Happy Birthday JT

Dear Justin Timberlake, I'm writing to wish you a happy 26th birthday, and to tell you that you're dead to me.

It wasn't always like this. You may remember that I enthusiastically praised the first single, "SexyBack," from your latest album, Futuresex/Lovesounds. It was the best song released last year. I was even going to give in and buy the CD. I still love that song; it's the only top 40 song I heard a lot and never got sick of.

But then you released "My Love," which you may remember me criticizing. It wasn't about you, it was about the rap interlude by T.I. (who, on his own terms, I like, especially "What You Know"). I disliked some of his awful rhymes, but on further listening it turns out it's worse than that. His rap is a complete demolition of the entire song. In your lovely falsetto, you croon a simple, even silly, love song: "If I wrote you a love note, and made you smile with every word I wrote"; "This ring here represents my heart, but there is just one thing I need from you / Say I do." But then T.I. comes in and changes the tone of the entire song: "I hate to have to cancel my vacation so you can't deny / I'm patient, but I ain't gonna try / If you don't come, I ain't gonna die." What the hell, JT? Still, I liked the rest of the song, and I had grand plans of doing a T.I.-free remix after I bought the album.

Until I heard your latest single, "What Goes Around Comes Around." Did you really craft a song around "what goes around comes around"? Tell me you didn't. (You did.) Justin, even as clichés go, that's tired. It's so tired it's dead, dried up like a frog next to a prefab subdivision that used to be a swamp. And no matter how much Timbaland kisses it with his studio skills, it will never turn into a prince. And from what I've heard, it's indicative of the rest of the album (aside, of course, from "SexyBack").

And then there's Alpha Dog, your new, long-delayed movie. I... I don't want to talk about Alpha Dog. And I don't think you should call here anymore.

Sting

A Reuters headline tells us "Sting Says Today's Rock Is a Bore." Let's play "guess the correct headline"!

"Sting's Rock Is a Bore Today"
"Today's Rock Says Sting Is a Bore"
"Sting Is a Bore (But He Wasn't Always)"

Dear Pop Stars; or, Goatdog Gets Nit-Picky

Dear Killers,

I like the whole Duran Duran–meets–Bruce Springsteen sound you're using on your new album; it's good for musicians to do their own thing, even if their own thing is a combination of other people's things. But in your new single "When You Were Young," I'm pretty sure you say "They say the devil's water it ain’t so sweet / You don’t have to drink right now / But you can dip your feet / Every once and a little while." Now, I'm not judging the quality of that sentiment—maybe some people who have experience with the devil's water go around talking about it. I'm just writing to point out that it's "once in a while," not "once and a while." (Note: most of the lyrics sites I've checked have you saying the phrase correctly, but I'm reasonably sure after a handful of listens that you say "and," not "in," Mr. Brandon Flowers.)

Dear Jeannie Ortega,

I think your song "Crowded" is pretty harmless for dancy top 40. However, there's a problem when you say "I won't be second to none." You see, being second to none is a good thing: it's just like being first. Peerless. No competition. Etc. When you say you don't want to be those things, I wonder what you're getting at. You don't want to be first? You want competition? You'd like to be... peerful? And this isn't just me being nit-picky about the whole double negative thing; I like a good double negative for effect—and don't let no one tell you different. But when it comes to a phrase that's as stuck together as "second to none," I get out my red pen.

Dear Rihanna,

I really loved the first single by you that I heard, "If It's Lovin' That You Want," which was so catchy and out-of-the-ordinary that I downloaded it (legally—I have the emailed iTunes receipt to prove it). I thought the next one, "SOS," contained a clever sample from "Tainted Love," which improved on the original by not containing the rest of the song. But I have problems with "Unfaithful," aside from the fact that the ballad format reveals your limited range. Lots of people sing about how cheating on your significant other kills him or her slowly, but it's a figure of speech. There's not really any killing going on; if there is, you're in a different genre entirely. So when you sing "Everytime I walk out the door / I see him die a little more inside / I don't wanna hurt him anymore / I don't wanna take away his life / I don't wanna be... a murderer," you're kind of embellishing—you're not really a murderer. Now there's a lot to be said for exaggerating for effect (there's plenty of that going on right in this here blog post), but the way it's presented in your song (all swirling orchestration and wailing voice), it's pretty darned silly.

Update:

Dear Justin Timberlake,

Please ditch this T.I. guy who guest-raps on your new single "My Love." You let him say "Call me candle guy / simply because I am on fire"? I think LL Cool J put it best when he said, "Here's 5 dollars, catch a taxi cab / Take your rhymes around the corner to the rap rehab."

Top 40

For lack of a CD player in our car, or even a working tape player to commandeer for my iPod, I've been listening to a lot of radio this summer, including top 40 stations. As with most forms of music, most of it is pretty terrible, but there are always gems. Instead of doing actual work, I thought I'd provide some examples of those two categories. The worst is not from Shakira, whose chirpy goat-voice weirds me the hell out, or even Paris Hilton, whose loungy sub-Blondie attempt at ska, "Stars Are Blind," is sort of listenable if you pretend it's not Paris Hilton singing. No, it's from her fellow non-entity Brooke Hogan.

Dear paparazzi, please stop paying attention to the talentless children of the rich and famous. You're just giving them something to whine about when they decide that they want to be pop stars. Take Brooke Hogan, for example: she didn't exist to me until I heard her hit single, "About Us," on the radio. In it, she complains that "I'm just trying to live but you're all up in my grill / How's a girl to breathe with all the media staring down my mouth with a four inch lens / I just wanna hit the mall with some of my friends." This is a very bad song. Very, very bad, and mostly because Ms. Hogan is a terrible singer. She makes me long for the days when Britney Spears was still a pop star. Modern producers can make just about anyone sound like a decent singer, so the fact that Ms. Hogan still sounds so bad despite all the money in the world is a testament to her profound lack of talent. Her thin voice wavers as it strains to hit the high notes she's trying to force out of her underfed body, and then it breaks down, sounding sometimes like she has her nose plugged, and other times like she's got something chewy in her mouth. In an attempt to cover her deficiencies, the producer layers her vocals, often from dramatically different takes, which makes it sound like Ms. Hogan is not a person at all, but is in fact the latest in computer voice technology. Added to the sonic despair is a rapper named Paul Wall, who sounds somewhat ashamed to be participating as he encourages Ms. Hogan during the chorus.

On the brighter side of the dial is Christina Aguilera's "Ain't No Other Man," the lead single from her self-reinvention album Back to the Basics. It's very good. It's 1960s, pre-"Who's Zooming Who"-Aretha-Franklin-good. It's brassy and assured, layered with a sampled big band horn section, and it showcases Aguilera's marvelous voice and attitude. I might just make this the first pop album I've bought since I don't know when.

That is, if I don't give in to Justin Timberlake's Futuresex/Lovesounds, on the promise of the lead single, the Timbaland-produced "SexyBack." I find this song's dreamy androgyny captivating: the first time I heard it, I couldn't tell whether it was by a man or a woman, and the lyrics didn't help very much: "If that's your girl, baby watch your back / 'cause you're burning up for me and that's a fact." Who's burning up for whom? I don't think it matters. Anyway, Timberlake, in a song produced by Timbaland (and I used to think they were the same person—you can tell how little I listen to top 40) croons fuzzily about his willingness to be whipped as Timbaland encourages him to "get your sexy on." It's all packaged in a fuzzy, electronic drone that I think I could listen to on repeat. Of course, the thing about top 40 stations is that I've practically been listening to it on repeat, and I'm not sick of it yet. That's a good sign.

In Praise of Soul Jazz Records

It was the ugly yet distinctive packaging that first made me notice London-based Soul Jazz Records. I was in an eccentric little record store in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and in the used world music section, I saw a bright yellow carboard sleeve. As Mercenárias: Brazilian post-punk, 1982–1985. It was like it was designed for my pretentious musical tastes: underground music by an all-female band in a foreign language? Where do I sign up? I bought it, and I love it. It's like a little bit of Wire mixed with a little bit of Gang of Four, with some samba influence and in Portuguese, all packaged in perfect little two-minute songs.

After that, I was seeing Soul Jazz everywhere. My favorite art historian picked up a double CD called Big Apple Rappin': The Early Days of Hip-Hop Culture in NYC, 1979–1982, filled with early rap that is surprising to someone (like me) who thought all early rap sounded like "Rapper's Delight." The highlight song, "How We Gonna Make the Black Nation Rise" by Brother D & The Collective Effort, shows that rap has always had its political side. Then I found New York Noise Vol. 2, a collection of music by early eighties post-punk and No Wave bands (and I learned what No Wave was). It includes a song by the Del-Byzanteens, featuring Jim Jarmusch on vocals and keyboards, which would make it worth the price even without all the other great (and greatly weird) songs included with it.

They specialize in just that sort of thing: collections of obscure music that appeals to geeks of various stripes. Perusing their catalog, you see reggae that's not Bob Marley, early dance music, lots of Latin American and Caribbean music, something called Deep Jazz, and lots of other weird discs, several of which are going on my wishlist.

Their packaging, aside from the eye-catching colors, is a little lacking. The liner notes are curious: there's often a level of detail that borders on the obsessive, but then they'll forget to include the release date of several songs. Their spelling could use some work (the Del-Byzanteens are listed as the Del Byzantines, which made googling difficult). They include a wasteful cardboard sleeve, which, you will remember, attracted me in the first place. But that's all the wrapping: it's what's inside that counts, and everything (admittedly, only three CDs) has been great so far.

I Like Both Kinds, Country and Western

I'll be a-pickin' and a-grinnin' for some time, thanks to the bounty of country and western that I recently picked up.

First up is a three-CD set entitled Country Music Hall of Fame: 54 Vintage Country Classics that I got at a used CD store near my theater—for $4. It has everybody from Roy Acuff to Hank Williams, with stops at Roy Rogers, Jimmie Rodgers, and Tex Ritter, among others. It makes me say "Hoo doggie!" and assorted other country slang statements of happiness.

Second is a two-DVD set of—wait for it—11 early John Wayne movies. Yes, folks, for the low price of $11, I have such gems as Randy Rides Alone, The Dawn Rider, and Hell Town. Most of them are from his 1930s Monogram period, although a few (like Angel and the Badman) are later. I'm going to have to start a Western category over at my review site to contain this abundance of cowboys (but no Indians, as far as I can tell).

Last.fm

In case you've ever wondered what music I listen to when I'm at home, now you can see for yourself: all Britney Spears, all the time! Last.fm is a site that keeps track of the music you listen to. You can also listen to music online through them, but I haven't looked into that yet. I guess it's not stalking if you invite the stalker in. (This is probably bound for the sidebar eventually.)

Three Punk Love Poems and a Song of Despair

Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers, "Pirate Love" (from L.A.M.F., 1977). Johnny Thunders started out in the New York Dolls, the archetypal glam-rock band. When they broke up after being mismanaged by Malcolm McLaren (who became more famous managing the Sex Pistols), he floated around for a while until forming the Heartbreakers with former Television guitarist Richard Hell, who promptly quit when he discovered that his new bandmates were more interested in drinking and overdosing on drugs than in rehearsing. This album was dead upon release, partly because the record company folded, and partly because the original mix was atrocious. This is from a 1994 remix, three years after Thunders died of an overdose.

Dead Boys, "Flame Thrower Love" (from We Have Come for Your Children, 1978). The Dead Boys were one of the angrier New York punk bands of the late 1970s. They were pretty nihilistic; their debut album Young Loud and Snotty was filled with screeds about hate and abuse and anger, all delivered in frontman Stiv Bators's rasp. I don't have their second album: I got this song off a compilation. I'm told the second album isn't as good, but this song is pretty great. Stiv Bators was once stabbed in the chest by a mobster during an argument. He survived until 1990, when he was run over by a car in Paris.

Stiff Little Fingers, "Barbed Wire Love" (from Inflammable Material, 1979). Dubbed "The Irish Clash," Stiff Little Fingers were a really great punk band. On their first album, they sounded rather Clash-like: much straightforward punk rock with political messages, with the occasional reggae-influenced song and some oddball flourishes, like on this song. From a melodic beginning, the song goes downright Beach Boys, with admittedly raspy, doo-wop influenced harmonizing in the catchy break. I don't think anyone from this band has died.

The Psychedelic Furs, "Pretty in Pink" (from Talk Talk Talk, 1981). The John Hughes movie of the same title ruined the Psychedelic Furs, who had been one of the best post-punk/proto-New Wave bands around. Before Hughes, their sound was darker; keyboards added to the sound, instead of defining it. This version is the original. They rerecorded it for the 1986 soundtrack, taking the edge out, layering it with unimpressive keyboards, and sapping it of its darkness. These guys are all alive too.

(Post title adapted from Pablo Neruda's poetry collection Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair).

Five Songs (and now you can listen)

My friend Shane is blogging his top 200 songs of all time. The thought of doing it myself makes me bonkers. I just can't. Instead, I will post now and again about songs I really like that people may not have heard of. This here is the first such post. (Click on the song title to download the song, listen to it, and then delete it from your hard drive because such file sharing is bad. The song links are good for a week or 25 downloads, whichever comes first. Click on the artist [if such a link exists] to purchase the CD.)

16 Horsepower, "American Wheeze" (from Sackcloth 'n' Ashes, 1996). 16 Horsepower is a weird alt-country band from Denver that uses accordions, jaw harps, fiddles, and various other instruments along with traditional bass, guitar, and drums. Their songs deal with Southern Gothic themes, like if Flannery O'Connor had started a rock band. Sometimes their lyrics are a tad opaque: "American Wheeze" seems to deal with pedophilia before segueing into an old-fashioned challenge to a duel. "Yeah you may be the only one/Come on son/Bring your blade and your gun/And if I die by your hand/I've got a home in glory land." Their lead singer's braying voice, along with the jangly music and florid lyrics, makes paranoid romps of all of the songs.

Wipers, "Return of the Rat" (from Is This Real?, 1980). The Wipers were a major influence on Kurt Cobain, and nobody's ever heard of them. You'll recognize the structure of the song, which sounds a lot like Nirvana's faster songs. If you google this song, you'll get Nirvana first, because they covered it—they even asked Greg Sage (who basically was Wipers) to open for them on tour. He turned them down, so I guess I can't complain about him being unknown. Anyway, the song has a hard-driving beat, fuzzy guitars, a heavy bassline, and plenty of paranoia.

Desperate Bicycles, "(I Make the) Product" (from Desperate Bicycles Anthology, date unknown). The Desperate Bicycles formed in NYC London in the late 1970s. They started their own label and released some songs; each single included an exhortation to other bands to start their own labels. They released one album and a handful of singles, then broke up. Their songs are really lo-fi: I have to crank up the volume to hear them very clearly. This one has a driving beat provided by a frantically played bass and guitar, along with lyrics that seem to be about the drudgery of working in a factory. "I make the product/I use the product/I hate the product" or something like that.

The Dinning Sisters, "Buttons and Bows" (from the soundtrack to The Paleface, 1948). Why do I love this song? It's goofy. "My bones denounce the buckboard bounce and the cactus hurts my toes/Let's vamoose where gals keep usin' those silks and satins and linen that shows/And I'm all yours in buttons and bows." It's one of those silly 1940s songs, sung in this case by one of those sister vocal groups. But it's catchy, the singing is beautiful—with a really cute semi-southern diction—and I'm not ashamed to have it on my iPod.

Charlie Feathers, "Nobody's Woman" (from one of his many albums, probably late 1950s). Charlie Feathers is called the father of rockabilly by some (including himself). I haven't listened to him much—I just got a compilation CD a few weeks ago. This simple song, praising his current love, combines everything I like about him: the distinctive delivery, the sometimes chirping voice, the wit. "I gave her all my money and let her make me blue/But I am hardly fool enough to give her up to you/She ain't nobody's woman, nobody's woman but mine." He sounds a bit like the early Sun Records stuff, but he sounds more country.

