vain, selfish & lazy.

Saturday, February 24, 2001

Fred,

It's come to my attention that you're going to be doing a Top 100 songs list. Fabulous! Everyone needs a gimmick these days, as proven by Tom and his on-again/off-again-though-mostly-the-latter Thousand, Robin's duplicate effort, and Josh's stalled run through 69 Love Songs. God knows you have the time for such an undertaking now, huh? Ha ha ha.

I know you didn't really ask, but might I make a few suggestions? Yeah? Okay.

- As I'm sure no one wants to see Beach Boys song after Beach Boys song, you should probably limit each artist to one ent- Calm down! I'm telling you, it'll work out better this way: You can show off how eclectic you are. Yes, I thought that'd do the trick.

- Don't limit it to singles; give it a broader scope. Many artists best songs never got released as singles and, besides, it'll save you the work of having to check every entry to make sure it was officially released, etc.

- Don't get anal. The list will probably have changed the second you make it, but who cares -- that's the nature of tastes and music. And don't get all upset that you might be forgetting something: If it's not on your mind when you make the list, how great can it possibly be?

- Just put it up sans commentary, at least for a little while. Then, if you want, you can do some sort of all-encompassing essay. But, please, do us and yourself a favor: Don't do song-by-song commentary. I'd like to see you actually finish a list for once.

And now I've made it so you can just post the list without any further explanation. That's another one you owe me, punk. Now get going.

Love,
Me
-fred solinger | steal this link! | discuss

Thursday, February 22, 2001

grammys 2001 - fucking brilliant!: believe or disbelieve the following as you see fit. this thought first entered my mind after u2 won their third award, but i didn't commit it to paper until later, following the eminem/elton duet when, instead of going directly to announcing the album of the year award as i thought, they went to a break. during that break, i wrote:

"-watch, it'll be steely dan -- along with u2, reaffirming the old guard."

steely dan would be the most amusing because:
a) unlike paul simon, they have no grammy history.
b) indeed, going into the night eminem had more grammys.
c) in their own way, fagen and becker are just as perverted as eminem, what with two against nature featuring songs about incest and threesomes. it's all in how you present it though because...
d) their sound is immaculately clean and so complex that they need studio cats and jazzmen to play it.

so, as eminem waits in the wings, stevie wonder and bette midler announce the award and when the name "steely dan" is spoken, i laugh like i haven't in quite some time. if they'd announced "SUPERTRAMP" or "FOGHAT," i couldn't have been any more amused. silence ensued and i sensed a collective stun; people appeared to be in daze, hanging out like they were waiting for the punchline. after weeks of building up eminem and a show that seemed like one long coronation procession for slim shady, the academy got the last laugh: for once, the joke's on eminem.

i enjoyed last night's show much more than i would've thought -- mtv, take heed. jon stewart hosted the show and, like eminem, he seemed like a pick that the grammy folks were high-fiving each other about, very proud of themselves. both choices seem unlikely, but ultimately worked and, so yeah, high five to them. initially i thought stewart's humor might be too obscure -- and it proved to be at first -- and too left of mainstream, like a lesser-known david letterman. his style is self-deprecating and he's a reactor not an actor; hosts always seem to do best when they're aggressive; stewart at times seemed like he was shrinking away. by night's end, though, he'd settled into a groove and finally seemed comfortable with, not so much being the center of attention, but as just being a part of the show, a show that brimmed with potential controversy but never got worse than the edge saying "orgasmatron" and the censors really fucking up on "stan," allowing the words "damn," "bitch," "shit," and "ass" through, the latter three coming through twice. (strangest moment might've been hearing eminem use the word "crummy" not once, but TWICE, in that very same performance.) i was hoping that, i dunno, ol' dirty bastard would appear on stage during steely dan's acceptance and claim the award in the name of the children.

performances were largely excellent, the best at any award show in a long time. some comments:

madonna: madonna's performance was pretty good, i have to say. she seemed to be in fine voice, but it's not as if "music" is a test of a singer's endurance and range. maybe it's just me, but she seems to have lost the ability to both shock or titillate anymore; maybe it's the hair: the blonde hair just makes her look older in my opinion, she should dye it darker. i'm uncomfortable with the idea of madonna-as-homegirl, but that didn't really detract too much from the performance. and it was good to see the guys from the "express yourself" video again.

nsync: justin -- no! -- what happened to the hair?! the look doesn't really work for him, but it's better than the screech powers style he had. i'm just glad they stopped the guy before he shaved justin bald JUST LIKE HE DID ERYKAH BADU! so that's why she's been wearing the headwraps. 'tis nothing to be ashamed of -- and it works for her. anyway, the hair thing allowed j.c. to establish himself as the star i always knew him to be. oh, and 'nsync should never be allowed to dress themselves. ever. justin's get-up in particular looked like it came from michael jackson's closet ca. thriller.

destiny's child: i've thought it before, but last night proved that beyonce is SO diana ross, and the other two remind me of the supremes that la ross dredged up for that "reunion" concert she gave, they have probably remained in the group because they're comfortable playing backup. but what did the dancers really have to do with the performance? they seemed a bit incongruous. oh, and i noticed that when they won the award -- and, oh my God, they just performed! what a coincidence! -- God seems to get a shorter shout-out the larger that an artist gets. and jesus! forget about jesus.

paul simon: he performed last night.

faith hill: what a lovely performance! very conventional, but nothing wrong with that when it's executed so nicely. not a faith hill fan, but she was great.

u2: and speaking of conventional. everything about current-day u2 suggests "we're just your average band." they still retain their populism, as evinced in bono's mugging for the camera and walking out into the crowd. and, goodness, they won an award just after they performed too! (earlier, i was wondering how they decided what awards to air. like, why, for example, did best r&b song by group/duo get air time but not best r&b song or album? same thing with rock. well, because destiny's child and u2, respectively and respectfully, are larger than d'angelo and the foo fighters, respectively.) man, if grammy loved "beautiful day," wait until next year when they release the really good songs from that album. but you know that, as grammy moves onto other things, u2 won't see a similar year next year.

shelby lynne & sheryl crow: a grammy wet dream. i was entertained: it was very classic rock, like, like...blind faith! with shelby as steve winwood and crow as, ironically, eric clapton. their segue into the award presentation was one of the most awkward and uncomfortable looking things i've ever seen, right down to the miscue on the soundtrack. i like shelby lynne, as a person at least, and realized this when she won her best new artist award. she's impresively unpolished and defiantly southern and probably didn't give a standing ovation for the next performance and when she was going up for her award and had to navigate through the detritus that same performance left behind, she probably said, "how am i 'sposed to git around this SHIT?" and she's the kind of chick who would bring up the fact that she'd put out 6 albums and been around for 13 years when she won the "best new artist" award. after the presentation, the camera flashes to some guy sitting next to beck who either says, "you should collaborate with her" or "i think i could nail her." as if.

moby ft. jill scott & blue man group: file under: "i guess you had to be there." or maybe if the cameras would've stayed steady this could've been better appreciated by us folks at home. as it stands, it's one of the weaker songs from play and though it did look and even sound good, it's the kind of performance that doesn't translate well to television. the crowd gave it a standing ovation though.

take 6 w/nnenna freelon: i have this theory that take 6 don't exist in the real world, that they exist in stasis, in suspended animation, until some awards committee pulls them out to add class to their show. and it was very classy and very entertaining and ms. freelon who i'd been previously unaware of was fabulous.

macy gray: i don't like macy gray and i think that's well-documented. her earlier antics, when she claimed her award, struck me as much about her does: as a planned accident. that said, i preferred the live version of "i try" to the radio version which is like saying i'd prefer to freeze rather than to burn to death; either way, i have a hard time believing that this was something jon stewart was genuinely looking forward to all night as he doesn't seem like -- or at least i hope he isn't -- part of that set. and God her voice. it's even worse live. was she even singing? and of course the audience "ha ha ha"d and applauded copiously afterwards.

christina aguilera: hey, a great performance, that girl can really sing, etc. i get the feeling that that moon-like thing that brought her into view and the long staircase were all her idea. no matter what she does, there seems to be this underlying compulsion to best britney, even if britney isn't present or in her category. and no matter how impressive she is, i can't help thinking that, "well, she'll never be better than britney." if britney is 80s madonna, than christina is...um...cyndi lauper.

canadian piano guy: he played, like, really fast and although i don't know if i have the training and knowledge required to say so, i thought he was great. grammys covering all bases tonight!

brad paisley & dolly parton: so, like, twice during the evening the camera panned to brad paisley and i asked myself, "what, WHO is brad paisley?" why, he's the fanciest cowboy in all of the rodeo! he looked like the kind of guy i would be uncomfortable telling a dirty joke around, though if i were dolly parton, well, he would just blush. after their performance, it occurred to me that he was the kind of guy who would've cleaned up years ago but will win NO awards as long as faith hill -- ha ha ha, oh just wait for this one -- breathes.

eminem ft. elton john: elton john, as you may know, has a history of reforming homophobes, see axl rose, and i know that he curses the fact that sebastian bach faded to obscurity before he could work with him. determined not to let that happen again, he hooked up with eminem. it can't be long before the surviving members of queen need money again, so next up for the troubled rapper: eminem's rap interpretation of "we will rock you." "it's a song, you know, that lends itself well to hip-hop because of the BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-CLAP, and the way that," he continues, "like, the melody is almost kinda rapped."

michael green, the president of the grammys, is likely the reason that eminem was nominated. there is something in his manner that makes me want to dislike him, but after seeing him speak on the show last night, introducing the lifetime achievement winners and also eminem's performance, i found that difficult. his speech was clear-headed and intelligent, a somewhat passionate defense of artists' rights. he brought eminem here, and with no further ado, presented him to us, and the performance lived-up to all of the hype, i felt. eminem was very animated, with this platform in front of the entire industry, he seemed determined to get his point across to them. unlike sensory-overload multimedia extravaganzas (see "MOBY") , a fantastic performance of a stirring song will always work on t.v.

following the eminem performance, there was a break and then the announcement of steely dan's victory, what for them is essentially a lifetime achievement award. the night was like extended foreplay that ends in premature ejaculation: uncomfortable for those present, and amusing to all who hear tale of it. u2 and steely dan, elder -- and elder still -- statesmen of rock rise up to give the youngsters the proper spanking they deserve: order has been restored. during the break before the award presentation, i considered eminem as album of the year, and notice that there is no superlative preceding the name of the award, as in "BEST album of the year." surely both eminem's detractors and fans could agree on the fact that the marshall mathers lp was the album of the year, in terms of the controversy that followed and the sheer amount of media time devoted to it and even though he didn't win, grammy really can't take that fact away from him. besides, what should he care? this is after all the man who said "who gives a damn about a grammy?" still stand by that, em?
-fred solinger | steal this link! | discuss

Monday, February 19, 2001

MISSY ELLIOTT, "GET YOUR FREAK ON"
i get in the car. start it up. turn on the radio. first words i hear: "me and timbaland been high since twenty years ago." now for the duration of admittedly brief trip to wendy's, i'm thinking, "okay, first thing i do when i get home is to search for this." food instantly becomes secondary, as if this trip was only meant to alert me to fact that this song was out that and, yeah, also a friendly reminder from my old friend the radio that i need to listen to it more often. the beauty of the internet is illustrated by the fact that i come home, do a search, and this song is waiting for me, ripe for enjoyment.

"get your freak on" is the debut single from missy elliott's new album, and while it's not as confrontational as "she's a bitch," it's still much better, cliched title aside. and when one talks about missy elliott records, one ends up spending most of their time discussing uber-producer timbaland. he's in superlative form here and it seems with each new record he carves out a new direction his creations could take only to say "screw it" and take a new road entirely, while still retaining the lessons of the past, with the next platter. with "get your freak on," i sense a vaguely asian feel not a million miles away from "big pimpin'" though while that hit was evidently sample-based and repetitive, "freak" suggests an entirely original creation, a refusal to follow any set pattern.

it starts off with what i'd call an invocation in a language i won't even attempt to guess for fear of showing my ignorance: what it has to do with anything that follows is anyone's guess. the main motif is played on either a guitar or some impossibly ancient and long-feared extinct instrument that floats over a heavy kick drum that seems treated to sound liquidy or, to put into words, like "vwoom-vwoom-vwoom" with tablas that literally rush in to fill the space between kicks. during the chorus, synth strings loom ominously and what i've decided to call "monster movie" synths creep in. and, oh yeah, missy raps too -- really, i don't mean to detract from her because there's obviously a synergy between her and tim that results in songs like this.

as i've said in an e-mail, it's not an "oh SHIT!" song like, for a recent example, "bombs over baghdad" but it's another in a trail of "wtf?" moments timbaland has left across the music landscape since ginuwine's "pony" at the very least. the most interesting comparison, however, is to aaliyah's "are you that somebody," a time when timbaland was obsessed with cramming every inch of space with noise right down to rattles and baby cries: the tim of the here and now, as his recent experiments suggest, is all about space and using that space to add to the ambience of the track, yet another trick he's added to his ever-growing arsenal. with the swedes, outkast, shek'spere, the neptunes, and timbaland, one truly has to appreciate, as tom has said so often, the golden age of pop production we're in currently. did i say this was a "wtf?" moment? no, scratch that: "get your freak on" is all about "wn?": "what next?"
-fred solinger | steal this link! | discuss

a tale of two nephews: yeah, i hate doing cutesy things like, "oh, listen to the funny thing my nephew did today," but this was far too amusing to let slide. i have two nephews who are, by definition, boys and the same age -- 7 years old -- who are also twins and, also by definition, as different as night and day.

while the one was sick with something, the other got a ride to school from one of their neighbors. it was a cold, winter day as he stood outside waiting for this neighbor to get him. as he stood there, he was holding on to the railing there by the front steps. it seems that this neighbor is running late and so to quell his boredom, he decides to act upon an idea he just had: he will stick his tongue to the rail to see if it will stick, a la flick in a christmas story -- even though it's a very dumb idea, i'm glad that he's latched on to one of my favorite films, but thank God he's too young for jackass. apparently, he didn't learn from flick's mistake for, as the neighbor arrives, my sister urges my nephew on as she sees he's not moving, telling him that, yes, it's okay to go with the neighbor, she is a good person after all. his response is unintelligible, obviously, and my sister then realizes what he's done and fetches some warm water to de-stick him. when she's done, he's ushered off to school, a little bloody, yes, but also a little wiser for the experience.

my other nephew, on the other hand, is learning the lessons of love. for valentine's day, he hoped to exchange gifts with a classmate, a girl who is now officially known as his girlfriend, but didn't want to do so at school for fear of being teased. phone rings. it's the little girl's mother, and it seems they're facing a similar dilemma. so, what a coincidence, they decide to meet after school. and so they do and gifts are exchanged and i imagine many photos are taken. later that day, the young lothario is heard to have remarked to my father, "i'll get him a date if he wants," the "him" in question being ME. the little don juan is obviously unaware that there are laws against that sort of thing, but i got a kick out of it. different as they can be, alright, and i wouldn't want it any other way.
-fred solinger | steal this link! | discuss

Sunday, February 18, 2001

NICK CAVE, "AS I SAT SADLY BY HER SIDE"
when the title of this first single and the title of the album, no more shall we part are combined, the gothic-meter goes off the scales which would lead one to guess that the new album by nick cave is essentially the boatman always calls twice. and they'd be correct. sorry if that setup was misleading.

well, in all fairness, based on what i've heard so far, no more shall we part won't be another tender prey though, while the tempos are slow and guitars are nowhere to be found, no more doesn't promise to be as, well, deathly serious as tbc. the highly alliterative and sibiliant "as i sat sadly by her side," a piano-based tale underscored by sobbing strings, may very well be representative of this approach, wherein a devilish nick, with a twinkle his eye, deflowers -- hold on, wait -- an idealistic young woman who sees so much beauty in the world and with a wry smile, nick shatters her illusions and makes her cry as he tries to stifle his laughter and you're left wondering why this girl is with him in the first place. is it the forehead? women love his forehead, i'm told.

the lyrics are literate and thankfully lacking in pretension and the melody is surprisingly tuneful, though there's one great hurdle to get over to enjoy this song: the voice. let's be honest, nick doesn't have the most pleasant of voices, true, but over the years he's learned how to use it to great effect -- imagine anyone else singing "tupelo" or "sad waters." his baritone is profound and striking and so it's a great shame that he refuses to use it here instead opting to sing in his upper register which is a weak, quavering thing and sounds like nothing so much as a (bad) impersonation of bryan ferry. i found it difficult to overlook my first several listens but once you're used to it, you're ready to enjoy it unabated. file under: music to ingeniously craft the downfall of man to.
-fred solinger | steal this link! | discuss