#tad kubler

[mitjalovse]

We have noticed a variety of homecomings in our discussions of them within the context of the musical releases that try to assure us all the things are back to normal then. For instance, The Hold Steady's Thrashing Thru The Passion finds them back with Franz Nicolay, their keyboard player. Surprisingly, they don't sound like they're searching for their old selves there, because they continue the development they did on their record without Nicolay, though one does notice they do have a set of signifiers that one can pinpoint towards a certain ideal I like to call indie rock industrial complex. I will try to explain the latter term thoroughly in my post about many similar musicians, since that one contains a lot of paradoxes.

[ramalbumclub]

20 Years of Almost Killed Me

Let me quickly run through the biography.

Craig Finn, future leader of The Hold Steady, was THAT kid in school - neither the first to be picked for the sports team, nor the last. A bespectacled adolescent navigating the school corridors, aware that there’s an “in-crowd” and he’s on the outs. 

He's the kid in-between - like most of us. Like me.

So what's the plan? How does he get from there to here?

Does he settle or does he aspire?

He does neither, he retreats into a world of books and music and becomes an expert in HIS field. He learns how to play guitar, becomes a fan of local Minneapolis bands like The Replacements and Husker Du, and, even though he's still a kid, he goes to see them at the "all ages hardcore matinee shows" in town.

Just a quick aside here but "hardcore matinee shows" sound like the most fun in the world - something to really build a day around. I'd basically vote for any political party that introduced them into the U.K.

But back to the story....

In his early '20s, Finn forms a band called Lifter Puller who are simultaneously pretty good but also not quite right. What works, spectacularly, is Finn's lyrics about drugs and the shady characters that surround them but "the not quite right" bit is the music - a sort of '80s inspired synth overdose that, at its worst, sounds like the soundtrack to a Brian De Palma movie and, at its best, sounds like the soundtrack to a Brian De Palma movie.

After a few albums, a modicum of success, Lifter Puller split up and Finn becomes a financial broker for American Express before moving to New York to get a job at a digital webcasting company. At this stage in Finn's life it would appear that his brief flirtation with a career in music had ended and he was now on a course for a series of jobs in tech and finance. In fact, he doesn't do anything related to music for two whole years. He's just the guy at work, the one who used to be in a band called Lifter Puller.

And then it happens.

Craig Finn is watching Martin Scorsese's The Last Waltz, the film of The Band's final concert, and he turns to his friend Tad Kubler, and says "Dude, why aren't there any bands like this anymore?"

Finn's observation is correct - there are no bands like that and I'm not sure there ever will be. But that's obvious, that's the bit we can all see. Even I've watched The Last Waltz and said to my mate Dan (I don't have a mate called Tad, I wish I did) - "Dude, why aren't there any bands like this anymore?"

No, what I love about this moment is what they did next. Finn and Kubler, there and then, decide to form a band like that. They took the completely mad decision in 2003, when everyone was still floored by that Neutral Milk Hotel album and everything it spawned, of creating a band with just guitar, bass, and drums.

They called themselves The Hold Steady and there wasn't a singing saw, a zanzithophone, or a wandering genie organ in sight.

What started out as an excuse for a bunch of guys in their '30s to hang out, drink, and play the occasional show, then becomes something of a going concern. Finn's lyrics, framed by Kubler's big riffs, created an unlikely breath of fresh air, a sense of celebration. Before long they're signed to Frenchkiss, the best name for a record label ever, and they release their first album - Almost Killed Me.

The album, in fact their career, opens with A Positive Jam, a song which tells the history of 20th Century America in 171 words. In the background, a lazy guitar struggles to wake up as the events are passed like road signs. It's their first song, on their first album, and after 90 seconds there's been a stock market crash, a World War, and 3 Kennedys are dead. The lyrical economy is remarkable, the way he deals with each decade precisely and definitively in one sentence. 

This is how he nails the '50s -

"We got shiftless in the '50s, holding hands and going steady, twisting into dark parts of the large Midwestern cities"

No need for the white picket fence trope, no need for Ike or Truman to co-star. Post war America perfectly reduced to "Holding hands and going steady". And then The Twist tells you the ‘60s are coming.  I got it straight away.

And this is how he nails the '70s -

"We woke up on bloody carpets, got tangled up in gas lines and I guess that's where it started"

He rhymed "carpets" with "started" and reduced the long term economic and political effects of the 1973 Oil Crisis to a line. What's not to like? I can still vividly remember my first listen now - the time, the place, and an album cover of blacked out faces. It was immediate. I was in.

And I didn't even know then what I know now, that he was providing context - that he was explicitly saying "We have shared history." Because at the end of the song, he brings us up to date, the guitar does wake up and the band kicks in. It's then that he tells us that he was bored so he started a band, it's then that he tells us that he wants to start it off with a positive jam.

The first time I heard Almost Killed Me I rewound the opening song again and again. I guess the "positive jam" that the song was trailing was The Swish, the second song on the album. But I couldn't get to it, I couldn't get past how good the opener was. I listened to it five times on the spin – by the time I was finished 15 Kennedys had died.

But then I did I get past it. I got to The Swish and my head fell off. Honestly, I stood there laughing, air riffing and dancing, in thrall to my new favourite band after just two songs. The bridge from A Positive Jam to The Swish is one of THE moments in music for me. It simultaneously comes out of nowhere yet evokes a memory. I made it through the rest of the album, breathless and giddy.

I'd never heard anything like it, despite having heard things like it.

Does that make sense? That bit really needs to make sense.

You know when The Sopranos came out and you thought "Jesus, not another story about Italian American Gangsters. Surely not THAT again." But then you watched it and saw that the characters were immersed in that culture as much as the viewer. They existed within their own context and couldn't move without referencing it.

And that was the difference. It was derivative but it was spun, from an angle so it wasn't head on.

That's The Hold Steady. That's Almost Killed Me.

It would be easy to say it's my favourite album of the 21st Century if only it didn't have to compete with what they did next - Separation Sunday, Boys and Girls in America and, finally, the hangover, Stay Positive. Finn had done it, with his friends they'd made one of the greatest runs of albums ever - an aggregate score of at least 36 out of 40.

At least.

Yes, there were comparisons to things you'd heard before, a familiarity, but for me it was almost entirely different. People screamed Springsteen, people screamed The E Street Band but I never really knew why. These weren't stories about open roads, about making love to the interstate. These were stories about the claustrophobia of community, about the kids in between - confined by drugs and religion. And you know what? Springsteen never swished through the city centre to do a couple of favours for some guys who looked like Tusken Raiders did he? No he didn't, he was probably driving somewhere.

The Hold Steady wore their influences on their sleeve but they spun them. They humoured them. They said "Tramps like us and we like Tramps" and told stories about people who looked like people -  people who looked like Rocco Siffredi, Elisabeth Shue, Izzy Stradlin, Alice Cooper, Mickey Mantle, and, of course, Tusken Raiders. They were doing that thing again - they were saying "We know you know. Because we have shared history"

But this analysis, my attempt at explanation, is nothing compared to the visceral triumph and joy of a Hold Steady show - the pleasure of watching this band that had been plucked from their own lives and were creating anew. I used to spend hours looking at the bass player, I'd never seen anyone work so hard whilst standing still - a man who started the night dry and ended it dripping in sweat and smiles.

And then there was Finn - the inbetweener, the most generous of front men. He was always so warm and inclusive to his audience, so glad that they're there with him. Yet he never forgets the band. Never. And for someone so wordy it's remarkable the gaps he leaves for them - the gaps for them to play and for him to admire. Often he’d be clapping, dancing, and having so much fun in admiration, that I’d worry he’d forget to join in again – that he’d forget that the moment after the gaps were his.

But he never did.

Fast forward to 2014 - to the Holiday Inn, in Brighton, a few hours after a Hold Steady show.

I'd probably had my back to him for about 10 minutes, having a night cap at the hotel bar and thinking about what had come before. But then I turned around and there he was - Craig Finn, sitting alone, a hero rather than a star. I decided to say hello and he gestured for me to sit down. We talked about The Last Waltz. I asked him if it was true, whether that's really how it started, and he said it was. We talked about the rest of the film, all those conversations, you know where they go - Joni Mitchell and all her chords; Van Morrison and that ridiculous high kick. And somewhere in the drink and The Last Waltz I lost the memory of the night, other than to say he was good company and he paid his way.

And if I met him now?

If I met him now, I'd probably get lost down another rabbit hole - about how we're the same age and how I wasn't picked first for the sports team either. I'd ask him how he feels now, at 44, about the start he gave himself at 33 - whether that still surprises him, whether it ever did. Whether he knows, REALLY knows, that for about four years The Hold Steady were the best band in the world. But more than that I'd tell him about how HE influenced, how HE inspired, about how Ruth and I always used to say this album club was about spinning familiar stories, about telling them from an angle rather than head on - just like The Hold Steady.

Because that's what we used to say. When we wanted to avoid nostalgia and reheating the past , we used to say it should be "JUST LIKE THE HOLD STEADY".

And before I lost another evening, and its fluid memory, I'd like to take the opportunity to thank him for that.

Martin Fitzgerald (2014)

[vmonteiro23a]

UNDER THE RADAR: NEW Album by The Hold Steady - "The Price of Progress"

UNDER THE RADAR: NEW Album by The Hold Steady – “The Price of Progress” “The Price of Progress is The Hold Steady’s most musically adventurous collection of songs so far, pairing singer Craig Finn’s vivid storytelling with arrangements that go in some unexpected directions. That’s not to say that Tad Kubler has forsaken guitar riffs: the lead single, “Sideways Skull,” is full of guitars that…

[sinceileftyoublog]

Guided By Voices Interview: A Conversation with Doug Gillard

Robert Pollard (left) and Doug Gillard (right); Guided By Voices perform “I Am A Tree” at SPACE in Evanston

BY JORDAN MAINZER

Journeyman Doug Gillard has been in Guided By Voices for 10 years, over 2 stints, for 12 official LP’s and other releases that no casual fan could keep track of. So, apart from Robert Pollard himself, I could think of no better person to analyze the creative process behind their recent crop of records, including two so far this year, Zeppelin Over China and EP compilation Warp and Woof, and a third coming, Sweating the Plague. More than ever, GBV seems to be a democracy, and not just because each member has gotten his turn at writing a few songs. From my conversation with Gillard over the phone last month from his home in Queens, I got the sense that as long as Pollard doesn’t have a clear idea for the song, he not only welcomes but relies on the others to help him complete it, even if he was the original writer. As for Gillard, he provides the backbone of the songs, something you don’t really notice but would if his contributions weren’t there, especially the horns and strings that supply dramatic flair or emotional weight. At any given live show, he’s the heart and soul of the band, whether doing backup vocals on the set mainstay that he wrote “I Am A Tree” or dishing Pete Townshend-esque riffs on the band’s Who worship.

Read our conversation below, edited for length and clarity, wherein Gillard also talks about his favorite new GBV songs, upcoming band-related news, and other projects he’s recently worked on or is working on.

Since I Left You: You’ve said Zeppelin Over China is unlike anything the band has done before. What makes it unique within the GBV discography?

Doug Gillard: I think it’s just a little warmer and has a little more orchestration and is probably the most diverse record.

SILY: A song like “The Hearing Department” is certainly hazier than your average propulsive GBV track.

DG: Yeah, Bob wanted sort of a rumba beat for that in his notes. Sometimes he has notes. Some songs he doesn’t. When we do the music, a lot of times, we just have freedom to take a song somewhere we’re feeling at the time of recording. Other times, he has sort of a vision. It’s a mixed bag, which is great. We like doing both. On that one, given that beat and the chords, it sort of reminded me of an early Fleetwood Mac song--Peter Green-era Fleetwood Mac.

SILY: On “Cobbler Ditches”, does he reference “Motor Away”?

DG: I think so, yeah.

SILY: You guys have so many songs, but having listened to a lot of them, I’ve never really picked that out before, where he’s referenced a previous song by title. It had to happen one of these days.

DG: I think it’s happened in the past, but I can’t be sure. There’s been a lot of records.

SILY: On this one, you did a lot of string and horn arrangements. That’s most notable on the singles and the ones you were playing before the album was out: “The Rally Boys” and “You Own the Night”. Where else did you add them in?

DG: They’re all over the record--“Vertiginous Rafts”, the last song on the record. Really, there are little parts of strings and horns on a lot of the songs on here. Sometimes, the strings are in the version of a Mellotron, but mostly, they’re not. Sometimes, they’re really subtle, too, added just to add a little bit of atmosphere.

SILY: Who plays them?

DG: I play them. I have an orchestra program, a MIDI program administered through a keyboard. There’s piano on there--key-related things.

SILY: I’ve seen how you adapted the first two live. Is it the same approach with the others? Are you even playing them?

DG: We will be playing more songs from the record. But when we play stuff live, we just kind of rock it out. I’m not concerned whether parts on the record aren’t in the song live. I really like seeing bands that play songs on the record different from how the record sounds.

SILY: Bob has said in past concerts that you’re the most instrumentally capable version of GBV ever even though the fans want the mistakes. But you achieve the balance between the record and live well. You still retain that rawness.

DG: Yeah, I think that’s true. Sometimes, I’ll try to play some of the string lines live on guitar if there’s room. I was doing that with “See My Field”. But it’s only because I hear them. I don’t have to play them. It wasn’t a request--just something I thought I would do.

SILY: Were the last songs you wrote for GBV the ones from “August By Cake” [Ed note: “Goodbye Note” and “Deflect/Project”]?

DG: No, there have been some B-sides to singles that band members have written that have come out. They haven’t been digitized, necessarily. They were vinyl-only and sold out quickly. One was called “Red Nose Speedway”...What was the other one called? I wrote one with Mark Shue. Kevin March wrote one that ended up on the B-side of a single and so did Bobby Bare.

SILY: You don’t play them live, do you?

DG: No, that’s correct.

SILY: Have you done the string and horn arrangements on other GBV albums before?

DG: Yeah. All the stuff that’s come out so far I have done a little bit, but on August By Cake really not much at all...some keyboards, maybe a string line here or there. How Do You Spell Heaven, a little bit. [Engineer] Travis [Harrison] did some string lines on August By Cake. And I did some arrangements on an ESP Ohio record which came out before August By Cake, which was Travis, myself, Mark Shue, and Bob.

SILY: Now that you’re back in the band, as of 2016, is “I Am A Tree” going to be in the set list for as long as you’re in the band?

DG: [laughs] I’m not sure. I would say probably so, but you can never be sure. There are a lot of songs in the can that Bob likes to rotate in and out of the set list. 

SILY: How does he or the band decide upon the set list on a night by night basis?

DG: Bob will have a master list that he re-sequences for every show. We’ll have a basic list for every tour, give or take some. Sometimes, he’ll get a whim or an epiphany and put something in mid-tour, which is always fine. But the sequence is different every night.

SILY: Do you have a favorite song on Zeppelin Over China or Warp and Woof?

DG: Wow...there are a lot of songs to choose from on both of those, and they’re all so damn good. Zeppelin Over China, I really don’t know what a favorite would be. Let’s see...looking at the list here...I really like “Where Have You Been All My Life” or maybe “Wrong Turn On” or “Jam Warsong”. There’s a ton, though. They all kind of have different purposes, different sounds. Warp and Woof, there are a lot of great little songs on there. I say little because they’re shorter. About two minutes or so. I think one of my favorites is “Angelic Weirdness”.

SILY: The two that are called out in terms of your contributions are the first and the final track, especially in terms of unique recording process. Didn’t you record “Bury the Mouse” in the van?

DG: Yeah, except for the drums. The drums were done first. We already had those, and we finished it on tour in the van. 

SILY: And “End it With Light” was at a soundcheck?

DG: Yeah, I did guitars at the soundcheck on that one. “Cool Jewels and Aprons” is another favorite from Warp and Woof. Oh, I forgot, the last song on 100 Dougs is mine. The instrumental. If you don’t have that actual EP, I can’t remember what sequence it’s in on Warp and Woof, but it’s called “It Will Never Be Simple”.

SILY: The third record you’re putting out this year is no longer called “Rise of the Ants,” right?

DG: That’s correct. It’s going to be called Sweating the Plague.

SILY: Are you able to talk a little about that one, whether your specific contributions, songwriting, and arrangements, or the feel for it in general?

DG: To me, there are similarities to Zeppelin Over China. There’s a little more hard rock on it, a little more of a 70′s rock feel to the songs, some “guitarmonies.” But there are some really nice ballads. It has the four ps that Bob talks about. [Ed note: pop, punk, prog, and psych] Lots of punk on it.

SILY: It’s been described as a little proggy.

DG: For sure. There are a couple prog songs.

SILY: Are there any more records on the horizon for you guys?

DG: There are some reissues this year because of album anniversaries. 

SILY: Bee Thousand?!?

DG: No. There’s always an anniversary of some album. Later this year, it’s the 20th anniversary of the release of Kid Marine, Robert Pollard solo, and of Speak Kindly of Your Volunteer Fire Department, which is a record I did with Bob. It was released under the name Robert Pollard and Doug Gillard, but it was the 4th one in the Fading Captain series of his records coming out around then. That has “Pop Zeus” on it and some other songs. That’s been remastered and it should be reissued in August. There may be a Cash Rivers collection coming out. I’m not sure about when that will be released.

SILY: You’re going to Europe for the first time in decades. Are you excited to play Primavera and the UK?

DG: Very much so, yeah.

SILY: When was the last time you were there with GBV?

DG: 2003, I’d say. We did a European tour and UK tour there.

SILY: Was that for Earthquake Glue?

DG: I believe so. It was either Universal Truths or Earthquake Glue. I think it was Earthquake Glue. I’ve been there a lot since with Nada Surf. I’m really excited to play there with Guided By Voices.

SILY: You contributed to the most recent Neko Case record. How did that experience come about?

DG: Neko had always liked my playing. When she was assembling songs for this record, she gave me a call, I went down to Tuscon, and I played a lot of tracks. I learned the songs. It was great.

SILY: I never realized that you were on The Hold Steady’s Stay Positive, too. I was looking at your credits and was like, “Woah, all these albums I’ve loved over the years!”

DG: Oh, yeah. I was friends with those guys at the time they were making that. I think I had just moved to New York, and they invited me to their session. Tad [Kubler] had me play the recurring riff on “Sequestered in Memphis”. That sort of Stones-y riff. That’s the only song I’m on, I think, but that was fun. They’re really good guys.

SILY: Any plans to come back to Chicago soon?

DG: I’m sure we will. We’re always around Chicago at least a couple times a year. Nothing that I know of just yet, but I’m positive something will happen in that area.

SILY: Anything you’ve been listening to, watching, or reading that’s caught your attention?

DG: I listen to a lot of podcasts. Mark Riley from the BBC does a Bowie podcast, The A to Z of David Bowie. I’ve been listening to a lot of that. I’ve been checking out stuff here and there.

SILY: I don’t have anything else to ask you--is there anything I didn’t ask about you want to say?

DG: Let’s see...not sure. I’m producing a band called The Bye Bye Blackbirds. They’re a guitar pop band from the Bay Area. They’ve definitely been around for a while. They have ex-members of Game Theory, The Mr. T Experience. My friend Bradley [Skaught] is the songwriter of the band. He writes some good songs.

SILY: Anything else not GBV in your realm coming up?

DG: Not really too much. GBV’s been planning a busy year with recording and shows and tours coming up, so I’ve been kind of leaving things open for that. It will be busy playing shows for sure. Really nothing else right now.

SILY: Thanks again for your time, I really appreciate it. Congrats on the releases, and looking forward to hearing the next one!

DG: For sure!

[erm2020]

45th Favorite Album

Stay Positive. The Hold Steady. 2008, Vagrant/Rough Trade. Producer: John Agnello. Purchased, 2008. IN A NUTSHELL: A rocking, energetic record that rates so highly because of Craig Finn’s lyrics and delivery. Keyboardist Franz Nicolay and guitarist Tad Kubler shine on songs that are Springsteen-y and Ramones-y, but it’s Finn’s oblique stories of small town sadness, love gone wrong, and…

[power-chords]

APPARENTLY Tad Kubler asked Camie (friend/fan/band employee) about me and was like “Who was that 18-year-old standing next to you on the barricade” which is hilarious because I was like maximum ten feet from the dude and I guarantee you I do not look 18 even at a distance. I am being read as a teenager purely on the basis of insane energy levels.

[jungleindierock]

The Hold Steady: Tiny Desk (Home) Concert

One of my favourite American punk rock bands The Hold Steady perform a wonderful four song live set for  Tiny Desk (Home) Concert. They are agreat band if you  don’t know their material then please take the time to take a listen, Craig Finn and Franz Nicolay solo stuff is also very good!!!!!

Setlist

Heavy Covenant

Unpleasant Breakfast

Riptown

Parade Days

Musicians on the set

Bobby Drake: drums

Craig Finn: vocals

Tad Kubler: guitar, vocals

Franz Nicolay: keyboards, accordion, vocals

Galen Polivka: bass

Stephen Selvidge: guitar, vocals

Stuart Bogie: clarinet

Peter Hess: clarinet

Jordan McLean: trumpet

[imagesofthegreatgull]

Hybrid Rainbow

Joy has always been a rare and precious commodity. I would argue, though, that in the developed world (Wherever, exactly, that is), it has become somewhat less rare in recent times, as standards of living and education continue to go up. That’s an absurdly privileged thing to say, I realize, but I’m trying to start this thing as evenhandedly as I can. I understand about suffering and poverty; I’m reading A Tree Grows In Brooklyn right now, even! Okay, saying we’re closer now than ever to utopia is going to smack of ignorance no matter how you phrase it, but it also strikes me as undeniably true, in the grand scheme of things. I think most people--aside from the fascists--would refuse a one-way trip in a time machine to any previous era, or at the very least, would recognize that it wouldn’t improve much of anything for them. As unruly as our age is, it’s still probably the best one we’ve gotten thus far, and as the boot-heel of oppression starts to ever so slowly ease up its pressure on the necks of the long-suffering masses, the question has begun to enter into the collective consciousness: what is to be done with joy when it begins to fall, unbidden, into your life with something like abundance? What is to be done if moments of joy no longer must be pried with great effort and sacrifice from the rockface of life, but lie strewn liberally throughout our days, needing only the will and lack of embarrassment to seize them?

Thus far, the latter-day generations have faced up to this problem with decidedly mixed success. The idea that expecting anything other than the very worst leaves one vulnerable to the universe’s cruel whims has been stamped upon the human brain for centuries, and has left many sadly unable to recognize their own privilege (Which, by the way, is a big part of why a whole lotta white folks refuse to admit they have it better than anyone else and continue to dig their heels in against progress because to them it looks like cutting in line). It is still widely accepted that constantly finding joy and peace and purpose in one’s own life is the purview of children and children alone, that it is a naivete to be grown out of. We have the impulse always within us to be hard, to be warlike, to show the world that we’re not weak and frivolous but monsters to be feared, without emotions to be appealed to or ideals to be fallen short of.

Remedying this problem has turned out to be one of the primary functions of counterculture. If it is often unhelpful to simply look at the entire value system of one’s parents and say “Fuck that”, as it tends to foster a rather negative self-definition, still, if part of that value system is a deeply entrenched distrust of happiness, “Fuck that” may be exactly the response called for. The beauty of “Fuck that” is that it leaps past the slow loss of faith in something and arrives immediately at a flat rejection of it, and since much of the history of civilization has been bound up with blind faith in arbitrary and harmful things, the ability and the courage to flatly reject something, to give it no credit for however widely accepted it is but to dismiss it as bullshit from the ground up, is a step forward in human consciousness tantamount to the reinvention of the wheel.

The great irony of the end of the sixties is that all the hippies were miserable for no reason: they won. Rock n’ roll did change the world, it just didn’t immediately transform it on every level into an unrecognizable nirvana. For all the apparent emptiness of its utopian dreams, the basic thrust of the thing worked out just fine: that particular cat will never be put back into its bag, and those ideas are now out in the ether forever, always waiting for someone to find them and be inspired to change their own life and the lives of those around them for the better. The same goes for the punk rock revolution a few years later: they may not have brought the bastards down, but they did successfully bring personal liberation to a lot of people, and poured exactly as much gas on the fires of populism as they intended to. Culture, and in particular art and in particular music, cannot, unassisted, change the world, but it can change your world, and has been changing small worlds all over the frigging place at least since those mop-topped Brits set foot on American shores and probably since Johnny B. Goode learned to play guitar just like a-ringin’ a bell. 

The thread can get lost, however. Culture is always a reflection of the people, and the people still spend a lot of their time bored, frustrated, and terrified of letting on that they have feelings about stuff. Young people especially, formerly the eternal pirate crew waving high the flags of “Liberty” and “Up Yours”, in recent times have often capitulated and resigned themselves to no more than a few stray moments of fun pilfered from the fortresses of the almighty Money Man-Kings, usually in the form of drugs, sex, and reckless self-endangerment. The cost of the hippies and the punks giving up their battles is that the counterculture lost its intellectual leadership, at least until the resurgence in political literacy in the 2010s. In the wasteland following the 70s, there were no John Lennons or Joe Strummers to look to for guidance; even the people who were elected to speak for their generation seemed adamant that there was fuck-all they could really say. Yeah, it’s nice to know that someone else feels stupid and contagious, but that’s not really a direction, is it? The generation-defining message Kurt Cobain and his peers sent out was “We’re all way too fucked up to do anything about anything”, and that introspective moodiness pervaded American underground rock music from the invention of hardcore at least all the way up to the moment Craig Finn watched The Last Waltz with Tad Kubler and said “Why aren’t there bands like this anymore?” and set out with rest of the Steadies in tow to remind everyone that music can save your immortal soul and that hey, that Springsteen guy was really onto something, headband and all, and together they all successfully ushered in the New Uncool and now we’ve got Patrick Stickles wailing that “If the weather’s as bad as the weatherman says, we’re in for a real mean storm!” and Brian Fallon admitting “I always kinda sorta wished I looked like Elvis” and everything’s great, except it’s not, everything’s fucked, but rock n’ roll is here to stay, come inside now it’s okay, and I’ll shake you, ooo-ooo-ooo.

