November 2003

Thank you Anna...

Filed under: Imported

Anna Fermin's Trigger Gospel
Oh, The Stories We Hold

Whenever any of my women friends express an interest in Alt Country or Americana music for the first time, I send them in two directions based on how well I know them. Women who really dig darker themes with a bit more of the sad endings and pessimism, I try to turn onto Neko Case. Not all of her songs are like that, of course, but Neko's not going to sugar coat anything for you; and, while I've never met a guy who didn't immediately begin salavating over her once he saw her live or started listening to her music, I've had several women tell me that Neko was just too mean for them.

For those ladies, the other option has always been Anna Fermin's Trigger Gospel. Anna attacks the issues of her life in a very personal way in her music; but, the combination of her soaring and expansive voice, with a kind of super-natural optimism that is woven into all of her songs, makes you see more oranges, yellows and greens when you close your eyes and listen to her, rather than the rainy Washington state grays that you sometimes get with Neko.

Fermin fans have been waiting a long time for this latest studio album, and it's pure Anna, if you're the least bit familiar with her work. The little girl from the Philippines who moved to Chicago to record twangy music, serves up equal parts of almost religious introspective tunes, and driving Luther Perkins-guitar, Steve-Earle-kiss-my-ass abandon. A few of the songs are curious mixes of the two. And, a few songs are pop-shuffle departures that are distinct, without upsetting the basic fabric of the record. I've seen her live several times, and her studio records really capture the warmth of her performance style. Oh, The Stories We Hold was worth the wait.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 28, 2003 4:27 PM

Natalie's 13 puppies vs. Toby's loaded trunk...

Filed under: Imported

From the Associated Press:

MASON CITY, Iowa � It was not your average doggy childbirth. A dog gave birth to 13 puppies in a delivery that started just before sunrise and went on for hours.

By early afternoon, Copenhagen's Star Hunter, "Star" to the family, lay surrounded by her 13 offspring.

Giggling and gently cradling a squirming pup, 7-year-old Rebecca Faught proudly proclaimed, "Star just kept having more and more and more."

Rebecca's parents, Tad and Lori, let her skip school Wednesday. Instead, the child got a hands-on science lesson � watching and helping the family's AKC registered yellow labrador give birth.

Resting in her makeshift maternity ward in the laundry room, "Star" kept a close watch over the pups � five black and eight yellow.

Labradors are noted for having large litters, according to veterinarian Jeffrey Cornick of Pioneer Animal Hospital, so "13 is a lot, but not extremely rare."

From Reuters News Service:

PARIS � A French hunter was shot by his dog after he left a loaded shotgun in the trunk of his car with two dogs and one of the animals accidentally stepped on the trigger, police said Wednesday, Nov. 5.

The man, from the village of Espelette in the Basque region, was admitted to a hospital in the nearby town of Bayonne Monday with leadshot injuries to the hip.

"As he was driving along, one of his dogs accidentally set off the gun," said a police official.

November is a month for hunting, dogs, hunting dogs, and hunting accidents. Whether you're from Iowa or France, your peripheral vision sharpens and you learn to sit motionless for hours at a time, breathing quietly through your nose. You get tapped into the primordial ooze for however many hours you choose in these times, and the world only floods back onto you in the laundry room, or from the trunk, where you left the loaded gun as you bounced in your LeCar back to the Chalet to skip yet another shower.

There's a hint of specious reasoning--but we'll use it anyway--to the line of thought that argues how strange it might be that, right as the Dixie Chicks release a double-live CD set and Toby Keith releases Shock'n Y'all, Natalie Maines pops up on the Today Show talking about how wrong the war in Iraq is and how misled we were in America. All "Politics" aside, look for Keith to show up on the Today show, Bill O'Reilly, or Sesame Street soon, taking shots at Maines' patriotism, wearing a T-shirt with his album cover on it. In a world where labradors who have sex give birth to 13 puppies in the laundry room, and loaded guns bouncing around in the trunk with two dogs and the safety off, accidentally fire randomly into the front seat, it's good to know that our country's musical "artists" have informed and sometimes controversial opinions, as well as detractors. It's especially comforting to know they have forums for expression of those opinions, especially right as their product is being released in time for the Christmas shopping season. Major label artists don't take a crap without the Executive VP of A & R handing them a roll of TP and telling them it's okay, so if Keith opens his knuckleheaded yap in response to Maines opening her knuckleheaded yap, we'll all know the truth about the whole mess. Arenas and stadia simply ruin these people, so maybe it's time to focus on music that was made for reasons other than the lip gloss tie-in and capri pants display at Target. Wide-brimmed, black felt cowboy hats, aisle 12.

If there were any Country radio stations in Minneapolis, they'd be banning the Chicks' music again this week.

