“His initial reaction to the spectacle was a feeling of sick envy, a horrible, aching covetousness. That was the effect the first view of Empress of Blandings always had on visiting fanciers. They came, saw, gasped, and went away unhappy, disoriented men, ever after to move through life bemused and yearning for they knew not what, like men kissed by goddesses in dreams….The Empress, after a single brief but courteous glance at this newcomer, had returned to the business which had been occupying her at the moment of Lord Tilbury’s arrival. She pressed her nose against the lowest rail of the sty and snuffled moodily.” – P.G. Wodehouse, Heavy Weather

(Source: Flickr / fellowette)

Happy long weekend, everyone!

We knew as soon as Bruce opened with Born in the USA outtake “My Love Will Not Let You Down” last night that this was to be no ordinary show. Next was the headlong rush of Born to Run semi-deep cut “Night,” and we were off - tens of thousands of New Englanders (and a few New Yorkers) hollering ourselves hoarse over three-plus hours of soulful, unscripted rock & roll in Gillette Stadium. I say “unscripted” because, along with the core of Wrecking Ball tunes he’s been playing all year, Bruce pulled all kinds of curveballs and audibles. My favorite part was the mini-Greetings set midway through: a swinging “Spirit in the Night” (“This all happened before you were born,” Bruce told Jake Clemons with a sly grin), “Growin’ Up,” and “Lost in the Flood” - with a rip-roaring electric version of Nebraska’s “Open All Night” thrown in the middle there by audience request, appearing to stump Little Steven. Or was it the note-perfect “Racing in the Street” a little later in the night? The E Street Band performs at this level night after night for months on end whenever they tour. It’s a powerful sight. “We plan on doing this another 30, 40 years,” Springsteen shouted from the stage, drawing more cheers and stadium-wide BRUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCEing. “They’re going to have to drag my ass off this thing, man.”

“Don’t mistake me, I clearly see that Ryan has a whole lotta ‘rage’ in him: A rage against women, a rage against immigrants, a rage against workers, a rage against gays, a rage against the poor, a rage against the environment. Basically the only thing he’s not raging against is the privileged elite he’s groveling in front of for campaign contributions.” – Tom Morello on ultra-conservative creepazoid Paul Ryan, who is, hilariously/sadly, a Rage fan. Read the whole thing, it’s great.

Two stories out of Chicago today: “someone hurled a 7-Up bottle filled with acid and other unspecified materials” at a Muslim prep school, and this guy was arrested for shooting an air rifle at a mosque. These incidents come just a week after somebody burned down a mosque in Missouri, and the day before that was when a white supremacist gunned down six Sikh people in Wisconsin. America is under attack by racist assholes. Why isn’t this the top story on the news?

(Links via Himanshu Suri and Lauren at AlterNet.)  

hndrk:

swvlswvl:

I’m currently enjoying Blur’s curious attempts to remake “To the End” in French….True fans – looking at you, Hendrik – surely know more of the story. Enlighten me, please!

Ooh, I’ll try my best! 

The (unreleased) demo to “To The End” actually features Justin Frischman, which would bring the grand total of the female cast to three. They obviously ended up with Laetitia Sadler of Stereolab for the studio recording; apparently Charlotte Gainsbourg was also briefly considered…

I knew you’d be able to shed some light on this subject! Cheers. Much more at Hendrik’s place.

Here’s a very nice tribute to Bill Doss by PopMatters’ Zach Schonfeld (and I’m not just saying that because he quoted me). A number of writers this past week have been talking about what the Olivia Tremor Control meant to them – Matt LeMay and Henry Owings are two others worth your time. It’s hard to imagine how OTC could go forward without Bill, but I’m confident that the strange, wonderful recordings he made with them will live on as long as pop music itself.

Ah, the pleasure of sifting through the bonus material when a beloved band gets a proper reissue series! I’m currently enjoying Blur’s curious attempts to remake “To the End” in French. There are two such translations included with the new remasters – one sung in a fairly awkward accent by Damon circa Parklife, and a lovely duet with Francoise Hardy from a year or so later. Cursory online rummaging has yielded few answers as to why they did this (twice!), or whether either version went anywhere on the French charts. True fans – looking at you, Hendrik – surely know more of the story. Enlighten me, please!

Update: As I suspected, Hendrik was the right person to ask about this.

I’m sure everyone else who loves the Olivia Tremor Control is feeling as crushed as I am right now. Bill Doss has died at a far too young 43; the world has one less person who can give us the kind of pure melodic joy that was his specialty.

On a selfish level, I feel robbed of the chance to see one of my favorite bands keep growing. OTC had already broken up by the time I fell in love with Dusk at Cubist Castle and Black Foliage, so when they reunited in 2005 it was like a gift. That first reunion show at the Bowery Ballroom – ecstatic, anarchic – is still one of my top five or ten live experiences.

Last fall, I ran into Bill standing outside Le Poisson Rouge after another Olivias show. He told me he couldn’t wait to start playing all the new songs they’d been working on. Wait ‘til the next tour, he said.

I saw them for the last time barely a month ago, in Williamsburg. My sister and I stood front row, maybe a foot or two from Bill’s part of the stage as he sang “Hideaway” and “Jumping Fences” and “A Place We Have Been To.” He seemed happy, I thought; he certainly brought us a little more bliss that night. Rest in peace, Bill.

You can’t fake the kind of rapport Frank Ocean has with his fans. Last night at Terminal 5, the all-ages crowd was in a continuous state of flipped-out rapture – which Frank earned with his powerful, direct performances. More on a great show here.

The first time I saw Wilco, they played an unreleased song called “Not for the Season.” I was a few weeks into my freshman year of college, and I became obsessed with the song, acquiring a demo that I must have listened to many dozens of times that semester. (I keep meaning to boot up my wheezing old laptop one of these days for the sole purpose of examining the iTunes play counts.) I think I was a little disappointed when it resurfaced the following spring on the first Loose Fur album under the name “Laminated Cat,” slowed to a crawl and robbed of its signature keyboard riff.

The song disappeared from Wilco’s set lists for the next seven years, but they’ve begun playing it again more recently, so I requested it via their website before seeing them at Prospect Park a couple of nights ago. And they played it! They played it again at Terminal 5 last night, smack in the middle of a fan’s dream setlist, and a third time for Jimmy Fallon’s TV cameras. I love this latest iteration of the song, which hews closer to the Loose Fur version but feels more cosmic, somehow, thanks to Nels Cline’s liquid guitar leads and Glenn Kotche’s almost-chaotic drumming. Has it really been 10 years since that first show?

The lessons of the tragedy in Colorado seem blindingly obvious: Guns are a scourge on our society. They should not be legal. Apparently saying this amounts to “politicizing,” but you know what? This is already about politics. Our broken system is such that no national figure from either party wants to touch gun control. That wasn’t always the case, but it never seems to change these days, no matter how many horrors we witness. It’s sad, but it’s also infuriating, and this is exactly the time to talk about it.

Pentametron purports to be a program that finds random tweets whose syllables fall into iambic pentameter, then retweets them in rhyming couplets, sonnet-style. I say “purports” because there’s real poetry in the results – more than I’d expect even the most cleverly designed piece of code to yield. Like so:

TONIGHT. TONIGHT. TONIGHT. TONIGHT. TONIGHT.
hand very itchy from mosquito bite
Okay okay okay okay okay
I took a 7 hour nap today

All packed and ready for the holidays! :)
it doesn’t even matter anyways
Not even fucking tired any more
I never got in twitter jail before

Turns channel …Final Destination 2
Another day, another interview.
I wonder how tomorrow’s gonna go..
I’d Rather Be A Harlot Than A Hoe

Off to rehearsal. Let the music play!
It’s gonna be a busy day today!

That was the first thing that came up when I loaded Pentametron this morning. I like it better than a lot of human-penned sonnets. There’s a clear theme of anticipatory excitement threaded through the 14 lines, and some nice stream-of-consciousness verbal echoes here and there. It’s not Shakespeare, but it’s something.

And yet, according to Pentametron’s creators, this is the product of an automated algorithm that “processes about five million tweets per day, and finds a few dozen iambic lines in that time.” What an eerily talented robot! Maybe I’ve been underestimating the literary potential of technology. (Hat tip to Lois Beckett for bringing this site to my attention.)

Update: Here’s a fascinating interview with Pentametron’s creator, Ranjit Bhatnagar, illuminating how the algorithm works. I wonder what Tristan Tzara would have made of this.

People act sort of surprised whenever Nas puts out a good album. Why, when he’s never made a truly bad one*? Anyway, I share in the general sense of delight surrounding Life Is Good – a record that sounds like Nas realizing exactly what makes him great and going for it. One of my favorite songs at the moment is the Mary J. Blige-assisted “Reach Out,” which could almost be a delayed sequel to “If I Ruled the World.” It’s interesting to think about how the intervening decade and a half has changed Nas – he’s more cynical in some ways, more generous in others, and every bit as skilled a storyteller.

* Yes, that includes Nastradamus – his weakest by far, but hardly the hot garbage platter of conventional wisdom. The title track is a jam!