Archive for July, 2010

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Leave me alone, I’m in control. I’m in control.

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The Strokes – Take It Or Leave It

OK, let’s talk about The Strokes’ show at Hordern Pavilion, Sydney, on Thursday night: I’m not going to pretend to care about the opening acts (who were, by the way, Gypsy & The Cat and The Like) because let’s face it: everybody was waiting for Julian, Albert, Nick, Nikolai, and Fabrizio to hit the stage. The openers were good, they were somewhat entertaining, but in the way they performed and interacted with the crowd it felt as if even they knew everybody was hanging around to see the headliners play.

A band so deeply idolised by the indie cluster who dearly adore Julian’s close-fisted singing-into-the-microphone style attracted a surprisingly violent mosh. There were elbows thrown, toes trod on, gadgets and jackets lost, and tears and expulsions throughout the night. I started the evening two people away from the barrier and finished six or seven rows back, to the side, jumping deliriously as Julian screamed in his ever-waning voice, “He’s gonna let you down!”

I met ginger-haired freckle-faced op-shop jacket wearing Jerry’s with irritatingly high-pitched voices and a defined articulation. I tangoed with trashy blondes wearing leopard skin tights and a lack of inhibition. I frowned at the alpha-dogs thrashing about in their band merchandise with a bottle of Smirnoff double-black in their hands (I know, right?) tilting unsuspecting strangers on their sides with their unbridled aggression.

But, all things said, The Strokes fucking rocked.

Forget going through a list of the songs. Forget talking about how “Last Nite” was met with a chorus of bellowing screams and body jerking. Forget how Julian’s between-song chatter was pretty funny (at one point, he looks at the beaten crowd and says, “I see a lot of beautiful women and violent movements,” prompting more body jerking and screams).

Forget detailing every minute and moment; I’m surprised I remember any of it.

(photos posted courtesy of fasterlouder.com)

[Check my pre-concert ramblings for pathways to the albums. Daniel was supposed to post today, but he’s making a four-hour round trip to a Leonard Cohen concert and asked for one of us to deputise in his absence. I wish him a magical experience.]

Posted on July 31, 2010 - Gigs - 4 Comments » Share

Scalpers and ballroom dancing

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Wolf Parade – No One Saves The Day [ Live]

When I saw Wolf Parade at the Showbox in Seattle on Monday, I killed some time before the show started by smoking a cig out front of the venue. My addiction’s been acting up lately.

Most of the members of Wolf Parade did the same. At one point a scalper approached guitarist Dan Boeckner and tried to sell him a vastly overpriced ticket. Boeckner declined, mentioned he was in the band, and they seemed to joke about it for a bit.

I’m not a big fan of going to shows alone. The shared experience of concerts is pretty ineffable, so having a friend you can turn and look at after the show and see the same gleam in his eyes or upturned corners of his lips helps cement the memory. That’s the same reason I usually dislike bootlegs; too much is lost.

Flying solo for this show ended up working out pretty alright, since I spent most of it with my eyes closed dancing my little white boy dance. It was the most cockrocktastic show I’ve ever been to. I’m pretty sure my penis grew two inches just from feeling the vibrations from those cockrockin’ tunes.

Some of the cheering after songs was louder than the music itself, and Dan mentioned that he enjoyed the “house party vibe” going on in the audience.

During the jam at the end of closer Kissing The Beehive, a guy named Page, who I had met out front, approached me with his hand extended. I went to shake it, but he moved it out, so instead I went in for a hug, figuring we were both drunk and that’s what drunk people do.

“That’s not what I was going for,” he yelled. “Spin.”

So we clasped hands above our heads and spun each other, awkwardly, self-consciously, like ballroom dancers.

Dan should have bought a ticket. Whatever he spent would have been worth it.

[Buy EXPO 86 and download Pardon My Blues.]

Posted on July 30, 2010 - Gigs - No Comments » Share

I live until the call.

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The Tallest Man On Earth – The Wild Hunt

I was never born, I just walked in one frosty morn. I live while I’m living, and I shall live until the call.

When I die, I die and I plan to be forgotten when I’m gone.

My path to heaven is guided. Along that golden highway I see God in the headlights, I read the signs. I say to myself ‘Things I have seen run with the river’s flow, and so shall I’.

Beyond this path I see another world. ‘This is not a summer dream’ I say. There I’ll sleep out in the glade just by the giant tree, just to be closer when my spirit’s pulled away.

