Some Songs Considered

“Kiss Me On the Bus” – The Replacements
(Words/music: Paul Westerberg, available on Tim, Sire 1985) 

Elsewhere on this blog, I wrote about how Paul Westerberg’s lyrics in many of my favorite Replacements songs drew on both adolescent spirit and the wisdom of hindsight.  Of course, this is only something that resonated with me once I reached a comfortable distance from my teenage years.  I first loved the Replacements as a teenager because these songs made a lot of sense when a lot of things stopped.  It also helped that these songs were often exciting, loud, energetic, and generally clever – all of the qualities I wanted to emulate even if I didn’t know how to go about doing that. 

My introduction to the band even ties into one of the quintessential teenage experiences.  I bought my first Replacements album the same day as my first date.

Appropriately (whether it’s based on the kind of teenager who becomes a Replacements’ obsessive or because you know me personally), I didn’t quite realize that it was a date until after the fact; a friend of mine convinced me to go to the homecoming dance with her, and I was too thick to read past “it would be fun if we went together.”  Regardless, I don’t quite remember why, but the afternoon before the dance I ended up at Circuit City and came home with Tim.  Whether I went out specifically to buy the record or that I had previously read about it and found it at a reasonable price, I came home and gave it my first listen on my boom box while I cleaned myself up for my first semi-formal dance.  I imagine that the giddiness in the first half of the album, particularly on “Kiss Me on the Bus” either resonated with me or fed into my nervousness.

It’s odd how memories and associations start to shift over the years.  A lot of the songs on Tim tie in to specific points in my life (“Bastards of Young” became the anthem of my aimless years, and “Left of the Dial” became my college radio show’s calling card), and the lingering memory of that first date (with no offense intended – it was a lovely evening) is the preparation for it, including coming home and putting on Tim for the first time.  The first half of side A, whether spinning on my turntable in my apartment or funneling through my earphones in the grocery store, always seems to find a way to bring a small part of me back to a time in my life where “lather-rinse-repeat” felt like the best idea in the world.

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

“The Cutter” – Echo and the Bunnymen
(Words/music: Pete de Freitas/Ian McCulloch/Les Pattinson/Will Sergeant, available on Porcupine, Sire 1983)

Most of “The Cutter” feels tightly wound.  Whether it’s the way the synthesized strings open the song at an unusually quick pace or the way that the guitar chords during the verse feel like sudden jolts designed to keep everything moving, the song’s basic elements create a sense of haste.  Even if a few of the basic elements, specifically the bass line, sound similar to something like Gang of Four, “The Cutter” doesn’t run on the same nervousness or pent-up energy.  Instead, everything feels quick – not rushed, but not exactly standing around either. 

In fact, this quick pace only feels quick when compared with the post-chorus.  Unlike the tightly restricted verses, this section widens the scope and reaches outward.  The hurried synth-strings becomes a triumphant fanfare of synthesized horns and the jabs of guitar shift to a steady rhythm.  Where the sense of quickness in the verses might come from the tightness, this section feels far less restrained.  Even at the same tempo, this post-chorus feels free and effortless, almost like an object in flight.  In a way, the verse felt like the rumble of an airplane on the runway quickly moving along yet feeling every bump along the way.  Then, from the moment it reaches liftoff, the soaring feeling overtakes the quick pace.  The song works similarly – the uplifting fanfare overtakes the quick pace.

More on Echo and the Bunnymen: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm

“The Killing Moon” – Echo & The Bunnymen
(Words/music: Pete de Freitas, Ian McCulloch, Les Pattinson, Will Sergeant, available on Ocean Rain, Sire 1984)

This August, Echo & the Bunnymen and Coldplay will perform on the same night at New York’s All Points West festival.  It seems appropriate because these two bands have a lot in common with each other. Specifically, both bands craft pop songs in a specific style – Coldplay sounds like a ballad-heavy Radiohead and Echo & The Bunnymen buffed out many of post-punk’s rough edges.  This earns both bands their fair share of detractors, leveling claims that the two are derivative or – even worse – boring.  Sure, neither band will go down in the books as daringly innovative, but I’m not sure that was either band’s goal.  Instead, these bands pour their energy into making their songs bigger and more lavish; to them, innovation means making a grander song.  Of course, this will turn some people off right away, but it’s at the expense of the songs.  Yes, both bands are a little over-the-top at times (and if you catch me in a weaker moment, I’d probably wonder out loud how these two are closing a major music festival), but their best songs deserve the deluxe treatment.  Even if their contemporaries did it better, both bands wrote some of the undeniably best songs of their eras.