The point of all this is my belief that even with the responsibility rock music has to provide cathartic outlets for dissatisfaction, is has an equal or greater responsibility to provide heroes. I think it’s time we all got over pretending that we’re better than the need for heroes, because we all insist on having them anyway, imperfect roses by any other name, and we’d do a hell of a lot better selecting them if we just admitted what we were after. We don’t just want particularly talented comrades, we want King Arthur, Robin Hood, Superman, Malcolm Reynolds. Damn it all, they don’t need to be perfect, they don’t even need to be all that great really, and yeah, Arthur dies, and Robin never gets Prince John, and Superman can’t save everyone, and the war’s over, we’re all just folk now, and John Lennon beat women and Van Morrison is a grumpy old fart and John Lydon’s a disgrace, but it’s the faith that counts. The faith that there’s something greater than ourselves that some people are more keyed into than others, and that whatever they can relay from that other side is what’ll see us through. All the best prophets are madmen, and madmen aren’t always romantic fools; sometimes they hurt people, or fail at crucial moments due to a compulsion they can’t control. Let he who is without sin etcetera, right? Why not cast aside realism and sincerely believe in something or someone, huh? 

I believe in the Pillows. I don’t know hardly anything about them; my expertise of Japanese culture and history extends to the anime I’ve seen and that “History of Japan” YouTube video that made the rounds a while back. I can’t locate them within the Japanese music scene; all their western influences seem obvious to me, and the rest I know nothing about. They’re the only rock band from their country I’ve listened to any great amount of, I don’t speak the language they mostly sing in, I don’t even know their career very well. The particulars of any experiences they might have had that motivated them to make the art they make are not ones I could possibly share in, so, saying that I “Relate” to their work sounds a little preposterous. They ought to be a novelty to me, a band that clearly likes a lot of the same bands I do despite hailing from a foreign shore, marrying that shared music taste with a cultural identity I have nothing to do with, a small, nice upswing of globalism pleasing to my sense of universalism but not having any kind of quantifiable impact on me.

Yet I, like a good many other westerners, believe in the Pillows. I’m a little buster, and my eyes just watered as I wrote that. In fact, it’s likely because of the barriers of language and culture that exist between us that my belief in the Pillows is so strong. Pete Townshend, someone else I believe in, once opened a show by saying “You are very far away...but we will fucking reach you”, and though the Pillows are both geographically (At the moment) and culturally miles away from me, Lord strike me down if they don’t fucking reach me. They reach me in a way many of their American college rock peers, many of their biggest influences in fact, never have. Dinosaur Jr, Bob Mould, Sonic Youth, the Pixies, Nirvana--all these artists speak directly to the American adolescent experience, but though they have all moved me to one degree or another, none of them have produced a body of work I can so readily see myself in as that of the Pillows. Maybe it is the novelty of it, maybe I’m fooling myself and it is just my sense of universalism carrying me away, but there’s something I hear in the Pillows that I don’t hear in those bands, and though the obvious candidate for that thing would be the foreign tongue the majority of the lyrics are written in, when it comes down to it, I think that thing is joy.

Joy, to me, is the possibility glimpsed by rock n’ roll. Not hedonistic pleasure, not a sadistic glee over the outrage of authority figures, but real, true, open-hearted, “Freude, schöner Götterfunken/Tochter aus Elysium”--type joy. Buddy Holly had joy. The Beatles, The Who, the pre-fall Rod Stewart, they had joy. Springsteen’s got joy to spare. Those people have such profound love for their art and their audience that just the continual recognition of the fact that they have a guitar in their hands and they’re being allowed to play it is enough to make them ecstatic, and whenever they want to actually express something serious they have to get themselves under control to do it. Yet, whether it’s the unfashionability of those utopian dreams, or the simple fact that rock music has become accepted by mainstream culture and is now a commonplace, unremarkable thing, but half the people who have picked up an electric guitar for the past few decades don’t seem all that excited about it. From Kim Gordon snarling about how people go down to the store to buy some more and more and more and more, to Thom Yorke moaning about how he’s let down and hanging around, crushed like a bug in the ground, even up to Courtney Barnett asking how’s that for first impressions, this place seems depressing, it’s not really a given anymore, if it ever was, that people who make rock music are very joyful in what they do. 

Of course, I’m not demanding that our artists be empty-headed fluff-factories; far from it. The Pillows write sad songs and angry songs same as everybody else. But the important thing is this: every song the Pillows play is played with an exuberance and abandon that is immediately striking, regardless of the emotional content of each song. Channelling that kind of revelry into rock music is both to my mind the initial purpose of the genre in the first place and something which has become so rare as to be remarkable. A veneer of detached cool, a howling ferocity, a whimpering woundedness--these have become the hallmarks of American rock music, and they are nowhere to be found in the Pillows.

At the same time, the Pillows are the very antithesis of artlessness. Joy of the caliber they deal in is more commonly found in folky rave-ups, a lack of musicianship giving way to trancelike festivity. But the Pillows are skilled song craftsmen like few others; their sound has evolved throughout the years, but they tend to settle in the neighborhood of power-pop, abounding in glorious hooks and surprising structures. A hundred unnecessary, perfect touches seem to exist in every song; a pause, a solo, a bassline, all deftly elevating the song into a perfect expression of something sublime, something that always--always--takes ahold of the musicians themselves and imbues their performances with power and purpose the likes of which most little busters can only dream of feeling. It should be testament enough to their brilliance that upon first listen to a song I never know what most of the lyrics mean, but whenever I look up a translation, they always turn out to be exactly what I felt they must be; their songs are so musically communicative that they all but lack the need for lyrics. 

This dual nature is why I believe in the Pillows: by so utterly failing to neglect both the highest possibilities of musical composition as an unparalleled tool for capturing emotional nuance and the unrestrained id-like rush that is the province of rock n’ roll, they successfully attain the lofty realm that is--or ought to be--the goal of music in the first place. Never once is there a hint of straying into the realm of primitivism nor into overthought seriousness, and instead they locate themselves somehow exactly center on the scale between punk and prog, lacking the weaknesses and gaining the strengths of both. They make rock whole again by finally disproving the tenet initially laid out by their heroes, your heroes, and mine, The Beatles: the notion that growing up means having less fun. The viscerally exciting early work of The Beatles lacks any of the depth and vision displayed by their later records, but those records are so carefully and expertly crafted that they tend to lose spontaneity, and constantly second-guess themselves where the juvenilia they followed forged unselfconsciously ahead. That legendary career path has laid out a false dichotomy that every proceeding generation of kids with guitars has chosen between, save for the few who could see past it, the ones who heard the wildness in “Revolution” and the wisdom in “Twist and Shout” and realized that they were of a piece, were one and the same, not to be chosen between but embraced fully. Pete Townshend. Bruce Springsteen. Joe Strummer. David Byrne. Paul Westerberg. The Pillows. The real heroes are not those who champion one side or another but fight all their lives for peace between them, knowing that we have not yet begun to imagine what could be accomplished if that were made possible.

Just as they bypass the divide between what Patrick Stickles termed the Apollonian and Dionysian tendencies of rock (I prefer to think of the usual battle as being between the Dionysians and the Athenians, with the true devotees of Apollo being most of those heroes I keep referring to, except Dylan, who might be a Hermesian), so too do the Pillows bypass the Pacific frigging ocean. And the Atlantic, to boot. Their music quotes the Pixies and The Beatles directly, and obviously owes much to Nirvana and all their college rock predecessors who spent the entire 80s desperately stacking themselves until the doomed power trio could finally vault over the wall. Their first record is practically a tribute to XTC. They do speak a lot of English, too. I’m informed that much of western culture is seen as the epitome of coolness in Japan, which might explain their obsession with Baseball, and apparently sprinkling a bit of the Saxon tongue into the mix is far from uncommon in the music scene(s). Regardless, there is something ineffably touching to a distant fan in a foreign land about hearing Sawao Yamanaka spit “No surrender!” or exclaim “Just runner’s high!” It looks from here like a show of mutual effort to understand me as much as I’m trying to understand them. They’re generous enough to have already walked to the middle where they’re asking me to meet them, a middle where it doesn’t matter that I don’t have a suffix attached to my name or that they don’t wear shoes in houses. The invisible continent that all forward-thinking and sensitive people come to long for is where the Pillows are broadcasting from, because they’ve realized that its golden shores and spiraling cities are attainable. They’re attainable with joy, with the fundamentally rebellious act of refusing to let the fascists bring down even your globdamn day, because who the hell gave them that power other than us? I know enough about Japan and America to know that either one accusing the other of being imperialist and socially conservative to a fault is a fucking joke, and to know that we’ve done a lot more wrong to them than they’ll ever do to us and the presence of the Pillows amounts to a “We forgive you”, not an “I’m sorry”. Having watched a decent amount of anime, which is basically the result of Japan’s mind being blown by western media and then proceeding to show their love by often almost inadvertently surpassing their inspirations, I know that the only way to save our respective national souls and everybody else’s too is to put our knuckles down, have Jesus and Buddha shake hands like Kerouac tried to explain that they would anyway, and embrace each other’s dreams and passions and adopt them into our own. 