Jack's "War is good you dirty pink-o commie, please buy my new CD" Top Twenty:

1. Live at Billy Bob's, Jack Ingram
Loud, driving, Country. It doesn't get much better than this.
2. Famous Anonymous Wilderness, Graham Lindsey
Perfesser Al wrote a great review of Graham's live show under my Robbie Fulks review. This album is just a great piece of music from start to finish. It's travelling minstrel hobo folk blues murder music at its best.
3. Warmth & Beauty, Thad Cockrell
Thad Cockrell is the tenor voiced hillbilly Barry White that Ryan Adams either steered clear of becoming or, never quite became.
4. My Baby Don't Tolerate, Lyle Lovett
Sam Snead used to take a backhanded swipe at Ben Hogan's popular Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf by saying he never had a callous in his life from playing golf. The unspoken words being that he was more of a gentleman golfer than the zealous Hogan. You get the feeling, listening to Lyle Lovett, that he doesn't have any callouses on his left hand from playing guitar. He puts out pretty complex musical albums, but they all seem so effortless and gentle.
5. A Day at the Farm with Farmer Jason, Jason Ringenberg
When I was a kid, my grandma had all these yellow, red, and blue vinyl albums with all sorts of hillbilly kids' songs on them. This record by Jason of Jason and the Scorchers is just like those old disks. Screw Barney!!! Plug this into the CD player in the minivan while your ADD kids drink soda pop playing video games in double reinforced harnesses in the back seat.
6. Oh the Stories We Hold, Anna Fermin's Trigger Gospel
Anna Fermin could melt butter on frozen lake in Canada in January.
7. Just For The Record, Bobby Flores
The best damn country dance record that's out right now.
8. Streets of Sin, Joe Ely
Joe Ely is an absolute legend. His voice is the almagated howl of all the ghosts of west Texas.
9. Fool For Love, Paul Burch
There are all these guys who can sing, write, and pick in Nashville, and all the talentless people who have hits on mainstream country radio go to see them when they go out. This is a country record that ought to be a big hit, but it doesn't contain any tampon jingles, so you're not going to hear it on the FM at say 2PM on a Thursday.
10. Railings, Frog Holler
Will be in Chicago and St. Louis later in November, I have my fingers crossed that they'll turn the van north for a show. Pennsylvania's finest hillbilly pickin' an' hollerin' band.
11. "OK - I'm sorry...", Bobby Bare Jr.'s Young Criminals' Starvation League
I like this better than the original disk. There's some great live material on it and some really nice studio outtake stuff.
12. Live from the Memory Hotel, Mark McKay
A fine live album from an up and coming heavy hitter on the East Coast roots rock scene.
13. Weatheredbound, Barn Burning
Every song is an imbalanced equation where the mandolins and fiddles could give way at any moment to power chords of I Wanna Be Sedated, all the while integrating polynomials of mountain strings, Music City steel fills, and Jay Farrar-style guitar turned up to "11."
14. Hope is a Thing With Feathers, Trailer Bride
Lead singer and songwriter Melissa Swingle could be singing about bluebirds eating lollipops in the sunshine, and you would still feel like somebody was asking you whether to take a relative off of life support. It's a deceptively alluring sound that wiggles its way into your noodle before you know what hit ya.
15. Swing Time, Wayne "The Train" Hancock
The Train is The Train is The Train. I just love to listen to the live version of "Thunderstorms & Neon Signs" on this record.
16. ring, Big Ditch Road
This is Minnesota's best country record right now. These are some of the loneliest songs you will ever hear.
17. Guitar Pickin' Martyrs, Luther Wright & The Wrongs
"Rebuild the Wall" was such a fun album, I was worried about what they might do next. But, the process of making that album really fine tuned the band's playing and songwriting, and this is just a great disk.
18. Lost Highway: Lost & Found 1, Various Artists
Mostly made up of songs from the artists' most recent albums, the highlights are obviously the unreleased stuff and yet-to-be released stuff, including "Falling Star" by the Jayhawks from the Bunkhouse Record, and a version of "Wichita Lineman" by Johnny Cash that will make you weep like a baby. "Hockey Skates" by Kathleen Edwards is also a great tune to throw on this album.
19. It Happened in America, Sherwin Linton & Friends
There's all these young guys and gals playing country around here now, and after a few hours of sitting around telling stories, one of them inevitably starts off a story, "Sherwin Linton once told me that..." This is a disk that just reinforces that Sherwin Linton has seen and done it all.
20. Deliverance, Bubba Sparxx
Why the hell not? It ain't your blog. He samples the Yonder Mountain String Band. He's got a GREAT goddamn last name too.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 25, 2003 3:55 PM

Today's Playlist

Filed under: Imported

Hi gang. Just thought I'd post the playlist from today's show on the blog as well. There was a lot of great new stuff in the mail, so look for blogged reviews of the latest from Jack Ingram, Anna Fermin, and others in the coming days. As always, tune into AM1220, The Mighty 1220, WMGT, Saturdays from 1 to 3pm for The Other Side of Country.

White Iron Band: Minnesota Pride Song, Bubba Sparxx: Comin' Round, Jack Ingram: Flutter (live), Lyle Lovett: On Saturday Night, Graham Lindsey: Emma Rumble, Mark McKay: Moonshiner (live), Johnny Cash: Wichita Lineman, The Copperheads: Letter From Houston, Randy Casey & the Cactus Thieves: Woe is Me, Paul Burch: Bad Girl She Used to Be, Bobby Bare Jr.'s Young Criminals' Starvation League: Flat Chested Girl From Maynardville (live), Willie Nelson: Please Come Home for Christmas, Trailer Trash: Please Daddy, Don't Get Drunk This Christmas, Jason Ringenberg: A Guitar Pickin' Chicken, Barn Burning: Preparations for Winter, Anna Fermin's Trigger Gospel: My Town, Emmylou Harris: To Daddy, Drive By Truckers: Sink Hole, The Gourds: Roll & Tumble

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 22, 2003 11:35 PM

As plain as the nose on his...umm...right....

