miércoles 18 de noviembre de 2009

Hugs And Kisses

The Strangely Muted Outbursts of Everett True

1. Tom Waits – Glitter And Doom

It’s a marketing device.

It’s a great marketing device. Give away eight tracks of Tom Waits’ upcoming live album to anyone who visits his new site, and no talk of donations or generosity or pythons wanting to be Bono, either. The reason it’s a great marketing device, one that works far better than Radiohead or Smashing Pumpkins gathering reams of column inches when they try something similar is because… to put it crudely… precisely what are Thom Yorke or Billy Corgan giving you for free that you haven’t heard thousands of times before, blasting out of late night TV sets or stadium PA systems? It’s marvellous, this ability the Internet gives us for downloading music free but stop, wait and think a moment. Do you really want most – or any – of it? There’s a reason there are critics (experts) out there. Life needs its filters, same way the sewers of Paris need their covers.

The reason this is such a superior marketing device compared to all else is that – damn it, you might want to listen to Waits’ gruff, maudlin tones pummelling their way through esoteric, cabaret-style dissertations on the sexuality of Christ, one-armed dwarves, and the loneliness of the male seahorse. Whereas there’s not the remotest hope in hell you could possibly want to do anything more than parade down the sidewalk next to Brighton beach clutching a triple-underlined idiot board proclaiming you didn’t pay anything for that new Radiohead song… what, listen to it? Are you crazier than crazed Jack McCrazy’s distraught elder brother Crazed Jock McCrazy? And any lingering residual guilt you might feel towards Waits as a slobbering grateful fan doesn’t exist… because, in your heart, you KNOW Waits doesn’t give a fuck how you feel, he’s doing it cos he’s rich and able to.

Speaking of which... have you joined Lily Allen’s campaign ~~in favour of the right for rich artists to get even richer at everyone else's expense~~ against file-sharing yet? No, that’s right, go ahead. She’s only doing it for her own good. I was listening to her forget the words to The Specials’ ‘Gangsters’ live at Glastonbury the other day on YouTube. Contrast to Amy Winehouse’s incredible readings of songs made rightly famous by The Specials on their debut album. I don’t give a shit about Allen’s right-wing political views frankly… that’s up to her. But when you start messing with the mother lode that is The Specials, that’s when I start getting steamed.

2. The Pepper Pots – Shake It!
Dum Dum Girls – Yours Alone (12 pulgadas)
Vivian Girls – Everything Goes Wrong

If you want to do it right, keep it simple. Know what to leave out. Resist the temptation to bring it slam up to date, that’s not why you’re doing it. Watch those harmonies. The harmonies matter. If you’re going to bring brass in, pay attention to Ms Winehouse not Ms Allen, to those impeccable mannered dudes from The Dap-Kings. (If you want attitude you might want to look to Ms Allen, though.) The image is important, very important – uniformity of style is always a winner, as are go-go boots and Mod fashions.

Don’t overreach yourselves. If you are going to overreach yourselves, then keep it subtle – Amy’s delighted laugh halfway through the studio version of ‘Hey Little Rich Girl’ (available on the bonus disc with "Back To Black") springs to mind.

Spain’s Pepper Pots are so Brighton’s Pipettes Mark One (um, only way more professional) it hurts me to look at them, shimmying their way across the dance floors.

A few weeks back, I was watching Vivian Girls – three girls, three harmonies, their drummer never forgets the Golden Rule that where percussion started going wrong is when percussionists started crossing their arms – play live at the Step Inn in Brisbane, and what impressed me most is the way they never let the façade slip, not once. It didn’t slip even when they were asking for way more brightness and reverb on their vocal microphones than the place was clearly able to give. It especially didn’t slip when the Bassist That Everyone Had A Crush On (not me, cos she reminded me too closely of another friend) was raising her beer in mock-celebration and toasting Friday for us all. It didn’t slip when the Lead Guitarist was picking out the solo runs, all trebly and super-saturated and insanely unforgiving. It didn’t slip when one song relentlessly followed the next relentlessly followed the next relentlessly followed the next in the no-nonsense tradition of every punk house party band these Brooklyn ladies grew up seeing play.

Indeed, the façade so didn’t slip that you know that in no shape or form was it really a façade in the first place. Or (as I wrote for Australia’s The Vine)...

I have no idea about defining music by making ill-founded assumptions about recording technique. I don’t know about that. Listen to ‘You’re My Guy’ from Vivian Girls’ occasionally art-punk second album Everything Goes Wrong. All I know is Vivian Girls get Ramones the way no band has got Ramones since Scotland’s Shop Assistants in the mid-80s (except perhaps Pink Flag-era Wire).

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