It takes better people to inhabit that better world, and in case that sounds like fascist talk, I mean we’ve got to do better, not be better. It’s no physical imperfection that holds us back, nor a mental imperfection exactly, as we all have our own neuroses and if we expunge those then we’ll be kissing art and lot of other vital stuff goodbye. No, it’s our discomfort with ourselves, our world, our neighbors, our aliens, that keep us from seeing that crazy sunshine. If we can’t even acknowledge the greatness around us, that surplus of joy I mentioned a while back that we just seem to have no idea what to do with, then we have no hope of ever achieving further greatness, of ever quelling man’s inhumanity to man down to an inevitable fringe rather than the basic order of the world. 

There was always more to do 

Than just eat and work and screw

But now that there’s time at last to do those things, we’re still afraid to, afraid that we’ll come up empty, that the search for fulfillment leads only to disappointment, better to hang back and play it safe, better not to risk becoming one of those people I shake my head at and pity and will secretly envy until I die. It’s a new world, and we must learn to be new people. I believe in the Pillows because I believe they make excellent models for that new kind of person. The way they behave in the studio and on the stage is the way people behave when they’re truly free, and we’ve all been set free already or will be soon, so if we’re going to try and learn what the fuck is next from anyone, I think we might as well learn from the Pillows. At least, that’s one of the places we could get that insight. There’s a lot of art and a lot of philosophy and political theory to sift through to in order to put together a workable 21st century identity, and the Pillows are hardly the only people to have begun making the leap. But because of a silly thing like the size of the earth, the infinitesimal size of the earth even compared to the distance between us and the next rock we’re gonna try and get to, not everybody is getting their particular brand of free thought and action, and I happen to think that’s regrettable, and it’s my will as a free individual to rectify it as much as I can.

Writing about music really is worthless, isn’t it? I haven’t said jackshit about what the Pillows actually do other than to vaguely qualify their genre and temperament, and the only more useless thing I could do than not describing their songs would be to describe their songs. If you don’t hear the bracing weightlessness in “Blues Drive Monster”, or the aching nostalgia in “Patricia”, or the soul-bearing cry in “Hybrid Rainbow” then nothing I could write about those would be more effective than “Little Busters is a really good album.” The better primer might be Happy Bivouac, from a few years later; it has the melancholic rush of “Last Dinosaur”, the ascended teenybopper “Whoa, whoa, yeah” chorus in “Backseat Dog”, and the intro that should make it obvious immediately that you’re listening to one of the best songs ever recorded which opens “Funny Bunny”. Those two, Runners High, and Please, Mr. Lostman are the classic era, selections from the former three immortalized in their biggest claim to western fame, the FLCL soundtrack, a brilliant use of their music that could warrant an equally long piece. Before and after those four are periods of experimentation and discovery equally worth your time, not all of which I’m familiar with yet. See, now I’m just an incomplete Wikipedia article; it’d be equally worthless to expound upon the individual bandmates, on the pure yawp of Yamanaka’s vocals, on the passionate drumming of Yoshiaki Manabe and the supernaturally faultless lead guitar of Shinichiro Sato, or the contribution of founding bassist Kenji Ueda, which was so valued by the others that when he left he was never officially replaced (They’re so sweet). I’m not here to write an advertisement or a press-release, I don’t really even know why I’m here writing this, but I know that I believe in the Pillows, that they’re important, and that people should write about them. I’m being the change I want to see in the world, get it? That’s all we can be asked to do.

It occurs to me that people believed in Harvey Dent too, and that didn’t turn out so well. Hell, let’s leave the comic book pages behind, people believe in Donald Trump, they think he’s a hero, and that’s all going down in flames as I write this. Having heroes can be dangerous, but I still believe it’s not as dangerous as not having heroes. “Lesser of two evils” sounds an awful lot like one of those false dichotomies between fun and intelligence or between misery and foolishness I mentioned earlier, so, let’s call it a qualified good. I’m not much of a responsible world-citizen if my only effort towards bringing the planet together is spinning some sweet Japanese alt-rock tunes and bragging about how open-minded I am, but if I do ever end up doing anyone any good, then I’d consider it paying forward the good done to me by the Pillows, among others. They helped me form my identity as an artist (Read: functional human being) and they made my adolescence a lot easier. Actually, that’s a lie: my adolescence was (And continues to be) pretty easy already, and the Pillows reassured me that I wasn’t avoiding reality by feeling that. While American bands sang about the downsides of being a mallrat or a non-mallrat, the Pillows offered a vision of teenagedome much like my own, one that was grandly romantic, in which suffering wasn’t a cosmic stupidity but a trial with pathos and merit, and joy was not an occasional indulgence but a constant presence, whether it was lived in or lost and needing recovery. 

That’s the old idea of youth, the youth of John Keats, the youth that makes the old miss it, makes it required that we explain to them that it’s still there, it never left, it’s a dream, a momentary affirmation, an attitude, a muttered curse word. So many of my peers, now no longer engaged in a constant race to stay out of the grave as their ancestors were, seemed intent on beating each other into their tombs, as if reaching walking death before their parents was the only way to outgrow them. There’s so much life just lying around and it’s just plain wasteful to let it lie in the sun and rust in the rain. There’s space enough to stretch, to not keep who you are awkwardly curled up inside yourself, to breathe the air and taste the wine and dig the brains of your fellow travelers in this loosely-defined circus. I found that space in the Pillows, having often suspected it was there, and while everyone is going to find that space in their own way--or not, still, tragically not--I have to think that experience was due in part  to some innate and unique quality of the music itself, not just a complimentary sensibility contained within myself. The Pillows are free, and that makes them freeing, it’s easy as that. Their liberation is plain as day; it rings in every chord, every snare-hit, every harmony; it’s up to us ascertain what we can do in our own limited capacity to hoist ourselves up to their level and give some other folks a boost along the way and a hand to grab afterwards. It’s the gift that art gives us, and the Pillows just give it more freely than most is all, which is why I think the suggestion to listen to them is more than just a solid recommendation. Like the insistence on listening to The Beatles, or The Clash, or any of the others, it’s a plea to save your soul, to learn the language of tomorrow and drink the lifeblood of peace and love and piss and vinegar, or else you’ll be lost, lost, lost. 

Can you feel? Can you feel that hybrid rainbow?

[bandstolookup]

lovage

moonchild trio

moonraker

weird little boy

painkiller

Patton & rahzel

omar lnx

naked city

General Patton vs the X-ecutioners

John zorn

Christian Fennesz and Mike Patton

The Ace Kefford Stand

Bedlam

Blue Murder

Big Bertha

Emerson, Lake & Powell

Forcefield

Peter Green Splinter Group

Casey Jones & His Engineers

Minute by Minute

Phenomena

Cozy Powell's Hammer

Rainbow

Saints and Sinners

The SAS Band

The Sorcerers

bob oxblood

sector 27

Spirit

Strange Brew

yardbirds

moon rat

marshmello

Young Blood

streetwalkers

cozy Powell

ashes divide

the vandals

judson crane

helios

zhao cong

little boots

ólafur arnalds

deru

nathan johnson

jay dee's ma duke collection

wang leehom

robert miller

john lenehan

dexter britain

honeyroot

cliff martinez

beacon trees

taylor lipari-hassett

robert miller

rob simonsen

lykke li

steve gutheinz

brian reitzell

orchard heights

duncan blickenstaff

appalachia castle

freckleland

mark mothersbaugh

bellflower

tycho

driftmob orchestra

peter born and john

hot chip

minus the bear

metronomy

neon indian

cut copy

miami horror

hotel cinema

michael collins

divide by nine

aidan grace

rapture ruckus

stephen christian

twice young

keefus green

alex g

diiv

daniel garrow

nathan wang

eola ferry

michael shapiro

animal island

isaac carpenter

grupo de janeiro

little north fork

zachery david

keith kenniff

zack holt

goldmund

lights & motion

tim halperin

lisle moore

analog heart

moncrief

the 84

sollitude

massara

todd terja

black bug

prins emanuel

aunt mary

wild life

gary lightbody

chic

jakob ogawa

moon mouth

raener

starmy

the elected

johnny thunders

discus

vibras

run with it

grupo fantasma

liam gallagher

james bay

kris platt

rough party

parade of lights

mariah mundi

david buckley

joseph trapenese

team ezy

alvin risk

founder

umo

PYRMDS

cherry glazerr

daniel heath

ELOHIM

raf rundell

the black jackets

root basket

BT

*repeat repeat

max aruj

hunter hunted

assuming we survive

r. lum. r

vindata

dark thoughts

elliot basin

julien rose baker

jesus piece

otto muehl

todd rundgren

foxy shazam

recent rumors

movements

yam haus

cashew chemists

the verve

faunts

half moon run

toro y moi

bappi lahiri

walls

gerd Janson

prins thomas

metronomy

shintaro sakamoto

kamome jido gassyodan

yo yo mama

yosi horikawa

mew

eddie c

kza

teen runnings

connan mockasin

mmt

kide ultimate

bombino

the handsome family

rac

washed out

odesza

sylvan esso

friendly fires

apocalipstic

pompeya

gary's gang

antarctic

penguins & petrels

whale song

humpback whale

cold cold life

ernie jackson

the midnight

currents

the smith street band

meg mac

the jungle giants

methvl ethel

alex the astronaut

g flip

eves karvdas

life fucker

abject pax

fit for a king

like moths to flames

claude oak

chuck berry

jesse malin

glen matlock

craig finn & tad kubler

the hold steady

the mescaleros

joey & jakob armstrong

sebastian mueller

zoe devlin

ranking roger

the beat

chuck prophet

mark stewart

the pop group

jackson couzens

anteros

charlie harper

uk subs

matt grocott

the shrives

matthew thomson

the hands

the amazons

pete wylie

itch

the king blues

ian prowse

pele

[drkandraz]

Why “Wish You Were Here” is About the 5 Stages of Grief

Note: I apologize for any wrong or misunderstood information in advance. Also, I acknowledge that I may sometimes be a tad far fetched so bear with me, please and keep in mind I am in no way qualified to analyse this professionally.

After their gigantic success with their first concept album, “Dark Side of the Moon,” Pink Floyd decided to revisit their feelings and ideas about the loss of their friend and former band mate, Syd Barrett.

For a bit of backstory, Barrett, who had been one of the founding members of the band and a leading figure for them, inventing several new guitar techniques and specializing in psychedelic and folk tones, left the band because of uncertain reasons (most likely, a mix of budding mental illness, specifically schizophrenia, and drug usage, like LSD). A couple of albums following his departure later, Roger Waters became a sort of leader for the band, focusing on lyrics and conceptual albums that encompassed single ideas. This is how “Dark Side of the Moon” came to be. Later, revisiting the loss of their old partner Syd, the band decided to make a new album specifically with the purpose of exploring their own feelings, disillusionment and ideas about Barrett’s departure. And this is how “Wish You Were Here” came to be.

The title, in itself, suggests the theming to be pertaining to grief, loss or missing someone dear. Unlike “Dark Side of the Moon”, the title belongs to one of the tracks on the album, due to the purpose that it fits the album’s concept perfectly. The album cover depicting two businessmen shaking hands while one is on fire points to the critical elements suggested by “Welcome to the Machine” and “Have a Cigar,” while the logo depicting two mechanical hands shaking hands, perhaps suggesting the same thing or, rather, the “mechanical souls” of the separated partners surpassing any medium, but they have been irrevocably changed by “The Machine” into simple machines themselves.

The album can be split into five different sections: “Shine on You Crazy Diamond Parts 1-5″, “Welcome to the Machine”, “Have a Cigar”, “Wish You Were Here” and “Shine on You Crazy Diamond Parts 6-9″. Each of them has a different speaker and suggests a new point of view to the theme of loss, pointing to the idea of the Kubler-Ross Model, or the Five Stages of Grief, through which one supposedly goes through when faced with loss: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance.

The first five parts of “Shine on You Crazy Diamond” are, instrumentally speaking, a throwback to the Barrett era of the band; they are constituted of psychedelic and folk-style tones accompanied by rare vocals, Barrett himself noting it sounded “a bit old” when he visited the studio one day. The song itself is sorrowful, but bizzare and sometimes seemingly very relaxed with itself ( in the trumpet sections, for instance). The speaker is the band as a singular ego reaching out to Syd. The lyrics note the tragic incidents in Barrett’s life before encouraging him to “Shine on” once more (*S*hine on *Y*ou crazy *D*iamond). This section represents denial as it is a throwback to Syd’s signature style and the fact that the lyrics are encouraging despite their acknowledgement of the tragedy. The lyrics do not seem to care to think about the meaning of the incidents, they are basically denying their whole existence because “Syd needs to come and shine again.”

“Welcome to the Machine” is a completely different beast from “Shine on You.” It is dark, mechanical, critical, cynical and terrifying. The melody consists of jerky metallic rhythms punctuated by just as jerky acoustic guitar, symbolizing the control of art by the titular “Machine,” representing the music industry (or, if you will, society as a whole) and its disillusion and complete control over artistic vision. The speaker is a supposed “father figure,” or rather a supreme controlling force. The lyrics suggest the idea that artistic integrity and originality stand in complete opposition with industry, punctuated by the fact that the Machine has already typed rockers as rebellious souls who dream for money. “Welcome to the Machine” represents anger less in itself, but more of as a product of itself. It seeks to induce anger and rebellion against an oppressive authority symbol, reflective of the band’s feelings of anger caused by the loss of their band mate.

Changing the radio station, an aesthetic decision for the album that gives the feeling of a supposed narrative (a person driving, grieving for a lost friend), we are greeted by “Have a Cigar,” a song that represents the commercial aspect of the music industry and criticizing empty words. “Have a Cigar” is, in a way, a continuation of “Welcome to the Machine,” as it can be assumed the speaker is the same, or part of the same hierarchy. In the same way as the new jazzy instrumentation is a mask for the aggressive theme of “Welcome to the Machine,” the angry controlling tone of the lyrics changes into the tone of a slimy salesman trying to convince you amicably. This song represents bargaining in a much more literal sense than the other songs represent their stages. In and of itself, it induces anger in the audience (“By the way,which one is Pink?”). As a massive, oppressive force (the music industry), the speaker represents the Godly figure the band is bargaining with. The answer the song seeks is to the question “Was it worth it?”. Thankfully, the answer is given in the next song.

The radio station changes again and we hear the first notes of “Wish You Were Here,” the eponymous song (sorry for overcomplicating my vocabulary here, I just really like that word)  of the whole album. It is obvious from the start that this is a sorrowful tune, therefore representing depression. The lyrics directly address Barrett’s situation “So you think you can tell/ Heaven from Hell/ Blue skies from pain...”. If thought of as a continuation of “Welcome to the Machine” and “Have a Cigar”, the song takes on a whole new meaning, criticizing Syd for “Exchanging/ A walk-on part in the war/ For a lead role in a cage”, essentially falling into traps the band almost made us fall into with the previous two songs: the music industry is terrible and counter-productive to creativity, yet, they say, it is needed to be a leading part of “the war,” Life. Through all of this, “Wish You Were Here” symbolizes depression and mourning, but is also self-righteous: the band knows they made the right choice leaving him behind.To modify a How I Met Your Mother quote, “I’m happy that we made the right choice, but damn it what if?”. It truly exemplifies depression this way: it knows rationality, and it knows it’s in the right, but it...feels wrong, in a sense.

As you may have observed, up until now, the lyrics have always suggested more than one feeling. This also leads to the idea that grief is not linear; emotions slide in and out of consciousness until the griever accepts the loss. This is relevant, as “Shine on You Crazy Diamond Parts 6-9″ and their lyrics reflect all of these feelings simultaneously, almost as a summary of the album. The song starts with a mysterious theme signifying a confusion in feeling, which leads into Part 7′s lyrics, mirroring part 4′s: “Nobody knows where you are/ How near of how far”, “And we’ll bask in the shadow of yesterday’s triumph/ And sail on the steel breeze” etc, symbolizing the band’s acceptance: they will no longer deny the loss, nor be angry, nor bargain with authority, nor be depressed; they promise to remember and honour Syd’s memory and move on. The next section is a psychedelic flourish as an ode to a lost comrade, followed by a sad psychedelic/folk theme as a last bit of regret and sorrow which ends the album with a satisfying feeling of acceptance.

To conclude this piece, I would like to mention that, as far as I know, this is simply a personal theory that could, in all honesty, be pretty easily taken apart. In spite of this, I retain my right to interpretation as I only wanted to share my love for the band and their work, especially this album which is my personal favourite, through what I believe I do best: categorization, interpretation and systematization. Feel free to tell me your own interpretations as I’d love to hear them and thank you for getting through this huge wall of text with me.

[shemakesmusic-uk]

INTERVIEW: High Waisted.

