BongoJazz

wow I sing a little but usually just play...female singers um ella fitz Sarah vaughan..joni Mitchell....wow aretha rickee lee Jones...

WWWP

I'm hoping this will be useful to some of you musicians.

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WWWP

Alright, here’s the deal. I want to revive this thing (and keep up with it henceforth) because I’m going through a ****ing rough time right now and need something to distract myself and, more importantly, something to commit myself to, so I’m really going to attempt to update at least once a week.

I don’t have any great ideas or clever themes to present at the moment, so I’m just going to start by going through my top artists from the past three months according to last.fm and say a bit about each of them. And of course I’ll conclude with a mixtape with songs from every band I mention.



1. Wingnut Dishwasher’s Union/Johnny Hobo and the Freight Trains


Both of these bands are fronted by Pat “The Bunny” Schneeweis, my favorite folk punk songwriter. Wingnut songs are generally political in nature and reflect Pat’s anarchistic philosophies, whereas Johnny Hobo is heavily laden in cynicism, drug use and addiction. In his own words, Pat described Johnny Hobo as a character that is “an archetype of misery, fear, and disengagement” and “reflective of a time period in which I was very miserable, afraid, and disengaged.”

I frequently listen to Wingnut’s Burn the Earth, Leave it Behind and Johnny Hobo’s Caught in the Act of Not Being Awesome while on my bike. There’s something about riding as opposed to driving or walking, no matter where I’m going or what time of day it is – whether I’m in a hurry and need to get to class, riding to meet my friends at the bar for $2.50 pint night or if I’m just on a solo midnight ride weaving through neighborhoods - that makes me feel uncharacteristically connected to my city and the people around me. Add to it the lyrics (and what has become my mantra):


And you have a suddenly less pessimistic, suddenly more hopeful, suddenly smiling version of me, peddling along on my way, having survived my personal apocalypse for one more day.

Videos below (including a cover of mine, because whatever).




2. BADBADNOTGOOD

In a similar vein, if I’m not listening to one of Pat’s several collectives, it is very probable that I’m listening to BBNG1 and BBNG2. I have yet to be proven wrong in regards to asserting that instrumental hip hop jazz can never being anything less than awesome.

These albums invoke memories for me of riding to the park in the middle of the night to meet up with a friend or two, 40oz's and weed brownies cased in tupperware shoved in my backpack or bike basket. We'd sit on the playground swings or in the damp grass and talk about the weight of it all, of the world, of our jobs, of our families, of our spirals and recoveries. None of us knew how to navigate our own lives, but we had each other to be chaotic with, simultaneously and empathically. I haven't done that for awhile now, though. I've recently driven away all the friends I had, both unintentionally and otherwise. Looking back on those nights feel the same to me now as when I visit trails I used to hike with friends who have died or watch a movie that reminds me of an ex. I don't feel like I should want to feel happy about remembering the good in each of these people, because I'm afraid it will negate the bad - either in them or in me.

Anyway, BBNG1 covers everything from Tribe Called Quest to Joy Division and BBNG2 contains notable Kanye West and MBV covers. Both albums are free for download or stream on their website, and as of yet no physical copies of either exist. BBNG3 is due out sometime this year.

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#TERMLIMITSFORMODERATORS

WWWP

3. R Stevie Moore


R Stevie Moore. The (facetiously) self-proclaimed new King of Pop – the incredibly prolific, heart wrenchingly underrated, underappreciated and seemingly not well-known lo-fi legend. His father is Bob Moore – bassist/producer/sidekick of Elvis, Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan, Jerry Lee Lewis and the like, and it’s clear from RSM’s work that music and production is the nucleus of every cell in his body. He’s worked with artists spanning from, most notably, Ariel Pink, The Vaccines, MGMT, Dr. Dog, Apples in Stereo and many, many international others. RSM has released hundreds of hundreds of cassettes, albums and compilations, his most widely recognized album being 1976’s Phonography, which in 1996 Rolling Stone listed as one of the fifty most significant indie records.

I’m not sure what else to say. R Stevie Moore is unclassifiable in his diversity; irreplaceable in his ingenuity. He friended me on Facebook, likes my pictures, has shared some of my youtube covers and proposed marriage (hahaha). I chat with him infrequently and he's just a cool old guy with a blue beard and a terribly awesome sense of fashion. I think he’s one of those artists you either “get” or you don’t – and I don’t say that to suggest that those who “get it” are superior; I just mean that I can understand why one wouldn’t. That said, I could never be your friend if you don’t.



4. Cody ChesnuTT



On the related note of bedroom-recording eccentric legends, I present to you Cody ChesnuTT. The Headphone Masterpiece, Cody’s 2002 release which was recorded on a 4-track cassette recorder in his bedroom, has substantially dominated my speakers over the past few months. The funky, neo soul, lo-fi debut consists of a multitude of short tracks containing guitar, bass, keyboard and an organ. Cody makes great use of overdubbing, and his lyrics range from ironic encounters with the rock and roll lifestyle to genuine proclamations of love.

Cody gained a small amount of mainstream attention after the album’s release due to the Roots remaking a song from The Headphone Masterpiece which got heavy airplay on MTV and BET in the early 2000’s. He was mentioned in the film Me And You And Everyone We Know (one of my personal favorites), and his track “5 on a Joyride” was played in a scene in which a young character gets his first blowjob. Quirky as fuck, all around.

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Astronomer

Kinda a late reply to this entry, but I love that you did a tutorial on shakers! You are the best. Also, your cover of Wingnut Dishwasher’s Union is sweet. Keep it up, wolvey! I look forward to future entries

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WWWP

I’m hesitant to spend much time discussing the following two bands because they’re both well-known on the boards and elsewhere, so I’ll focus my attention on particular albums and tracks. I’m also going to split this into two entries to avoid too much text in one post for those of you with short attention spans (assuming, of course, this is being read by anyone).

Last Three Months Theme - Entry Three A: Someone, Oh Anyone, Tell Me How to Stop This

5. The Antlers


Hospice is one of two albums two which I’ve felt an immense emotional and personal attachment. In its beauty I find great amounts of comfort, but in its depths are sparked equally great stabs of pain remembered. Listening to this album is tumultuous for me and because of what it brings up for me it is not always particularly enjoyable – and perhaps it’s the masochist in me – but I find myself returning to it again and again.

I often wonder what it will be like to watch my father die. I’d be watching from a distance, of course, I don’t mean to imply that I’d have anything to do with how or when it happens – if it’s sudden there are thousands of miles of separation between us already, but if it’s a long-term process due to illness or what have you I won’t be at his bedside. I’ll maintain that distance just as aggressively as I do now. After recently unwillingly surviving a suicide attempt I’ve been spending a lot of time pondering the origins of my disease, and as my father was my abuser and the gardener that both planted and nourished the suicidal seed in the stem of me, I can’t even pretend that I would mourn him. It would not be a loss, he would not be missed. I find myself contented by the thought – his ability to ever harm another person being ripped from him in the solidity of death.

When I listen to Hospice, an elegant and wholeheartedly devastating album that narrates the relationship between a terminally ill, previously abused patient and a hospice worker, I find I place myself as both the victim and the caretaker depending on which ideas of myself dominate my thoughts at a given time. Typical of the codependent behavior that arises from abusive relationships, sometimes I’m the one with my head in the oven, and sometimes I’m the one telling my father to take his out (Sylvia). Sometimes the lyrics “And as it opened I could hear you howling from your room/ but I hid out in the hall until the hurricane blew” mean I’m hiding from my father’s anger, and sometimes it means I see and hear the pain he’s suffering himself (Two). By the end of the album, no matter what amount of sympathy I’ve felt toward myself or my father, the refrain “Don’t ever let anyone tell you you deserve that (Wake)” brings me back to the present moment, in which I am alleviated from the guilt I feel for abandoning my father in his illness, validated for having suffered what I’ve suffered, and empowered by having stood up for myself in the act of running away.

This is not what the album is about. But this is what the album is about for me.

__________________

#DEMODFROWNLAND
#TERMLIMITSFORMODERATORS

WWWP

Thank you! I hope if you watched the entire shaker video you didn't think I was serious though.... hahaha.

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Astronomer

Haha, I did watch the entire shaker video, your frivolity is why I loved it! Anyway keep up the beautiful covers also

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WWWP

Just making sure, haha. Thank you for your kind words in regard to my covers, I do appreciate it

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#DEMODFROWNLAND
#TERMLIMITSFORMODERATORS

WWWP

6. Belle and Sebastian


The first time I heard Belle and Sebastian it was on a mixtape (with a drawing of a cat on it) given to me on a first date – the ultimate form of hipster flirting, amiright? The track the guy included was “If You’re Feeling Sinister” from the album with the same name. Upon first listen, I didn’t like it at all. It was not something I would have expected the dude to include – he was punkish in appearance, adorned in denim vests with Black Flag patches and wore a large, full, angry, red beard. “What is this,” I remember asking myself. “Wistful pop is definitely not my thing.” By the first chorus, during which are sung the words “if you are feeling sinister go off and see a minister,” I skipped the track. “Oh great,” I thought. “He’s a bible thumper.”

I abandoned the mixtape, having found only one track out of twenty listenable. Soon after, I stopped seeing the guy, for reasons apart from having received an underwhelming mixtape, and I shoved the cd into my case and it was more or less forgotten about. Aside from this, all I knew of Belle and Sebastian was the slight controversy regarding their relationship with Aidan Moffat and their use of "arab strap" in both a song title and album name. I fucking love Arab Strap and that hairy troll of a man, so I was a bit turned off from the start.

A handful of months ago, however, I attended an album-trade party hosted by a good friend, and she tried to trade me Belle and Sebastian’s The Life Pursuit for my copy of Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. I refused, remarking that Belle and Sebastian weren’t my style. “Really?” she asked. “I would have guessed they were right up your alley.” I told her about my limited exposure to them and she insisted I try listening again – she didn’t make me give up my Flaming Lips album, instead we ended up trading a Simon and Garfunkel for a Tom Waits. As I was leaving the party, she looked at me very seriously and said “Listen, give Life Pursuit a shot. If I could embody a track it would be ‘Dress Up In You.’ Seriously, the album is great.” I believed her, she had never steered me wrong musically.

Upon my arrival home I spotify-ed the track and was immediately enveloped in the beauty of it. The subtlety of the bass line, the perfect use of horns, the attention-grabbing harmonies, the relatable and honest lyrics – I was enamored. It became the anthem I sang to myself in memory of friends I’ve had in years past who, from early ages, ensured their life success simply in their essences. There are people who you just know will make it – no matter which road they take, they’ll end up somewhere that works for them and is somehow always perfect and enviable. I’ve never felt like that, I’ve never been like that. I’m just not that person, but I have a fondness for finding those that fit the description and doing what I can to ensure they realize their own potential.


After drowning myself in The Life Pursuit I pulled out the old mixtape with the drawing of a cat on it and gave it a second chance. It was then that I realized I had missed the second half of the chorus of “If You’re Feeling Sinister” –


- and realized I had entirely missed the point of the song, and entirely missed out on such a great band for all of those months. Wistful pop is absolutely my thing. I was an asshole for thinking I was above it. Lesson learned, I suppose.

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#DEMODFROWNLAND
#TERMLIMITSFORMODERATORS