Cultural Detritus, Reviews, and Commentary
Wilco – Kicking Television: Live in Chicago Nonesuch 79903-2 (2005)
I found this album tremendously disappointing. Wilco spends most of the record trying to pander to the audience by over-emphasizing the sappiest elements of their music. Kicking Television is a paradigmatic attempt to appeal to an audience’s bad taste. These live recordings add nothing to the studio versions, save a few awkwardly tacked on guitar solos. There are rewarding moments, but they are lost in a sea of mediocrity.
Gary Bartz Quintet – Libra Milestone MSP 9006 (1967)
A nice, if very straightforward, post-bop album from saxophonist Gary Bartz. This is not too far off from what he would have been doing when he played in The Jazz Messengers, or what Miles Davis‘ groups were up to in the mid-1960s. Bartz’s quintet is packed with big names. Bassist Richard Davis really emerges as one of the most delightful voices. Bartz isn’t a particularly strong presence, and he hasn’t yet found his unique voice that relied on long, sinuous lines that fit into a jazz/rock fusion setting. Even if this doesn’t push any boundaries, it is still adeptly played stuff with appeal for many listeners.
Tim Berne’s Bloodcount – Lowlife: The Paris Concert I JMT Productions 514 019-2 (1995)
Those listeners well acquainted with the late 1970s New York loft jazz scene (of the kind documented on the Wildflowers series) and other efforts from that era might say Tim Berne’s Bloodcount is mining familiar territory on Lowlife: The Paris Concert I. But the performances here are superb, and the band members do manage to leave their own personal stamp on the music even if they don’t quite (or even try to) reinvent musical forms completely. They borrow freely from the past; yet their focus is on musical effect in the present. All the playing is confident and bold. Berne himself is playing as well as ever. He doesn’t overplay his hand, and his long, sinuous lines build tension with impressive dexterity. On the Julius Hemphill compositions “Reflections/Lyric/Skin 1” Marc Ducret locks in to his inner Sonny Sharrock, though elsewhere he is more plaintive. He deserves a reputation as a top-flight guitarist. Jim Black is a powerfully steady force throughout, as is the rest of the band. On the remastered version at least, the sound is pristine, and if not for the album title one would probably never guess this was recorded live (the plastic-free packaging of a Winter & Winter reissue is also pretty neat). The intriguing originals “Bloodcount” (not the Billy Strayhorn tune) and “Prelude/The Brown Dog Meets the Spaceman” are perfectly placed to build up to and then ease off the intensity of “Reflections/Lyric/Skin 1”. This one is too good to turn off midway through.
dead prez – Let’s Get Free Loud 1867-2 (2000)
dead prez are not a passive kind of group. The duo’s logo is the hexagram “Shih” (the army) from the I Ching (the Chinese Book of Changes). This represents the power collectively residing in the people. Lets Get Free unabashedly tries make use of that power. stic.man and M-1’s raps are direct. They can be more purposeful than elegant, but that is part of the uncompromising artistic position dead prez take. Lets Get Free has a southern sound with little treble and a whole lot of bass. The first side of the record is a cynical condemnation of American society. “‘They’ Schools” is a broad critique of a defective educational system only responsive to white interests. Side 2 makes plans for the future. “Discipline” and “Animal In Man” reveal some diverse talent. The instrumental “You’ll Find A Way” has a smooth, assured attitude and keeps the record fresh. “Hip-Hop” was the underground hit. There are some cringe-worthy songs here, but mostly this is good.
Tom Waits – Blue Valentine Asylum 6E-162 (1978)
While not Tom Waits’ most strikingly original work, his Hollywood beatnik shtick is still quite effective here. There are plenty of faux jazz ballads, a showtune, and a few intimations of his edgier eighties songwriting. He even manages to pull off the maudlin “Kentucky Avenue”. Everything seems more polished and sober than Small Change and most people find it far more inspired than Foreign Affairs. This is one of Waits’ most successful albums of the 1970s. It was also his last effort completely dedicated to this particular old time hipster musical persona. His next albums would start to take a left turn toward rogue carnival weirdness.
