jukeboxgraduate.com

33 1/3

Today is the deadline, and my proposal for a book in the next edition of this amazing series has been completed, emailed and receipt confirmed. Decisions at the end of January.

I will tell you then which record I wanted to write about, because it will either be "Drat, didn't make the cut" or hopefully: "Great, I now have to spend the better part of 2006 writing 30,000 words on this album."

I'm a Daring Female!

Well, no shit, some of you will say.

I'm featured in a recent article (which links to a profile of myself) at the very cool web site DaringFemale.com, full of great, inspiring stories about everyday women who are out there kicking ass. Check it out!

zero and blind terry

the last dance: end of the devils & dust tour
sovereign bank arena, trenton, nj
22 november, 2005

The last show of the tour. I could wax rhapsodic; I could pontificate about the significance of the Devils & Dust tour as it pertains to Springsteen's career; I could try to place the tour in some kind of continuum as per my own fandom.

But really, it all comes down to this:

"Zero and Blind Terry."

This is my I-will-never-hear-it-in-a-million-years song, the song he has never played, and most likely, would never play.

"Hey, maybe you'll win the GA lottery tomorrow."
"Right, and Bruce will open the show with 'Zero and Blind Terry', too."

So when he sits down at the piano after "Long Time Coming," the wild card slot, and announces he's about to play something he's never played--I would like to say I jumped up and down in glee when the first notes were played. No, it was more like shock, a weird sense of deja vu -- Am I really here watching this or am I in some dreamscape?-- and it was only the simultaneous intake of breath from two fans behind me that brought me back to earth and made me realize that I'd have to get another punchline.

And then, in what I would like to imagine was a delicious sense of continuity on Bruce's part, he segued straight into "Backstreets," which was in my opinion THE moment of the evening. Not that "Backstreets" was conspicuously absent on the tour but it was hardly a frequent flier and it was always beyond transcendent when it did show up. Tonight, no exception, bones stripped bare, just Bruce and piano, yet just as grand and majestic as any full band version.

The Link Wray tribute as an opener was wonderfully raunchy, and made me wish he would go on tour and PLAY THE FUCKING ELECTRIC GUITAR ALL THE TIME. [See: previous references to suggestions for future backing bands.] "Fire" on bullet mic worked, distorted vocals, a touch of prerecorded melody behind it. "It's Hard To Be A Saint In The City," top ten in my personal pantheon, not so much; part of the melody of that song is the way the words roll off each other and that was hidden behind the wall of distortion. (And I am a *big* fan of the distortion, don't get me wrong.) It turned it into a talking blues, which wasn't working for me until I imagined it as a Dylan talking blues, which, of course, it already was.

"Song for Orphans" was a non-event for me -- sorry, I had to say it -- but in the excitement over that I had totally forgotten that "Drive All Night" could still make the setlist. And it did, heart-stoppingly, gloriously, the emotion still heartfelt, but tempered, aged like good whiskey. You still believe that he would drive all night just to buy you some shoes. I think I even like it better now, the declarations have power without the (sometimes) overblown histrionics this song has exhibited on past tours. I know full well that that is part of its legend, but we are all older now, and if it didn't ring true the performance would have been pathetic and just plain sad.

A passel of nieces and nephews and cousins and aunts and uncles and all the Springsteen children come out onstage, jingle bells in hand, and yep--it's that time of year. The Christmas season is officially open with my first public hearing of "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town." That song started to mean Christmas (okay, as much as Christmas can mean to a Jewish girl from Connecticut) in my early teens and nothing has changed. If I heard it in August I'd feel the same way.

And then, one more time, "Dream Baby Dream," and it's over, finished, done. It is not so much sad as quietly wistful, the same way the changing of the seasons can also make you ache a tiny bit, simply over the passing of time.

