Last night I stopped by the record store after imbibing in a few pints of adult libations. While browsing, I spotted Lana Del Rey’s new album PARADISE and picked it up, mostly to make fun of it. I turned the CD over and the first thing I noticed was the song “Cola.” I really like that word for some reason and I thought it was a strange word to title a song. Was this song about soda? Did the word cola actually in the song? Theses and many other questions entered my mind.
This woman is a genius.
I immediately announced that I was going to listen to this song when I got home. Of course, I forgot because I had a bunch of other stuff going on, but just before I went to bed I recalled Lana Del Rey and her soda-song. I fired up my Spotify app and played “Cola.”
I didn’t know what to expect when I hit play but I certainly wasn’t expecting “My pussy tastes like Pepsi cola, my eyes are wide like cherry pies, I gots [sic] a taste for men who are older.” I burst out laughing and hit rewind so I could listen again. When the song was over I played it again. Then I played it again. I texted my friend and told him he had to listen to “Cola,” that it was too funny/strange to dismiss.
Once the initial shock/glee of hearing a young woman breathlessly sing about how her pussy tastes like Pepsi cola wore off, I started to get angry. Why was this woman famous? Her image and album are everywhere! She’s a hack/phony/fraud. I thought about all the really great singers out there who would kill to have her level of exposure and how much better their songs probably are. It made me sick.
Then I sat back and tried to think about why I was so angry. Is it because “Cola” is a bad song? Well, no. “Cola” is actually a really good song, despite the strangeness of it. Then I thought, is it because she’s a bad singer? Again, no. Lana Del Rey may not be the world’s greatest singer, but she does have a unique, breathy-vocal style that isn’t unpleasant to hear. And in a world where everyone in the music business is trying to sound exactly the same, Lana Del Rey definitely has a unique sound. When one hears Lana Del Rey they immediately recognize that’s whom they’re hearing.
I realized that my confused feelings were the result of only one thing: art-pop. Lana Del Rey catches a lot of flack because she’s been marketed to us all as Adele when that’s not who she is. This is art-college let’s-all-shave-our-heads kind of stuff. As soon as I realized this, I started to wonder if her less-than-stellar SNL performance wasn’t some sort of performance-art stunt.
Now, I’m not saying that Lana Del Rey is some kind of genius. Don’t get me wrong, being weird for the sake of being weird can be lame and tiresome, but in small doses it’s fun. And that’s what “Cola” is, it’s a four minute dose of weird. I’m sure somewhere someone can explain her message, man. Al I know is, Lana Del Rey somehow convinced a lot of people to release a song in which she sings about how her pussy tastes like Pepsi Cola: if for no other reason that should earn her our respect. Fun fact, this song reached #22 on Billboards rock charts.
Awesome. Lana, you go girl.
For the past few weeks, every time I go anywhere that sells music I see Lana Del Rey. She stares at me, seductively, from the cover of her album PARADISE. The only thing I knew about Lana Del Rey was that she was super-polarizing and that her appearance on SNL a while back was much maligned. I saw that performance and didn’t think it was as bad as everyone said, but then again I’ve always been a sucker for a pretty face.
Like. Pepsi. Cola.
Anyway, last night I was stumbling through my local record store and for some reason I decided to pick up PARADISE. I turned it over and was amused that one of the tracks was titled “Cola.” I told my friend who was with me at the time that I was going to listen to this song when I got home.
And so, a few hours later, just before I went to bed I entered the world of Lana Del Rey. I fired up Spotify and gave “Cola” and most of PARADISE a listen. I picked “Cola” because that word seemed so odd on the back of a CD, especially on the back of one with such an enigmatic person on the front.
I didn’t know what to expect when I hit play but I certainly wasn’t expecting “My pussy tastes like Pepsi cola, my eyes are wide like cherry pies, I gots [sic] a taste for men who are older.” I guess my first thought was Gee, this song should be titled “Pepsi Cola” and then I realized that there was no way in hell Pepsi would let her get away with that. The song is dark, brooding, and kinda sexy…but they lyrics are atrociously stupid. The kind of vapid non-sense girls AND boys in creative writing classes the globe over churn endlessly churn out.
On just about every level, I can’t imagine who this song is supposed to appeal to. Is “Cola” a four-minute joke? Is Lana Del Rey making fun of us for making fun of her by releasing a song this absurd? I don’t know and I’m not sure I really care. As I get older I find my patience for this sort of thing gets shorter and shorter. I really wanted to give Lana Del Rey a fair shake, but “Cola” made it virtually impossible for me to do that, it’s just too ridiculous.
I think I may have mentioned it a time or two, but I really love Warren Zevon. I’m always trying to convince people that he’s amazing. I’m like Johnny-Appleseed, but instead of apples I spread my love of Warren’s music. And instead of walking across America (committing eco-terrorism) I say things like “Warren Zevon is my all-time favorite songwriter” at parties and I write on this blog about Warren, when I can.
Writing about Warren’s music is tricky without falling victim to clichés like: tortured genius. Clichés don’t do much in terms of convincing people the songwriter they’ve never heard of is worth their time. A lot of people write funny songs and a lot of people have heartbreakingly sincere ones. One of the things that made Warren so special was that often his songs were both.
“He was a genius.”
I’ve been trying to figure out what is the track to play for people when I’m ranting and raving about Zevon. There are so many really good ones, too many really. The cheap shot or most obvious choice is “Werewolves of London” which, to be fair, was the first Zevon song I ever heard. But I figure that most people have probably heard that classic rock staple (even if they didn’t know it was Warren) so I didn’t even consider it. It’s a good song, but most people consider it, wrongly, as a novelty song. Then there are his really lovely love songs, some of which are so heartfelt they can reduce you to tears…but without knowing the sarcastic-edge of Zevon I find that these songs don’t have the same impact.
Which brings me to “I Need A Truck.”
“I Need A Truck” was not issued as an album track. In fact, the song is really just a 48-second demo that was recorded during the sessions for his third album EXCITABLE BOY. I heard the track when it was finally released as bonus material on the 2007 reissue of the album. There is no music, just Warren singing. It’s a funny song about needing a series truck to haul away life’s problems. Guns, women, bad thoughts, Percodan, and gin—all of these things need their own truck. The song goes from humorous to philosophical when Warren concludes by singing “And I need a truck to haul all my trucks in.”
It’s a tossed-off scrap, but “I Need A Truck” is a perfect microcosm for all the best Warren Zevon songs. There is no bullshit to the song, nothing to get in between the new-listener and Zevon**. There is nothing but Warren, his wit, and his demons. You want to know why I love Warren Zevon so much? Listen to “I Need A Truck.”
** When you find someone to have and hold, don’t let nothing come between you.
Have you ever fallen deeply in love with a song? I think we all have at some point in our lives. I’ve been head-over heels in love with “So High” by Guided By Voices for months now. It’s not on any of their albums, but rather was released as a B-side to the “Doughnut For A Snowman” single. I found it one day while trolling around on Spotify, as I often do to kill time.
GBV is one of my all-time favorite bands, so it shouldn’t come as too big a surprise that I feel so strongly about one of their songs…but my love for“So High” feels strange because the song is less than one minute long. If you know anything about lead singer/songwriter Robert Pollard, you know that length is not one of his strengths. His tunes, which are catchy as hell, are nearly always tragically too short. In fact, the rather tossed off, unfinished nature of the band’s songs is probably the #1 reason they’re not a household name.
“So High” indeed.
The A-side of the single, “Doughnut For A Snowman,” appears on the band’s first comeback album LET’S GO EAT THE FACTORY, which came out earlier this year (side note: can you believe has put out 3 awesome albums this year?). That song begins with a gradual fade-in of what is actually the tail end of “So High.” For whatever reason, “So High” didn’t make it onto the album. The song seems to be related to “Doughnut For A Snowman,” so why was it left off the record? These are the questions that keep me up at night.
Anyway, maybe it’s my love of cast-off, discarded things, but strange fact that a (very) small part of the song is on the record really piqued my interest. So I listened to “So High” probably 10 times in a row, and before I realized it: I was in love with it. The song has a cozy, campfire feel. I love the cheap, plastic recorder/flute in the song, I think it’s adorable.
The lyrics, while nonsensical are also very charming and full of warmth. As you’re hearing it, the song seems to be about something, something really philosophical and important. But it’s not. Which is pretty funny because that’s kinda what it’s like to actually be so high.
Dashed off in under a minute, Pollard’s “So High” is like a short hug from a long lost friend I never knew I always missed. The song is like roasting marshmallows on the banks of a glow-in-the-dark lake with your best friend while John Lennon drunkenly plays you an unfinished Beatles song. It’s chocolate cake on the beach. It’s probably my favorite song of 2012. It’s 43-seconds long.
Please take a listen:
I saw the latest James Bond movie, SKYFALL, this weekend and boy is it a doozy. After the disappointing QUANTUM OF SOLACE (stupid Writer’s Strike), the Bond producers wisely pulled out all the stops to make sure that SKYFALL was top-to-bottom brilliant. Oscar Winning Director Sam Mendes brings his usual confident, steady hand (not to mention cinematographer) to the proceedings and manages to do the impossible: make a 50 year-old movie series seem fresh and relevant.
Mr. Kiss-Kiss Bang Bang.
There are a lot of criticisms one can lob at a Bond movie, but for me the first thing that either pleases or disappoints is the theme song. The last two films in the long-running film franchise have had less-than-stellar songs…in fact, even though I’m a pretty big Bond fan, I had to go look up what the last two songs were in order to write this post. CASINO ROYALE, a fantastic reboot of the Bond series was shackled with the boring, unimaginative song “You Know My Name” by Soundgarden/Audioslave-mope Chris Cornell. Besides being overly-generic, the song had nothing to do with the movie. I know that these films usually have ridiculous, impossible to use-in-a-song titles…but “You Know My Name” wasn’t able to tie in any way to the film: weak-sauce.
Speaking of ridiculous titles: QUANTUM OF SOLACE. As a Bond fan, I like to pretend that this film doesn’t even exist. This isn’t a film blog, so I’ll spare you all my armchair analysis, suffice to say during the middle of the movie I turned to my wife and whispered: “I am so bored right now. This is boring me.” There is nothing worse that can be said about a film than it’s boring. “Another Way To Die,” the film’s theme song isn’t boring in the least. In fact, a little boring might have been a good thing for the Alicia Keys/Jack White duet. The song is pairing of two really great artists who really do not go together well. The track is overstuffed and Jack’s fuzzy guitar, usually an asset, detracts from the proceedings because a Bond theme song is not supposed to be down and dirty or indie rock it’s supposed to be glamorous and high class.
Ever since Paul McCartney & Wings excellent “Live and Let Die,” the Bond producers have chased that elusive dragon: a theme song that’s both good for the film AND a massive pop hit. As a result, a lot of really cheesy bands have contributed theme songs over the years that now seem a head-scratch worthy. How could we have grown as a culture had Lulu, Rita Coolidge, and Sheena Easton not been allowed the honor of performing Bond themes (?). If you are a little fuzzy on who Lulu or Rita Coolidge are, it’s okay: they’re musical footnotes.
Sometimes flash-in-the-pan stars put out decent theme songs, like a-ha’s “The Living Daylights” for Timothy Dalton’s first outing as Bond (THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS). And let me go on record as saying that Duran Duran’s “A View To A Kill” is 1,000% better than the film A VIEW TO A KILL. But did we really need a Sheryl Crow or Garbage Bond theme? And do you even remember what songs they did? I didn’t.
