Story Archive (Page 155 of 202)

PHANTABULISTIC, a word I thought I invented yesterday to describe the second song on Radiohead's new album (Shit. I wasn't the first one to use it). It was at I Love Music after I had posted eight threads on eight songs of the new album. How did this word originate in my mind? Maybe PHANTAstic (!) plus faBULous plus realISTIC?

I just found a jewel of a weblog. It is on chess. Its name is Open chess diary and it is written by Tim Krabbé, a Dutchman who must be in his sixties or seventies. The posts are numbered, right now we are at #217 which dates from Monday and which is on the Duke of Brunswick who was neither extremely successful in chess nor in his profession as a Duke. But he apparently contributed to law. There are many diagrams and photos and extremely interesting posts on go, chess problems, combinations, everything related to chess.

Krabbé also used to be an active cyclist and wrote the book De Renner on a 140 km course in the Cevennes in 1978. The best chess site I have found up to now on the interweb. Recommended wholeheartedly to aficionados.

Thom Yorke can say what he wants about the meaning of the title and the lyrics of Radiohead's new album Hail to the Thief. For me and for the wide public this will always be a political album criticising the fraudulent practices of the current president of the US and the people behind him. And that is all that counts. Maybe Yorke did not intend it as a protest album. In that case it is his unconsciousness speaking. Which actually would make the political statement even stronger. In any case the lyrics are ambiguous enough to provide clues for this interpretation.

The title of the first song for me symbolizes the new world disorder. The end of rationality and logic, the beginning of despotism and chaos. Whoosh is only in power as two times two votes have been counted as five. The maths has been twisted. The new calculus of power: the powerful decide the rules of arithmetics. Concerning the official reason for the Iraq war, the so-called WMD, the equation was equivalent. It read 0+0=1. Dumbsfeld said so.

Musically 2+2=5 is the most dynamic song on the album. Things pick up slowly. We can hear a low-key succession of notes of an acoustic guitar. Yorke sings in a normal tempo, volume and non-falsetto voice:

are you such a dreamer to put the world to rights i'll stay home forever where two and two always makes a five

A melancholic guitar theme appears. The "vibrato" guitar play builds up the tension. Yorke sings:

it's the devil's way now there is no way out you can scream and you can shout it is too late now

Up till the peak when Yorke starts shouting and the song explodes into an up-tempo hard-rock number. The guitars are loud and fast now, the real drums kick in with all their ferocity. Lyrics:

because you're not there payin' attention

After that middle part there is another change of level. The guitars jangle (think Unrest) for a short while before they change again and start sounding like a very fast car trying to brake. Yorke repeats the album title line which when written out always makes me think of the German Heil Hitler. One has to admit though that Hitler got elected by the people and not by the judges:

oh hail to the thief oh hail to the thief

and all of a sudden the car comes to a stop and everything is over. As if it had only been a bad trip. Let's hope that this be the truth concerning current American politics as well.

An amazing opener going straight into the centre of things. Yorke et al. do not beat about the bush, they hit us right into the head. The listener has no time to reflect about this track, it passes by with an enormous speed and leaves only distant memories.

Q1: Are there any comments made by Leonard Cohen at concerts, at interviews or in notes to Paper-thin Hotel (from the weird Leonard Cohen / Phil Spector coproduction Death of a Ladies' Man) on the website Diamonds in the Lines? A1: No.

Q2: Are there pictures of Suzanne Verdal who inspired Cohen's most famous song on the web? A2: Yes.

Q3: Are there any pictures of Suzanne Elrod (with whom Cohen had two kids) on the web? A3: Yes. Just look at the cover of Death of a Ladies' Man. It is the woman on the right. When Cohen writes about listening to a woman making love to someone else in Paper-thin Hotel it is probably her.

Q4: When does Cat Power play her Black Session chez Bernard Lenoir? A4: I fear she does not play at all. Lenoir's boss Michelle Soulier must have said no. Too much of a risk as a live act, she could run away. But there is Grandaddy on Monday, the 23rd of June.

Q5: What happened to Phil Spector after he had been arrested for murder recently? A5: He was bailed out for one million dollars. He has not been charged yet. Authorities say they are investigating. Spector says that the actress shot herself (source).

Q6: Hat le sofa blogger schon etwas über Friedman und Drogenmissbrauch geschrieben (die Nachricht kam gerade im Radio als ich den letzten künstlichen Berg erklimmt habe)? A6: Nein.