(At least we'll never have to hear "Reno" live, ever again.)

tweedy solo

jeff tweedy solo
ulster performing arts center
kingston, ny 18 november 2005

I am not exactly a worshipful Tweedy disciple. I loved Uncle Tupelo but early Wilco didn't do a ton for me, and to be honest, I like the most recent Wilco output better -- or it's probably more correct to say that it just speaks to me more now. It's contextual. Early Wilco hardly sucks, it just wasn't what I was looking for then.

But Tweedy can give me a shot in the arm in an inspirational sense, from the perspective of watching the artist work, and although I got shut out of the free NYC shows and didn't have the time to go wait in a standby line, I decided that a two-hour drive upstate to Kingston (just outside of Woodstock) would be a worthwhile investment.

So I come to this from a whole different mindset than your average Wilco fan, because I am such a tourist, I do not have the years of emotional resonance attached to the songs that they do. I know what I like and I pretty much like hearing anything. The setlists have been rich and expansive and exploratory (it was the posting of one such setlist that made me wake up and say, 'I really need to go see one of these').

The theater was tiny, the audience mostly attentive, and it being the last show in the US, a huge sense of relief manifesting itself by way of relaxation. He was glad he did it but he was also glad it was (almost) over. Voluble, personable, dealing with the acolytes and the morons with equal good humor. Dude was funny. Chatty. Sharing a story about how Tupelo played this very theater, and they rehearsed for a couple of days before the tour started. In the middle of one of the rehearsals, Rick Danko walks in, and he found himself unable to function with Rick fucking Danko standing there watching him. So he walks over to Danko and tells him that. Danko: "That's cool, man. Always stay desperate!"

He's a fucking great guitar player, or I guess 'can be' is the qualifier, but acoustic solo you got nothing to hide behind so either the chops are there or they're not. They are.

And the songs. Moments of introspection and revelation, some wistful, some happy. The singalong to "California Stars" still echoes in my head three days later.

Just when I thought we were done, it was enjoyable, worth the drive, all of that, someone in "the abyss" (as Tweedy mentioned he referred to the audience in an universal sense, since he couldn't see anybody) launched into a lengthy story that no one quite understood, but what Tweedy got out of it was that she wanted him to play "Misunderstood." Pause. "But without all the drums, BOOM, bang?"

So he does it. Solo. Acoustic. No thundrous intro. And you are on the edge of your seat, wide awake, riveted, picking your jaw up off the floor, "If you still love rock and roll" giving you the sharp intake of breath, lump in throat, unintentionally masterful and the spontaneity of the selection making the depth of the performance that much more meaningful.

One moment. Not that the other moments were not worthy, but this one was for the ages.

Setlist [Via WilcoBase]

springsteen enters the mcsweeney's zone

McSweeney's Internet Tendency: Bruce Springsteen Songs, If the Title More Accurately Reflected the Subject Matter.

It's funny, sure, but it's still stupid snarky cooler-than-thou enough to make me want to defenestrate the author. It's the stereotype of what your average hipster thinks Bruce's songs are about (and tell me, "It was written for McSweeney's, DOH" and I'll defenestrate you.)

Greg Dulli's Amber Headlights

Two years ago, right about this time of year, during a late fall dark and bleak, I saw the Twilight Singers for the first time. The first cold had just set in and my heart was newly healing, stumbling over the remnants of betrayal. That show was the perfect balm to wounds visible and invisible, just like Blackberry Belle likely helped Dulli heal from his own loss.

Another fall leads into winter, and I am in a different place and Dulli gifts us with what should have been (or more likely, what might have been), Amber Headlights. So much different in mood and feeling and color than Blackberry Belle, and obviously so: these were the recordings-in-progress as the truly-post-Whigs Dulli began to "fly without a net" (his words). All of this would be quietly shelved following the death of his close friend, Ted Demme.