And leave my heart to the wild hunt.

[Buy The Wild Hunt.]

And today we have Sam. Sam likes The Tallest Man On Earth. Some cry for Dylan comparisons, others lambaste them for trying. And you?

Posted on July 29, 2010 - Tunes - No Comments » Share

Laughing at the life we’re wasting.

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The Strokes – Someday

Julian was young. His greasy hair framed a kind of chubby face with a faded jawline, against his discolored skin. He wore white-collared shirts and grey suit-pants; flask with a cap screwed on loosely in his back pocket. His voice was unremarkable. Not many paid attention when he spoke.

When he was five, his father threw him a penny and said, “kiddo, work this penny into a dollar and you’ll never go hungry.” He ran into the workshop in the garage and molded that penny into a glowing medallion and stitched it into his chest, “J.C” carved onto the frame. He ran outside, shirtless, and screamed into the rain: “I’m fucking starving!”

The Strokes – Under Control

Julian was older. He was in jail. He’d been pissing on a cop car in downtown Manhattan and they found him unconscious, spread-eagled across the hood, cuffed him and took him in. He was whistling into the wall, forehead scraping against the bricks. There was a stern blonde sitting at the desk. He hummed, “I don’t want to change the world. I don’t want to change your mind.” He chewed through the nail on his pinky finger. She stamped the date on his imprisonment report and chewed on her tongue.

The Strokes – Red Light

On Sunday morning, tracing a circle around Sara’s bellybutton, Julian stared at the ceiling. Sara’s legs wrapped around his. “Are you coming home to me?” came in whispers from her mouth. “Will you stay?

Julian closed his eyes and, speaking to just about anybody that would listen, replied “I would cheat and lie and steal but now I’ll stay at home and kneel for you.”

She lay back on the pillow, sweat simmering in the sheets, and stared at the ceiling. For a long time, she didn’t say a word. And when she did speak, it wasn’t that he wasn’t listening or what she said wasn’t important. It was just that it was for the two of them, and it’s none of your business.

[Buy any one or two or three of Is This It, Room On Fire, or First Impressions Of Earth. I’ll be at the Sydney concert tomorrow night. If you see me, say hello.]

Posted on July 28, 2010 - Tunes - 4 Comments » Share

I can only snigger.

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T. Rex – Life’s A Gas

Sweltering sun and shimmering blades of grass dancing in the wind would suggests a typical exquisite summer evening. That’s just it, though– typical. Even in the midst of dusk’s magic,can the feeling of indifference imbue your state of mind. Where’s that jolt? Where’s that bang? Slipping into a spiral of tawdriness, you’d think to recuperate your buoyancy with a bit of glint and vitality.

I can’t be bothered.

I chose to linger in indifference.

Marc Bolan knows this feeling. Marc Bolan said it all.

Just for another 2 minute and 24 seconds. I want to linger. I want to sulk in the vacancy. I want to lay wilted. I want to dawdle in the realization how nothing really matters at all. I want stare into the exhausted sky. He says he can place my love there. I want to ponder priesthood. I want the strings of the songs to take it’s best shot at breaching the abyss that is my mood. I want to take a crack at breathing unwavered even for the duration of the last 20 luminous seconds of the song.

But I can’t.

Through the jingle of his gripe and the grief of his recollections, I can only snigger. Albeit, I concede the “what if’s”, the “maybe’s”, the “almost’s” induce the most tragic, heartrending, sorrowful tales there are, (they don’t count, you know). Bolan is right. Life’s a gas. [Purchase.]

Posted on July 27, 2010 - Tunes - 1 Comment » Share

She is perfect in that fucked up way

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Everclear -Amphetamine

I should have quit when I wasn’t so far behind.

[Buy So Much For The Afterglow and listen to it pretty consistently in your middle school years so when you play it later on in life it will be drenched in enough nostalgia to drown your inhibitions toward rocking out alone in your car.]

Posted on July 26, 2010 - Tunes - 2 Comments » Share

Before it changes itself.

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Nick Cave – I’m Your Man (orig. Leonard Cohen)*

*Turn the volume up. So loud that if you have to drown out Mr. Cave and can scarcely hear yourself drain the sounds out of your throat so be it.

