Stephinsources

Build a nest in the sand dunes, lay our eggs and walk away

2006-02-14T00:00:00.000-05:00

I kind of short-changed the Human League the first time around, so here's another attempt. In the 69LS interview booklet, after Daniel Handler pointed out the apparent Phil Oakey (Human League front man) influence on "I Can't Touch You Anymore," Merritt stated that "The Human League are second only to Kraftwerk, in my mind." The band started out in the late seventies when Martyn Ware and Ian Craig-Marsh, two computer programmers, invited Oakey to sing for them. Their first single was "Being Boiled," a dark, menacing song with mentions of "slaying," "torture," and yes, being "boiled alive." Synth player Adrian Wright, who ran the slide projector during shows, hooked up with the trio around this time. After two albums, Ware and Marsh departed and formed the group Heaven 17, and Oakey assembled a new lineup to embark on a European tour, for contractual obligations.

The band finally found success under the producer's hand of Martin Rushent (who worked with Buzzcocks, Altered Images, XTC, and many others) with the release of Dare (Dare! for the US release) and the subsequent EP Fascination! For their 1986 album Crash, they took a more Top 40-friendly approach and employed the producer duo of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. That duo (which produced several smash albums for Janet Jackson) even wrote the album's single, "Human" - a number one hit. On the Human League tribute album Reproductions, the 6ths (Merritt with singer Lloyd Cole) covered "Human" in a low-key style, and well-aware of the song's laughable earnestness, Merritt tackles the mid-song spoken word passage with just a hint of a British accent (and his falsetto delivery of "I am just a maaaan" is pure cheese.)

I also short-changed John Foxx, so here we go. Foxx (real name: Dennis Leigh) started out in art school, playing around with synthesizers, and eventually he formed the band Tiger Lily (inspired by the Velvet Underground and the New York Dolls) which evolved into Ultravox! (more! exclamation! points!). This outfit made three albums for Island Records, the first of which was co-produced by Brian Eno, and these records would be a big influence on Gary Numan. After Island dropped the band, Foxx left to start his solo career, and his replacement, Midge Ure, helped lead Ultravox (no "!" at this point) to fame and fortune with tracks like "Vienna" and "Reap the Wild Wind."

Foxx wasted no time and released his debut album, Metamatic, in January of 1980, full of icy synth sounds and modern urban imagery. Concerning Metamatic, Foxx commented, "At the time it felt dangerous, as if I'd thrown the baby out with the bathwater. I stripped things down to the point where I might have gone too far. In retrospect I did exactly the right thing." He enjoyed modest success - several of his singles charted, and he even created the score for Michelangelo Antonioni's film Identification of a Woman. However, in 1985, he put his music-making on hold, citing disinterest, and fell back on his art background, working in graphic design and photography. His return to music ten years later came in the form of a collaboration with Louis Gordon, yielding two albums, and the duo toured churches and botanical gardens across Europe. "Underpass" is originally from Metamatic, but here is the single version, available on the excellent career-spanning compilation Modern Art: The Best of John Foxx.

The 1965 entry on the list is "You Don't Know" by Ellie Greenwich, the Brill Building songwriting partner of Jeff Barry. Greenwich helped write some of the greatest pop songs ever, like "River Deep, Mountain High" for Ike and Tina Turner and two featured on Stephinsources, "Then He Kissed Me" (Crystals) and "Be My Baby" (Ronettes). She saved one of her best for herself, though - a soaring, heartbreaking song about the despair of unexpressed love. Her vocals are up for the task, and she just nails the line "I can't let her know" (near the one minute mark).

Growing up in Brooklyn, then Long Island, Greenwich had a mini-revelation when she heard "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" by the Shirelles, because the melody was similar to that of a song she had written. She established herself, along with boyfriend (later husband) Jeff Barry, with the Brill Building songwriting crowd via Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. Also, Greenwich and Barry recorded song demos that impressed Leiber, Stoller, and Phil Spector so much that they were turned into an instant band, the Raindrops. I Can Hear Music: The Ellie Greenwich Collection has three charming tracks by the Raindrops (two were hits for other bands), and it includes the stunning "You Don't Know" - but it also includes the album Let It Be Written, Let It Be Sung... from 1973. With soft rock versions of old and new songs, it was intended to be similar in style to Carole King's immensely popular Tapestry, but the arrangements are just dreadful to my ears. A better way to own "You Don't Know" is by getting the unbelievably great One Kiss Can Lead to Another: Girl Group Sounds Lost & Found boxed set on Rhino, released late last year. Other Merritt favorites are on it, like Dolly Parton, Petula Clark, and Dusty Springfield, and it's totally worth the dough.

I'll end with Merritt's thoughts on race and music, from this interview for Barnes & Noble:

What I'd like to see in the year 2000 is the abandonment of music being categorized by the race of the artist, or the perceived race of the audience. It's disgusting, and I would like to be amazed that it's still happening. [Eliminating] racism and sexism would be major improvements, and it would make an enormous difference in the music industry. It would be really nifty if black people were allowed to make records that didn't have to constantly refer to very recent traditions of black radio. It's absurd, and at this point, it's as though the only thing the American public were allowed to hear were "coon songs" and ragtime. It's worse, I think, than it was in 1899.

And he goes into it more in this Flagpole interview:

Merritt: I think music is one of the most segregated industries in the U.S. I gather it's different in Britain.
Flagpole: It's kind of across the board in the entertainment business, though, not just in music.
Merritt: Well, if you go see an action movie, it's most likely going to have one black male star and one white male star and kind of randomly assigned races for the female romantic leads. Often you'll have multi-racial couples. That vanishes when you move to comedies, and it's incredibly rare when you move over into music.

Flagpole: Do you think your music serves in any way to rectify the situation?
Merritt: Only in as much as I don't make those distinctions. Smashing genre is a lot of what I'm about.

On that note, I leave you with a track by Public Enemy, a group that has more than a few things to say about race issues. With members Chuck D, Flavor Flav, Professor Griff, and Terminator X, the pioneering hip-hop group made a huge impact in the late 80s with its political and socially-relevant (and sometimes controversial) lyrics and adept turntable scratching. From Fear of a Black Planet (selected for preservation in the Library of Congress in 2005), here's "911 Is a Joke," which is Merritt's selection on the list for 1990.

Human League - "The Sound of the Crowd"
Human League - "Human"
John Foxx - "Underpass"
Ellie Greenwich - "You Don't Know"
Public Enemy - "911 Is a Joke"

There was a request for the Alvin Lucier tracks. Ubu, which had been out of commission for a while, is now back up and running, and you can get the 15 minute version of "I am sitting in a room" on that site, here. Here's the 1980 version excerpt I had previously posted:

Alvin Lucier - "I am sitting in a room" (fragment, 1980)

Well, folks, that's the last post. Many thanks to Chris Heschong, Robey Pointer, and Britton Ware for helping me obtain certain tracks, and special thanks to Chris for the bandwidth and server space. Thanks for reading, and if you have requests for re-posts, I can probably work something out - just email me. See you on Stephinsongs (and if you're not on Stephinsongs, join today!)

There are no more lovers left alive; no one has survived

2006-02-06T23:58:00.000-05:00

First earning mainstream success in the mid-to-late '80s, Pet Shop Boys are giants in the electro-pop world, and after 20+ years, they're still feeding devoted fans and dance aficionados their combination of carefully crafted synthpop and smart lyrics. The duo of Neil Tennant (vocalist, lyricist, and keyboard player) and Chris Lowe (keyboards) hit number one around the world with the sophisticated half spoken/half sung "West End Girls," and other hits followed like "Opportunities" and "What Have I Done to Deserve This?" which featured guest vocals from Dusty Springfield. The aloof, slightly nasal vocals from Tennant and the cheerfully artificial synth arrangements mark the Pet Shop Boys' catalog, and they've been able to shift and adapt enough to endure in the capricious realm of dance music. In 2001, Pet Shop Boys had ambitious plans for a festival tour, called Wotapalava, that would feature gay musicians including the Magnetic Fields, but the plans were scrapped after headliner Sinead O'Connor backed out. The band created a score (released last year) for the 1925 silent film Battleship Potemkin, a film school necessity, and they performed it at a live screening in Trafalgar Square in September of 2004. This spring, they plan on releasing a new album, entitled Fundamental.

After the release of Very in 1993, Tennant came out, and not surprisingly, the band is popular among the gay community. However, like Merritt, Tennant often writes lyrics that are intended to be of an ambiguous sexuality, though some have particular resonance with gay listeners. One such song is "Being Boring," which Tennant has stated was written about a friend who was dying of AIDS. In it, he reflects on earlier times when he'd "bolted through a closing door" before singing "...all the people I was kissing, some are here and some are missing." The song's title comes from an essay written by Zelda Fitzgerald called "Eulogy on the Flapper," in which Fitzgerald wrote on the titular figure: "...she refused to be bored chiefly because she wasn't boring."

In Chickfactor #11, Merritt named Tennant as being "the best lyricist in an electropop group," along with himself and Gary Numan, and he and Claudia Gonson have repeatedly asked him to be a singer for the 6ths (to no avail, so far). As Gonson explains, Pet Shop Boys were highly influential for Future Bible Heroes, and she speaks specifically about Memories of Love in Chickfactor #10:

"I think it's largely influenced by the Pet Shop Boys - it's kind of a Pet Shop Boys meets Martin Denny kind of thing. I give it the Bananarama treatment, and Stephin gives it the vernacular Neil Tennant treatment."

"Dreaming of the Queen," which was Merritt's pick for 1993, comes from the album Very, and it's about a peculiar dream involving having tea with Lady Di and the Queen, contemplating "why love had died." Also included this week is the forementioned "Being Boring" in its single form, taken from the compilation Discography.

Pet Shop Boys - "Dreaming of the Queen"
Pet Shop Boys - "Being Boring"

Shifting gears a bit...
Magnetic Fields vocalist ld beghtol will be writing a book about 69 Love Songs, and he is making an open request for "anecdotes, images, and other stuff related to the record, its songs and how it's affected people's lives/art/etc." - this also goes for live performances of 69LS. If you'd like to contribute something, contact him at this address: tmf69lovesongs at aol dawt cawm

Once is delicious but twice would be vicious or just repetitious

2006-01-30T22:54:00.000-05:00

A peerless composer and lyricist in the Broadway realm, Stephen Sondheim has been in the biz for over five decades, creating huge hit musicals that are continually revived. During his rocky childhood - his father abandoned him and his mother was clingy and smothering - he became a friend of the son of Oscar Hammerstein II (the musical giant behind such shows as Show Boat, South Pacific, The King and I, and The Sound of Music), who was a profoundly influential mentor to Sondheim. After graduating from Williams College in 1950, he studied under the composer Milton Babbitt, known for his bold forays into electronic music.

Sondheim first found praise as a lyricist, penning West Side Story in his mid-twenties and Gypsy in 1959, and his first Broadway production as both a lyricist and composer, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, opened in 1962. His next success was Company in 1970, centered on a bachelor's 35th birthday and his married friends, "middle class people with middle class problems" as Sondheim calls them. Based on the Ingmar Bergman film Smiles of a Summer Night, A Little Night Music (Merritt's 1973 entry on the list) was another hit, featuring one of Sondheim's most famous songs, "Send in the Clowns." Other productions include the gruesome Sweeney Todd from 1979, which is currently experiencing a revival, Sunday in the Park with George about the pointilist painter Georges Seurat, and the psychological fairy tales of Into the Woods from 1987.

One of the most well-known versions of "Send in the Clowns" is Barbra Streisand's take, and the title refers the circus practice of dispatching a team of clowns to distract the audience after something goes awry. Streisand was actually pursued by Merritt and Claudia Gonson to be a singer for the second 6ths album; Gonson said, "I wrote a lot of letters to Eartha Kitt and Liza Minnelli and Barbra Streisand, and I got a lot of responses that were kind but noncommittal." The second track this week is "I Never Do Anything Twice," originally written by Sondheim for the 1976 film about Sherlock Holmes, The Seven-Per-Cent Solution (by the way, the title isn't an "I've solved it!" solution, but instead refers to a 7% cocaine, 93% saline solution.) The Three Terrors performed it as part of their "...Go Hollywood" show in April of 2001.

Barbra Streisand - "Send in the Clowns"
Julie Wilson - "I Never Do Anything Twice"

It was fun for a while, there was no way of knowing

2006-01-23T23:58:00.000-05:00

Almost comically, Avalon is a notorious seduction aid, the musical equivalent of Spanish Fly: Any bachelor who plays it risks announcing his depraved intentions in neon letters, ALL CAPS.

- Rob Tannenbaum, Village Voice

Roxy Music's Avalon, Merritt's pick for 1982, is indeed a swanky album, and it's one of the few Roxy Music releases that doesn't feature a trashy woman on its cover. It makes one imagine white-tie affairs with socialites straight out of an F. Scott Fitzgerald novel mingling and having torrid, consequence-free trysts at beach houses on the French Riviera. It just oozes sophistication, with Bryan Ferry's suave voice singing unabashedly passionate lyrics like "I'd do anything to turn you on" (or, more smugly, "All the world, even you, should learn to love the way I do.") This world overlaps with Merritt's world, full of attractive and brooding people (see the cover of Get Lost), hopeless romantics who dance among chandeliers and avoid hard labor.

With an art school background, the group was formed in the early 70s by Bryan Ferry with a lineup that included Brian Eno, whose synth stylings added an experimental side to the band's glam rock. Eno was gone from the picture after two albums, and the outfit continued their furious pace of recording, releasing a total of five albums between 1972 and 1975. They gradually moved away from their rock tendencies, with more emphasis on soul, and by the time Flesh + Blood was released in 1980, their edge was practically gone. This led to the smoothness that is Avalon, the band's 8th and final studio album; after a tour to support that album, Bryan Ferry ended the group and focused on his solo career.

This week, we have two selections from Avalon, and it's an album that is hard to describe without making it sound like some insufferable adult contemporary release. True, it is lite rock, and it does feature saxophone flourishes, but they pull it off with taste and finesse.

Roxy Music - "More Than This"
Roxy Music - "Avalon"

Blue is my world now I'm without you

2006-01-16T23:55:00.000-05:00

"I don't know why Whitney Houston doesn't do one of my songs. A lot of them are blank enough for her to play around with and have bland enough lyrics for the meaning to be in the singing rather than the lyrics, which is what she seems to demand from a song. I do that sort of thing pretty well, and I'm actually surprised that I haven't been taken up by that group of people."

That first sentence of Merritt's sounded a little flip back in 1998, with just a hint of indignation (although I have no doubt that he was being serious), but that was before 69 Love Songs and being signed to Nonesuch Records. Many indie-friendly bands have covered Merritt's songs, and a few of those groups were a bit more popular than the Magnetic Fields at the time, like Lush (who covered "I Have the Moon") and White Town (who covered "Famous"). However, Peter Gabriel's cover of "The Book of Love" (on the Shall We Dance? movie soundtrack album from 2004) is the first example of an artist that is significantly more well-known than Merritt tackling one of his songs. (And see this page for a rundown of some other recent and not-so-recent covers - add the Shins' live cover of "Strange Powers" to that list.)

As explained in this Wikipedia entry, "cover" songs were probably so named because decades ago, when a song became popular, other musicians would quickly release their own versions of the song to capitalize on its success, thus "covered" like a football carrier at the bottom of a pileup. The dynamics of the music business have, of course, changed substantially within the last hundred years, and whereas the "cash in" covers of the early-to-mid 20th century were based on a certain song's popularity, in the last few decades, such covers were often based on a certain artist's popularity.

For their Lonely Days EP, Future Bible Heroes recorded an English version of "Love Is Blue (L'Amour Est Bleu)", and it's somewhat astounding to read that in 1968, there were four different versions of that track on the charts, the most popular one being the non-vocal one by Paul Mauriat and His Orchestra. Time magazine analyzed this song back in 1968:

For those whose idea of an oldie is pre-rock 'n' roll, there is still hope. A record called "Love Is Blue" has become a hit without any of the ingredients that pop musicians have considered necessary for the past few years: the juggernaut beat, the vocalisthenic performance, and the strain of novelty. "Love Is Blue" is concocted according to an entirely different recipe. Its rocking rhythm cradles a plaintive, folklike melody swathed in lush strings and horns. It is an all-instrumental number, the first to become a bestseller since 1963.

(By the way, that forementioned instrumental bestseller was "Telstar" by the Tornados.)

"Love Is Blue" has three composition credits: André Popp (who composed the music), Pierre Cour (who wrote the French lyrics), and Brian Blackburn (who wrote the English lyrics). Popp was a French arranger, composer, and bandleader who made highly unusual spage-age pop in the 50s, using various tape manipulation techniques - comparisons to Esquivel are fair, as both had playful and bold arranging styles, and Popp also reminds me somewhat of Perrey and Kingsley (although Popp's work predates theirs), with their ever-changing sound effect-ridden pop madness. (This page and this page have a few brief Popp sound samples.)

Versions of "Love Is Blue" are plentiful, and this week, three renditions are featured. The forementioned version by Paul Mauriat and His Orchestra was a tremendous smash, staying at the #1 spot (USA charts) for five weeks. The proto-waif, whisper-voiced Claudine Longet, known for marrying Andy Williams and shooting a boyfriend, gives us a French language version, with a spoken English middle section. And finally, we have a version by Arthur Lyman, who played the vibes in Martin Denny's band and was a prolific and notable figure in 50s and 60s exotica.

Paul Mauriat and His Orchestra - "Love Is Blue"
Claudine Longet - "Love Is Blue (L'Amour Est Bleu)"
Arthur Lyman - "Love Is Blue"

By request, the Wild Stares track is back up:

The Wild Stares - "Babies Falling"

To die by your side is such a heavenly way to die

2006-01-09T23:46:00.000-05:00

Morrissey is a bit of an easy target for mockery, being unabashedly effeminate and seemingly eternally sad, and I can't help but think of an episode of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 where he emerges from a giant Tupperware container (to lock in pop star freshness) and says, "This is a song I wrote at a time of my life when I was...very, very sad. Breakfast, actually." He is, however, a fascinating songwriter, often channeling Oscar Wilde, who can tap into adolescent despair and loneliness like few others can, and his voice, high and pleasant, can deftly carry any melody he takes a stab at.

It's often mentioned that Morrissey attended the legendary Lesser Free Trade Hall show by the Sex Pistols in 1976 (recreated in the film 24 Hour Party People), but as documented in letters to various music mags, he wasn't really impressed with them. He much preferred the proto-punk New York Dolls and glam singer Jobriath. In 1982, he formed the Smiths with Johnny Marr, who gave the band its distinctive jangly guitar sound, and the group had an incredible five-year run of singles and albums on Rough Trade Records. There was a bit of friction between Morrissey and Marr, and Allmusic.com's band bio says that Marr "...was frustrated with Morrissey's devotion to 60s pop and his hesitancy to explore new musical directions." After Marr left in 1987, Morrissey disbanded the Smiths and promptly started his solo career. Starting off with the pop-friendly Viva Hate, certainly easy on the ears of Smiths fans, he drifted into guitar rock territory (Your Arsenal) and even into prog rock for later releases.

In a review of Morrissey's album You Are the Quarry for the New York Times (alternate link here), Merritt called Morrissey "the best lyricist in rock," and there are obviously similarities between Merritt's "how utterly over-the-top depressing can I get?" songs and Morrissey's "nobody loves me and I want to die" songs. At one performance by the Magnetic Fields, Stephin and Claudia discussed how someone referred to one of their songs as being Morrissey-esque, and then one of them responded that "Summer Lies" had to be their most Morrissey-esque song, particularly the lyrics "hiding in my room, wasting away, cutting myself." And so this week, we feature Morrissey at his most Morrissey-esque, with two of his classics: the majestic, wistful "Everyday Is Like Sunday" (do notice, as that site's commentary points out, that it's "everyday" and not "every day") and one of the ultimate morbid pop songs, "There Is a Light That Never Goes Out."

Morrissey - "Everyday Is Like Sunday"
The Smiths - "There Is a Light That Never Goes Out"

I'm on my way and I won't turn back

2006-01-02T23:29:00.000-05:00

Folk singer and guitarist Odetta turned 75 this last New Year's Eve, and there's a 51 year span between her first album from 1954, and her latest, Gonna Let It Shine, released a few months ago. In those five decades, she's blown minds with her powerful voice and influenced many notables in the folk music biz, including Joan Baez and Bob Dylan; Odetta gave Dylan encouragement early in his career (before he was in NYC), and her album Sings Ballads and Blues inspired him to switch from an electric to an acoustic guitar. Stephinfans know Odetta from her astounding (and markedly non-indie) singing for the 6ths track "Waltzing Me All the Way Home"; her voice demands attention, being commanding and husky yet elegant. In an interview for the San Francisco Bay Guardian, Merritt recalled witnessing the recording session:

"I think I actually cried at the recording session because it was so unexpectedly beautiful. Hearing Odetta sing my song for the first time was like hearing an orchestra play my symphony for the first time, I imagine."

And in an interview for NY Blade, Merritt explained Odetta's unique interpretation of the song:

"She told me that she saw the song ‘Waltzing Me All the Way Home’ as being about two gay black soldiers in World War II, which is completely different from what I thought of the song being about. I don’t generally think of my characters in visual terms so I didn’t have any race in mind. I also don’t really think of singers in visual terms."

Merritt has admired Odetta for a long time, as she (along with Jefferson Airplane) performed at the first concert he ever attended, and in the 69LS interview booklet, Merritt named her as one of the great vocalists in the pantheon. At one of the Magnetic Fields performances at Town Hall in NYC in 2004, Claudia Gonson placed a copy of Odetta's At Town Hall album at the front of the stage; apparently, they saw it for sale by a street vendor that very day and took that as a good omen. *(see footnote)

"Gallows Tree" (a.k.a. "Gallows Pole") is a tense song from the point of view of a person trying to stall his own death by pleading with the hangman. It's a traditional song that was included in Leadbelly's repertoire, but I'm partial to Odetta's version (from her 1957 album At the Gate of Horn), which demonstrates her impressive guitar chops. (By the way, the person playing bass on that song is Bill Lee, film director Spike Lee's father.) Odetta's "Spiritual Trilogy" comes from the forementioned Sings Ballads and Blues album from 1956, and it's a stirring medley, to say the least. By the time she gets to "I'm on My Way," she's practically barking out the words, passionately, and she ends each sustained note with an exhausted wilt - it gives me the shivers every time.

Odetta - "Gallows Tree (Gallows Pole)"
Odetta - "Spiritual Trilogy: Oh Freedom / Come and Go with Me / I'm on My Way"

Note: just so it won't be startling news when the time comes, I'm going to be wrapping this blog up probably at the one year mark - around Valentine's Day. While theoretically I could write about every last artist Merritt has ever mentioned, I feel like I've kept things fairly relevant so far to the task of unlocking his tastes and influences. I have artists picked out for the last six weeks, but if any of you have some suggestions or requests, I'd be happy to read them.

* footnote added 1/9/06: my remembrance was somewhat incorrect. Here are my notes from soon after the performance:
Stephin brought a copy of an Odetta album (a live performance at Town Hall!) and displayed it in front of him. He said that someone bought it on the street for him that day.

I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes

2005-12-19T23:55:00.000-05:00

The British band the Troggs, of course, are best known for their 1966 #1 hit rendition of "Wild Thing," but that sludgy, unexpectedly influential garage rock oddity, with dramatic pauses and an ocarina solo, is just one side to the band. They had a number of hits in the U.K., but they only had one other big American hit, "Love Is All Around," a flower child-friendly song with pastoral strings and a gentle simplicity. Between these two extremes, what brought it all together was Reg Presley's vocals, delivered with his distinctive, snarly voice, and the embrace of basic pop aesthetics. In addition to inspiring garage bands, punks, power-popsters, hippie love rockers, and Jimi Hendrix (who covered "Wild Thing"), they also (allegedly) inspired a cinematic moment. The infamous (and NSFW, mind you) "Troggs Tapes" (linked page includes an MP3) is an 11-minute recording of some sailor-mouthed studio dialogue, reminiscent of a Derek & Clive sketch, and apparently this leaked swear-fest was the basis for the scene in This Is Spinal Tap where the band attempts to record some new material in a studio. I should point out that This Is Spinal Tap inspired the line in "Time Enough for Rocking When We're Old" that goes "There'll be time enough for sex and drugs in Heaven, when our pheromones are turned up to 11." And, close to thirty years after they had formed, the group experienced a slight comeback with the 1992 album Athens Andover, recorded with help from members of R.E.M. (who had covered "Love Is All Around") and the dB's.

In the Raygun interview with Merritt, he mentions the Troggs in his discussion of bubblegum music, and in Chickfactor #6 he lists the Troggs compilation Archaeology as an essential pop recording. And, I'm willing to bet that it's no accident that the titles of the Troggs' two most popular songs are found within the lyrics to two Magnetic Fields songs: "I miss doing the wild thing with you" from "Come Back from San Francisco" and "Desert island, love is all around" from the Holiday track. This week's first selection, "With a Girl Like You," is overshadowed by the two biggest hits in the band's history, but it was a British chart-topper during its time. It's just one big marvelous hook, with proto-Big Star guitar bursts, staccato singing, and irresistible "ba ba ba"s.

The Troggs - "With a Girl Like You"
The Troggs - "Love Is All Around"

Stephinsources will return on January 2.

Originality is passé

2005-12-12T23:58:00.000-05:00

The Onion: What do you yourself listen to most?
Merritt: What I listen to most would probably be ABBA. An important band. And basically the people who are doing what I'm doing, which is plagiarize. Stereolab, for instance. [...] I think records should sound somewhat familiar. They should grapple with what's gone before. Right now, there's been no new technology in music for the first time in a long time. [...] There being no new technology, we have only the old stuff to recombine all the time in hopefully slightly new ways.

Plagiarize? Yes, plagiarize. The line between homage and theft gets crossed - so what? Anyone who claims to be doing something totally original in the realm of music should be approached with deep skepticism. Whether it's reusing folk songs collected by Alan Lomax or sampling, mimicking distinctive production styles, or throwing clichés around, Merritt has never shied away from appropriation.