CD Tag

I have been tagged by Nick of Nick's Flick Picks twice now, once for a book questionnaire that I avoided, and now for this CD questionnaire, which is much easier for me than the book one would have been.

1. Total Number of CDs/Albums I Own: Around 300 on my shelves, plus 50 or so sitting on spindles in my desk. I'm weird about CDs: I have to see them, or else I'm not going to listen to them. I ran out of space on my shelves, and now most of my new copies are languishing. I tried binders, thinking that it would eliminate my prejudicial privileging of encased CDs over uncased CDs, but that lasted about a week before I flipped out and replaced all the CDs in their cases, which I had presciently stored in a closet, thinking that this very thing would happen.

2. Last Album I Bought: Last album I acquired would be more accurate; that would be Basie at the Sands, Count Basie's landmark 1966 performance. Along with it, I got Frank Sinatra's At the Sands with Count Basie, which was recorded the same night. I've been getting into jazz more and more lately, and these are two great CDs. Before that, I picked up Destiny Street by Richard Hell and the Voidoids (I'm also going through a punk phase). The last CD I shelled out money for was Sinatra's Songs for Swingin' Lovers.

3. Last Album I Listened To: Since I did most of my CD listening in my now-departed car, I can't rightly remember. Oh, wait, I know. At my theater, while I'm building the prints for Saturday's show, I like to listen to something loud (so I can hear it over the clattering reels). Last night, I was pumping Mission of Burma's Vs.. "Learn How" and "That's How I Escaped My Certain Fate" are two of my favorites.

4. Currently Listening To: You mean right now? Nothing. I don't usually listen to music at work, because I'm an editor and I can't concentrate when someone's singing in my ear. Let's turn on iTunes and see what shuffle turns up... "You Win Again" by Hank Williams.

5. Lyrics or Beats?: Lyrics, lyrics, lyrics (if I had to choose). I'd choose music over lyrics, but "beats" is different than "music." I don't listen to much beat-driven music—not much R&B, not much funk, no dance music at all. To paraphrase the guy who inspired this post, I'm more likely to go for Tom Waits than Kylie Minogue.

6. First Album You Fell in Love With: Now you're asking potentially embarrassing questions. It was Billy Joel's Greatest Hits, Vols. 1 and 2. I was eight or nine, we had the double cassette, and I knew every single word of every single song. And I'd sing them, too, in "concerts" my sisters and I would put on for our own amusement (in between pretending to be superheroes).

The second and third albums I fell in love with are equally embarrassing. The second, which was the first cassette I bought, was Richard Marx's self-titled debut, and the third was Motley Crue's Theatre of Pain, a CD that defined my musical sphere of interest for several years, until I discovered...

7. Biggest Impact: R.E.M.'s Out of Time, which I think my friend Billy stole out of a car and gave to me. It was really eye- (and ear-) opening; I never really looked back. Before that album, all I listened to was hair metal, and it really opened up new musical vistas for me.

8. Favorite Album: This one is tough. I tend to get tired of albums quickly. Things I listened to constantly when I was younger sit unopened on my shelves. I guess Morphine's Cure for Pain is one of the few CDs that I've had a long time and can (and do) still listen to. It was the first CD I'd ever bought based solely on a review: John Popper of Blues Traveler said that it was like taking off his socks after a long, hot day at work. That was enough for me. Also, The Tragically Hip's Phantom Power is another one that I never get sick of.

Right now, my favorites are Stereo Total's Oh Ah!, which is weird and irresistable, and probably Richard Hell and the Voidoids' Blank Generation.

9. Most Listened To: Morphine's Cure for Pain, R.E.M.'s Reckoning, Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, Hedwig and the Angry Inch (the original cast recording, not the movie soundtrack), Elliott Smith's Figure 8, and The Tragically Hip's Phantom Power.

10. Sexiest Album: Define "sexiest." How about Hedwig and the Angry Inch? Is Marvin Gaye's Let's Get It On too obvious? I am fond of Massive Attack's Mezzanine, too. Oh, and I can't forget Dusty Springfield's Dusty in Memphis, especially "Just a Little Lovin'." And Roxy Music's Avalon, especially after Bill Murray's interpretation of "More than This" in Lost in Translation.