To be fair, you have to evaluate this record for what it is, no more, no less: admittedly unfinished, a polaroid, a slice in time, not a finished product for mass release (although it is, gratifyingly, finding success outside of the major label mainstream). The songs are classic Dulli, some might have been Whigs songs or were originally written with the Whigs in mind. And even though this did not go through the rigorous process that An Album would have, as a document it is fascinating and infuriating -- Dulli can write riffs and evoke a story arc in a melody line without seeming to break a sweat, maybe the necktie will be a little askew and the cigarette burned down to the filter. There's no question that songs like "So Tight" or "Cigarettes" are Classic Dulli, "Early Today" has one of those guitar lines that sound like a heart unrending, "Golden Boy" should be on your summer driving soundtrack, "Get The Wheel" is likely the predecesor to the astonishing "Teenage Wristband" -- and the superlatives could continue. All of this, for a release of unfinished demos that's better than most people's completed albums.

Where Blackberry Belle was elegie and eulogy, Amber Headlights is the Garden of Eden before the fall. Selfishly I am glad these saw the light of day and even more selfishly I hope this is not the final destination for these tracks and they make their way into the live Twilight Singers show, where that truly unique grouping of musicians can help the songs take on a life of their own outside the studio, and in the process, extend unintentional catharsis or elation or even just a moment to get down to everyone in the room.

Order Amber Headlights here

NaNoWriMo Update

For those keeping score:

23,169 / 50,000 (46.0%)

Two more weeks to go.

horses/horses

Patti Smith
Tower Records in the Village
8 November 2005

"Why an in-store, Patti?" our birthday girl began the evening. Not that this was her birthday, but I was treating this as a celebration for the record, and for the accomplishment. And from Patti's demeanor and mood, I am sure she was too. It was truly lovely, there is no other or better word to describe the mood. She enjoyed every second of it, was joyful and voluble, snapping black and white Polaroids of the crowd and the band, sharing anecdotes with the audience (even stupid ass questions, and there were many, were entertained).

The most heart-stopping ones, for me, was when she related about living in the Chelsea Hotel and hearing Janis Joplin rehearsing the songs that ended up on Pearl and now Horses is on Sony's Legacy label, just like Pearl is. Or the semi-infamous story about meeting Jimi Hendrix as he left the opening party for his Electric Lady Studios and how she carried that with her when they went in to record Horses (and, sure, the stories about John Cale banging his head against the wall, repeatedly, during the sessions were way fun too).

The band was acoustic, Lenny and Jay Dee and Tony Shanahan, and the songs were, well, the songs. "Free Money" and "Kimberley" and "Gloria" and I know I am missing some but I didn't want to be a fucking documentarian tonight. It was a celebration of the work and the fact that we are all still here on this planet, alive and going strong, and a tribute to those who are no longer.

I was talking with some friends on Sunday about how I keep seeing ghosts, or being haunted by them. And not real ghosts, mind you, I keep having heavy deja vu -- a recent trip to Maxwell's brought back avalanches of memories of my 80s years there, someone mentioning Luchow's on Law And Order snapped into my brain that old 14th Street vista, getting off the Lexington Avenue line at Union Square and the Palladium marquee and mural looming before me. (Parallel that with this afternoon, waiting in front of Tower Records, and not being able to get my bearings because I look down 4th Street and the fucking Bottom Line is not there and so the street doesn't look right and I decide that I have it all wrong and what I am looking for is one block up...)

So now, tonight, Horses 30 years on, recorded a stone's throw away, CBGB's three minutes in the other direction, all the landmarks of that time (or their ghosts, anyway) all around us. And the fact that this record was pivotal in bringing me to this city, in ensuring I had no other destination for my future, in liberating me from fate and hurling me towards destiny.

this may be marketing hype, but it is hardly an overstatement.

So this is about all I want to say. While I hate bloggers that don't write about a show, just upload photos, I am saving all my Horses insight for the BAM show on the 30th.

and so it begins

The time has come, as the walrus would say, for novel #2 to begin in earnest. The flip of a United States coin will determine which of the two concepts that have been battling themselves within the confines of my brain for the past year will be what I go forward on.

Of course, what this means for you, the reader of this blog, is this: frequent updates as I flail around to write something, anything -- except what I'm supposed to be writing. Works like a charm.

Thank god the new laptop arrives tomorrow. Wish me luck.