Which brings me to Adele’s song “Skyfall.” SKYFALL has so many good things that by the time it was over I had (nearly) forgotten how good the theme song was. “Skyfall” is a great example of how to do a Bond theme song right. Just grabbing any popular artist of the moment and having them turn in a song isn’t the way to go. Instead, a real singer was hired. Adele is an amazing singer. She’s also a very talented song writer! Taking a glance back at Bond themes of yesterday, I can’t help but notice that many were written by composer John Berry and not the act performing the song.
Adele’s “Skyfall” works not only because she’s such a good singer-songwriter, but because her style of music fits with the elegant, glamorous world of the Bond films. She’s a classy artist who’s song will sound just as classy tomorrow, or even ten years, as she sounds today. Maybe the song is a little old-fashioned, but I guarantee it’ll hold up infinitely better than a song like Gladys Knight’s “License To Kill” or Madonna’s “Die Another Day.” I’m not sure if “Skyfall” is going to be a smash #1 hit, but it’s a great song that isn’t boring to sit through AND just as important doesn’t embarrass the franchise. Which, let’s face it, has a lot to be embarrassed about (I’m looking at you Roger Moore).
Oddly enough, all of this makes me think about Amy Winehouse. Winehouse was the #1 pick of both fans and the film’s producers to do a Bond theme. She was rumored to have been approached to perform the theme song for QUANTUM OF SOLACE, but it wasn’t to be. I remember when Adele first broke a few years ago, the first comparison made was to Amy Winehouse. The two are alike in many ways: both are women whose style is very much rooted in classic pop/jazz standards. Both wrote really personal, really good songs. Both were given amazing, powerful voices that don’t, on the surface seem to really fit their bodies. But whereas Adele is down to Earth and grounded, Winehouse was a complete and utter wreck.
Winehouse and Adele actually remind me a lot of Bond and SKYFALL’s villain Raoul Silva. Silva is a former MI6 agent gone bad, he’s essentially an evil Mirror Universe version of Bond. I think that Adele is the white knight version of Amy Winehouse’s dark knight. I don’t mean to say that Adele is good and Amy Winehouse is bad, just that they’re different sides of the same coin. Adele is like the Winehouse who didn’t succumb to her fame: or Winehouse is Adele who did.
After the movie I had trouble thinking about anything else besides this strange irony. Winehouse was never able to do a Bond theme, even though she seemed so well suited for it. Then SKYFALL comes out and there is Adele, doing a theme song that’s the best one in years. I feel like there should be a term for when art and life collide so perfectly.
Last week while I was bunkered down in New York City, waiting for Hurricane Sandy to do her worst, my wife’s best-friend Becky bravely sacrificed her iPhone’s battery so that we might have some tunes by candlelight. I love going through people’s iTunes, I find it a nice way to both get to know AND judge the shit out of someone. My iTunes is an atrocious mix of the best and worst of rock, pop, jazz, country, and blues music. There’s things in it that I’m proud of…and a lot that I’d rather you just skip over.
Imagine there’s no Red Rocker.
Becky’s iPhone was filled with a lot of her favorite bands: Green Day and Barenaked Ladies. Not exactly my cup of tea, but I’d say I like both those bands enough. Anyway, as I browsed her iTunes, I noted that she had Van Halen’s “Jump” one her phone twice: once from the album 1984 (GREAT album by the way) and again from a Greatest Hits compilation. I laughed and pointed this out. She had an explantation, but there was no need: “Jump” is great song so why NOT have it on your phone?
Becky loves it when I take pics of her sleeping, that’s why we’re such good friends.
Becky also had a large quantity of The Beatles on her phone, as well as some John Lennon solo stuff. That got me thinking, had Becky heard Mighty Mike’s “Imagine A Jump”? She hadn’t, and it really bummed me out. Mighty Mike is this French DJ that does mind-blowingly awesome mash-ups. Seriously. Before Mighty Mike, I thought DJ’s and mash-ups were lame, but this guy’s Queen/Michael Jackson mash-ups changed my mind.
