of the song, which is much to their credit.

I give The Fastbacks a lot of credit for covering one of my personal favorites “Teenage FBI”, but I wish they’d done a better job. Their version is very fast and bratty, emphasizing the “someone tell me why” parts of the song. I also wish Chore had done a better job of playing “Subspace Biographies” – another big personal favorite, and also a lot more obscure than most of the other covers that I found, which gives Chore some bonus points. The problem with Chore’s version is not that it’s too sloppy; but that it’s far too polished and clean, it sounds too ordinary for my liking. They play the song a bit heavier than GBV too – I’m pretty sure the rhythm guitarist is playing in drop D tuning, making the song a lot beefier-sounding than it should be.

New Radiant Storm King‘s version of “I Am A Scientist” from a split single with GBV is an odd one – on one hand, the music is very faithful, and on the other the singer butchers the song with his mush-mouthed vocals which make it sound as though he is actually mocking the song. The pointless sloppy backing vocals they added to the arrangement at the end doesn’t help, either.

The Grifters‘ drunken live version of “Postal Blowfish” is very true to the spirit of live GBV, and is pretty fun, but doesn’t quite gel. Real Lulu’s version is a lot better – the girl who is singing sounds kinda creepy and possessed, almost like that girl who sings on all of the best A Certain Ratio songs. It’s got a really nice “we are members of an evil rock cult, the Branch Pollardians” vibe to it.

Finally, The Breeders‘ version of “Shocker In Gloomtown” is nice and smooth, and nails the song without surpassing the original. Just plain pleasant, really.

Again, this is pretty decent bunch of covers. I’ll get to the Great Pavement Song Massacre later on, or tomorrow…

Let’s talk about some recent Neptunes tracks, okay?

Last night I heard “Grindin'” by Clipse for the first time – I’m pretty amazed, it is one of the most naked, spare, minimalist songs I’ve ever seen on MTV. It’s all repetitive electronic percussion, no bass, there’s no keyboards, no nothing. On what passes for a chorus, Pharell from the Neptunes softly sings the word “grind-ing” while a percussive keyboard sound makes a brief little cameo. It’s so simple, so tense, so effective. It sounds primal. The MC isn’t special, I sort of wish this track was for someone a bit more charismatic – I get the feeling that this song would sound great with Mystikal or Ludacris.

The Neptunes-produced “Grimey” by N.O.R.E. (aka Noreaga) has a very similar beat (but hey, don’t all Neptunes tracks have more or less a variation on the same beat?), but with a really cool early 80s kind of keyboard hook, and a nervously pulsating bassline. Noreaga is a competant and passable MC, so he’s barely a factor in the quality of the song – the chorus is pretty good, once it comes in along with that keyboard hook, it really clicks. A good track, but not quite a classic.

The Neptunes remix of “Emotions” by Destiny’s Child is a really interesting one – what was originally a soft-pop acoustic ballad is now re-outfitted with a chugging keyboard riff, tambourines, a lightly thudding snare, and a politely funky bassline. It’s very satisfying, especially because Beyonce et al recorded a brand new vocal track for the mix, so it’s really smooth. I’m surprised that this wasn’t the regular single mix, really. Very strong.

Their remix of Angie Stone‘s “Everyday” is nice enough, and certainly improves upon the original version; but is more or less The Neptunes on autopilot. Standard Neptunes beat, standard Neptunes keyboard and bass, you’ve heard it all before. It’s the sort of self-parody that they could do for the rest of their careers, but thankfully they are avoiding that lately.

The Neptunes contribution to the “What’s Going On?” all-star benefit cd is pretty fair – some preachy MCing by LL Cool J, Fabolous, Da Brat, Mobb Deep, Noreaga, and Queen Latifah over some benign light-soul keyboards, an easy-going beat, and some crooning by Pharrell Williams. I like it, but it’s nothing really special. It’s certainly good for what it is meant to be…

On the opposite end of the spectrum, the Neptunes mix of Mr. Cheeks‘ “Lights, Camera, Action” is really inspired and fun. It’s similar in feel to their mix of Britney Spears’ “I’m A Slave 4 U”, but with a nice catchy pop hip hop song, with that chorus quoting Outkast’s “Ms Jackson”… It’s a bit of a novelty song, I think, but it’s worthwhile and memorable.

Also fitting that description is their remix of N’Sync‘s “Girlfriend” with Nelly on guest vocals. This one is really great – smooth, slick, fun modern pop. This song is really all about Nelly being Nelly, Justin Timberlake doing his best Michael Jackson impression, and the rest of N’Sync crooning innocuously in the background. The acoustic guitar is a nice touch, too… I’m pretty sure that in 20 years, there will be folks working very hard to make a retro record that sounds a lot like this.

Finally, I bit the bullet and decided to check out the re-recorded-with-a-live-band versions of my favorite songs from The Neptunes’ N.E.R.D. LP, and I’m glad that I did. I never expected that live version of “Brain” could ever improve upon the electropop original, but hey, I’ve got to admit that it feels a lot more energetic and fluid without losing the basic sound of the main riff or sacrificing any of the original’s nervous twitchiness. In fact, the live band version sounds a lot more twitchy and manic. Similarly, the live version of “Things Are Getting Better” has some really well-done/well recorded percussion that automatically one-ups the original. Not bad – I guess it’s best to not be so quick to judge what seemed like a really insane decision to re-record the LP; they seem to know exactly what’s the best for them.

I really like this bit of this interview with Jarvis Cocker…

Q: Why don’t you get contacts?

JC: I have got contacts. I wear them on stage. I had to do that because my glasses used to fall off. There was one incident at a gig in Sheffield where I was crawling around the stage for about 10 minutes looking for them – they’d fallen into the bass drum. I’m very shortsighted and people always say, “Why don’t you get laser treatment?” But I quite like waking up in the morning and everything being soft and fuzzy. It’s nice to choose when to bring the world into focus and start your day.

Nicely put, Jarv.