11. Biggest Disappointment: Hands down, it's R.E.M.'s Reveal. Although it's hard to believe I was still capable of being disappointed by them, after their steady decline after Monster. I suppose it was the biggest disappointment because it was the point where I gave up on what had once been my favorite band.

12. Five Albums That Mean the Most to You: They're scattered in here already. Morphine's Cure for Pain was the soundtrack to much of my time in college, and the lyrics of "I'm Free Now" still make me smile ("I got guilt I got fear I got regret, I'm just a panic stricken waste, I'm such a jerk"). The Hedwig soundtrack, for various reasons. Elliott Smith's Figure 8. Mercury Rev's Deserter's Songs. But #1 is The Tragically Hip's Phantom Power.

CD vs. LP

This article takes on the age-old question that has confounded philosophers for millenia: do LPs sound better than CDs? The answer is "hmm, could be." It comes down to this:

Just because one technology is inherently superior to another in one way or another does not in fact ensure that an application of that technology is superior.

In a conversation with Travis, we came to the conclusion that you can substitute a lot of words for "technology" in that sentence, like "religion" or "roast beef." The article also explains things like why 8-tracks sucked although they shouldn't have, why the 1812 Overture can't be reproduced accurately on any recording medium, and what Tim Robbins is talking about in Bull Durham when he talks about his "quadrophonic Blaupunkt."

Spending Money

To celebrate yet another day of not having a job to go to, I went out and splurged on music. I've been wanting some new music for some time, to the extent of bugging friends to make me mix discs. If I haven't bugged you yet, consider yourself bugged. I bought the following CDs:

Nigeria '70: The Definitive Story of 1970s Funky Lagos. I have no idea what might be on this disc. I envision it to be something like Pirate's Choice, the Orchestre Baobab CD I bought after hearing about it on NPR. The All Music Guide calls it a "stunning compilation" and "a rich, historical document that you might actually want to listen to." Sounds good.

Gang of Four's A Brief History of the Twentieth Century. Four years ago, I bought a CD by a band called The Elastic Purejoy in a bargain bin in Florida. The Elastic Purejoy is Dave Allen, who was in Shriekback, Low Pop Suicide, and Gang of Four. Because I am a completist, I bought a Shriekback CD, which is good 1980s alterna-pop. I didn't like Low Pop Suicide. And now I have my Gang of Four CD. After listening to two songs in the car on the way home, I state that it sounds like it came out of the same era as Mission of Burma and Wire, which it did. Which is good.

Lyle Lovett's Anthology, Vol. 1: Cowboy Man. Back in college and grad school, I was in a writing group called Litera. There was this guy Ron Riekki, who lives in Chicago but I never see him; he really liked Lyle Lovett, and he wrote a poem once that referred to a Lyle Lovett song. This is all to say that I still never listened to Lyle Lovett, and this is my first attempt.

Illinois Jacquet's Jumpin' at Apollo. This is another NPR find. Illinois Jacquet apparently changed the tenor sax forever when he "honked," which is playing the same note in succession, at least according to the NPR broadcast I heard. This CD features Jacquet playing with an A-list of jazz performers, none of whom I know except Charles Mingus.

So now it's 1:43, and I have three hours to kill until a bunch of us go see Hero. Do you want to come? We're meeting for dinner at the Billy Goat, and then we're seeing the movie at 7:00 at the AMC River East 21. Don't say I didn't invite you.

I'm here in my new apartment, feeling like a lazy bastard as Rebecca's cleaning people straighten up the apartment behind me. I didn't want to be here when they were here, because I feel a little too bourgeois having cleaning people picking up after me—notice how I called them Rebecca's cleaning people? I feel like the spirits of Upton Sinclair and Eugene V. Debs and Emma Goldman are looking down on me with scorn in their ghostly eyes.

Cool Jazz Head Shake

Last Friday, Rebecca and I accompanied Brian and his friends to a jazz show at the Hothouse. It was one of the most amazing live performances I have ever seen. I publicly apologize for not inviting Shawn. I forgot. I'm sorry. I'm a jerk.

