Category Archives: Music

Coming Soon, More Jack White

Music

400px-Jack_White

 The 21st century’s greatest talent in rock and roll will soon be back with a vengeance.  Jack White recently revealed to Rolling Stone that he is working on 25 new songs for The Dead Weather, The Raconteurs and a follow up solo project.  His legions of fans must be salivating with the news that he is busy at his Third Man Studio preparing for upcoming projects.  After the release in 2012 of his wildly successful Blunderbuss, he left everyone who heard it wanting more.  Well folks, your prayers have been answered in a big way. The new projects promise to be as exciting and diverse as Jack White always seems to be.  He never disappoints.  This genius bounces from genre to genre with the ease of an acrobat and with such determination at everything he attempts, few, if any, can compete.  He has the music world at his beck and call and I have no doubt that we will be as in awe of his new work as any in the past. 
Keith   

Pixies: What’s the Deal With Kim?

Music, , , , , , , ,

What is happening?  On the heels of The Pixies announcing a new European tour beginning in September, Kim Deal has parted ways with her band mates.  On the band’s official Facebook page the band said, “We are sad to say that Kim Deal has decided to leave the Pixies.  We are very proud to have worked with her on and off over the last 25 years.  Despite her decision to move on, we will always consider her a member of the Pixies, and her place will always be here for her.  We wish her all the best.”

Black Francis, Joey Santiago and David Lovering

As big of a Pixies fan as I am, and I am indeed fanatical about this band, I don’t know that band founder, songwriter, guitarist and vocalist, Charles Thompson IV (Black Francis) can pull this one off.  Although the written music he creates, backed by lead guitarist extraordinaire, Joey Santiago, is second to none, I think Charles underestimates the value that Kim brought to the band.  She is far too talented to just be replaced.  A killer bass player with a voice that sounds like it was sent to us from heaven, Kim was the most approachable member of the band and had, and still has, a rabid following that would crawl on broken glass to hear her sing Where is my Mind, Hey, Gigantic or Bone Machine. She gave the band a human feel that would not have been possible for Charles to accomplish without her.  His reclusivity is not the stuff that endears pop fans to an artist, no matter how accomplished they may be.  Kim brought an everyman’s feel to the band that invited fans and listeners into the group’s sounds, textures and emotion. This ambitious quartet created five studio albums in five years of always listenable, sometimes hypnotizing, and never, ever, ever disappointing music.  It is simply music that makes you happy to be alive.

Although we have not heard a word from Kim herself, that leaves us to speculate as to what is going on.  Kim has been busy touring the twentieth anniversary of the Breeders album, ‘Last Splash’, with her sister and best friend, Kelley, so scheduling issues may have been at play.  Perhaps Deal realized that the Pixies may have run their course and it was time to walk away with some sense of dignity and accomplishment.  Maybe the tensions that exist between her and Charles were just too insurmountable to spend lengths of time exposed to one another, especially stuck across the pond for two months.  Perhaps it is something as unexciting as she simply didn’t want to.  She had previously expressed absolutely no interest in going back into the studio to record a new album.  Maybe the
other three band mates have this in mind and she took her leave because of that.  No matter the reason, taking her leave at this time was probably a good move.

I found the Pixies later in life after watching their documentary, loud QUIET loud, and
fell instantly and hopelessly in love with them.  So much so, that never a week goes by in my house when at least two or three of their albums are not played at maximum volume.  There has never been a band before, and I’m thinking there won’t be in the future, that sounded so fresh, so new, so fun.  Between Charles’ broken Spanglish lyrics, Joey’s precise
and incomparable guitar work, Dave’s steady hands and Kim’s more than adequate bass accompanied with the voice of an angel, they were fresh and exciting, something to look forward to.

I have had the pleasure of seeing a lot of the bigger names in rock and roll in concert and had always hoped that a Pixies’ concert would someday be in my future.  Sadly, I will not be attending their show if and when they come to my area.  The band cannot be the same without Kim Deal.  Her presence among them was more than integral, it was essential.  Without her, there is no Pixies.  They are merely three members of what was once a great pop band that have, for whatever reason, decided to embark on a tour all the while hoping that no one will notice Kim’s absence.  People will.  We do.

I am going to drag myself off now and listen to some Pixies as they were meant to be heard.  With Charles’ determined, driving, mostly undissectable words, Joey’s second to none lead guitar, Dave’s understated back beat, and Kim’s wondrous and haunting voice that takes us to places we seldom visit.  Places we would inhabit forever, if given the opportunity to do so.

In the words of the Dandy Warhols, ‘Cool as Kim Deal’.  They knew of what they sang and I defy you to disagree with them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pl1xgsC3UOM

KimDeal2010

Keith

The Wall : The Last Great Album of the 1970s

Music, , ,

the-wall1.png

Released in the UK in November 1979, and internationally in March of the following year, Pink Floyd’s The Wall might be, arguably, not only the greatest album of the 1970s, but the best concept album in the history of music.  The band finished touring the album in June 1981, in Dortmund, Germany, with eight sold out shows.  The short lived tour was so popular the band decided to record five shows at Earl’s Court in London that were immortalized on the album, Is There Anybody Out There? The Wall Live 1980 – 81.

One must wonder if the band, or Roger Waters in particular, had any idea what a masterpiece they had just unleashed upon the world?  The 81 minute double album
was constructed with a conceptual backbone that has not even remotely been
paralleled.  A sketchy semi-autobiographical piece penned almost exclusively by bass player, band co-founder, and chief architect, Waters, takes listeners on an adventurous trip that few albums could even begin to replicate, and I believe that few even dared to try.  How could they? To even think of such lofty goals would be folly.

It is nothing short of an adventure that takes its listeners on a story of a rock star pulverized by his post war upbringing and torn apart by an ever-growing greedy music industry.  We are invited, willingly or not, to bear witness to a man quickly coming unglued by the strains of life, the overuse of drugs and the occasional psychotic break. It may not be pretty, but the sounds that emanate from this tale are not that different from witnessing a car wreck……..we are all helpless to turn away.   It is a driving, melodic, and hypnotizing opus.  An oratory assault that will not easily be forgotten, if indeed it ever is.

This is one of those rare albums that, I will say out loud and I know there are many who feel the same, changed my life. It hit me with such a wave of shock and intrinsic admiration, that I knew I would never listen to music in the same way again. It was heartbreak wrapped up in inspirational warmth that I don’t know I have felt to such a degree since. This album, along with Pete Townsend’s solo effort  ’Empty Glass’ was the best music to come out of the eighties, and they both peaked in 1980.  Sorry to all the hair band fans out there.  I hope the nine of you never read this blog.

Rock, booze, drugs, death, violence, sex, and mental illness may be the themes of this project, but the way The Wall was recorded, engineered and mastered will place it in the annals of music history as one of the finest examples of perfection pressed to vinyl.

Thank you for allowing me to wax poetic about this album.  I was feeling a tad nostalgic realizing that the handful of shows on this tour was the last time the four original members of Pink Floyd played together until a one off reunion at Live 8 on July 2nd, 2005.  Sadly, it shall never happen again with the sudden passing of keyboardist/vocalist Richard Wright from cancer in 2008.

I shall leave you with one of my favorite tracks from The Wall.  

Enjoy,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0HrrR9QDQU

 

Keith