He awoke that morning feeling dead, looked about his covered walls trying to connect to something; some appearance, some idea, some light, but – nothing. And so he lifted his legs up off of his bed and went outback. Removed a rectangular piece of steel from his pocket and began to drag it across the small of the back of his smooth neck – the blood dripped, it seeped into his black, short-sleeved cotton shirt, flowed over his beautiful soft hands. His mouth wasn’t clasped but its lips felt no jerk as to part and release a sound – not a sigh, not a cry, not a yearn. After three grazes, Kal dropped onto the cemented pavement and rubbed oil onto the bleeding cuts. As he felt the burning sensation he lit a cigarette and his mouth involuntarily formed a smile. Thus, he could walk in the world. Whether the road be concealed with ordinary gravel or reveal a shallow dirt.

[Leonard Cohen’s I’m Your Man soundtrack is awash with glittering covers dragged through the mud. Just like it should be.]

We don’t know who Jerry is. We found this in our email a few mornings ago and here it is today. Maybe he’ll be back someday but regardless, thanks.

Posted on July 25, 2010 - Tunes - 1 Comment » Share

Go, go! Go, Johnny, go go go!

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Chuck Berry – Johnny B. Goode

Strap pushing down on his shoulders, Johnny strummed his air-guitar in front of the mirror with his legs spread wide and one knee kicking to the beat, the other stretched straight. He was wearing his favorite crushed brown leather jacket; one his father would wear on most nights. It was years away from fitting Johnny. He would contort his fingers into perfect chords, and hum his progressions with immaculate timing while grilled chicken and baked potatoes wafted into the room from downstairs where his mother was preparing a meal. Jumping, sneakers pounding down on the hardwood floor with a crash crash crash, Johnny riffed. From downstairs his mother called, “Johnny, be good!”

[Buy Chuck Berry Is On Top.]

Posted on July 24, 2010 - Tunes - 1 Comment » Share

Wisdom

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Marc Streitenfeld – Wisdom

The opening click clack of acoustic and modern swoon may be all your heart needs to fall. This song and its sensitive synth, artfully allowing for the calm transition of keys to horse shoe clatter, calming choir, and drawn out strings. Oh, to have a château in France. I lost one whole summer to that dream – and I’m willing to hold to it tight until its eventual fruition. The wisdom is in the jump, not the landing.

[‘A Good Year’ and its soundtrack.]

Posted on July 23, 2010 - Tunes - No Comments » Share

Dictated but not read.

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Stone Jack Jones – Smile

This time last year, the same date I think, I told someone in a
drunken ramble that, “I pride myself on my impotence, er,
independence.” That is exactly what I said. I can remember
word-for-word what it was I said a year ago, but not who I was talking
with when I said it. I remember the song that was whispering fuzzy
through a radio close by, but not who it was I was talking to. Isn’t
that funny?
I thought so at least.

Anyway, this time last year, I felt my greatest strength was the fact
that I could live without anyone close to me, just wallow in my
loneliness and I would be okay. I said that then and I guess it was
true.

I met you after that, not very long after that, either. We spent every
minute together that we could spend together, you remember. And there
was that night we climbed that hill and drank wine and saw the
fireworks exploding over all the city lights, remember? Of course you
do, what am I thinking. You said it amazes you that each of the lights
has its own purpose. I think about that time a lot, actually. It’s one
of my favorites, you know. But I think you knew that.

I need you here right now. I need you here anytime, but mostly right now.

Christ! Sorry, I rolled over my toe with this godforsaken chair.

I mean sure, I’ve got my bed and my blankets and some to spare, but
it’s not the same. Warmth. You had this warmth about you. When my
knees were all folded under your knees, and my arms wrapped around the
whole of you, it was just
fucking
warm.

It’s so damn cold here.
I don’t mean to curse but god damn if it’s not cold here.

And quiet. I haven’t heard a sound other than myself for two hours
now, maybe three. I never talked to myself before I met you, but now
it’s all I do. Talk and talk like someone’s listening. But you aren’t.
Are you? No. What am I thinking.

Who was it that I was talking to that night last year? Was it you? No.
Yes? I don’t fucking know. Sorry, I don’t mean to curse.

(illustration by Stanley Donwood)

Josh is a friend. And Josh found tunetheproletariat some way somehow and we are grateful to offer his writing proudly like a peacock’s feathers.

Posted on July 22, 2010 - Tunes - 1 Comment » Share

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