So, there's an obvious legal issue with plagiarism, but there's a way to deal with that. A Time article mentioned Merritt's encounter with the book The Manual (How to Have a Number One the Easy Way) (well worth the read!), and inside it, there is a discussion of copyright laws and the concept of groove:

...gangsters of the groove from Bo Diddley on down believe they have been ripped off, not only by the business but by all the artists that have followed on from them. This is because the copyright laws that have grown over the past one hundred years have all been developed by whites of European descent and these laws state that fifty per cent of the copyright of any song should be for the lyrics, the other fifty per cent for the top line (sung) melody; groove doesn't even get a look in.

Lyrics are 50%, and the top line melody is the other 50%. That's it! Anything else - rhythms, accompanying melodies, chord progressions - doesn't count.

Merritt's beloved Stereolab has several obsessions, including vintage keyboards (Moog and Farfisa, especially), lounge music, and 70s Krautrock. Many Stereolab songs use the bass drum-abusing motorik beat (a.k.a. "Apache beat"), directly lifted from drummer Klaus Dinger of Neu!, and astute fans have noticed that Stereolab's groove on their epic-lengthed "Jenny Ondioline" is pretty much identical to the one on Neu!'s track "Hallogallo." Similarly, Stereolab borrows heavily from another Krautrock classic, "It's a Rainy Day, Sunshine Girl," by Faust, for two different songs: "Animal Or Vegetable (A Wonderful Wooden Reason...)" and "Anemie," available on their stellar radio session compilation, ABC Music.

Auxiliary Stereolab member Sean O'Hagan has his own band, the High Llamas, which is an outlet for his own pop yearnings and enormous Beach Boys fixation. In O'Hagan, Merritt has a kindred soul, as both share a complete disinterest in writing lyrics that are personal, not to mention the 60s fetish. With sparkling, intricate arrangements featuring a variety of strings and electronics, the High Llamas build upon their influences and make possibly some of the most underappreciated pop music today. Merritt is particularly fond of their 1998 album Cold and Bouncy (which features this week's first selection, "The Sun Beats Down"), one of his TimeOut New York picks for that year, and in an interview in 1999, he mentioned that it was "...the only pop record from the last year that I’ve played more than ten times."

The High Llamas - "The Sun Beats Down"
Stereolab - "Anemie"

By request, the Young Marble Giants tracks are up for another week:

Young Marble Giants - "The Man Amplifier"
Young Marble Giants - "N.I.T.A." (demo)

I want to change my seat just so I can step on everybody's feet

2005-12-05T23:46:00.000-05:00

The versatile entertainer Eartha Kitt has led an unusual and extraordinary life so far, one that has crossed paths with such characters as Orson Welles, Secret Service agents, and Batman. But the most memorable thing about her is that unmistakable voice - agile, articulate, and *ROWR* super-hot. Her best-known persona as a live performer is that of a sex kitten cabaret singer, acting the part of a pampered temptress. After humble beginnings, Kitt joined a dance troupe which took her to Europe for a tour; while filling in for an absent singer in Paris, a club owner spotted her talent and then hired her. Orson Welles had caught her act and was quite taken by her, and he cast her in a stage adaptation of Faust. Upon her return back home, she hit the club circuit and Broadway, and in 1953, she recorded her first album for RCA, hitting the Top Five. With great success on the stage, in nightclubs, and on records, Kitt expanded her career by acting in films, and in 1967, she played the role of Catwoman on the Batman TV show.

In the next year, Kitt was invited to a White House luncheon with Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson, where she spoke out regarding the Vietnam War, allegedly making the First Lady cry. This event caused Kitt to be blacklisted in the States and also to be investigated by the F.B.I., and she lived in Europe for the next decade to escape scorn. Kitt returned to the United States in 1978 to a more welcoming public and government (President Carter even greeted her) and resumed her singing and acting careers. Her recent productions include The Wild Party, Rogers and Hammerstein's Cinderella, and Nine (a show which you might remember being mentioned in the Magnetic Fields song "Promises of Eternity").

Why yes, Stephin is a fan, citing her Eartha-Quake boxed set and also seeking her as a vocalist for the second 6ths album. The first song this week is a fun little spazz-out called "I Wanna Be Evil!" which demonstrates Eartha's range as a performer - coy and reserved one minute, crazed and wicked the next. This version is taken from Eartha Kitt in Person at the Plaza from 1965, which reportedly is Kitt's own favorite album. Did Stephin have this song in mind when writing "I Wish I Had an Evil Twin"? Someone should ask him. The second song this week is a "charming Rodgers and Hart tune" from the musical Spring Is Here entitled "Why Can't I?". It's available on Kitt's 1994 album Back in Business, which earned her a Grammy nomination.

Eartha Kitt - "I Wanna Be Evil!"
Eartha Kitt - "Why Can't I?"

Sing me the kind of song you hear in an operetta

2005-11-28T23:59:00.000-05:00

The work of Victorian era duo Gilbert and Sullivan (lyricist/stagewriter William S. Gilbert and composer Sir Arthur Sullivan) served as the inspiration for two songs by the Magnetic Fields: the harpsichord-bound "For We Are the King of the Boudoir" and "In an Operetta." Together, the pair created comic operas which often demonstrated "topsy-turvydom," the ever-present state of wacky complications and the mingling of diverse characters from varied backgrounds (hence, the name of the Mike Leigh film Topsy-Turvy, about the production of The Mikado.) Written over a century ago, their operettas continue to be performed today, including their three most famous ones, H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance, and The Mikado and serve as influential precursors to the modern stage musical. Now, Merritt sings of an operetta, and perhaps a little definition is in order. An operetta is kind of like opera lite, typically light-hearted and comedic, and not all of the words are necessarily sung; players are usually selected for their singing abilities rather than their acting abilities. A musical, however, tends to be more like a play that is interspersed with songs, therefore acting takes a greater importance.

On first listen, "In an Operetta" might seem like a trifle, but it's actually quite a clever song with several literary and musical references, twisted around into a sort of meta-Victorian plot. First off, Violetta is the main character in Verdi's opera La Traviata, first performed in 1853, a tragic story about a courtesan who faces disapproval when she falls in love with an aristocrat. The "cross-dressing female sailor" plot line was used in traditional Irish seafaring songs, and the most popular one, "The Handsome Cabin Boy," was covered by Kate Bush, Frank Zappa, and Jerry Garcia, among others. The protagonist of Charles Dickens's Great Expectations, first serialized in the early 1860s, is an orphan named Pip, and the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta The Pirates of Penzance is centered around a band of orphaned pirates who are softies at heart.

Richard D'Oyly Carte was an important figure in the professional life of Gilbert and Sullivan, as he produced most of their operettas and built London's Savoy Theatre in 1881 for performances of their works. His D'Oyly Carte Opera Company is still around today, although they have ceased productions since May of 2003, waiting for better economic conditions. This week, two tracks performed by the Company are featured: "Never Mind the Why and Wherefore" from the nautical love story H.M.S. Pinafore and the spooky "When the Night Wind Howls" from the "supernatural opera" Ruddigore.

The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company - "Never Mind the Why and Wherefore"
The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company - "When the Night Wind Howls"

Life is more than going to see things, and that's too bad

2005-11-21T23:58:00.000-05:00

In an interview with Merritt in The Independent, he mentions two concerts that each made a lasting impression upon him - one was seeing Einstürzende Neubauten perform their first NY show in 1984, and the other was a set by the falsetto-voiced ukulele player, Tiny Tim. Merritt said, "Both were life-changing shows, although for opposite aesthetics."

Formed in West Berlin in 1980, Einstürzende Neubauten pushed music to the limits of listenability with its cacophony of guitar noise, power tools used as musical instruments, and rhythms banged out on pieces of metal. Their live shows were legendary for being utterly chaotic, and Merritt wrote the following for Time Out New York about the concert he witnessed:

"...Einstürzende Neubauten, the German difficult-listening group that ruined my hearing 15 years ago (and left me with spark burns on my neck for weeks); the construction-site-as-music-ensemble is so loud without amplification that no one could tell when Danceteria turned off the sound system; the band that commanded its followers to 'listen with pain' and destroyed whatever stage it played on with buzz saws and jackhammers; the group whose name means 'collapsing new buildings,' which perfectly describes its sound."

It's plain to see why Merritt would be drawn to Tiny Tim, as both are avid ukulele players and have a commanding knowledge of early American pop music. With his thick, six-foot frame, unruly long hair, and high singing voice, Tiny Tim was often dismissed as merely a kitschy novelty, but his love for late 19th century/early 20th century music was completely sincere. The Allmusic biography for Tiny Tim says, "...he was an avid collector of 78 rpm records and sheet music, and often scoured the New York Public Library's musical archives for material." Gaining a modest amount of recognition in the Greenwich Village scene in the early 60s, his big break came with an appearance on Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In, and soon he became a television variety/talk show staple. Some attribute the birth of trash/tabloid TV to a single event in 1969: his televised marriage on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson to his girlfriend, Miss Vicki.

