I have a Dream (or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Electricity)

To be released on Full Time Hobby next week, a Tim and Jeff Buckley tribute album called “Dream Brother.” Artist and track listing is as follows:

The Magic Numbers - Sing A Song For You
Micah P. Hinson - Yard Of Blonde Girls
Sufjan Stevens - She Is
King Creosote - Grace
The Earlies - I Must Have Been Blind
Bitmap - Dream Brother
Engineers - Song To The Siren
Adem - Mojo Pin
Tunng - No Man Can Find The War
Stephen Fretwell - Morning Theft
Kathryn Williams - Buzzin' Fly
Matthew Herbert & Dani Siciliano - Everybody Here Wants You
Clayhill - The River

We’ll see if the Engineers can touch the This Mortal Coil version of “Song to the Siren” (even though Liz and Robin say they hate it). I’m particularly looking forward to hearing The Earlies interpretation of “I Must Have Been Blind”. You can hear a clip of Sufjan’s contribution on the fan site All Good Naysayers : http://allgoodnaysayers.net/news/2005/09/06/dream-brother/

On an unrelated topic, I have been hit by lightning. Well, not me personally but my computer has had an electrical smack down. Just in case you think you are safe (I thought I was immune), I am providing a link for Dummies (i.e. people like me).

http://www.dummies.com/WileyCDA/DummiesArticle/id-2270.html

Caveat venditor

Tom Waits is suing a European division of General Motors, claiming they used an imitation of his voice in one of their car commercials. Waits was approached on a number of occasions by an advertising firm who wished to use one of his songs. Each time he refused, so the advertising firm took it upon themselves to find someone who sounded like Waits and aired the commercial in Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Finland earlier this year.

Waits has remarked, “apparently the highest compliment our culture grants artists nowadays is to be in an ad – ideally naked and purring on the hood of a new car. I have adamantly and repeatedly refused this dubious honor.” He is suing for damages on the grounds that the company violated his “personality rights.”

Other recent car advertising music, that I am aware of, has featured:

Grandaddy’s Nature Song
Aqueduct's Hardcore Days Softcore Nights
Donovan’s Catch the Wind
CIV's Can't Wait One Minute More
Buzzcocks’ Why Can't I Touch It

For the smaller bands, the money probably helps to keep them afloat and further away from having to obtain restrictive big-label contracts. Nonetheless, it is still shocking to hear these sound bites.

On a related note, you can see the trippy M&Ms commercial which features Iron & Wine’s cover of The Postal Service song Such Great Heights here:
http://us.mms.com/us/fungames/tv/play_mov.jsp?movieid=Kscope_30_7PM_300

Also, check out this 2001 New York Times article about "bands selling out":
http://www.elephant6.com/press/NYtimes.html

I hope some day you'll join us...

There will be an anti-war rally and a concert in Washington DC on Saturday, September 24th. Anti-war protestors are demanding an end to the war in Iraq and the immediate withdrawal of US troops.

Activities include a mass rally on the Ellipse in front of the White House (rally site opens at 7:00 am and at 11:30 am there is a scheduled joint rally) and a march downtown. After which there will be an anti-war concert at the Washington Monument. The concert will be hosted by Jello Biafra and feature such artists as:

Thievery Corporation, Bouncing Souls, Joan Baez, Le Tigre, The Coup, Steve Earle, Ted Leo + the Pharmacists, Wayne Kramer with the Bellrays, Living Things, Sweet Honey in the Rock, The Evens, Machetres, Head-Roc.

Please visit these sites for more information:

http://www.opceasefire.org/
http://www.unitedforpeace.org/
http://dc.indymedia.org/
http://www.internationalanswer.org/

Like an X-Ray

This is an actual X-Ray of my left ankle complete with screws and plate. Tis' lovely, innit? I broke it while descending the staircase of my flat in London (stupid thick-sole Doc Martens). I spent a week in the Chelsea & Westminister Hospital where they take pain management very seriously (wheeee!). I now have Frankenstein scars on either side of my ankle -- I like to tell people I broke it while sky diving.

Since my sister works in MRI (started in X-Ray), I thought I would make her a mix c.d. with either titles or suggestions of X-Ray and the like. The two songs I thought of immediately are here with links (though I think the second link doesn't work at the moment):

Andrew Morgan - Misadventures in Radiology
http://www.andrew-morgan.com/flash/mp3/05.mp3

Bill Ricchini - Like an X-Ray
http://www.billricchini.com/BR_mp3/like_an_xray.mp3

That obviously isn't enough, so I queried one of my favorite music boards and here are some of their suggestions (copied and pasted verbatim so formats are inconsistent):

Bauhaus - The Man With X-Ray Eyes
Ray Davies - X-Ray
Jets To Brazil - "Your X-Rays Have Just Come Back From The Lab And We Think We Know What Your Problem Is"
Liz Phair---X-ray Man
Fountains of Wayne---Radiation Vibe
Grifters - "X-Ray Hip"
The Vapors: Turning Japanese "I want a doctor to take your picture, so I can look at you from inside as well."
Screaming Blue Messiahs: Good And Gone "Your X-rays have just come through, and we know what the problem is."

Feel free to leave me a comment with your suggestion if you can think of any and I will try and make this mix c.d. work. Thanks!

Thin Lads

Recently, I was recounting the days of my late teens to a friend in New Zealand. That, of course, opened up a floodgate of memories from days when I didn’t have to worry about mortgage, insurance payments and the lot. So what does one do when they are feeling nostalgic in the 21st century?

So I Googled my favorite local band from those days – the Thin Lads! No hits for the Lads but found a mention of their former lead singer Barry Copeland in a July Virginian-Pilot article. So what is Barry doing now? Apparently he has changed his name to Barry Bliss and is recording on Antifolk in New York. I am providing a couple of links to websites and an mp3 of his solo work. His voice seems different (different sound of music all together) but still great—I just wish I could provide an mp3 of Thin Lads (and maybe I will one day as I have their demo tape among a plethora of other late 1980s/early 1990s local Norfolk bands).

I now have Barry's c.d. and you should have it too.

Barry Bliss - A Bullett in the Dark :: mp3 :: Barry Bliss on Antifolk

**2011 Edit: There is a Thin Lads entry (no. 44) on the Hardcore Norfolk site which leads me to believe that there will be some Lads discussion in the film to open in 2011. See the trailer here.

Perfect Stranger

The world is full of strangers
They are very strange
I am never going to know them
Which I find easy to arrange.
Florine Stettheimer,
Crystal Flowers
(New York: Privately Published, 1949), 59.

Portrait of Myself,
Florine Stettheimer,
1923, oil on canvas

Mexicano en Suecia

I'm not sure what the Mexican population in Sweden is but I do know that there is a Swedish band called The Mexicos who make great music. They make me happy -- I hope you enjoy them as much as I do. Take a listen:

http://www.pntsstln.com/mexicos/the_mexicos_lofi_referee.mp3

http://www.pntsstln.com/mexicos/the_mexicos_the_paralympics.mp3

http://www.pntsstln.com/mexicos/the_mexicos_grenoble.mp3

http://www.pntsstln.com/mexicos/the_mexicos_undone_&_undo.mp3

The Mexicos (self-titled) cd was released 05-01-2005 on Bedroom Temporary.

Pretty (Ugly Before)

The above images are by artist Marlene Dumas (born 1953, South Africa) and are part of her Magdalena series (ink on paper from the collection of the Tate Gallery). Dumas has the distinction of having the highest price paid for a work by a living female artist at auction. Her 1987 painting The Teacher yielded an incredible $3.34 million at Christie’s earlier this year. This is interesting as this is an artist who does not paint the niceties of life. Instead, much of her work challenges Western notions of ideal body types, standards of beauty and sexual politics.

Dumas's work, while restricted by the confines of two dimensions, is able to depict the life force and natural form of woman – that is, the breath and swell of natural forms. Her work seeks to explore gender roles and societal norms. Her figures often show an isolated woman against a white backdrop in her most vulnerable state, which creates a sense of alienation. Through the use of exaggerated forms, such as a swollen abdomen or sagging breasts, she is able to encapsulate the essence of woman's unconstrained form and her subjects are mostly of under-represented groups in society.

I really like the contradiction of style within her works. In one sense everything seems quite painterly and fluid and in other areas the forms are very graphic and articulated. Dumas wrote in 1999, “What a funny thing painting is. The abstract painters always insist on their connection with the visible reality, while the so called figurative artists (or at least I do) insist that what they really care about, is the abstract qualities of life.”

Her works and shows of the last few years tend to focus more on sexual dynamics and are openly sensual while still maintaining a sense of alienation. While not always considered "pretty," these types of images often create a sense of voyeurism for the viewer. It goes beyond the sense of vulnerability to more explicit emotions of pain, tension and sometimes humor.

You can see more of her works at Postmedia:
http://www.postmedia.net/dumas/dumas.htm

Three Little Indies

Over the weekend, as I was laid up writhing in pain, I watched a few films -- one that I had never seen and two that I've seen on so many occasions I can almost recite. (Please note, this isn't going to be a film review -- they are just three movies that I like and I think I relate to in some pathetic and tragic ways).

The first was Chi Girl which I was happy to finally catch. It isn't a typical mockumentary because the "documentary" within the film becomes a character of its own (if that makes sense). The character that it is based around, Heather, is a bit of a dysfunctional mess. I was so reminded of myself in her obsessive-compulsive behavior of checking her watch every 10 minutes and phoning home to pick up her non-existent voice mail (uh, yea, I do that too). The "narrator" character Randy is what I find the most interesting. The way he is simultaneously repelled and attracted to Heather (I find myself being attracted to the most dysfunctional of people and it seems the more of a mess they are, the more attracted I am). Both Heather and Randy have the same stalker qualities and become quite obsessed about non-existent relationships. While it doesn't sound very romantic, I found it to be a very romantic film (at least what qualifies as so in my universe).

So after feeling completely, yet oddly romanticized by Chi Girl I decided to break out two other films that I also relate to on a "girly" level. First is Welcome to the Dollhouse which tells the story of a bullied pre-teen girl in suburbia. Dawn is homely, not popular, emotionally abused by family and sexually harassed by a local boy. Every time I watch this film I feel a great deal of discomfort yet I want to watch how Dawn deals with these situations. She seems very superficial on some levels but you know that her character is built from adversity and that generally makes for a more thinking and interesting person in the end. The banality of suburban living is so aptly portrayed, you feel as if this could have been the home of a family that you visited sometime in your youth.

The last film I watched was Ghost World which I adore even though it is fairly simplistic as a tale of someone who feels like an outsider. I can't help but see a parallel in Enid's strange relationship with Seymour with a relationship I once had (oh, I'm not going to reveal here, heh). I also identify with the way she pushes folks away and then feels slighted when they don't call or concern themselves with her. On another basic level, the whole "becoming yourself" and identity building is so important at that age. Lastly, the whole "truth is stranger than fiction" element is showcased very well (i.e. the crassness of every day living in consumer-oriented America). Like Chi Girl, the main character disappears in the end which is a fantasy I think we all share at some point in our lives (the idea of picking up and leaving and starting new somewhere else, sigh).

Chi Girl (1999; written, directed and 'starred' Heidi Van Lier)
Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995; written and directed by Todd Solondz)
Ghost World (2000; written by and based on comic book by Daniel Clowes; directed by Terry Zwigoff)

Glossary (part I)

crenellation

n 1: a rampart built around the top of a castle with regular gaps for firing arrows or guns [syn: battlement, crenelation] 2: the action of constructing rampparts with gaps for firing guns or arrows [syn: crenelation]

Source: WordNet ® 2.0, © 2003 Princeton University

I chose the architectural term “crenellation” as I am one of those folks who safely guards my true feelings but have the periodic urge to fire off some shots.

I find the whole blog phenomena interesting in a Marshall McLuhan-ish way. He wrote that "all media are extensions of some human faculty -- psychic or physical” and that "the wheel is an extension of the foot; the book is an extension of the eye; clothing, an extension of the skin; electric circuitry, an extension of thecentral nervous system." I guess I’ll use this as an extension for the now.