The acts were Von Freeman and Fred Anderson. Freeman, who is 82, played with Charlie Parker and Sun Ra. He's a born storyteller. The concert was preceded by a Q&A session run by a self-important twit who kept saying "Aaaahh" in an annoying manner and seemed more interested in showing of how much he knew about jazz than in finding out anything interesting. Freeman mostly ignored him, though, instead talking at length about whatever came to mind. When it came time for the concert, he played first. He was great, and his band was pretty good. He played the "usual" style of a series of solos: tenor sax, bass, guitar, drums.

I've never liked drum solos. I discussed this with Brian, and we agreed that they are usually uninteresting. My theory is that the other solos keep with the tempo of the previous solos in the song, so you can see how they fit into the overall scheme. The drummer almost necessarily breaks tempo.

It was nearly midnight when Anderson took the stage. It was his 75th birthday. He is a quiet man, but he lets his saxaphone speak for him. He was absolutely amazing. Rebecca likened him to "a pair of lungs"; this sounds funny, but it looked about right. He bent over his horn, blowing with all the energy in his body, and sometimes it looked like he might collapse. It was like the horn was part of his body. We only stayed for one "song," which went on for a blissful 30 minutes. He played free jazz, instead of Freeman's more song-oriented style. He was accompanied by a fantastic bass player and a drummer who actually played interesting solos.

I don't know much about jazz. I guess I just know what I like when I hear it. I really liked Anderson and his band. Anderson runs the Velvet Lounge here in Chicago. They have a regular Sunday jam session; the one time I went to it, at least two of the performers from this show were there. Anderson was there too, but he wasn't playing. I will have to go back on a night when he is.

The title of this entry refers to the preferred method of showing appreciation during a show: you drop your head a little, close your eyes, purse your lips like you're about to kiss your grandmother, and shake your head back and forth slowly. This was demonstrated by the MC of the show, a critic who is important in Chicago jazz circles (but I can't remember his name). Even he stopped doing the Cool Jazz Head Shake during Freeman's drummer's solos.

Concerts of Doom

Antisemitism, right-wing cabals, depression about the future, the death of the universe... I think it's time for something frivolous.

What is the most embarrassing concert you've ever attended? For guidance, here's my top four:

4. Kansas, at the Muskegon Summer Celebration, where they rounded up acts that should have retired long ago. They were overweight, they wore spandex, and they played "Dust in the Wind." At least they were still having a good time. The lead singer climbed a stack of amplifiers and ran around in the audience.

3. Starship, featuring Mickey Thomas. Yeah, that means without Grace Slick. Just Mickey Thomas, singing those memorable 80s songs like "We Built This City" and "No Way Out," and taking a crack at the classics. His rendition of "White Rabbit" was particularly cringe-inducing. This concert was also part of the Muskegon Summer Celebration.

2. 38 Special. And REO Speedwagon. And Survivor. They apparently opened every season at Val-du-Lakes, a small outdoor venue near Ludington, MI. I think they were all wearing wigs. I'm sure about the lead singer of REO Speedwagon. This was my first concert, so don't give me a hard time about it.

1. Feel free to give me a hard time about this one. Warrant, Slaughter, and Vince Neil, also at Val-du-Lakes. This one is hard to talk about. I still liked Warrant, you see, even though I knew in my heart that they weren't any good. I had to sit through Slaughter, which was painful. Then Warrant came on, and Jani Lane proceeded to get so drunk that they didn't finish any songs. He would just change his mind halfway through and start in on another one. We didn't stick around for Vince Neil. I'm sure we didn't miss much.

Records of Shame

In the spirit of Shawn's recent post about bad movies, I thought I'd write about bad music that I either owned in the past and now repudiate or currently own and enjoy covertly. This can be music that you know in your heart is bad, music that is universally scorned, or music that is so out of keeping with your usual music taste that it is an anomaly on your shelf. It could be music that you used to like but now you hate. Whatever. Anything goes.