“Imagine A Jump” is one of Mighty Mike’s best. It’s the acapella/vocals of Van Halen’s “Jump” merged with the hauntingly simple piano of John Lennon’s classic “Imagine.” The best part? The (slowed down) vocals actually work with “Imagine.” The upbeat, devil-may-care Van Halen song is transformed into a downbeat, depressing ode to suicide and desperation. I know that doesn’t sound particularly fun but it’s actually a cheeky bit of fun.
This is amazing. Thank you Mighty Mike:
In my review of the latest Tame Impala album, LONERISM, I noted that Tame Impala sounded a bit like Oklahoma freak-rockers The Flaming Lips. I think that both bands share a common 60’s-LSD-Beatleband strand of DNA, but what would happen if the two bands were to meet? Would a rainbow-colored funnel of sunshine spew trippy death all over existence? Or would they just make a really nice song?
The Flaming Lips are good at a lot of things, but spelling is not one of those things.
Turns out they’d just make a really nice song. The Flaming Lips put out an album of collaborations this year called THE FLAMING LIPS AND HEADY FWENDS (sic) which features Tame Impala. The song, “Children of The Moon,” might not be as epic of mind-blowing as one would hope…but it is really good.
The song leans more towards the Australian rockers mellow-gold rather than The Lip’s more purple nurple sound. Still, you can definitely hear how The Flaming Lips magnified Tame Impala’s more understated vibe (to great effect I think).
Check it out:
Tennessee rockers The Features have become one of my favorite bands through double-osmosis: I dragged my wife to a Kings of Leon show a few years ago and they were one of the opening acts. So impressed with their sound, my wife did something she never does and actually went out bought some of the bands CD’s. The Features are probably one of the hardest-working bands I’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing–six times in less than 4 years.
Beyond the endless touring, however, The Features also consistently release an album every year (give or take) that’s really good. The band’s song writing has not only been solid as a rock, but they’ve done that rare thing in rock where they’ve stayed true to themselves while still managing to grow artistically AND appeal to an increasingly wider audience. Most recently, the band was featured in a national TV spot for a big American car company.
WILDERNESS, the band’s latest album is fantastic…but you should hear them all.
The Features seem to be a band on the verge of breaking big, and when that day comes I’m going to feel very smug. But because I’m a Hipster-Soothsayer, I’m going to be a bit sad, too. I mean, can a band so down-to-Earth and workman-like endure the harsh spotlight? I wouldn’t think so, but then I heard “Fats Domino” from the band’s most recent album WILDERNESS.
“Fats Domino” is a soft battle-cry, but a battle-cry nonetheless. It’s about all the things we need, or don’t need. It’s a list of everything not needed…and the one thing that we can’t live without: Rock ‘n Roll. “You can take everything except my rock ‘n roll, my love, put down Fats Domino.” The song, which is in the context of a relationship ending, on the surface is about a dude asking for his records, but beyond the surface “Fats Domino” is about nourishing, enduring magic of rock music. We live in a modern world full of so much crap that, quite frankly, none of us need. “Fats Domino” is a song written by a band that has it’s priorities in order and their heads on straight. That it’s called “Fats Domino” and not “Elvis Presley” or even “Chuck Berry” is both telling and extremely comforting. Not only do The Features know where they as a band are going, they know where rock has been.
I think this sort of musical literacy and historical awareness is not only endearing but also very comforting. I’m comforted that The Features love rock music. They don’t just live it, eat, sleep, and breathe it–they know it intimately. The Features aren’t rock stars, they’re craftsmen. The albums they make are strong, sturdy chairs like those built by master-carpenters; beautiful to look at but also very functional.
So I don’t worry about The Features getting success and losing their heads. The only thing that I worry is that the success will remain elusive for them, not for their sake….but yours.
Defending Axl Rose 