Q7: What is BBC's album of this week? A7: Stupid question. Obviously Radiohead's Hail to the Thief.

Q8: Did I write on the version of Howe Gelb's This Purple Child with Grandaddy on Hisser in my weblog yet? A8: No, I did not. I really should have. There is this horn section sample after 2:50 which sounds like an intruder from outer space in the balanced song. For the next two minutes I just wait for this extraterrestrian to come back. And it does.

P.S. Dieses Posting war natürlich hauptsächlich inspiriert von dieser Story. Irgendwie eine fatal attraction. Könnte man auch unter guilty pleasures einsortieren. Abstossung und Anziehung. Geschmacklosigkeiten und Selbstironien. Insgesamt immer noch mit Abstand das interessanteste deutschsprachige Weblog. Mit anderen Worten, ich bin wieder Abonnent, Peter, schreibst Du jetzt auch wieder mal was im Minima Moralia Gemeinschaftsweblog? Es ist dort im Moment erschreckend still. Und wer ist eigentlich "the frank"? Dein alter ego?

I got this sweet-sour story via e-mail. Even if your French is rusty you should have a fair chance to understand it. If not, copy and paste the text and try the Google translation.

Il était une fois, une île ou tous les différents sentiments vivaient: le Bonheur, la Tristesse, le Savoir, ainsi que tous les autres, l'Amour y compris.

Un jour on annonça aux sentiments que l'île allait couler. Ils préparèrent donc tous leurs bateaux et partirent. Seul l'Amour resta. L'Amour voulait rester jusqu'au dernier moment. Quand l'île fut sur le point de sombrer, l'Amour décida d'appeler à l'aide.

La Richesse passait à côté de l'Amour dans un luxueux bateau. L'Amour lui dit, "Richesse, peux-tu m'emmener?" "Non car il y a beaucoup d'argent et d'or sur mon bateau. Je n'ai pas de place pour toi."

L'Amour décida alors de demander à l'Orgueil, qui passait aussi dans un magnifique vaisseau, "Orgueil, aide moi je t'en prie!" "Je ne puis t'aider, Amour. Tu es tout mouillé et tu pourrais endommager mon bateau."

La Tristesse étant a côté, l'Amour lui demanda, "Tristesse, laisse-moi venir avec toi." "Ooh... Amour, je suis tellement triste que j'ai besoin d'être seule!"

Le Bonheur passa aussi a côté de l'Amour, mais il était si heureux qu'il n'entendit même pas l'Amour l'appeler.

Soudain, une voix dit, "Viens Amour, je te prends avec moi." C'était un vieillard qui avait parlé. L'Amour se sentit si reconnaissant et plein de joie qu'il en oublia de demander son nom au vieillard. Lorsqu'ils arrivèrent sur la terre ferme, le vieillard s'en alla.

L'Amour réalisa combien il lui devait et demanda au Savoir "Qui m'a aidé?" "C'était le Temps" répondit le Savoir. "Le Temps?" s'interrogea l'Amour. "Mais pourquoi le Temps m'a-t-il aidé?" Le Savoir sourit plein de sagesse et répondit: "C'est parce que seul le Temps est capable de comprendre combien l'Amour est important dans la Vie."

I was a little bit surprised when I read in the Slate music club from last week which featured Radiohead's new album dissected via e-mail by Sasha Frere-Jones and Gerald Marzorati (NYT magazine) the following sentence by Frere-Jones:

Radiohead's new album, Hail to the Thief, was leaked a few months ago onto the Internet, and it's interesting that the final versions of these songs seem to be no different from the leaked versions.

On one hand I'd be very happy if this was true as I found the mixes which were leaked to the web absolutely perfect and could not imagine any improvement on them whatsoever.

On the other hand my feelings would be mixed as Radiohead's producer Nigel Godrich said that the tracks that leaked were the unmastered versions. If Frere-Jones is right Godrich has not been saying the truth (for marketing reasons?) which I find pretty inadequate and morally reproachable especially in the view of the album title.

So now I am not sure if I will buy the album anymore for two reasons. I was 100% sure before. But why should I buy an album which is identical to the mp3 versions and why should I buy an album of people who lie to me?

In the end I'll probably buy the album because I have the feeling it is the best album of the zero years yet. Before in my view that album was Amnesiac but Hail to the Thief seems to be even more of a miracle.

By the way this comes from someone who has kind of despised Radiohead and especially Thom Yorke's voice before. Interesting is this statement by Frere-Jones concerning the change of his voice:

Starting with Kid A, Yorke started restraining his voice to produce a textured legato phrasing, much more like a violin than a horn.

P.S. The Slate e-mail exchange has been discussed here extensively on I Love Music!

I do not want to write about last night's Cat Power show at the Mousonturm. Just two or three sentences. It was the most pitiful, disgraceful and abominable concert I have ever seen in my life. Not really a concert, more a performance gone terribly wrong. Chan Marshall was totall drunk and certainly on other drugs as well. Her band left her alone on stage after maybe thirty minutes of very badly performed songs by her. Then she was talking drunkard's gibberish mixed with many insults to the audience and didn't manage to play one song on her own. I regretted not having taken a video camera to film her and to give her the tape as a present to show her her face this night.

She is going to play tonight at the Mousonturm (thank you, Andreas for the tip) in Frankfurt. Probably she will play mostly her new very good album You Are Free. But I wouldn't mind seeing her perform my two favourites of hers which almost made me cry when I listened to them today. The terrific Nude as the News and the hypnotic Cross-Bones Style.

Somehow in her purity and other-worldiness she reminds me of Nick Drake. I had Northern Sky in my waking ear this morning and had to listen to it together with the whole of Bryter Layter. Northern Sky is almost a lush song in Nick Drake's œuvre. I don't mean that in terms of production. Maybe the piano which is played by John Cale makes the difference. There is a lucidity and serenity in this song I absolutely adore. Nick Drake seems to have found the joy in his melancholy. Just the first lines:

I never felt magic crazy as this I never saw moons knew the meaning of the sea I never held emotion in the palm of my hand

I also noted that on Hazey Jane II, another perfect song from this album, Richard Thompson played the lead guitar. Untypically for Drake the feel of this song is very American, very Western. The characteristic lead guitar play to me sounds a lot like a guitar heroe who was going to emerge about eight years later: Mark Knopfler. Richard Thompson must have been a very strong influence for him.

The three instrumentals on Bryter Layter are also grand cru. My faves are the title track (a mystification of Brighter Later, I suppose) and especially the closer Sunday with the wonderful and wise impressionist flute theme. The strings fit in there perfectly.

In the end I was surprised how much I liked the record as in my memory it was the least appealing of his due to the over-production with strings and stuff. But even the women background choir on the self-mocking Poor Boy somehow made sense though I really hate these kind of choirs. One of these Things First was another stand-out in the simplicity of the tune and the almost surreal lyrics:

I could have been your pillar, could have been your door I could have stayed beside you, could have stayed for more ... I could have been a signpost, could have been a clock As simple as a kettle, steady as a rock

reminding me a little of the incarnation of a chanson d'amour which is Jacques Brel's Ne Me Quitte Pas.

It is really sad that there are no albums made like that anymore today. And the jazzy Bryter Later from 1970 is even Nick Drake's weakest album.

has a new album out: World Without Tears. I am just listening to four tracks from it here at EuroRanch. Excellent bluesy songwriting which can be filed under Americana-Roots with some country elements (pedal steel). Lucinda Williams has got this Southern drawl of which I can't get enough. Her great voice is rough and raspy. Think of a fifty year old Janis Joplin and you'll come close. Relax and fill your glass with Bourbon. Recommended without reservations.

Jorge Luis Borges in seinen Harvard Vorlesungen von 1967/68, die jetzt unter dem Titel Das Handwerk des Dichters (Original: This Craft of Verse) auf deutsch erschienen sind:

Ich betrachte mich vor allem als Leser. Wie Sie wissen, habe ich mich ans Schreiben gewagt; aber ich glaube, das, was ich gelesen habe, ist viel wichtiger als das, was ich geschrieben habe. Denn man liest das, was man mag - aber man schreibt nicht, was man schreiben möchte, sondern was man zu schreiben fähig ist.

I consider myself mainly a reader. As you know I dared to start writing but I think that what I read is much more important than what I wrote. As one reads what one likes but one writes not what one would like to write but what one is capable of writing.

I guess it is time to pack it in then. As I am not even able to translate a German translation of a very simple text back into the original as I would like to...

P.S. Does any of my readers have the original English quote by Borges? I'd be glad if he/she posted it in the comments just to see how Borges' English was.