Tom Waits – Heartattack and Vine Asylum 6E-295 (1980)
Here Waits is still operating within the realm of orchestrated pop balladry (“Saving All My Love for You,” “On the Nickel,” “Ruby’s Arms”), but he’s made a noticeable change in welcoming more harder-edged blues-rock sounds to his palette, with heavier drums and guitar and no piano (“Heartattack and Vine,” “‘Til the Money Runs Out”). This proved to be a transitional album as Waits moved toward his edgier mid-80s sound. But often he is stuck with a slick, “professional”, L.A. kind of sound (“In Shades,” “Downtown”) that is too much of a compromise between the two poles of the album. Even when he does succeed in one firm style or another, it is hard to find people who want to swing between gravelly crooning and gruff R&B the way this album is presented. There is definitely good stuff here, but the sum total is a little unsatisfying. After marrying Kathleen Brennan, whom he met while working on One From the Heart, he basically committed to the style of Swordfishtrombones and stuck with that approach for the rest of his career.
Tom Waits – Swordfishtrombones Island ILPS 9762 (1983)
A good album, but one I hardly ever revisit. Of course I dig stuff like “16 Shells From a Thirty-Ought-Six”. You would have to be a major asshole not to. But this album as a whole doesn’t resonate with me like some of his others. Still a fine effort and among Tom Waits’ better ones. This would be his last album for nearly twenty years to look back at all on the lounge jazz/blues that characterized much of his 1970s output.
Tom Waits – Real Gone Anti- Records 86678-2 (2004)
Some killer songs, “Hoist That Rag” chief among them, but also a lot of filler in the middle part of the album. Marc Ribot is a strong presence.
Elvis Costello and The Attractions – Get Happy!! F-Beat XXLP1 (1980)
There is a good chance that asking some fans their favorite Elvis Costello album will get the answer: Get Happy!! What essentially begins as a genre exercise in soul and R&B ends up as an enduring statement that went beyond new wave clichés. It has more energy than seemed possible from Costello. He directs this into a completely honest brew of catchy melodies and soulful backbeats.
This is one of the classic new wave albums because it’s also an anti-new wave album. The ancient modernism of the conflicted emotions stands out. This isn’t so much a fun pop album. Get Happy!! is about music that you often need to hear. It works upon you. The phrase “Get happy” is a hollow motivational catchphrase. This album wonders why. The purportedly trivial gets its due. Anyone who has ever been sad, lonely, depressed, disenchanted, or anything other than what they want to be, has the needs to hear this album.
“I Can’t Stand Up (For Falling Down)” takes the overlooked Sam & Dave classic (penned by Hayes/Porter) someplace new. Costello takes on the song at a double-time tempo. He tweaks a few of the lyrics to his purposes and adapts where needed his vocal style. He emerges with a something entirely more frantic and delusional. Costello wants to escape the inescapable. Sam & Dave sang a slow, bluesy ballad. Costello reinterprets the song where he acts before he thinks as an excuse to avoid his pain. How could he “fall down” at the pace of he sings this song? His desires are as real as he makes them, conviction his only ally.
Costello was an intelligent hipster. Here he directs his thoughts to the minutiae of life; its illusions fascinate him. The songs don’t come to explicit conclusions. Get Happy!! doesn’t provide answers. Perhaps the only thing Costello and The Attractions do identify with are old Stax and Atlantic soul sides and some wont to act. His usual cynicism is held in check by the glaring deference to pop music of the past. So under it all is a love for music, and that love gets put to use.
So with “Beaten to the Punch” Costello has his lyrics as sharp as ever (for example, “if you got a head for figures then you better count me out” is a great line wherever it lies). Hesitation seems to be everyone else’s problem but Elvis can’t help but implicate himself in the mess. While he claims to have no choice in these matters, he certainly knows where he wants to end up. The way to get there just isn’t what he had hoped for. The tables turn and he’s as desperate as everyone else.
Maybe the honesty of this record comes as a by-product of a hasty recording process (think Big Star’s Third). That separates Get Happy!! from Costello’s other sometimes dubious efforts to reinvent himself. With so many great songs like “Black & White World,” “New Amsterdam,” “High Fidelity,” and “Riot Act,” he obviates the need for posturing. This is a last-ditch effort to make something, anything, happen. The record simply isn’t calculated for Costello to position himself as some kind of legendary songwriter or rock star. When talented artists make music they feel, on instinct, without over-thinking, it can be unique in all the right ways. So it was with Get Happy!!