In Chickfactor #11, Merritt recalled the forementioned Tiny Tim show:

"Tiny Tim did a show at the Rathskeller in Boston in the late '80s with five band members and five audience members, he played for two hours. Mr. Tim would play the same three chords on his ukulele for 15 minutes, so the band could easily play along (they'd never rehearsed), and trill in falsetto every standard he could think of with those chords, from 1880s Stephen Foster to 1970s Donna Summer. After a while he'd change one of the chords and go off on a new set of songs, never stopping for applause. His enthusiasm for songs of the early 20th century was really touching, and of course he was such a freakish person and so adrift in time, that by the end all eleven of us were blubbering and sobbing along with 'Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree with Anyone Else But Me.'"

Einstürzende Neubauten - "Krieg in Den Städten"
Tiny Tim - "Tip-Toe Thru the Tulips with Me / On the Good Ship Lollipop" (live)

Love, you're such a sweet thing, good enough to eat thing

2005-11-07T11:40:00.000-05:00

Merritt: The only genre that I can say I love is bubblegum - but I can say that because I feel free to define what is and what isn't bubblegum: Ramones, Kraftwerk, Abba, the Troggs. I'd like to have a bubblegum store.
Raygun Magazine: You could call it blow pop. [Merritt doesn't laugh.] Define the bubblegum aesthetic.
Merritt: Celebration of simplicity of form, lack of high art intentions and brevity.

The popular conception of bubblegum is disposable, sing-songy pop music churned out by faceless musicians and marketed to prepubescents (and this is certainly true in many cases), but Merritt's own definition distills what really makes bubblegum pop's best moments so memorable. Keep it short and simple (three chords, verse/chorus/verse/chorus/chorus), and make it insanely catchy.

According to Merritt, the cheerleader chant that begins the Magnetic Fields track "Washington, D.C." was intended to channel the Bay City Rollers' track "Saturday Night." The Bay City Rollers were a Scottish, tartan-wearing teen sensation, perhaps a prototype for boy bands, and Merritt told Chickfactor that they were the first band he saw in concert "by choice."

The Ohio Express had a brief existence during the early part of the classic bubblegum period (late 60s to early 70s), and as cited by Claudia Gonson for Caught in Flux, Stephin was a fan. The producer duo of Jerry Kasenetz and Jeff Katz were the masterminds behind the outfit, along with another successful bubblegum group, 1910 Fruitgum Co. Their arrangement was an odd one (and I highly recommend the book Bubblegum Music Is the Naked Truth for more), as their first hit was not even performed by them - it was the track "Beg, Borrow & Steal" by the Rare Breed (available on the Nuggets compilation) simply re-released. To clarify: it was the same exact recording, not a cover, released again under the Ohio Express name. While the band was out performing and making appearances, studio artists would create their new songs, including their biggest hit, "Yummy, Yummy, Yummy."

Responsible for fifteen top-40 hits in a five year run, Tommy James is best known for his work with the Shondells, including songs like "Mony Mony" and the dumb garage rock of "Hanky Panky." But, it's his pure pop like "I Think We're Alone Now" that earned him a spot in the bubblegum hall of fame. His track "Crimson and Clover," a chart topper, slowed down the pop formula and used wah-wah guitar and a tremolo vocal effect for a psychedelic feel. Regarding the vibrato guitar on the Magnetic Fields track "All My Little Words," Merritt said:

I took great pains to get the vibrato almost at tempo but not quite. I've always liked "Crimson and Clover" by Tommy James and the Shondells, where the vibrato - "crimson and clo-o-o-ver, over and o-o-o-ver" - is not quite in time. I think it's supposed to be in time.

When asked to select "the perfect song" for NPR's All Songs Considered, Merritt's pick was "Sugar, Sugar" by the Archies, a song for which I couldn't imagine a single note being in a different place. Merritt writes:

This laidback three-chord anthem full of sweet double entendres and soulful hand-clapping enthusiasm is recorded with minimal guitar and maximal two-finger Farfisa organ. The pinnacle of bubblegum music, if not pop itself, S.S. was performed by cartoon characters on a Saturday morning television show, and went to #1 with no band to back it up on the road.

The Bay City Rollers - "Saturday Night"
The Ohio Express - "Yummy, Yummy, Yummy"
Tommy James and the Shondells - "Crimson and Clover"
The Archies - "Sugar, Sugar"

Stephinsources will return on November 21.

When we go dancing underneath the city in the catacombs

2005-11-01T22:44:00.000-05:00

Rob Levy: What is your songwriting process? Do you set aside specific time to write, or does it just come in bursts of creativity?
Merritt: I sit around in gay bars with a pencil in one hand and a drink in the other, my little black notebook in my lap, listening to thumping disco music and eavesdropping.

(from Playback St. Louis)

Stephin speaks fondly of various dance clubs from his younger days in Chickfactor #11, and although loud throbbing dance music was probably responsible for much of his hearing loss, it serves an essential role in his songwriting. Though Merritt is primarily a pop songwriter, dance rhythms are used in various tracks, from "The Desperate Things You Made Me Do" to "You Can't Break a Broken Heart," and a handful of Merritt tunes have been remixed for dancefloor action, including "Hopeless," "I Thought You Were My Boyfriend," and several tracks on The Lonely Robot.

Merritt's pick for 1987 on the list is by an outfit which has the unique distinction of being a one-hit wonder and also being hugely influential in the dance world. M/A/R/R/S was a collaboration between two bands on the 4AD label, Colourbox and A.R.Kane, around the time when American house music was arriving in British clubs. The driving track, "Pump Up The Volume," was considered the first house hit made in Britain, and it inspired, for better or for worse, numerous sample-heavy dance tracks for the next few years, bringing sampling from hip-hop circles out into the mainstream. In the 4AD catalog, the song is considered a bit of an anomaly, as the label's early-to-mid 80s output gravitated toward the gloomy and dark.

One enduring band that joined 4AD's fold during the early 80s was Cocteau Twins, who are responsible, more than anyone else, for the popular conception of "the 4AD sound": a sort of structured ambience, using chorus-laden guitars and synthetics. This pigeonholing is unfair to the majority of 4AD bands who sound nothing like Cocteau Twins, but on the other hand, you can always spot an Ivo production (Ivo Watts-Russell being the label's founder) a mile away. The Twins' third album Treasure is oozing with artificiality, which Merritt would undoubtedly appreciate - it's his selection for 1984 on the list. The drum machine, the guitar effects, and the synth flourishes are all distinctly unnatural sounding, and even the non-language in which Elizabeth Fraser sings is of her own invention. And that voice...Fraser is simply one of the most amazing singers around, capable of making astoundingly beautiful sounds.

November is a big month for 4AD, as they celebrate the 25th anniversary of the label with ten nights of performances in London and the releases of a retrospective label compilation and a Cocteau Twins boxed set.

M/A/R/R/S - "Pump Up The Volume"
Cocteau Twins - "Lorelei"
(sorry, again, for the delay!)

I could dress in black and read Camus

2005-10-24T22:59:00.000-05:00

Chickfactor: Are you a participant in the goth scene of New York?
Merritt: So much so that I wrote the book on it.

I can imagine Merritt delivering that line with a sly smirk, but indeed, Merritt is a goth at heart. In a Chickfactor interview with Claudia Gonson, when asked if Merritt and she were new wavers together back when they were teens, Gonson responded, "Yeah, we were goths." Browse through Merritt's songbook and you'll find lots of over-the-top, depressing lyrics with plentiful references to suicide, vampires, and death. And, he has an entire band, the Gothic Archies, devoted to mixing gloom and doom with bubblegum pop. Their official site states: What makes this band different from The Magnetic Fields is that any glimmer of hope is absolutely extinguished.

When assembling the goth canon, several bands quickly come to mind: Siouxsie and the Banshees, the Cure, the Sisters of Mercy, Joy Division, and the quintessential goth band, Bauhaus. Formed in 1978, Bauhaus made a sinister, sometimes terrifying kind of post-punk rock, marked with Peter Murphy's harrowing vocals, Daniel Ash's fuzzed-out, dagger-sharp guitar licks, and the nimble yet menacing rhythm section of David J on bass and Kevin Haskins on drums. The band's appearance (black clothes, make-up) and record artwork (for example, grainy stills from silent films) helped define the goth aesthetic, but their own music was influenced by glam/art rockers like T. Rex, David Bowie, and Brian Eno.

"Bela Lugosi's Dead" is the mother of all goth songs, clocking in at nearly ten minutes, with a bassline so simple it's brilliant, creepy guitar noodlings, and Murphy unnervingly chanting "UNDEAD UNDEAD UNDEAD!" It's a song that the Magnetic Fields performed as a encore at an Atlanta show in 1997. "Dark Entries" was one of the earliest singles on 4AD Records (actually, it was called "Axis Records" at the time), a label that was home to other bands beloved by goths, like Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance, and the Birthday Party. Back one evening in 1998 while on tour in the Pacific Northwest, Merritt commented that instead of performing that night, he'd rather be attending the Bauhaus reunion show that was happening that night in that same town. Well, Bauhaus are back on tour, so pull out your deteriorating Bauhaus shirt, Stephin.