My top five bad music:

1. Richard Marx. The first tape I ever bought. You know the one. Sing it with me. "And I remember how you loved me/Time was all we had until the day we said goodbye/I remember every moment of those endless summer nights..."

2. Anything by Warrant. I loved them. I hated them. I still own "Dirty Rotten Filthy Stinking Rich," although I don't display it with my other CDs. I purchased a Warrant CD as recently as college.

3. I once downloaded a Mandy Moore song. I didn't keep it because I felt dirty. But it was so damned catchy. No, I won't say which one.

4. Steelheart. Do you remember Steelheart? Of course you don't. Nobody does, because they were crappy. They were a cock rock band, sub-Poison, who took themselves more seriously. Don't need nothing but a good time? Not Steelheart. They dealt with issues. I don't remember which ones. Their defining characteristic was that their lead singer could shriek like the violins in the murder scene in Psycho.

5. Dan Fogelberg's Greatest Hits. This should be higher on the list. Like at #1. My ex-fiancee really liked that song "Same Old Lang Syne," so I bought her the CD. Fine, I liked it too. When we split up, she left it with me. I admit to playing it a few times and thinking, damn, some of these songs are really catchy. The used CD store employees laughed in my face when I tried to sell it, so I microwaved it and used it as a coaster for a while.

Rock on.

Ray Davies Shot

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=4075146

Ray Davies, the lead singer of the British rock band The Kinks, was shot in New Orleans last Sunday while attempting to foil a mugging. He was released from the hospital today.

This event prompted me to come up with the following news headlines:

Kinks singer shot; clutches leg and shouts "You Really Got Me"
Kinks singer shot; files suit against The Doors
Kinks singer shot; to be held for observation all day and all of the night

I couldn't resist.

Elliott Smith, 1969-2003

http://www.salon.com/ent/music/feature/2003/10/22/smith/index.html

One of my favorite musicians, singer-songwriter Elliott Smith, committed suicide. He was 34. He wrote some of the most raw and honest and painfully sad music I have ever heard. Lots of people write depressing music and don't kill themselves, but I guess you never really know an artist simply by listening to their songs.

My favorite album by him was XO. You might have heard his song "Miss Misery" in Good Will Hunting, or his song "Needle in the Hay" from The Royal Tenenbaums.

What can I say? I'm sad that there won't be any more music from him. At least he left five great albums for us to listen to.

Does R.E.M. Suck?

http://slate.msn.com/id/2089925/

Slate.com's Chris Suellentrop on whether or not R.E.M. are turning into a Rolling Stones for the new millenium.

I am torn. I think that their last good album was Monster. I disliked New Adventures in Hi-Fi, which I thought was bloated and monotonous. Up, the first album after the departure of drummer Bill Berry... I don't think I can remember a single song off it, even though I own it. I was a little upset that they said they would break up if one of them quit and then they didn't, but I never really believed that they would. Their last album, Reveal, had one glimmer of greatness, the song "Saturn Return," which sounded like a new and interesting direction. Sadly, the rest of the album was like an outtakes album from their previous three.

I really don't know what they should do. I want them to make a great album again, and it doesn't have to sound like their old stuff. I would rather it didn't. It might not sell many copies, but it wouldn't be treading water. I'll still buy the album planned for 2004. Here's hoping.

Johnny Cash (1932-2003)

http://www.salon.com/ent/music/feature/2003/09/12/cash_obit/

Salon.com writer Stephanie Zacharek, who my friend Shawn and I call some variation of "Stephanie Zach-I-Hate-All-Movies," eulogizes the Man in Black.

I am a latecomer to the Johnny Cash bandwagon. I didn't listen to him, or even really think about him, until his song "Delia's Gone" showed up on MTV just after high school. Then came his brilliant cover of Soundgarden's "Rusty Cage," where he made the angry anthem his own. But it wasn't until the last year or so, when I started playing pool with friends at the Gold Star, a bar in Wicker Park, that I truly came to appreciate him. There was something about his songs echoing through the dim bar, accompanied by the clack of pool balls and the murmur of the regulars holding the bar up, that made them hit home.