Filed under: Imported

Okay, let's do this. See if these headlines really shock you:

Jackson Accused of Molestation, Again

Billionaire Heiress, Often Pictured Scantily Clad, Intoxicated, Makes Homemade Sex Film

Cuckoo Clock Caught Red-handed with Murder Weapon Found Guilty in Sniper Trial

President Who Had 3 Bullet Wounds, Two From the Front, Suspected Murder Victim of More Than Single Shooter with Ancient Bolt Action Rifle Who Was Poor Marksman

Jack's "No, really..." Top Twenty:

1. Live at Billy Bob's, Jack Ingram
I like live albums. I've seen Jack Ingram a bunch of times and he's flat-out one of the best live shows going today.
2. Famous Anonymous Wilderness, Graham Lindsey
Perfesser Al wrote a great review of Graham's live show under my Robbie Fulks review. This album is just a great piece of music from start to finish. It's travelling minstrel hobo folk blues murder music at its best.
3. Warmth & Beauty, Thad Cockrell
Thad Cockrell is the tenor voiced hillbilly Barry White that Ryan Adams either steered clear of becoming or, never quite became.
4. My Baby Don't Tolerate, Lyle Lovett
Sam Snead used to take a backhanded swipe at Ben Hogan's popular Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf by saying he never had a callous in his life from playing golf. The unspoken words being that he was more of a gentleman golfer than the zealous Hogan. You get the feeling, listening to Lyle Lovett, that he doesn't have any callouses on his left hand from playing guitar. He puts out pretty complex musical albums, but they all seem so effortless and gentle.
5. Swing Time, Wayne "The Train" Hancock
The Train is The Train is The Train. I just love to listen to the live version of "Thunderstorms & Neon Signs" on this record.
6. Just For The Record, Bobby Flores
The best damn country dance record that's out right now.
7. Streets of Sin, Joe Ely
Joe Ely is an absolute legend. His voice is the almagated howl of all the ghosts of west Texas.
8. A Day at the Farm with Farmer Jason, Jason Ringenberg
When I was a kid, my grandma had all these yellow, red, and blue vinyl albums with all sorts of hillbilly kids' songs on them. This record by Jason of Jason and the Scorchers is just like those old disks. Screw Barney!!! Plug this into the CD player in the minivan while your ADD kids drink soda pop playing video games in double reinforced harnesses in the back seat.
9. Hope is a Thing With Feathers, Trailer Bride
Lead singer and songwriter Melissa Swingle could be singing about bluebirds eating lollipops in the sunshine, and you would still feel like somebody was asking you whether to take a relative off of life support. It's a deceptively alluring sound that wiggles its way into your noodle before you know what hit ya.
10. Fool For Love, Paul Burch
There are all these guys who can sing, write, and pick in Nashville, and all the talentless people who have hits on mainstream country radio go to see them when they go out. This is a country record that ought to be a big hit, but it doesn't contain any tampon jingles, so you're not going to hear it on the FM at say 2PM on a Thursday.
11. Railings, Frog Holler
Will be in Chicago and St. Louis later in November, I have my fingers crossed that they'll turn the van north for a show. Pennsylvania's finest hillbilly pickin' an' hollerin' band.
12. "OK - I'm sorry...", Bobby Bare Jr.'s Young Criminals' Starvation League
I like this better than the original disk. There's some great live material on it and some really nice studio outtake stuff.
13. Live from the Memory Hotel, Mark McKay
A fine live album from an up and coming heavy hitter on the East Coast roots rock scene.
14. Weatheredbound, Barn Burning
Every song is an imbalanced equation where the mandolins and fiddles could give way at any moment to power chords of I Wanna Be Sedated, all the while integrating polynomials of mountain strings, Music City steel fills, and Jay Farrar-style guitar turned up to "11."
15. ring, Big Ditch Road
This is Minnesota's best country record right now. These are some of the loneliest songs you will ever hear.
16. Guitar Pickin' Martyrs, Luther Wright & The Wrongs
"Rebuild the Wall" was such a fun album, I was worried about what they might do next. But, the process of making that album really fine tuned the band's playing and songwriting, and this is just a great disk.
17. Live Recordings from the Louisiana Hayride, Johnny Cash
Kind of a cool little disk of historical stuff. The audio quality is a little iffy on some of the tracks, but the energy of the young Cash and cohorts is remarkable.
18. Lost Highway: Lost & Found 1, Various Artists
Mostly made up of songs from the artists' most recent albums, the highlights are obviously the unreleased stuff and yet-to-be released stuff, including "Falling Star" by the Jayhawks from the Bunkhouse Record, and a version of "Wichita Lineman" by Johnny Cash that will make you weep like a baby. "Hockey Skates" by Kathleen Edwards is also a great tune to throw on this album.
19. It Happened in America, Sherwin Linton & Friends
There's all these young guys and gals playing country around here now, and after a few hours of sitting around telling stories, one of them inevitably starts off a story, "Sherwin Linton once told me that..." This is a disk that just reinforces that Sherwin Linton has seen and done it all.
20. Deliverance, Bubba Sparxx
Why the hell not? It ain't your blog. He samples the Yonder Mountain String Band. He's got a GREAT goddamn last name too.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 19, 2003 7:16 PM

Knee deep in CD's

Filed under: Imported

"Weatheredbound"
Barn Burning

There's a curious Geometry to East Coast Alt Country/Roots bands. It's all vectors and angles connecting Scarborough Fair, "Elite Hotel, " the oddities of the Velvet Underground and the New York Dolls, and, the long forgotten ghosts of WSM on a clear Saturday night. It's a strange sound, birthed in weathered Dutch barns and crowded cement streets, where stock brokers whiz into town on trains and novelists whiz out to Corona typewriters in single stoplight burghs, to write the next great thriller of Freemason intrigue on Wall Street. In walks Barn Burning with their latest disk, "Weatheredbound". Every song is an imbalanced equation where the mandolins and fiddles could give way at any moment to power chords of I Wanna Be Sedated, all the while integrating polynomials of mountain strings, Music City steel fills, and Jay Farrar-style guitar turned up to "11." Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus, and there is Country music in Rhode Island.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 13, 2003 12:11 AM

Wading Thru CD's

Filed under: Imported

"Live From the Memory Hotel"
Mark McKay

I spent some time on Mark McKay's web-site trying to figure out who Mark McKay is, and I still don't know. There's a bit of Springsteen in his work; there's a bit of Townes Van Zandt; there's a bit of Delbert McClinton; there's a bit of Phil Lesh. But, I just couldn't tell you, without seeing him live, who Mark McKay is. The songs on this disk have an "American ghost" quality to them, like they've always been around and he's just channeling them to a new audience. If you're a sucker for good quality live music--and I am--this is a good record for you, something you can play in the background, while you're baking cookies, lathing a chair leg, or mixing up poison for the neighbors' cats.

"My Baby Don't Tolerate"
Lyle Lovett

Sam Snead used to take a backhanded swipe at Ben Hogan's popular Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf by saying he never had a callous in his life from playing golf. The unspoken words being that he was more of a gentleman golfer than the zealous Hogan. You get the feeling, listening to Lyle Lovett, that he doesn't have any callouses on his left hand from playing guitar. He puts out pretty complex musical albums, but they all seem so effortless and gentle.

Being a "radio guy," though, one song gave me pause. As you know, I love a theory, and one theory is that Country survives partially due to its absorption of other influences and musical formats and genres. I'm fine with that. What scares me with the stream crossing though, is that most of it has been done to the detriment of Country recently. That's why I ruthlessly, mercilessly, and doggedly attack Shania Twain. Without getting off on that tangent--yet--there's a song on this disk that seems to incorporate, use, absorb...whatever you want to call it...the shiny new child of corporate radio: Smooth Jazz. You Were Always There, could have been written and recorded by the extremely narcissistic Sting, just as easily as it was by Lovett. Don't get me wrong, if ANYBODY is going to pull Jazz, Fusion, Smooth Jazz, whatever, into Country, it probably should be Lovett, a master composer and conductor, working from a roots tradition. I just fear this canary in the coal mine, because maybe it's a grave portent of somebody like Garth singing "St. Augustine in Hell" with a pedal steel and fiddle and calling it Country. The dumbasses at mainstream radio will be forced to play it, and all the clones will follow Chunky's lead to the promised land. I shudder.

Oh yeah, my favorite tune on "My Baby Don't Tolerate," is On Saturday Night, a dance hall number with pills and Cadillacs®. Now THAT'S Country, buckaroo.

"Just Because I'm a Woman: Songs of Dolly Parton
Various Artists

If the sum of your knowledge of Dolly Parton is that she has big breasts, then you probably want to click back to your browser homepage and go about your business of selling your parents' favorite stuff on Ebay, finding out if anyone's in the adoption market for your children, and downloading YOUR OWN PERSONAL COPY of the amature Paris Hilton sex film.

With her wigs, plastic surgery, make-up, and high heels, Dolly Parton has become a lighthouse of feminine empowerment in this ass-over-head 21st Century, because there is only one of her, and she is a supremely talented poet and songwriter. So, it was about time some folks got together and paid tribute to her in some way.

I don't typically like these Various Artists things, but this one, like all of them, has its high points, low points, and points of unintentional comedy. The best thing on this disk by leaps and bounds is Emmylou Harris' recording of To Daddy. The worst song is the laryngitic alley feline reading given to Dagger Through the Heart by Sinéad O'Connor. Which brings us to the surprise of the disk. A good deal of it was created by having Alison Krauss and Union Station or some group of Nashville session players laying the music down, and then shipping it off to whomever for vocals, as was the case with ol' shinehead. Another such number was Shania's recording of Coat of Many Colors. If you know her personal story, you know that this could be the perfect song for her, and she does a surprisingly good job. But, the whole thing was ruined for me in the liner notes that explained, "Alison Krauss and her great band, Union Station, [laid] down the track for Shania. We then transferred the ProTools file to Mutt Lange in Switzerland for Shania to record her soulful vocal. It was then sent back to us for Alison and Dan Tyminski to add harmony vocals." I just haven't ever been given any evidence that this woman can sing without studio tricks and harmonizer boxes. I guess if she shows up at my house and sings this song in the living room, I'll be convinced. Shelby Lynne and Allison Moorer continue their awesome sibling rivalry with melt-your-guts versions of The Seeker and Light of a Clear Blue Morning, respectively. And finally, Me'Shell N'Degéocello does a really kooky version of Two Doors Down that highlights the universality of Dolly's music.

Dolly kicks your ass at the end with her Bonus Track recording of Just Because I'm a Woman. If you're a guy and you don't cover up your tackle while listening to that song, you've never been kicked there. Whether you buy this disk depends on only one thing: Do you love Dolly?

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 12, 2003 5:50 PM

I uhhhh.....I uhhhhh....I got nothin' (stolen from somebody else)

Filed under: Imported

Jack's Plain Brown Wrapper Top Twenty:

1. Live at Billy Bob's, Jack Ingram
I like live albums. I've seen Jack Ingram a bunch of times and he's flat-out one of the best live shows going today.
2. Famous Anonymous Wilderness, Graham Lindsey
Perfesser Al wrote a great review of Graham's live show under my Robbie Fulks review. This album is just a great piece of music from start to finish. It's travelling minstrel hobo folk blues murder music at its best.
3. Warmth & Beauty, Thad Cockrell
Thad Cockrell is the tenor voiced hillbilly Barry White that Ryan Adams either steered clear of becoming or, never quite became.
4. Just For The Record, Bobby Flores
The best damn country dance record that's out right now.
5. My Baby Don't Tolerate, Lyle Lovett
Sam Snead used to take a backhanded swipe at Ben Hogan's popular Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf by saying he never had a callous in his life from playing golf. The unspoken words being that he was more of a gentleman golfer than the zealous Hogan. You get the feeling, listening to Lyle Lovett, that he doesn't have any callouses on his left hand from playing guitar. He puts out pretty complex musical albums, but they all seem so effortless and gentle.
6. Swing Time, Wayne "The Train" Hancock
The Train is The Train is The Train. I just love to listen to the live version of "Thunderstorms & Neon Signs" on this record.
7. Railings, Frog Holler
Will be in Chicago and St. Louis later in November, I have my fingers crossed that they'll turn the van north for a show. Pennsylvania's finest hillbilly pickin' an' hollerin' band.
8. Guitar Pickin' Martyrs, Luther Wright & The Wrongs
"Rebuild the Wall" was such a fun album, I was worried about what they might do next. But, the process of making that album really fine tuned the band's playing and songwriting, and this is just a great disk.
9. Streets of Sin, Joe Ely
Joe Ely is an absolute legend. His voice is the almagated howl of all the ghosts of west Texas.
10. A Day at the Farm with Farmer Jason, Jason Ringenberg
When I was a kid, my grandma had all these yellow, red, and blue vinyl albums with all sorts of hillbilly kids' songs on them. This record by Jason of Jason and the Scorchers is just like those old disks. Screw Barney!!! Plug this into the CD player in the minivan while your ADD kids drink soda pop playing video games in double reinforced harnesses in the back seat.
11. Hope is a Thing With Feathers, Trailer Bride
Lead singer and songwriter Melissa Swingle could be singing about bluebirds eating lollipops in the sunshine, and you would still feel like somebody was asking you whether to take a relative off of life support. It's a deceptively alluring sound that wiggles its way into your noodle before you know what hit ya.
12. Fool For Love, Paul Burch
There are all these guys who can sing, write, and pick in Nashville, and all the talentless people who have hits on mainstream country radio go to see them when they go out. This is a country record that ought to be a big hit, but it doesn't contain any tampon jingles, so you're not going to hear it on the FM at say 2PM on a Thursday.
13. "OK - I'm sorry...", Bobby Bare Jr.'s Young Criminals' Starvation League
I like this better than the original disk. There's some great live material on it and some really nice studio outtake stuff.
14. Live from the Memory Hotel, Mark McKay
A fine live album from an up and coming heavy hitter on the East Coast roots rock scene.
15. Temporarily Disconnected, BR549
A funky little EP showcasing the band's new lineup. This band's strength has always been live performance, and now that they're out of the clutches of big label machinery, maybe they'll make something as strong as the "Phone" album again.
16. ring, Big Ditch Road
This is Minnesota's best country record right now. These are some of the loneliest songs you will ever hear.
17. Live Recordings from the Louisiana Hayride, Johnny Cash
Kind of a cool little disk of historical stuff. The audio quality is a little iffy on some of the tracks, but the energy of the young Cash and cohorts is remarkable.
18. Freedom's Child, Billy Joe Shaver
People who don't listen to Billy Joe Shaver make the Baby Jesus cry.
19. It Happened in America, Sherwin Linton & Friends
There's all these young guys and gals playing country around here now, and after a few hours of sitting around telling stories, one of them inevitably starts off a story, "Sherwin Linton once told me that..." This is a disk that just reinforces that Sherwin Linton has seen and done it all.
20. Deliverance, Bubba Sparxx
Why the hell not? It ain't your blog. He samples the Yonder Mountain String Band. He's got a GREAT goddamn last name too.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 12, 2003 12:27 PM

Stupid thoughts of a stupid man

Filed under: Imported

My friend Cromwell, down the road, has a huge mottled green bird that still squawks "Off with their heads," a dim memory from the time of Madame DeFarge and the madness of the French Revolution. The filthy, ageless animal was hatched in the slums of Paris and came over on a boat with a servant, who was indentured, at the time, to Benjamin Franklin.
It is weird to stare into the crazy black eyes of a savage yet well-spoken old bird who can remember snatches of conversation between Ben Franklin and Aaron Burr, and sometimes even George Washington. You never know for sure, with these beasts, but lying is not in their nature and most smart people take them seriously. When the thing starts screeching and babbling about a thunderstorm over the Hudson River on Wednesday night in 1788, it is probably telling the truth.
Nobody knows what it means. Old Ben had a queer sense of humor, but he definitely understood the weather. Thomas Jefferson kept ferrets, which gnawed on his body at night, and eventually poisoned his blood.

--From Generation of Swine : Tales of Shame and Degradation in the '80's, by Hunter S. Thompson

In my return back through the passage, I heard the same words repeated twice over; and looking up, I saw it was a starling hung in a little cage.--`I can't get out--I can't get out,' said the starling.
I stood looking at the bird: and to every person who came through the passage it ran fluttering to the side towards which they approach'd it, with the same lamentation of its capitivity--`I can't get out', said the starling--God help thee! said I, but I'll let thee out, cost what it will;...
The bird flew to the place where I was attempting his deliverance, and thrusting his head through the trellis, press'd his breast against it, as if impatient--I fear, poor creature! said I, I cannot set thee at liberty--`No,' said the starling--`I can't get out--I can't get out,' said the starling.
I vow, I never had my affections more tenderly awakened; nor do I remember an incident in my life, where the dissipated spirits, to which my reason had been a bubble, were so suddenly call'd home. Mechanical as the notes were, yet so true in tune to nature were they chanted, that in one moment they overthrew all my systematic reasonings upon the Bastile; and I heavily walk'd upstairs, unsaying every word I had said in going down them.
Disguise thyself as thou wilt, still slavery! said I--still thou art a bitter draught;...

--From A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy by Mr. Yorick, by Laurence Sterne

Maude Lebowski: "You can imagine where it goes from here."
The Dude: "He fixes the cable?"

--From The Big Lebowski

In the past few weeks, I've seen Mystic River, Kill Bill, and Matrix: Revolutions, and, I've read The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown.

The sum total of these experiences struck a chord with me as I walked out of the theatre the other night at the end of the Matrix. I get the sense that we're going through a period in this country of technological romanticism, where special effects fuel our imaginations to the point that what's right in front of our faces no longer appeals to us. This feeling first creeped over me as I sat through Kill Bill wondering, "what's the point?" Tarantino really made brilliant piece of disjointed narrative with Pulp Fiction, but he seems to be saying with his latest, "let's just do this to do this, it doesn't really have to go anywhere." There aren't even tantalizing hints as to why we would even root for The Bride to kill everybody who betrayed her. She was one of these scumbag killers too, regardless of whether she got pregnant and married, or whatever. In the end, the whole point of the movie seems to revolve around fantastical martial arts scenes of cartoon violence.

In case Tarantino has been stoned for the past 12 months (and he has, if you read any entertainment-type magazines), Matrix: Reloaded had the cartoon martial arts movie market cornered. In fact, the name of the second movie should have been Matrix: Overblown Karate Movie with a nonsensical Rave Scene, Reloaded. The mantra in Hollywood these days must be something along the lines of, "hire a karate expert, give them a few 360 degree shots, and if there's a story crammed in there somewhere, let's make sure and remove that before we convert it to a video game." The third installment of the Matrix series, while entertaining, is only slightly more fluffy than the popcorn that I ate during the flick. There is literally an hour's worth of story to the entire 3 film franchise, and yet, they somehow squeezed almost 9 hours out of it (do you hear the sarcasm?).

My gut feeling about all this really came home to me as I reflected on the first movie I saw recently, Mystic River. The backlash to the video-gamification of movies is that people forget how to tell more realistic stories. There's such a fear that people won't let their guard down for an engrossing and morose story, the reaction is to try to throw multi-layered, ensemble numbers at the audience, in the hopes of creating a kind of fire cracker, plot-line effect. Eastwood's flick supposedly has 3 main characters, but there is really only about 1 3/4 stories fully developed, and the characters themselves move in and out of levels of complexity for which there's no rhyme or reason. Maybe if the pedophile fight scene had involved some karate and a few 360 degree shots, I would have enjoyed it more.

Maybe it's a leap to apply this thought to The Da Vinci Code, but I think it really fits. On its face, the book is a fun little romp through Art, European, and Religious History. If you can put it down after that and walk away, good for you. Just like this is just a blog, that is just a book. But, without ruining the book for anybody, the historical premise is one so revolutionary, that I wanted to research a little of it. While I learned a great deal about the whole "Priory of Sion," story, what was reinforced is this quest for romanticism in the world that leaves reality behind. You don't have to look far to find that a great deal of the renewed interest in this historical theory was brought about by the Nazi propaganda machine in Vichy France in the early part of WWII. Without discounting the entire premise, I think it's worth noting that Dan Brown side-stepped that little bit of the story in the novel.

So what's the point? I guess I'm wondering out loud if our escapism isn't starting to seep in and move beyond mere escapism. Maybe we've gotten to the point where we need the fantastic in our lives, and are afraid of reality. Maybe I'm also wondering if maybe these escapist notions aren't starting to carve into realism's territory, and kind of creating a fear vaccuum where filmmakers and other artists are afraid to flesh out certain things because they might lose our attention.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 10, 2003 3:27 PM

You Think I DIDN'T Watch?

Filed under: Imported

I just love the show descriptions from my satellite TV package:

Every Which Way But Loose: A truck driver woos a country singer while fighting bare-knuckles brawls egged on by his orangutan.

The 37th Annual CMA Awards: Vince Gill hosts the ceremony in Nashville

Southpark is on at 9 (nine) PM in Minnesota, so to kill time, I flipped over to the CMA awards for raw blog material, knowing full well that I couldn't stomach the whole show.

Luckily, I was just in time to hear Terri Clark sing her latest song out of tune while the video played in the background for today's A.D.D. television crowd. Her forced improvisations in between verses were comical during this future rental car jingle.

After her, a bunch of assholes came out and sang some Whitesnake cover ballad called "I Melt," while the video for it played in the background as well. While watching it, I told myself I'd actually look up whatever band was singing it, but then I realized it didn't really matter. It was just more REO Speedwagon power ballad bullshit with some kinda steel fills thrown in, so who cares who those over-coutured lunchboxes were?

The "Hindsight is 20/20" CMA bravely awarded Johnny Cash's "American Recordings IV: The Man Comes Around," Album of the Year. I agree with a lot of people that while good, "IV" isn't his best of the American bunch, and frankly, I would have preferred they just skip the phoney post mortem ass kiss. His kid gave a classy acceptance speech.

Patty Loveless to that point saved the show for me, doing a nice high energy, smokin' version of an ol' Rodney Crowell tune. No video in the background, no belly button, no tin-ear wailing into a microphone about angels melting her.

I really wanted to quit early here and switch over to Southpark for the rerun at 8:30, but I decided to power through.

So Vince Gill, whose hosting style I actually like--very laid back, self-deprecating, not forced--introduces the first performance of the night by a Horizon Award Finalist. These are supposedly the "next big things." Enter Joe Nichols, one of the neo-traditionalists that always gets thrown around like he's saving the format with his Johnny Depp hair and his Mark Chestnutt-Brad Paisley-et al voice. Apparently, with Horizon Award finalists it's important to show a video collage behind them while they sing, prominently featuring their album cover so you can be sure to run out and buy it immediately. Oh yeah, he's supposedly singing a song too.

Sigh.

So how do you fix this? Why of course, have Allison Krauss and Union Station take the stage. And suddenly, everybody gets it. Here are five people who can sing with very little amplification, and, can all play the absolute shit out of their instruments. Why, they don't even need a video playing behind them. But, the good TV execs know that they ADD crowd needs something shiny going on, so they have this giant sun disk full of kaleidoscope images running through the whole thing above their heads. Too real and true for you? Stare at the pretty pictures....Up to this point, and after, they were the only ones to receive a standing ovation from the crowd. I'd love to say it's because they're the only ones with any talent, but hey, I'm a NICE guy these days.

So ruin everything and bring out Blake Shelton, the next Horizon Award Nominee. Naturally, he had to sing a song about someone dying. I checked, and his mother isn't dead. Same collage video featuring his album cover in the background.

Okay, okay, I'm dying here. It's almost nine. I want to turn over. But....YES! My old nemesis. She comes out, bellybutton prominent, video going crazy in the background, that phony bastard on violin not really playing anything as usual. She didn't lip synch, but, near the end of the song, when she finally tried to stretch the vocal, she failed miserably. She has the range of about 6 keys on an upright piano in a downtown church basement. And this song...I'll bet anybody a whole paycheck it's a commercial for something in the "ladies aisles" of Target or Walgreen's before December 1st. IT WAS WRITTEN TO BE A JINGLE. Naturally, after she finishes, it's important to pan the cameras immediately on Faith and Martina, thus completing the unholy trinity of the death of Country Music.

Gary Allan, another "neo-traditionalist" saviour hits the stage singing out of tune and I'm late for Southpark, good-bye CMA.

One last note: I flipped back during a commercial and caught the "I Melt" Styx knockoff band getting an award for best band or something (I still don't know, and will never give a damn who they are), and the lead singer decides that they only started playing and won this award because of the influence Alabama had on them, which, if you've visited this space before, you know is absolutely perfect. So they decide they're going to give it to Alabama because they're retiring. Pan to Randy and the drummer from Alabama, who are kind of forced on stage to stand with these clowns. Randy looks angry and insulted (note to phony Nashville pretty boy pop-stars, real men hate pity) as they lumber up on stage and fight off these guys' hugs. They'll be singing "I Melt," one key lower in cigarette scratched voices, opening for Sawyer Brown at the Medina in front of 150 people bussed in from a nursing home in Shakopee, in ten years.

But, I ramble, without further ado:

Jack's Shania's Bare Knuckles Voice Sounds like someone Brawling with an Orangutan Top Twenty:

1. Live at Billy Bob's, Jack Ingram
I like live albums. I've seen Jack Ingram a bunch of times and he's flat-out one of the best live shows going today.
2. Famous Anonymous Wilderness, Graham Lindsey
Perfesser Al wrote a great review of Graham's live show under my Robbie Fulks review. This album is just a great piece of music from start to finish. It's travelling minstrel hobo folk blues murder music at its best.
3. Warmth & Beauty, Thad Cockrell
Thad Cockrell is the tenor voiced hillbilly Barry White that Ryan Adams either steered clear of becoming or, never quite became.
4. Just For The Record, Bobby Flores
The best damn country dance record that's out right now.
5. Swing Time, Wayne "The Train" Hancock
The Train is The Train is The Train. I just love to listen to the live version of "Thunderstorms & Neon Signs" on this record.
6. Railings, Frog Holler
Will be in Chicago and St. Louis later in November, I have my fingers crossed that they'll turn the van north for a show. Pennsylvania's finest hillbilly pickin' an' hollerin' band.
7. Guitar Pickin' Martyrs, Luther Wright & The Wrongs
"Rebuild the Wall" was such a fun album, I was worried about what they might do next. But, the process of making that album really fine tuned the band's playing and songwriting, and this is just a great disk.
8. Streets of Sin, Joe Ely
Joe Ely is an absolute legend. His voice is the almagated howl of all the ghosts of west Texas.
9. A Day at the Farm with Farmer Jason, Jason Ringenberg
When I was a kid, my grandma had all these yellow, red, and blue vinyl albums with all sorts of hillbilly kids' songs on them. This record by Jason of Jason and the Scorchers is just like those old disks. Screw Barney!!! Plug this into the CD player in the minivan while your ADD kids drink soda pop playing video games in double reinforced harnesses in the back seat.
10. Temporarily Disconnected, BR549
A funky little EP showcasing the band's new lineup. This band's strength has always been live performance, and now that they're out of the clutches of big label machinery, maybe they'll make something as strong as the "Phone" album again.
11. ring, Big Ditch Road
This is Minnesota's best country record right now. These are some of the loneliest songs you will ever hear.
12. It Happened in America, Sherwin Linton & Friends
There's all these young guys and gals playing country around here now, and after a few hours of sitting around telling stories, one of them inevitably starts off a story, "Sherwin Linton once told me that..." This is a disk that just reinforces that Sherwin Linton has seen and done it all.
13. Hope is a Thing With Feathers, Trailer Bride
Lead singer and songwriter Melissa Swingle could be singing about bluebirds eating lollipops in the sunshine, and you would still feel like somebody was asking you whether to take a relative off of life support. It's a deceptively alluring sound that wiggles its way into your noodle before you know what hit ya.
14. Fool For Love, Paul Burch
There are all these guys who can sing, write, and pick in Nashville, and all the talentless people who have hits on mainstream country radio go to see them when they go out. This is a country record that ought to be a big hit, but it doesn't contain any tampon jingles, so you're not going to hear it on the FM at say 2PM on a Thursday.
15. "OK - I'm sorry...", Bobby Bare Jr.'s Young Criminals' Starvation League
I like this better than the original disk. There's some great live material on it and some really nice studio outtake stuff.
16. Freedom's Child, Billy Joe Shaver
People who don't listen to Billy Joe Shaver make the Baby Jesus cry.
17. Live Recordings from the Louisiana Hayride, Johnny Cash
Kind of a cool little disk of historical stuff. The audio quality is a little iffy on some of the tracks, but the energy of the young Cash and cohorts is remarkable.
18. The Lawless, Kevin Deal
Texas' finest concrete pourin', storytellin' troubador.
19. The A-List, Urban Hillbilly Quartet
Another great live band from Minneapolis, this is a collection of some of their best stuff.
20. Deliverance, Bubba Sparxx
Why the hell not? It ain't your blog. He samples the Yonder Mountain String Band. He's got a GREAT goddamn last name too.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 6, 2003 12:09 AM

87 Southbound

Filed under: Imported

There are a lot of music clubs in this town. People in Minneapolis sometimes take it for granted that this IS a "live music town." All you have to do is drive up to St. Cloud, down to Des Moines, or, over to Fargo on a Friday night, to watch your umpteenth Blue Oyster Cult cover band, and then you realize that this little confederacy of club owners, who'd all cross the street if they saw another walking down the sidewalk, have created one of the live music Nirvanas in the grand old U.S. of A., that other pundits, authors, journalists, and bloggers lament is not THEIR town.

The Minneapolis Star and Tribune unfortunately sent Jon Bream, a fine American, down to the Xcel Energy Center this past week to watch, and, try to produce a few thousand words on one Shania Twain, and her shallow, hollow, domo arigato mr. roboto, form of "country" music. His review, while finely crafted, was more predictable than the Bears' win over the Pats in Super Bowl XX. BUT, dear readers, not one to shake it off and zip it up without a thought of flushing, I'm always willing to entertain theories.

I'll never cross the street and say that Shania is good, worthwhile, or talented. She sucks. That's that.

The question is, are the acts that I pimp good, worthwhile, or talented? Is what we profess merely a scene, another kind of club or clique, full of people so hip on being hip, they forgot to be good? Hmmmm.

Enter one Wayne "The Train" Hancock. Hancock's schtick is decidely retro. It's also decidely simple. It's also decidely a lot of other shit. Basically, you have a wild-eyed Texas hillbilly up there wailing about all sorts of things, while a standard slap-bassist does nothing dramatic in particular, and, the only musician in the group creates the only recordable sounds with a tricked out Telecaster out of the whole mess, for something like 2 hours.

So, is this purely honkytonk mania of twitchy eyeball looks and non-sequitur song intros somehow BETTER than a bulemic, Prozac� queen in a Wild jersey singing about cliche things that never happen to her at her palace in Switzerland? Yes.

Just read Bream's review. She had to drag some little girl in some bullshit cowgirl outfit onstage to placate her about things she couldn't possibly understand, and things she DIDN'T want to possibly understand. Wayne "The Train" was a little buzzed, a little tired, and a whole lot real. And, more than anything else, he was Country. He coulda greased his hair back, put on his boots, and hooked up his wallet to chain, but fuck all that. Tonight was a Hawaiian shirt, tennis shoe night. Play until Louie pulled the plug. If your reality is nothing but $65 dollar seats to some truck rally concert of punks like Kenny Chesney in muscle T's singing Eagles' songs in borrowed Vikings jerseys, well then folks, steer clear of 11th and Glenwood. There are places in the world where music happens, and sometimes, it happens for less than $10 at the door.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 2, 2003 2:46 AM

Go to the show

Filed under: Imported

 
(Photos linked from artists' websites)

This weekend presents two grand opportunities to catch different points on the Roots Spectrum. Tonight at Lee's Liquor Lounge, Wayne "The Train" Hancock will be playing with Accident Clearinghouse opening. Tomorrow night, at The Fine Line, the lovely Gillian Welch will be performing.

Hancock is kind of a poster child for hard livin', while Welch is a poster child for a hard life. Both shows are probably taking place in the perfect venues, as well. Welch, no doubt, will receive a slight audience boost in the form of Green and Purple jerseys.

Posted by Jack Sparks at November 1, 2003 2:39 PM

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