Bauhaus - "Bela Lugosi's Dead"
Bauhaus - "Dark Entries"

Which is more musical: a truck passing by a factory or a truck passing by a music school?

2005-10-17T22:41:00.000-05:00

Experimental composer John Cage was a controversial figure who studied under Henry Cowell and Arnold Schoenberg during the first half of the 20th century and invented some of the boldest artistic approaches in modern music. He favored using modified instruments, such as his "prepared piano," which was a grand piano with small objects (nuts and bolts, screws, bits of rubber, spoons, etc.) wedged in between its strings. Inspired by Zen Buddhism, Cage often used indeterminate techniques for his works, for example using the outcome of a coin toss to shape a piece.

Cage's most notorious piece has to be 4'33", which is a piece where the performer plays no notes at all, and all of the ambient noises in the performance space constitute the work. One event in Cage's life that influenced the creation of this piece was his visit to an anechoic chamber, which is a special soundproof room. Rather than hearing complete silence, Cage heard a high sound and a low sound; the sound engineer present told Cage that the high sound was the sound of his body's nervous system and the low sound was his blood pumping through his circulatory system. Cage's conclusion was that total silence was an impossibility, as long as he was alive.

4'33" is Merritt's 1951 entry on the list, and track eleven on Merge Records' reissue of The Wayward Bus and Distant Plastic Trees, being four minutes and thirty-three seconds of digital silence, is an homage to this piece. The Magnetic Fields also performed it as an encore, related by Claudia Gonson and Chris Ewen in this article in The Independent:

"It's like when The Magnetic Fields performed 69 Love Songs at the Lincoln Center over two nights," adds Christopher Ewen, Merritt's partner and the third Future Bible Hero, "and at the end of the second night, the audience wanted an encore!" With no more songs in their armoury, the group opted for a performance of "4'33"", John Cage's celebrated silent piece.

"The applause after the 69th song was hyperactive and crazy," recalls Gonson, "but then you sit for four minutes and 33 seconds, and afterwards the applause is really mellow and relaxed - John Cage would have loved watching what happens to an audience after it: they're a little disappointed."

(I'm being nit-picky here, but actually the 4'33" encore was at their Somerville show in late 2000, not their Lincoln Center show.)

One of Cage's pieces for the prepared piano is the eerie "Sonata XIV," performed here by Maro Ajemian and recorded in 1950 under Cage's direction, and it was included on the Orbitones, Spoon Harps & Bellowphones compilation, beloved by Merritt. The second track this week is a short excerpt from Radio Music, a work which requires each performer to tune a radio to various frequencies, and the result is what just happens to be on the various stations at the time. Finally, we have a performance of 4'33" by the BBC Symphony Orchestra (a full video, with commentary, is available here.)

(SPOILER ALERT! In case you are wondering about the audience laughter around the 2:00 point and are unable to view the video, it's when the conductor, between the first and second movements, pulls a handkerchief out of his pocket and wipes his forehead.)

Maro Ajemian - "Sonata XIV"
John Cage - "Radio Music" (excerpt)
BBC Symphony Orchestra - "4'33""

Pineapples, guavas, mangos, Martin Denny playing tangos

2005-10-10T22:45:00.000-05:00

If you've ever wondered about Merritt's obsession with Hawaii, which brought us "My Blue Hawaii," "Oahu," and "Volcana!", I can think of two sources for it. First, Merritt lived in Hawaii while growing up - one of the many places in which he lived during his childhood. Second, he has a deep appreciation for exotica and its master, Martin Denny, who passed away earlier this year at the age of 93. Denny's trademark sound was an amalgam of distinct musical styles, playful and elegant, in an easy-listening package; in this interview, he discusses the development of his sound in the 50s:

"Well, the way that started was that part of my training was how to make a small group sound larger than it really was. So I would use a lot of different percussive effects, and then I started collecting instruments from the South Seas and from the Orient, also from Latin America. The music became a quasi-mix of music from the South Pacific, the Orient and South America. We were always experimenting, and trying out new ideas. Of course, that's when we added the birdcalls on 'Quiet Village.'"

This article about Future Bible Heroes clears up the story about the band's formation, which happened when Merritt and Chris Ewen "...were drawn together by their appreciation of exotica by masters like Martin Denny, members of the electronic vanguard such as Enoch Light, and musical masterminds such as Lindsey Buckingham."

Like Denny, Merritt has a fondness for collecting musical instruments (see the 69 Love Songs instrument list for evidence of this), which is mentioned by Claudia Gonson in this article for Sound on Sound:

"Stephin has really been involved in collecting and using exotic and interesting and weird instruments," explains Claudia. "Chris, too, has not only collected cool instruments, but become sort of a connoisseur of '50s and '60s technology from the earliest days of electronic production. So when you hear the beginning of a song like 'Doris Daytheearthstoodstill', which is like a looped bubble, basically, you think about Enoch Light, or Martin Denny and the earliest stages of making music with electronic things, and there's a kind of integrity. There's a real artistry to it."

"Quiet Village" was composed by Les Baxter, another huge figure in the exotica scene, but Martin Denny's version (complete with birdcalls and frog sounds) was the one that made it into a hit. Regarding the frog sounds, as the story goes, when Denny's band played in Hawaii in 1956 at the Shell Bar, which featured an amphibiously-populated pond near the stage, frogs would croak along with the music. The band thought that these flourishes matched well with their sound, so they incorporated the croaking sounds (recreated using a guiro) into their songs. The first version is from Denny's debut album for Liberty Records, entitled Exotica and released in 1957. The second version is from the 1969 album Exotic Moog, and although it was released under the Martin Denny name, Denny doesn't actually play on it. Still, it's a great version, blending electronics with exotica in a way that I think Merritt and Ewen would approve.

Martin Denny - "Quiet Village" (1957)
Martin Denny - "Quiet Village" (1969)

There's only cliché to get across this feeling

2005-10-04T20:29:00.000-05:00

Going from punk to off-kilter lo-fi bedroom pop, Chris Knox has had a career that's impossible to overlook when discussing New Zealand's musical history. Starting off in the late 70s Kiwi bands the Enemy and Toy Love, Knox and Alec Bathgate then teamed up for the duo Tall Dwarfs, one of the most beloved bands on the Flying Nun roster. The geographical separation of the two has put time constraints on their collaborations, despite the band being the most prominent project for each of them. Knox has recorded quite a catalog of solo work and also creates animated movies, draws cartoons, and writes columns. Merritt fans will recognize him as being the vocalist for the 6ths track, "When I'm Out of Town," and he was cited by Merritt as being one of the "best contemporary lyricists in English" in Chickfactor #12.

Chris Knox's "Not Given Lightly" was Merritt's favorite recording of 1989, and it's an intimate and completely charming song, written as a love token for Knox's wife. In 2001, members of the APRA named the track as being New Zealand's ninth best song of all time, and it's available on the album Seizure (FYI, Knox sometimes suffers from epileptic fits), which is a good starting place for diving into Knox's solo material. There's a bit of uniformity within the solo Knox catalog, with a typical song being built up from a rhythm loop, a rhythm guitar riff, and maybe an Omnichord (a sort of electronic autoharp). Knox has an odd, sometimes naughty sense of humor, yet he also has numbers that are totally heart-wrenchingly sincere, sometimes to the point of discomfort (take for example "Young Female Caucasian," during which Knox actually weeps.)

Some tracks by Tall Dwarfs are compatible with the Chris Knox solo formula, but Bathgate and Knox feed off each other's weirdness and often go into stranger (yet listenable) territory. They are unafraid of the grotesque (speaking of which, their self-portraits are the most unflattering likenesses ever), in terms of both lyrics and sounds, and have a low-tech recording style that lends much to the Tall Dwarfs listening experience. Merritt has expressed his admiration for Tall Dwarfs, in particular the album Hello Cruel World, a compilation of the duo's first four EPs from the early 80s. From the opening twin guitar chords of "Nothing's Going to Happen" (which would be re-recorded for a grand Phil Spector homage called Wall of Dwarfs), you know you're onto something amazing. Hello Cruel World, which includes this week's second selection, is a great entry point, and you can't go wrong with 3 EPs and the Dogma EP (bundled with Fork Songs), too.

Chris Knox - "Not Given Lightly"
Tall Dwarfs - "Crush!"

(sorry for the late post, folks!)

I hear a new world calling me

2005-09-26T22:57:00.000-05:00

The entry for 1962 on the list is "Telstar" by the Tornados, a rousing and poignant tribute to a satellite, and it's the most successful and enduring song recorded by Joe Meek, the tragic oddball producer and songwriter. Strangely enough, Meek wasn't a musician and was actually tone deaf. Sometimes referred to as "the British Phil Spector" (which is only accurate in the fact that both had distinctive sounds that were immediately recognizable), Meek's production techniques were unusual in his day, as he used liberal amounts of reverb, compression, and delay effects and employed the fruits of his electronic tinkering.

In several ways, Merritt has a kinship with Meek, with their shared affinity for pop music and experimentation. Until recently, Merritt recorded his music in a home studio, and Meek used his home at 304 Holloway Road in London to record numerous acts. The Wikipedia entry for Joe Meek describes the recording of "Johnny Remember Me": "...he placed the violins on the stairs, the drummer almost in the bathroom, and the brass section on a different floor entirely."

Meek productions are often peppered with unusual sound effects, and Merritt himself has an arsenal of odd techniques for making sounds. In this interview for the San Francisco Bay Guardian, Merritt describes one of his favorites:

Bay Guardian: Please explain the Slinky Guitar.
Merritt: It's an appropriation of two guitars. You connect them with a slinky and block, or let [the slinky] oscillate between them. You plug in both guitars and pan them left and right, and you get a sound from the spring. I usually use it for percussion.
Bay Guardian: Do you like Joe Meek?
Merritt: I obviously identify with Joe Meek.
Bay Guardian: Have you read his biography?
Merritt: I can't imagine someone who spent his life in the recording studio would have a very interesting biography. Except for the last five minutes, which would be pretty interesting.

Merritt is referring to the disturbing conclusion to Joe Meek's life, documented in this excellent article by John McCready. In 1967, the paranoid and mentally ill Meek murdered his landlady with a shotgun and then turned the gun on himself.

The first selection this week is from the proto-concept mini-album I Hear a New World from 1960, which Meek described as "An outer space stereo music fantasy" and involves chipmunk-voiced, blue-skinned inhabitants of the moon. "Telstar" was Meek's sole American hit and one of the biggest selling instrumentals of all time; it's simultaneously epic and cheesy, and by the way, that reedy keyboard you hear is a Clavioline. This page features an MP3 (track #10) of Joe Meek singing the "Telstar" melody over a different song (I wasn't kidding about him being tone deaf), along with a number of other Meek demos. The 4-CD boxed set Portrait of a Genius: The RGM Legacy was released a few months ago, but a more reasonably-priced introduction is the sterling 2-disc compilation Joe Meek: The Alchemist of Pop, which I recommend highly.

Rod Freeman and the Blue Men - "I Hear a New World"
The Tornados - "Telstar"

I like candy when it's wrapped in a sweater

2005-09-19T00:18:00.000-05:00

According to ld beghtol, quoted on David Jennings's 69 Love Songs site, "I'm Sorry I Love You" was intended to be a tribute to the band Bow Wow Wow, but "...it didn't quite come out that way." Merritt elaborates on this in the 69LS booklet:

"It was originally supposed to be one of those Carter Family sort of songs, but we discovered in the studio that it worked well with a Bo Diddley beat."

One of Merritt's picks from the early 80s, Bow Wow Wow was assembled by Malcolm McLaren, taking Adam Ant's backing musicians and adding one Annabella Lwin, an adolescent Burmese girl who, as the story goes, was discovered by McLaren singing in a London dry cleaners. A typical BWW song has several distinct features, notably a tom-heavy Burundi beat and utterly enthusiastic vocals from Annabella. Though they're often relegated to "one-hit wonder" status for their cover of "I Want Candy," they have a number of tracks even better than that one. The 1996 compilation The Best of Bow Wow Wow probably has all you need, with the terribly catchy "C30, C60, C90, Go!", "Do You Wanna Hold Me?", and "Go Wild in the Country" being the highlights.

Tracing "I'm Sorry I Love You" back to Bo Diddley isn't a direct path. We can start with Bow Wow Wow's "I Want Candy" cover - it was written and recorded by the Strangeloves and released in June of 1965, but the rendition that McLaren used to reference the song was the one by Brian Poole and the Tremeloes (also known for their "Here Comes My Baby" cover) from July of 1965. The original version by the Strangeloves indeed uses Bo Diddley's trademark rhythm and borrows substantially from his song "Hey Bo Diddley."

Possibly the best place to get the original "I Want Candy" is on the generous Nuggets boxed set, which expands the original Nuggets double-album compilation from 1972 to a 4-CD set. The full title is Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era, 1965-1968, and it's jam-packed with guitar-driven garage rock numbers ("Psychotic Reaction" by the Count Five, "You're Gonna Miss Me" by the 13th Floor Elevators) and psychedelic pop songs ("Incense and Peppermints" by the Strawberry Alarm Clock, "I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night)" by the Electric Prunes). The last track on the compilation, "Blues' Theme" by Davie Allan & the Arrows, is from the film The Wild Angels; this movie featured a character named Mike (played by Nancy Sinatra), referenced by Merritt in "Papa Was a Rodeo." Really, if you have any interest at all in 60s pop/rock, then don't hesitate to get this, and Nuggets II (which concentrates on non-American bands) is amazing, as well. And, tying it all together, Merritt named it as one of the best releases of 1998 in Time Out New York.

Bow Wow Wow - "I Want Candy"
The Strangeloves - "I Want Candy"

The captive, pushed and shoved, was given leather boxing-gloves

2005-09-12T22:55:00.000-05:00

Handler: What other songs do you get in your head?
Merritt: There are two things that I always, for decades, have gotten stuck in my head while walking down the street. One of them is a beautiful song by the Red Krayola, "Plekhanov:" "Neither anticipation / nor fulfillment / is realistic / in dialectic / Who's learned the language of the Internationale? / Our conversation / for seventeen years / has volunteered / Plekhanov / a priori / Who's learned the language of the Internationale? / Who was ever disowned by his Granma?"

Handler: What's the other song?
Merritt: The jingle for Bumble Bee tuna: "Yum, yum Bumble Bee / Bumble Bee tuna / I love Bumble Bee / Bumble Bee tuna..."

Handler: I always get "Dude Looks Like A Lady" stuck in my head.
Merritt: I love that song.

Continuing on with another band on Rough Trade, we have the Red Crayola (later changed to "Krayola" due to obvious legal reasons), a ridiculously diverse and inventive outfit centered around the singer/songwriter/artist Mayo Thompson. The group started out in the late 60s playing freaky, noodly psychedelic rock, but later recordings, while still experimental and challenging, aren't as easy to place into a certain time period. Thompson also mined subjects such as art, political history, philosophy, and psychology for his pointedly non-rock, non-pop lyrics. His fascinating songs earned him a spot on Merritt's short list of "best contemporary lyricists in English" in Chickfactor #12.

In the 70s, Thompson began collaborating with Art & Language, a collective formed in Great Britain in the late 60s that focused on conceptual art. Together, they made three albums: Collected Slogans (1976), Kangaroo? (1981), and Black Snakes (1983). Kangaroo?, which was released on Rough Trade, featured an amazing line-up of post-punk musicians: Gina Birch from the Raincoats, Lora Logic and Ben Annesley from Essential Logic, Epic Soundtracks from Swell Maps, and Allen Ravenstine from Pere Ubu. It's an incredible album, one that is constantly shifting and sounds fresh upon repeated listens, and although the lyrics are plainly written out, the unifying themes (Communism, language, Gestalt theory, and others) make it somewhat of a puzzle. This week, two songs from Kangaroo? are featured: "Plekhanov," cited above, and the opening track, "Kangaroo?" which was played by Merritt on WFMU when he was a guest DJ on February 25, 2000 (RealAudio stream here - "Kangaroo?" starts at 22:16).

Thompson was busy as a producer during the late 70s and early 80s, and he even served as Rough Trade's label manager for a little while. Still, the Red Krayola continued making making music through the 80s, and in the early-to-mid 90s, the band teamed up with Drag City Records, facilitated by huge Krayola fan David Grubbs, which released new Red Krayola releases and also re-issued a considerable amount of their backcatalog. And to this day, they're playing live shows; this page shows details for performances in Chicago and California in the upcoming weeks.

And if you're wondering about the Bumble Bee tuna jingle, go here for a sound file and an unbearably cute TV commercial from the 70s.

The Red Crayola with Art & Language - "Kangaroo?"
The Red Crayola with Art & Language - "Plekhanov"

In love is so tough on my emotions

2005-09-05T22:54:00.000-05:00

"They will not remind you of anything."

This statement was written in the N.M.E. in 1979 about the Raincoats, and indeed, they defy comparison. While first inspired by 70s icons like the Clash, the Sex Pistols, and Patti Smith, the four-woman band cast aside the constraints of punk music. Using guitars, a violin, and drums, they created music that is simultaneously energetic, unpredictable, and often affecting; though their music sounds odd, it's a natural weirdness that's never forced. Their self-titled debut album is one of Merritt's favorites from Rough Trade's early days. It was reissued in the 90s thanks to the advocacy of Kurt Cobain, but sadly, the album has again fallen out of print.