The title of “The Killing Moon” suggests a much darker song.  Instead, it strives for a sort of dour beauty rather than gothic gloom.  The tinkling piano lines and guitar phrases echo slightly and sound slightly spooky, but overall they give the song a majestic feeling.  Even Ian McCulloch’s deep voice has a rich tone on this song.  The song (like the album’s cover) sounds cavernous, yet it’s not the kind of cave with the threat of monsters lurking in the darkness.  Instead, it’s sufficiently lit by torches that highlight the cave’s distinctive formations.  It’s a grand song that sounds like a beautiful secret hiding place rather than a source of terror.  Some might label this as false advertising, but hearing “The Killing Moon” should wash away any doubts.  Everything in the arrangement – from the brooding melody to the restrained use of synthesizer in the background – works to create this cavernous wonder.

More on Echo and the Bunnymen: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm

“Start Choppin” – Dinosaur Jr
(Words/music: J Mascis, available on Where You Been, Blaco y Negro / Sire 1993)

J Mascis plays guitar so effortlessly that it looks like he’s barely interested in playing.  When I saw Dinosaur Jr perform last fall, he barely changed expression whether he played chords during a verse or tore through a fast-paced lead section.  Two massive Marshall stacks stood behind him like his army of sonic assault, waiting for their stoic leader to give his orders.  Mascis, now draped in long, silver hair, seems more likely to be a war room tactician than a field general.  Nonetheless, he possesses a quiet command on stage, directing his guitar to replicate the precise tone, timbre, and volume at the blink of an eye.  Sure, Lour Barlow and drummer Murph are valuable allies, but Mascis is the Supreme Allied Commander in Dinosaur Jr, calling the shots and leading the way through an assault on our ear drums.

I prefer to think of Mascis as a sonic commander rather than just a guitar hero because he does more than just shred.   He understands his strengths as a musician (and his band’s too) and writes songs that play directly to his strengths.  “Start Choppin” shows Mascis range as a guitar player by moving between the playful opening riff, the weighty post-chorus chug, and the unhinged solo in the song’s second half.  Sure, Mascis could play at full throttle for three minutes and might make it sound exciting, but he prefers restraint in his songs by offering some contrast.  He also spins a solid melody, and even if Mascis will never sing like seraphim, he keeps it in a range that makes him sound quirky and casual rather than deficient.  Lou Barlow might have a (slightly) better voice, but Mascis needs to be front and center with his compositions.  Everything he does, whether it’s the casual vocals, the graceful shifts in texture, or the acrobatic guitar parts, comes across as confidently effortless.  I’m certain that Mascis became a virtuoso only through many years of practice, but his greatest gift is his ability to make what others might twist into complex compositions into simple blasts of distorted pop.  If Mascis says to start choppin’, I’m asking where to begin.

More on Dinosaur Jr: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm

“Movin’ On Up” – Primal Scream
(Words/music: Bobby Gillespie, Andrew Innes, and Robert Young, available on Screamadelica, Sire 1991)

I wasn’t prepared for my first encounter with Screamadelica.  I only knew Primal Scream casually, and from a couple casual listens to their late 90s output (plus my preconceived notions of what a band called “Primal Scream” should sound like) I expected something harsh and jarring.  Instead, I found the record in the used bin somewhere, brought it home and watched my jaw drop.  Until Bobby Gillespie sang the titular line to this song, I wasn’t sure I had the right album.  This was far too bright, melodic, and even soulful to be the same band I expected.  Instead, the album turned out to be something incredibly unique (to me, at least) – it manages to transcend genre.  Most reviews will throw out a bunch of hyphenated genre terms, but it’s really about using elements from different genres to create a specific sound.  It shares sounds with dance records and rock records (and soul, hip hop, and others too) yet never wholly belongs to any single genre.  It bursts out of the stereo and commands attention, regardless of your genre preferences.

Screamadelica hasn’t aged equally.  A couple of the tracks (predictably, the ones that lean a bit heavier on house music, so that might just be my taste talking) sound like the early 1990s, but many of them still sounded fresh when I discovered the record in the early 2000s (and still do today).  “Movin’ On Up” still sounds vibrant and uplifting.  Appropriately, Gillespie borrows some of the language of gospel music (“I was blind / now I can see” or all of this talk about shining lights) and even recruits a couple members of the choir to assist him.  This is dangerous territory – one false step and the track becomes cheesy imitation or a bland pastiche – yet Gillespie navigates it capably with producer Jimmy Miller’s guidance.  Rather than make a gospel record (and really, who would want to hear one sung by a guy who was once in the Jesus and Mary Chain), Gillespie and Miller borrow the elements they like – the specific shades that will help color the entire picture – and place them along with that bright “Love the One Your With”-like guitar riff.  Everything works well together – especially that wonderful guitar solo, one that I can imagine Noel Gallagher tucked away in his memory bank.  It’s the kind of song that might sound clumsy on paper, but quickly reveals its graceful nature within seconds.

More on Primal Scream: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm