Monday, August 27, 2007

It's a good time for Superman to lift the sun into the sky.

First: Threadless is having its $10 Back to School Sale, which ends Sept. 3.


Second, from my best pal Ryan:

I picked up Jim Derogatis' Flaming Lips bio at the bookstore on a whim yesterday. Reading it has prompted me to look for old Lips footage on you tube. Before I made any progress with that I ran across this nice video of a girl playing "Waiting for a Superman". I really like it.

Friday, August 24, 2007

Dear boy, I'm gonna make you a man.

In celebration of the fact that the storm-related blockwide (or more) brownout affecting my neighborhood for the past 24 hours hasn't affected my Internet access, here is a post! I figure posting for the first time in weeks is a good way to pass the time while I wait for everything in my refrigerator to melt and spoil.

  • The Raincoats "Lola" (Kinks cover)
    For a while there, everyone seemed to want to know my opinion of the NY Post's "Best 100 Cover Songs of All Time" thing. Um, yeah. Let's just say that I scan all "Best Cover" lists for the Raincoats' version of "Lola." If I'm unable to locate it, I don't really pay much attention to the rest of what's there. I mean, Orgy's version of "Blue Monday" made the list? Are you kidding me?

  • Shampoo "House of Love" (East 17 cover)
    Hell, even this is better than most of the covers on that list!

  • The Belles "Melvin (Gloria)" (Them cover)

  • Nico "The End" (Doors cover)

  • Luminous Orange "Sunday Morning" (Velvet Undeground cover)

  • Rachel Z "Tonight, Tonight" (Smashing Pumpkins cover)

  • Jason Falkner "This Will Be Our Year" (Zombies cover)

  • Angels Of Epistemology "Fiction Romance" (Buzzcocks cover)

  • Silent League "Can't Get It Out OF My Head" (ELO cover)

  • Sarah Blasko "Don't Dream It's Over" (Crowded House cover)

  • The Walls "Ain't Nobody" (Chaka Khan cover)

  • Alice Wonders "Here Comes Your Man" (Pixies cover)
     
  • Monday, August 13, 2007

    He was a stranger in our land.

    I've been slacking on my blog reading for the past month or two, so I was shocked to learn a few days ago of Lee Hazlewood's death on August 4. I know that there have been a slew of celebrity deaths in the past week or two, but it's unfathomable that I didn't read or hear mention of Hazlewood's passing via ANY mainstream media outlet until I specifically hunted them out after reading of his death via bloggers. A shame. I loved him. RIP, Lee.

  • Lee Hazlewood "It Was a Very Good Year" (Frank Sinatra cover, comp. Ervin Drake)
    Thank you, Lee, for many very good years of music. I, for one, will sorely miss you and your talent.

  • Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood "Jackson" (comp. Lieber/Wheeler)
    I get that the Johnny Cash/June Carter version won a Grammy, but I still don't see why theirs is the most popular version of this song. (Although Cash's duet with Miss Piggy is one of my favorites.) Honestly, I think Johnny and June's version lacks the sense of deadpan snarky resignation that Nancy and Lee's has. Theirs is coyer. Grittier. Angrier. Sexier. And it's one of my favorite songs of all time.

  • OP8 "Sand" (Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood cover, comp. Lee Hazlewood)
    OP8 was a project featuring Lisa Germano, Howe Gelb (Giant Sand) and Joey Burns and John Convertino (Giant Sand/Calexico). Their sole album Slush—which features a cover of Neil Young's "Round and Round" as well as a slew of lush originals—is one of my favorite albums of the 1990s.

  • Calexico feat. Valerie Leulliot "Sundown, Sundown" (Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood cover, comp. Lee Hazlewood)
    Speaking of Calexico, here's another of their Hazlewood covers. This and the following track come from Total Lee! A Tribute to Lee Hazlewood album.

  • Lambchop "I'm Glad I Never..." (Lee Hazlewood cover)
    I'm not the hugest fan of alt-country or Americana, but when it's done well I'm all for it. I discovered Lambchop, a Nashville band, via the handful of covers they've done, but I'm now a fan of their originals as well. It makes me sad that this track is so short.

  • Caroline Williams and Spectre "These Boots Are Made For Walkin'" (Nancy Sinatra cover, comp. Lee Hazlewood)
    I have so many covers of this that I just put them on shuffle and picked the first one that hit that I hadn't already posted in the past. And here it is!

  • Steve Wynn Quintet "Summer Wine" (Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood cover, comp. Lee Hazlewood)
    Steve Wynn's post-Dream Syndicate catalog is so immense that I've weaved in and out of it for years never deciding whether I was into it or not. I do know, however, that I really like the stuff the quintet has put out.
  • Friday, August 03, 2007

    Have a drink, have a drive, go out and see what you can find.

    I totally meant to mention this the other day when its first airing on ErrorFM.com occurred, but luckily the podcast era ensures later listenings: The Waiting Room (Hope Eternal & Drunk Country) presents Drunk Covers III.

    Legs are required for jumping, dancing.

    OMG, I hate the new Blogger deal where you have to be signed in on your linked Gmail account and whatnot. I didn't realize how much I hated it until, in the middle of writing this post, I logged into a different Gmail account but kept updating the blog only to have Blogger NOT SAVE any of my updates as I made them. So, just know that I initially spent a good deal of time writing little accompanying snippets to each of the following tracks but only a few were written before the e-mail gaffe and now I'm too annoyed to rewrite the others—including the one in which I confess to having sung "Ultimate" at karaoke.

    Enjoy!

  • Lil' Dave Merriman "I Palindrome I" (They Might Be Giants cover)
    Dave is a good friend of my pal Jessica and acquaintance of mine because he fronts both the Arrivals and the local GBV tribute band, Textbook Committee. I used to be quite the TMBG fan, although I haven't advertised it so much in recent years.

  • Jay Buchanan "Lemon" (U2 cover)
    When my friend Ryan (who is/was a pretty big U2 fan back in the day, depending on the era) visited a few weeks ago, I believe we were making fun of "Lemon." Or maybe I was making fun of it and he and my other friend Brent chimed in. Regardless, it reminded me that I didn't hate this '60s-esque blue-eyed soul/R&B cover of it.

  • Palomar "I'll Come Running" (Brian Eno cover)

  • Fabienne Louves "She Works Hard for the Money" (Donna Summer cover in Swiss German)
    The Swiss are allowed to have pop stars too, I suppose.

  • Jared Louche and the Aliens "Search and Destroy" (Iggy and the Stooges cover)

  • Takeshi Terauchi & The Bunnys "One Fine Day (aria from Madame Butterfly)" (comp. Puccini)
    I didn't realize how much I needed Japanese Ventures-style surf-rock covers of famous classical pieces until now.

  • Skye Sweetnam "Part of Your World" (from The Little Mermaid, comp. Menken/Ashman)

  • Nerina Pallot "Love Will Tear Us Apart" (Joy Division cover)

  • Animal Jazz "Frozen" (Madonna cover)

  • Karen Jo Fields "Famous Blue Raincoat" (Leonard Cohen cover)

  • Spoon "Decora" (Yo La Tengo cover)

  • Astrud "With Whom to Dance" (Magnetic Fields cover)
     
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