One of the striking things about the debut album is the unpolished, yet completely exhilarating drumming by Palmolive (real name: Paloma McLardy), who was an original member of the Slits. Palmolive was an inspiration for Claudia Gonson, who cites her as her favorite drummer, and in Chickfactor #10, Claudia names the Raincoats as her favorite band of all time. She even recounts a trip to England in order to track down the band in the mid-80s: "I was going to give them a tape of Buffalo Rome, which became the Magnetic Fields' Distant Plastic Trees."

The first track on the debut album, "No Side to Fall in," is a manic little number featuring frantic fiddling and what sounds like an aluminum can being beaten. (Note: the Geffen reissue of the album includes the track "Fairytale in the Supermarket" as a bonus song, but instead of being added at the end, it is used as the opener.) "In Love" is a disorienting song, apparently mirroring the dizziness of love with abused guitar and violin strings and repeated syllables. Though it too is out of print, I also give high marks to the second Raincoats album Odyshape, which is even stranger and more removed from its contemporaries than the debut.

The Raincoats - "No Side to Fall in"
The Raincoats - "In Love"

Things you had forgotten, things that couldn't last

2005-08-29T22:28:00.000-05:00

In this remembrance, Claudia Gonson explains how Merritt profoundly influenced her musical tastes in the early 80s and how they loved music from the early days of Rough Trade. Rough Trade began as a shop in 1976, and two years later, Rough Trade - the record label - was spawned; the shop and the label separated into two distinct entities in 1982. The discography of Rough Trade Records is sprawling, eclectic, and frequently mind-blowing. It was home to several bands mentioned previously here, including Young Marble Giants, Rainy Day, the Dream Syndicate, and Opal, and several 6ths singers had releases on Rough Trade, like Robert Scott (with the Clean and the Bats) and Dean Wareham (with Galaxie 500). Merritt has expressed his appreciation for several Rough Trade artists, including Morrissey (of the Smiths, of course), Mayo Thompson and the Red Crayola, the Raincoats, and Weekend.

After Young Marble Giants disbanded in 1981, main songwriter Stuart Moxham formed the Gist while singer Alison Statton teamed up with guitarist and fellow Cardiffian Simon Booth to form Weekend. Soon after, they were joined by Spike, on guitar and viola, and the outfit recorded three singles and an album (plus a live mini-album) for Rough Trade during their brief career together. Upon listening to this week's selections, it's immediately apparent that Weekend sounds nothing like Young Marble Giants, as Weekend uses a breezy jazzy approach with layers of nylon-stringed guitars, saxes, and strings.

Alison describes the band's sources in this article excerpt from 1982 in Sounds:
"...we have three different influences coming through, I'm still very into folk music and ballads, as I was in the Giants (though now I'm playing bass too), whereas Simon's into the jazz thing and Spike's off on a tangent all his own."

Simon explains, in the same article, that while he worked in a London jazz shop, he cultivated an appreciation for jazz from the be-bop era of the 50s. This may be true, but the pop jazz that Weekend plays reminds me more of the laid-back Brazilian bossa nova of Antonio Carlos Jobim and Astrud Gilberto, rather than 50s be-bop.

With one of the most gorgeous guitar intros ever, "The End of the Affair" begins La Varieté, the sole (proper) album by Weekend and one of Merritt's favorites. Thanks to Vinyl Japan, if you buy their re-issue of La Varieté (which includes the '81 Demos EP) along with the singles/live compilation Archive, then you have nearly everything. "Drumbeat for Baby," another track off La Varieté, is presented here with its slightly longer 12" version, which is available on Archive.

Now, if you will, take a look at the cover of Archive (which was originally the cover of the "Past Meets Present" 7" single). Look familiar? The watercolor painting was made by Wendy Smith, who also created the cover art for...Distant Plastic Trees and The Wayward Bus by the Magnetic Fields. Smith is also responsible for the cover of La Varieté and the photo on the cover of Colossal Youth by Young Marble Giants.

Weekend - "The End of the Affair"
Weekend - "Drumbeat for Baby"

Staring at the ceiling, wishing she was somewhere else instead

2005-08-22T22:58:00.000-05:00

69 Love Songs is chock full of ersatz genre pieces - some resemblances and hints are there, but seldom does a song on it convey any sincere claim to authenticity. One might think that "World Love" would attempt to blend all non-American/European musical styles, but instead it ends up sounding like something off Paul Simon's Graceland. "Punk Love" uses the familiar Ramones chord progression and the vocals have a bratty snarl to them, but other than that, it sounds little like punk. It's about as genuine as a chimpy-sounding Casio keyboard rhythm/accompaniment preset. Mind you, these aren't complaints - it's apparent that Merritt did this all intentionally, and it's another side of his love for artificiality. So, what happens when he makes an (off-kilter) imitation of an imitation? You get "It's a Crime."

Stephin Merritt: I think of it as that small genre of Swedish reggae. Ace Of Base have done reggae, sort of reggae, ABBA has done sort of reggae. I'm sure a-ha have, but I don't remember.
Daniel Handler: I'll ask my wife. She's a big a-ha fan.

ABBA have dabbled in various genres - "Fernando" and "Chiquitita" both have Latin touches, and "Ring Ring" and "Dance (While the Music Still Goes On)" are tributes to Phil Spector's girl group pop - but perhaps their most unexpected genre choice is reggae. "Tropical Loveland" is a cute trifle - the drums and guitar utilize the standard reggae rhythms, sure, but the song is incredibly white bread. It's too clean and not sweaty enough to be authentic, but that's hardly the point - ABBA are in the pop business. Six years later, they used a vaguely reggae beat for their track "One of Us," which seemed to serve as a prototype for the career of Ace Of Base.

Also, I should point out that when it was performed live, "It's a Crime" had a Motown-esque chorus of backing singers. Swedish reggae, Motown soul, electropop...man, that is so freakin' meta.

ABBA - "Tropical Loveland"
ABBA - "One of Us"

Fling them from the top of the Brill Building

2005-08-15T22:47:00.000-05:00

The Brill Building, referenced in "Epitaph for My Heart," was a one-stop pop song factory, located at 1619 Broadway in New York City. In the building during its heyday, in the late 50s and early 60s, you could obtain a freshly written song, have it arranged, assemble studio musicians and singers, record a demo, and then try to sell it to various record companies, all without stepping outside. At its wall-busting peak, it housed 165 music businesses.

This sort of division of labor may not sit right with modern audiences, but it's unreasonable to demand that songwriters also be musicians and singers, not to mention models. Merritt has stated that he despises touring (their tours are referred to as "tourettes"), and his band the 6ths demonstrates his desire to be known, first and foremost, as a songwriter by having other people sing his songs. Several of his recordings from the last half dozen years don't even feature Merritt as a musician or singer, like "Acoustic Guitar" and "Waltzing Me All the Way Home."

The Onion: Then how do you actually go about writing Stephin Merritt songs? Do you consider yourself primarily a lyricist?
Merritt: I suppose I consider myself primarily a songwriter. I'm involved with both lyrics and music, intertwined, usually. The lyrics are about the same thing the music is about, usually. They comment on each other, and if I wrote one without the other, like I did on the Future Bible Heroes record [Memories of Love], it wouldn't mean the same thing. Which it doesn't on the Future Bible Heroes record.

The Onion: Do you prefer to sing yourself, or have other people sing?
Merritt: I prefer to have other people sing, because it's a lot easier to judge how well they're doing. Everybody hates the sound of their own voice when it's played back.

69 Love Songs itself seems to be, also, a tribute to the industrialized songwriting process. It's self-consciously packaged like a generic product, using the most bland font of them all, Courier, and the title also brings to mind other store-bought products, like a box of 64 Crayola™ crayons or maybe even 2000 Flushes™.

Including the Bacharach/David duo (featured last week), the Brill Building was associated with several prominent songwriting teams, among them Carole King/Gerry Goffin, Jeff Barry/Ellie Greenwich, and Barry Mann/Cynthia Weil. Wall-of-sound producer Phil Spector made many Brill Building songs into hits, and all three songs this week are Spector productions from the highly recommended Back to Mono boxed set. "I Love How You Love Me" written by Barry Mann and Larry Kolber, Merritt's entry for 1961 on the list, sounds innocent upon first listen, but a second listen will put a knowing grin on your face if you have an unclean mind like mine. On the other hand, "He Hit Me (It Felt Like a Kiss)" (a Goffin/King composition) is not at all subtle, and it's actually quite disturbing - the Three Terrors covered it for one of their performances. And finally, one of the most glorious moments in pop music is "Be My Baby" (penned by Barry/Greenwich), which has an unforgettable drum intro that was borrowed for countless other songs, including the Magnetic Fields track "Candy."

The Paris Sisters - "I Love How You Love Me"
The Crystals - "He Hit Me (It Felt Like a Kiss)"
The Ronettes - "Be My Baby"