Times are tough for the world right now and we need music more than ever. NYC's High Waisted share ‘Drive,’ the second single from their upcoming album, Sick of Saying Sorry, out May 22. Bandsintown exclusively premiered the track last week, calling it the "new single that we need right now" and praising, "High Waisted are giving us the positive vibes that we need in these seemingly dreary time."

High Wasted is NYC-based surf rock, with notable pop sensibility, feminist ideals and an affliction for rock and roll. Jessica Louise Dye’s powerful voice meshes with her eclectic mix of infectious guitar melodies. Joined by Jono Bernstein’s vintage drum vibes, they create modern day anthems full of insightful hopes. High Waisted bring empowerment, feminine inspiration, and raucous rock ‘n’ roll to every stage with an unforgettable live show. 

The group's sophomore record is ready for the world to hear, produced by Tad Kubler (The Hold Steady) and mixed by Arun Bali (Saves The Day) and we had a chat with Jessica all about Sick of Saying Sorry, touring and more. Read the interview below.

You're gearing up to release your sophomore LP Sick of Saying Sorry in May. What is the record about? What were your influences for the album and what does it mean to you?

"Sick of Saying Sorry is an unapologetic record about finding hope in a hopeless situation and the strength to get up when the world is screaming at you to stay down. It’s release was delayed due to being in a biking accident, which makes its release even more special. We’re at yet again another crossroads, this time with the majority of society in total lockdown. We need art in this time of darkness."

Absolutely. How is Sick of Saying Sorry different (or similar) to On Ludlow? Were there any musical influences or sounds that you were able to incorporate on this record that you hadn’t previously? Were there any differences in the songwriting process?

“Sick of Saying Sorry is more honest. We spent time writing, touring, recording in pre-production, making changes, touring and then recording in-studio. We broke the songs down to their simplest forms and built them back up again. Everything grew together quickly and we were flexible when it came to listening to what the song needed, not what we wanted from the song."

I really love the artwork for the album. Please tell us a little bit more about that.

"We came up with the idea based on the idea of self improvement and growth. “You used to be my cup of tea, but now I drink champagne.” The tea cups have been in my possession since my first week living in NYC. Friends and I would sip whiskey and bubbles from them during snow storms and heat waves, through break ups, tears and victories. They were part of every life changing moment. We no longer live in that apartment and we no longer drink from those tea cups. It marks the end of that part of my life. We collaborated with Jonathan Fasulo at his home studio, to take the table top idea to album cover art. Jono and I do all of the layout design from there and send it to press!"

That’s so awesome! I like that. What do you hope fans will take away from Sick of Saying Sorry?

"I hope fans enjoy Sick of Saying Sorry as an escape from their worries. What a strange time we’re living in. We hope we can connect with fans in person sometime soon, but until then we’re riding this out from the comfort of our own homes and neighborhoods, writing music and trying to stay sane."

Were there any other songs written during this period that didn’t make it onto the album, and if so, will you revisit them again in the future?

"Probably a dozen, there’s always material left on the cutting room floor. Things find a way of coming back around. We released a split 7” at the end of 2017 with some tracks that didn’t make the LP, because they were such a departure from our normal sound."

Hopefully (fingers crossed!) you'll be touring the record. What do you love most about touring and being on stage?

"As of now we’re taking things day by day, monitoring what the CDC says and the government. We’ll definitely miss the rush and joy being on stage brings up and hope to return when the world has recovered. We definitely love catching up with friends outside of New York and seeing the smile of someone losing themselves in the [live] music."

Which of the new songs are you excited to debut live and why?

"'Burdens' because the horns are so special! But we also had a bunch of friends featured on the album.

Do you remember your first ever show? If so, please tell us about it!

"High Waisted’s first show was at Union Hall. We had balloons and projections. I think I wore a white baby doll dress."

You have been so busy and accomplished so many awesome things in the last four years. What would you say has been the biggest highlight of your time in High Waisted? And why?

"There’s not one event to highlight, it’s the fact we’re still getting to create."

Finally, what's one non-musical goal of yours for 2020?

"I’m learning how to sew and want to make my own costumes."

Sick of Saying Sorry is out May 22.

Photo credit (top): Daniel Topete

[dustedmagazine]

The Hold Steady — Thrashing Thru the Passion (Frenchkiss)

Thrashing Thru The Passion by The Hold Steady

The last decade has been tough for fans of The Hold Steady. After releasing Almost Killed Me (perfect), Separation Sunday (also perfect), and Boys and Girls in America (near perfect), songwriter Craig Finn got high on his own supply. His stories turned into schtick, resulting in the overwrought Stay Positive. Flamboyant ivory tickler Franz Nicolay took off,Heaven is Whenever was as clear and committed as its shrug of a title, and the less said about the plodding Teeth Dreams, the better. Expectations were low for Thrashing Thru the Passion, so to say that Thrashing exceeds those expectations is to damn it with faint praise. It deserves better. The Hold Steady will probably never match the thrill of their first three releases, but Thrashing Thru the Passion is the most enjoyable record they’ve made in thirteen years.

Thrashing Thru the Passion (which continues their tradition of terrible album titles and covers) doesn’t break new ground for The Hold Steady. Songwriter Craig Finn still sings like a youth pastor on a bender; the band still sounds like an above-average Springsteen cover act with a residency in a punk bar, and the lyrics are still allusive short stories about roads that go on forever and parties that never end. What sets Thrashing apart from the three releases that preceded it are its light touch, a product of their expanded lineup. Nicolay has rejoined the fold; second lead guitarist Steve Selvidge has decided to stick around and there are horns on almost every track. There are more moving parts on Thrashing than any previous Hold Steady record, but rather than weighing them down, they add welcome subtlety and complexity. Moment by moment, Thrashing is their busiest and most interesting release.  

From the sax solo and gentle, twinkling vamp in the otherwise unexceptional “Traditional Village” to the wailing slides on “Star 18,” there are small, unexpected pleasures — funny keyboard textures, cute guitar squiggles, tricky rhythms, breakdowns, buildups, and modulations — on every track. Of course, this being The Hold Steady, an expanded lineup also means their Big Moments are even bigger than usual. The core songwriting team of Craig Finn and guitarist Tad Kubler are both Midwest expats, so there is, as always, unhealthy portions of corn and cheese here, but if you can resist the dual guitar solo at the end of “Blackout Sam,” the syncopated horn and keys hook on “Entitlement Crew,” or the stadium stomp of “T Shirt Tux”’s coda, you are made of sterner stuff than I.  

You will read that this is a less anthemic incarnation of The Hold Steady. True, but it’s not the problem they’d have you believe. Freed from the burden of writing anthems, Finn is back to doing what he does best: telling tragicomic tales of the perpetually hungover. On character sketches like “Denver Haircut,” “Epaulets,” and “Blackout Sam,” Finn is sharper and funnier than he’s been in years. Nothing on their last three albums matches the compressed wit of “Entitlement Crew”’s opening couplet: “Tequila takeoff/Tecate landing/Sorry about the centerpiece/Thanks for understanding.”  

If there’s one theme underpinning Finn’s songs, more than drugs, parties and Catholicism, it’s faith, the belief, however misguided, that the next high, the next detox, or the next town will solve everything. Like many of you, I had nearly lost faith in The Hold Steady, but I had also forgotten that, faith is, every so often, imperfectly and unexpectedly rewarded. If, like your average Finn character, it’s been a while since you’ve been to church, there’s a word for that: grace. Thrashing Thru the Passion is not a great record, but it is very good, better than we had any right to expect and, in its own joyful, beer-soaked way, graceful.   

Isaac Olson

[marymosley]

Mueller and The Stages Of Grieving

The release of the summary of findings by the Special Counsel has left much of the country in stunned silence.  For two years, millions of voters have kept hope alive that the term of Donald Trump would be cut short by a type of avenging angel in Robert Mueller.  They are now left with a reality that is still difficult to process: Donald Trump is likely to finish his term as President of the United States. There I said it.

Cable programs that have spent years airing assurance of criminal prosecutions seemed at a loss for words. Indeed, it is difficult to process.  Matthews are going through what is a familiar process. It is called the stage of grieving.  Psychiatrist Elizabeth Kübler-Ross famously laid out the stages of denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Judging from the responses on Sunday night, we are still a fair distance from acceptance. 

Denial

For much of the last two years, many voters have been in open denial.  Denial is easy when it is a collective effort.  Voters quickly tuned into channels that reaffirmed their greatest hopes for prosecution or impeachment. This echo-chamber audience buoyed the ratings of MSNBC and CNN where viewers were assured by legal analysts that the evidence against Trump was overwhelming and that Mueller to set things right.  As Kübler-Ross explained, people will often start by cling to a false and preferable reality. 

That took an effort on collusion. From the outset, the entire theory of collusion was a bit wacky.  For months, legal analysts spoke of collusion like it was a defined crime.  It took months to get commentators to acknowledge that there is no such offense in the criminal code. The notion was that the Russian would collude with Trump or his family or aides to hack computer systems and then arrange for the leaking of the information through Wikileaks.  One has to have a tad more respect for Russian intelligence to believe that they would place themselves at risk by colluding with Trump or Trump Jr. or a circus clown like Roger Stone.  Why would they put themselves one tweet away from utter destruction?  In the same vein, it made no sense to schedule a meeting in Trump Tower with half the world’s media downstairs to hold one of your secret meetings. Add to that the fact that they did not know who was going to be at the meeting and did not actually turn over the promise evidence of criminal conduct by Hillary Clinton.

Many people still seemed stuck on denial.  On Friday, it was revealed that the Special Counsel had decided that he would not bring down any additional indictments. Some of us stated that this clearly indicated that Mueller had rejected the allegations of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians.  Nevertheless, on Sunday morning, House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff was still claiming that there was ample existence of collusion even if no one seemed committed a single criminal act of collusion.  Even before the summary was released, Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) declared that “very little credence” should be put in what Barr is saying.  Others like MSNBC host Joy-Ann Reid and panelist Eli Mystal noted that Barr’s approach to the summary “feels like the seeds of a cover-up are here.” As for Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff, he has doubled down on both obstruction and collusion.

Anger

Many people however are past denial and moving quickly to anger. MSNBC Chris Matthews exclaimed “How can they let Trump off the hook?”  Over the last year, such anger has increased as filing after filing failed to mention collusion and even stated that no Trump campaign member knowingly dealt with the hackers or trolls in Russia.  Despite these lengthy “speaking” indictments, anger simply augmented the denial.  For those of us pointing out the absence of key elements and evidence, we were denounced as Trump supporters even through our columns generally denounced Trump for his conduct.  Either you were all-in on the guarantee of criminal prosecutions or you were a Russian boot-licking troll for Trump.  This anger rose to a crescendo when key figures from Michael Flynn to Paul Manafort were charged with things far removed from any collusion-related crime.

Nevertheless, there was considerable advantage in keeping this anger alive.  Democrats ran on the expectation that they would seek impeachment after the midterm elections.  Media virtually banished all other news to cover legal analysts explaining how new disclosures would easily satisfy the standard for prosecution or impeachment. 

Bargaining

As 2018 turned into 2019, the bargaining stage began.  Voters began to accept that Trump might not be charged but he would at least be impeached.  Mueller was now portrayed not as a prosecutor but investigator who would give the goods to Congress for a swift and satisfying impeachment.  After all, many Democrats rallied voters on the pledge of impeachment and Democratic leadership continued to insist that Trump was committing impeachable offense. As I wrote before the midterm elections, impeachment was always a cynical ploy for power.  Democratic leadership had no interest in impeaching Trump and no intention to do so.  Why bring about a Pence Administration in which he could unite the country just before the 2020 election?  They want a wounded but living Trump in the White House not because it is necessarily good for the country but it is manifestly good for them. 

With the release of the summary, many have shifted to the argument that, if collusion is a dry well, surely there can be relief in collateral crimes being investigated in New York and various congressional committees. Indeed, a recent poll showed support for impeachment of Trump falling, even among Democrats.  Instead, many critics will be satisfied with further investigation even if they do not likely mean impeachment or prosecution.

Depression

As soon as the midterm elections were over, the Democratic leadership revealed the greatest bait-and-switch in history. Pelosi announced that impeachment was no part of their “agenda.”  The members who were howling before the election about impeachable offenses now insisted that it would make no sense since the Republican Senate would not go along.  That was depressing enough, but then people had to read this chilling line: “[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.” That was followed by a finding by the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General that there was insufficient evidence of obstruction for a criminal case.  In other words, your Trump condition is terminal.

Acceptance

We are now at the final stage were people begin to accept the inevitability of the final result.  With Mueller not finding collusion or serious criminal acts, the two years of misleading and overhyped theories of criminality have come crashing down.  Democrats can walk away with their added seats and the media can walk away with the added ratings, but voters are left with the painful reality to cope alone. 

Of course, if prosecution or impeachment is unlikely, for many there is little to live for.  Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross was not particularly helpful on bedside manner. She assured patients that such death is “neither frightening nor painful, but a peaceful cessation of the functioning of the body.” However, rest assured, there will be no cessation of the function of one body.  The House committees will continue to investigate and suggest that they could yet impeach . . . all the way up to the 2020 election.

Mueller and The Stages Of Grieving published first on https://immigrationlawyerto.tumblr.com/

[sinceileftyoublog]

The Hold Steady Live Preview: 12/4, FANS.LIVE

Photo by Adam Parshall

BY JORDAN MAINZER

Whether Passover or Thanksgiving or The Hold Steady’s annual Massive Nights celebration at Brooklyn Bowl in NY, everything’s going virtual in 2020. What’s also new is that the beloved rockers are releasing a new album just over a month later, more than halving the gap between their previous two records, 2019′s Thrashing Thru The Passion and 2014′s Teeth Dreams. The event, streaming tonight at 8 PM CST via FANS.LIVE, began last night and continues tomorrow night, and the setlist from last night included two songs from their upcoming Open Door Policy, neither of which was the single released earlier this week, “Family Farm”. Musically, the track takes full advantage of the band’s current six-piece lineup, especially the return of keyboardist Franz Nicolay, whose piano buoys Tad Kubler’s riff and horns from Stuart Bogie and Jordan McLean. It’s also a classic Hold Steady song, rife with references to previous songs, records, and characters within the band’s universe, Craig Finn’s wordplay strong as ever. (The narrator, stuck in a hospital, laments, “And the nurse that they assigned me / Had Eruption as her ring tone / Blasting out through built-in speakers like it's bug spray / Buzzing like a hornet halfway blown,” an unintentional eulogy to the late, great Eddie Van Halen.)

[allbrooklynveganposts]

The "Pioneering People Basilica Benefit" paid tribute to Hole's Courtney Love and also featured The Hold Steady's Tad Kubler, Justin Vivian Bond and Kenny Mellman, Meredith Graves and more.

Continue reading…

[themusicenthusiast]

Single Review: “Eureka” by The Hold Steady

An instant classic. That’s what “Eureka” (out via Frenchkiss Records) is, at least by the standards of The Hold Steady. The lead cut from their latest pairing of singles, it captures everything that has made the band so riveting for the last decade plus and then takes it to another level. Musically, it fits the mold of being an iconic American rock song. Think of a brief opus the likes of which Springsteen has proven to be a master at writing, or even Petty, just being pure an honest, even relatable as the story unfolds. It’s exhilarating and urgent, picking up speed as it builds to a dynamic crescendo; the guitars allowing for some impeccably well textured moments, Tad Kubler and Steve Selvidge ultimately cutting loose and wailing in the final stretch.

Every bit as prominent is Franz Nicolay, the keyboardist proving to be an integral component to The Hold Steady’s latest music now that he has made his return to the fold. The keys seep in at just the right moments – culminating with a glorious solo -- setting off that quintessential rock sound, which mixes well with the band’s more modern style of indie and alt rock. The story that accompanies it all is every bit as captivating, Craig Finn’s unique manner of singing and speaking being as riveting as ever as he spins a tale of two strangers brought together by happenstance. As is customary of Finn, it’s the intriguing amount of specific details that makes “Eureka” stand out so. “…He didn't say much; she never thought it was love. It was mostly about the adventure.” That final half of the third verse (and repeated on occasion) is so concise you just have to marvel at it. It speaks volumes about what is going on without getting too bogged down in the details of these two people as they journey to Eureka, California. That articulate nature persists throughout the track as the adventure seeking woman in the story comes to realize they guy she hitched a ride with wasn’t all she hoped he’d be, nor were his friends. Eventually depicting some events that evoke scenery of the Haight-Ashbury days, “Eureka” enters some anthemic territory. The then refrain of, “No gods, no kings let freedom ring…” is meant to resonate with listeners, a line that can be interpreted in whatever way people wish to, and in the context of the song it seems more about just relishing being carefree and living with no worries. An intense and enthralling character driven song, “Eureka” stands as being one of the best entries yet in The Hold Steady’s fairly extensive catalog. It’s vibrant and even somewhat fun in regards to the sound with some darker elements creeping in via the lyrics, those two qualities coexisting perfectly. Much like their previous singles (including the one that accompanies “Eureka”), this one suggests the best is yet to come for The Hold Steady. And whatever they have coming down the pike, so long as it’s in a vein similar to this, is certain to be excellent. Purchase Eureka b/w Esther on: iTunes | Google Play | Amazon MP3 | Bandcamp Visit The Hold Steady’s websites: Official Website | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter