Monthly Archives: March 2007

Site News

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Hey there,

Jon here. I’ve added a new feature for registered users which will allow you to subscribe to post-update notifications by e-mail. So, if you’re not quite hip to the RSS thing (and, let’s face it, it’s really just for rave children…), then you’ve got another option. Registration is easy, as the link is on the menu bar, and you’ll never need to fear the spam bogeyman because of me. Once you’ve registered, you can change your subscription options from your profile.

In the next few weeks, we should find a story about the early days of Pluto Tapes “frontman” Andy Hicks, my favorite R.E.M. concert moment, as well as teenage odes to love and death. Oh, and quite possibly the reveal of our very first collaborative project! (Let’s say that there’s a fifty-percent chance, here.)

And, as ever, if there’s something you’d like to try, ask me: I won’t say no – How could I?

Sigur Rós, #1

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sigurros.jpg

There is an archway in Oxford – a replica of the Bridge of Sighs – and it stands, for no particular reason, at the head of Queen’s Lane. The only prison it joins is a library, and, yet, its decontextualized nature allows it to become part of the essential semiotics of Oxford. It is fitting, then, that I should pass beneath it as the first humming sounds of Sigur Rós’ #1 came through on a foggy, October evening. The experience of listening to this song, and the untitled album from which it comes, did much to realign my perception of what was possible, and, indeed, what was in my life.

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Tom Waits / Bruce Springsteen, “Jersey Girl”

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In an earlier conversation about the Counting Crows cover of The Psychedelic Furs’ “The Ghost in You,” I said that a cover version should do these things: “…present an alternative viewpoint, invoke the sensibility of the original, and leave you with a newfound appreciation for the genius of song.” And, I suppose, that’s pretty much how I feel about it. Cover songs are remarkably tricky animals, as the best you can hope for is to distinguish yourself from the original artist in a way that is both interesting and insightful, and, yet, avoids being truly ignoble. Which is to say that there’s a fairly long distance on the continuum between Flying Lizard’s cover of “Money (That’s What I Want)” and Nirvana’s version of “Where Did You Sleep Last Night?” Occasionally, if a band is quite lucky, they find a way to truly make another artist’s art their own. In this category, you might place Pearl Jam’s rendition of “Rockin’ in the Free World,” or “Winterlong” by the Pixies. (Seems Neil Young gets all the love, tonight.) Continue reading →

Genesis, “Home By The Sea”

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Images of sorrow, pictures of delight
Things that go to make up a life
Endless days of summer, longer nights of gloom
Waiting for the morning light
Scenes of unimportance like photos in a frame
Things that go to make up a life

 

 

The very first concert I ever went to was one given by John Denver at the Worcester Centrum in 1982. I don’t really remember a lot about this particular concert, as I was about three, except for this strong mental image of the lights going dark, and then coming up over the stage as John made his way through the crowd. Now, there aren’t a lot of ways I can spin this experience as cool, and, to be honest, it really is incidental to the story. Suffice it to say that this was the first time I’d ever seen so many people in one place, and it has come to mind at every concert that I’ve attended since. Really – even at Nine Inch Nails concerts. (How’s that for street cred?) I suppose, though, that the reason I was there in the first place was that my mother’s albums had largely consisted of singer-songwriters from the 60s and 70s. People like Don McLean, Joan Baez, and so on. I will admit that I still know the words to almost every John Denver song I’ve ever heard, though. And, between you and me, I even like some of them. Continue reading →

Peter Gabriel, “Mercy Street”

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Late at night, when almost everyone is asleep and my mind wanders over the width and breadth of my life, those thousand sordid images, I find myself drawn to certain songs. It’s an instinct that I’ve had since I was very little, and I’m sure my father, and the music he lulled me to sleep with, has everything to do with it. This song has ever been one of the late-night songs. I first heard it when I was about ten. My uncle Troy had the “Sixteen Golden Treats” disc, and he would let me borrow it from time to time. I remember staying up in the small hours listening to it over and over. Over the years, I’ve really come to admire Peter Gabriel’s originality. His fierce, and often impossible, integrity as an artist. I don’t really intend to go too deeply into it, as I’m really only here to share this brief moment with you. (Never fear, though: Peter will certainly be along soon enough in the “Songs” series.) Continue reading →