Some Songs Considered

“Sonic Reducer” – Dead Boys
(Words/music: Stiv Bators/Johnny Blitz/Cheetah Chrome/Jeff Magnum/David Thomas/Jimmy Zero, available on Younger, Louder, and Snottier: The Rough Mixes, Bomp 1989)

“Sonic Reducer” speaks to the part of my soul that rarely expresses itself in words, which is probably why I’m writing and immediately deleting lines of clichés trying to start this post.  It taps into the sort of adolescent anger that attracts many of us to punk rock in the first place, but does so in an aggressive and blatant way.  It gives these feelings a backbone rarely associated with this strand of punk; usually this sort of rage comes with a nervous, frantic energy.  However, “Sonic Reducer” sounds like a freight train accelerating downhill, barreling through with enough force to destroy anything in its wake.

So when Bomp records reissued the “rough mix” of the Dead Boys debut, “Sonic Reducer” probably didn’t need a refinishing.  There are a few expected touches, such as a slightly quicker tempo and a more abrasive guitar sound immediately.  Overall, the song has a dryer, rawer sound than the original version and sounds like Raw Power-era Stooges.  For me, the drum break at the end validates this alternate version.  Where the original puts some sort of panning effect on the drums, the raw treatment of the tom toms gives this version eeriness on top of its aggression.  Coupled with the most brazen lyric in the song (“I’ll be a pharaoh soon”), this bridge tips the song into a new realm of menacing confidence – one that speaks to the part of us that wishes we could declare ourselves kings and act upon this declaration confidently.

More on Dead Boys: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm

“Watching the Detectives” – Elvis Costello
(Words/music: Elvis Costello, available on My Aim is True (Reissue), Rykodisc 1993)

Elvis Costello earned a reputation as a gifted lyricist.  Most discussions of his music, particularly his late ‘70s output, focuses on the sarcasm, wordplay, and wit in his lyrics (which makes sense for a man who uses the word “anaesthetize” in a pop song).  His skill doesn’t end on the lyric sheet, though; Costello could put notes on a staff with the same expertise he could fill his notebook.  Whether arranging his own songs or producing others records, Costello has a knack for using his core group of musicians to create whatever sound or mood his song needs. 

“Watching the Detectives” does this particularly well.  Using the same group of core instruments that made the melancholy “Allison,” Costello turns a wobbily reggae shuffle into a darker, more sinister sounding song.  The lyrics draw on the melodrama in a TV detective show, and in turn Costello draws on some of sounds of a noir thriller in his song.  Overall, it makes his story about a couple divided by television that much more mysterious.  Like the shows the lover enjoys watching, we’re missing some of the clues about the relationship; borrowing some of the musical tricks from these shows is Costello’s way of winking at us as he makes a boring night on the couch seem dramatic.  From the dirty drums to the dark sounding guitar, the dark groove puts us on alert.  When his band suddenly cuts out at the end of the third verse, Costello uses the band to create drama beyond his narrative, ultimately letting the music help him tell his story.  It’s hard to imagine making a droll night in this compelling with words alone.

More on Elvis Costello: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm

“Dancing in the Moonlight (It’s Caught Me in Its Spotlight)” – Thin Lizzy
(Words/music: Phil Lynott, available on Bad Reputation, Mercury 1977)

I’m a night person, and over my lifetime this has been an annoyance to my mother, a badge of honor, a source of professional stress, a partial reason for giving up caffeine for a couple years, and currently an accepted fact of my existence.  Even though I love the early morning, my body prefers to meet the quiet hours right before falling asleep rather than waking up in time for them.  Regardless, I don’t try to fight it as much anymore.  Instead, I try to use my most lucid hours to my advantage (part of the reason why ninety percent of these posts go up just before midnight) and try not to stress too much about the nights where I’m in bed wide awake at 1:30 AM.

In a strange way, I’d say that the late hours feel just like the introduction to this song.  It creates a relaxed cool propelled by finger snaps (because snare drums would wake the neighbors).  Of course, my late nights rarely sound as cool as Phil Lynott, who soulfully tells a story of a teenager getting in trouble for a late night romantic tryst.  His narrator offers the defense that the moonlight made him do the E-Street shuffle, and understand what’s he’s trying to say.  If the late nights and early mornings are equally quiet, the associated revelations tend to be different.  Early mornings offer solitary moments of personal reflection while late nights provide the time to be alone with someone else.  Whether at a dance meeting the pretty people or dancing on the streets with one specific person, the night gives the opportunity to have moments impossible during the busy mid-day rush.   These are the kind of moments that make us spontaneously dance, even if we know we’ll be paying for the consequences for the next few days.

More on Thin Lizzy: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm

“Swingtown” – Steve Miller Band
(Words/music: Chris McCarty/Steve Miller, available on Book of Dreams, Capitol 1977)

I’ve never seen the Steve Miller Band, but everyone I know who has seen them over the past decade gives a similar synopsis – they were a lot of fun, they “jammed” far too much, and Steve Miller uses a different guitar for virtually every song and has a story for each one.  I have little desire to ever see them live, so I’m fine with taking my friend’s word for it.  Still, I appreciate the lengths that Steve Miller goes to validate himself as a masterful guitar player.  It’s wonderful to show off your talents (and he is talented), but it’s Miller’s songs that pay his bills.  At his best, Steve Miller’s songs sound simple and offer little room for improvisation.  When you’re writing snappy pop-rock songs, there isn’t much time for extended guitar solos.  I guess this is how Miller ends up devoting a chunk of his show to a free form blues jam – getting it out of his system so he can get back to the pop songs that made his career.

However, it’s unfair to brand Miller’s best songs as “simple” alone; there’s a great deal of care in the arrangements.  Take “Swingtown” as an example – it’s a simple song about dancing after a long week of work.  However, the arrangement redeems the song from mediocrity.  “Swingtown” flows in a circular pattern by constantly building itself up to a climax only to do it again.  The instruments come in one at a time, vamping on each other until the entire band’s playing.  Once the entire band’s in, Miller presents the song’s best melody without words.  It might seem like a cheap move at first, but in a song that extols the virtues of dancing, Miller’s wordless singing sounds like the beacon summoning the crowd to their feet.  By the time he’s trying to convince the crowd to dance, they’re already moving along with him.

More on Steve Miller Band: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm

“E.M.I.” – The Sex Pistols
(Words/music: Paul Cook, Steve Jones, Glen Matlock, and Johnny Rotten, available on Never Mind the Bollocks, Virgin 1977)

Earlier this week, I was reminiscing about my cassette walkman.  I remember spending hours in high school plugged into it, usually carrying at least one spare tape “just in case” I got stuck somewhere and needed to listen to more than one cassette tape in its entirety lest I’d be forced to interact with someone.  I grew up in the CD era right before CD-Rs became popular (a quick aside – I remember going to a computer show with my dad and getting blank CDs for roughly $2 a piece and thought they were a bargain!), so I rarely bought a new album on cassette.  Instead, my travelling companions came in two varieties – homemade tapes either with an album on each side (or a mix of CD tracks and radio recordings) or bargain bin tapes.  I made a couple huge finds – most prominently I got a copy of R.E.M.’s Chronic Town at a department store going out of business sale.  I also remember having the Sex Pistols’ Never Mind the Bollocks tape in this collection (and I’m sure it’s in one of my shoeboxes somewhere), and I have a very vivid memory of sitting at school waiting for a band rehearsal as the second side of the tape played.  I identified with punk rock because it was many things that I wasn’t at 14 - adventurous, brazen, and uncompromising.  In many ways, this cassette is my personal punk rock emblem – while my peers walked around with portable CD players, I let the cassette wheels’ gentle hum mix in with the power chords.

The Sex Pistols might be more known for their attitude than for their music, and while personality was more important to the Pistols than to some of their peers (The Clash, for example, became more defined by their eclecticism than their attitude, especially in their later years), they deserve a little more credit.  Sure, these songs sneer, spit, and scoff all over the place, but they’re also well written.  “E.M.I.” embodies this balance between spirit and craft.  It’s a dig towards their former label (and by proxy a dig at the “punk as a fashion statement” sentiment), but it’s not as obtuse as the Pistols usually get accused of being.  Sure, they explicitly name the target, but it’s more a list of (reasonable) complaints rather than a libel suit waiting to happen.  It’s a cathartic release of this frustration, but it’s also catchy as hell, from the chanting of the label’s name in the background to the way John Lydon (then Rotten) annunciates every syllable.  He instinctively knows what to distort and what to rush through in order to bring his audience right in line with him.  Looking back at it, especially with it at the very end of Never Mind the Bollocks, “E.M.I.” seems like a triumphant middle finger towards their detractors.  Sure, it’s not polite to gloat when you’ve won, but sometimes it just feels right.

More on The Sex Pistols: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm

“See No Evil” - Television
(Words/music: Tom Verlaine, available on Marquee Moon, Elektra 1977)

Much has been made (and rightfully so), about the expert guitar work on Marquee Moon, but I think that Tom Verlaine’s vocal style sells this song. While the technical prowess surpasses much of the rest of their mid-70s New York peers, somewhere beneath Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd’s dueling guitars lies an anxious, unnerving punk song. Verlaine’s sneer (and it’s truly a sneer - the man can play guitar with the best of them but don’t expect to hear him belting out jazz standards anytime soon) channels Patti Smith’s cadence and pacing. The lyrics even seem like Patti Smith castoffs, which is fine given that the words take a backseat to the vocal delivery and the chugging attack of guitars. That being said, “See No Evil” provides a perfect lyrical start to Marquee Moon. Verlaine squeezes every bit of defiance possible out of his lyrics and conveys the impatience and anxiousness embedded within. That, and even after years of listening to this song, I still find a tremendous amount of joy in shouting out the “evillllll” bit at the end of the chorus. It would have made a fine three-chord romp, but it’s the otherworldly arrangement of those hypnotic guitar lines and open hi-hats that makes this song a classic.

I understand why Michael Stipe would be drawn to this song (given his hero worship of Patti Smith). R.E.M. covered this song a bit in the mid-80s. (ED: Link fixed, not sure why it wasn’t working before)

Oh, and Verlaine and Lloyd wail on this song. Have I mentioned that yet?

More on Television: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm