MUSIC – Page 29

DANIEL JOHNSTON

Monday, November 13, 2006

You must be wrong if you think you don’t love me…

This is the first song you see Daniel Johnston play in the wonderful documentary about his life, THE DEVIL AND DANIEL JOHNSTON. I couldn’t get it out of my head for a week.

If you’re unfamiliar with Daniel Johnston’s music and art, check out his website, the fansite Rejected Unknown, and the BBC Collective’s page on him.

Here’s a great Youtube clip of his song, “I Had Lost My Mind,” complete with an animated drawing from the documentary:

I promise tomorrow I’m going to post a nice pretty picture up here, but for now, The Dems won, Meg and I just finished kicking the GRE in the nuts, and it’s 60 degrees outside, so we’re going to relax and get the apartment ready for the company we’re having this weekend.

In the meantime, there’s a great article from Slate about R.E.M. versus U2. Sorry Don, but I’m on the R.E.M. side of the fence. I went through my big R.E.M. phase in high school, when I ~~stole~~ borrowed a copy of Reckoning from my girlfriend’s brother. I hadn’t listened to them lately until I found a mint copy of the Murmur LP at Half Price for four bucks. Ooh, did it sound good.

Other things that sound good: Exploding Hearts and this dude.

MP3 MONDAY: MOULTY!

Monday, November 6, 2006

I remember the days when things were real bad for me
It was right after my accident, when I lost my hand…

The Barbarians – “Moulty”

[audio:http://www.austinkleon.com/mp3monday/moultybarbarians.mp3]

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“Moulty” was a song by a Cape Cod garage band called the Barbarians, who in 1964 grew shoulder-length hair, wore sandals, and were fronted by a one-armed drummer with a hook.

Moulty was drummer/singer Victor Moulton, who at the age of 14 had lost his left hand while he was building a pipe bomb, and this 1965 single is a recitation by Moulton (backed not by the other Barbarians, but a cadre of New York session musicians including, allegedly, members of Levon and the Hawks, soon to become the Band) about his accident and how it changed his life. The monologue, written by producer Doug Morris, is sappier than a sugar maple in March, but the combination of the cheesy recitation and the sloppy rock and roll backing, with its drunk-sounding, ragged massed backing vocals, is oddly appealing. The Barbarians didn’t think so, and left Laurie Records soon after the single was released without the band’s consent.

I can’t get enough of this song. It’s so goofy and hilarious, but so earnest. It makes me happy.

If you head over to Rbally, you can listen to a version of Yo La Tengo doing it live with Lenny Kaye (Patti Smith’s guitar player, and the compiler of the original Nuggets collection on which “Moulty” was collected) in 2005. Also, be sure to check out some video of Victor’s one-handed drumming.

“Moulty!”

EVERYBODY’S TRYING TO BE MY BABY

Thursday, August 17, 2006

“I don’t want to throw out any sacred things. What…is sacred? Oh, Romeo and Juliet, for instance. And all music is.”

– Vonnegut, BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS

I’ve found music is one of the only really great cures for depression. Yesterday I listened to Carl Perkins’ “Everybody’s Trying To Be My Baby” probably half a dozen times:

well they took some honey from a tree / dressed it up and called it me

everybody’s tryin’ to be my baby

i went out last night ’bout half past four / fifty women knocking on my door

everybody’s tryin’ to be my baby

Now, there’s some debate as to whether Perkins wrote the song or not (there was a swing band in the 30s who did a song by the same name), but regardless: what possesses somebody to write such a ridiculous song? Do you think Carl Perkins’ life was really like that?

I prefer to think that whoever wrote the song was just using their imaginations. What if, instead of being lonely, a million women were chasing you around? What if, instead of being a nobody, everybody in the world wanted a piece of you?

There could even be a little trace of menace in the song. I mean, does this guy ever get any alone time? If you swapped “to be my baby” with “to get my money,” you’d have a paranoid celebrity song, wouldn’t you?

Either way, I like the song, and it makes me feel happy.

SVENONIUS FOR PRESIDENT!

Wednesday, August 9, 2006

Here is the chapter list for Ian Svenonius’s just-released PSYCHIC SOVIET, a “set of nineteen essays and prose pieces” presented “in pocket size for the student’s easy reference in the event of any ethical and/or aesthetic quandaries,” complete with links to excerpts or related articles:

Instructions
The Psychic Soviet
Vampirism & Vampirology
The Blood Latte
Beatles vs Stones
Rock ‘n’ Rolligion
The Responsible Use of R ‘n’ R
Eat the Rocument
Time as Money
Seinfeld Syndrome
Rock ‘n’ Roll As Real Estate
A Warning to Swedish Girls
Scion-tology
Mordor Dearest
Camp Exploitation
The Stilyagi
The Seduction of Paolo Hewitt
The Mix Master Race
You Can’t Always Get No Satisfaction
Person Inscription

I’m a big fan of Ian’s live music and his pseudo-academic-rock-n-roll rants, but you might be wondering, “How seriously should I take this book?” Well, here’s a quote from an interview from TimeOut Chicago:

How seriously do you think people should take the book?
This is something that I deal with a lot. People in America are so binary. They think that if something’s funny that it’s not serious. If you can manage to be funny, that doesn’t mean that things don’t mean anything. I’m sure Thomas Jefferson told some jokes.

Chapters I’m looking forward to? “Beatles vs. Stones” (I’m leaning towards the Stones these days), and “Seinfeld Syndrome,” which is supposedly about how Seinfeld was a ploy to market New York to the upper-class (did you know you can catch reruns every night at both 7:30 and 11?)

Ian is also on tour, and on Myspace, where he posts a blog. (And where there’s also a hilarious Weird War promotion.)

“The light has been switched to the ON position!” I’m rooting for you, Ian. And us! Here’s some YouTube from the Make-Up days: