Song du semaine: The Donnas, "Fall Behind Me"

Just a clinic in rock guitar playing here. Poor video, unfortunately, almost as badly synced in places as the old Joy Division clip for Love Will Tear Us Apart.



And to my great surprise, it almost works acoustically. I say "almost" because it really needs drums and a more emphatic vocal. The guitar, though, is still pretty good.

Song du semaine: Velvet Revolver, "Fall to Pieces"

We all knew Velvet Revolver wouldn't last, right? Weiland hasn't learned self-control in any sense of the word by this point, and it may never happen.

And that's a shame, because in his better moments, he's a talented singer willing to open up to startling self-examination about his drug-riddled past.

Fall to Pieces is a good, solid rock song -- pretty guitar figures from Slash and Dave Kushner, building to a stirring chorus as Weiland sells the drama.

But the video is remarkable as well. It has a sweetness you don't usually see from rock clips, with Weiland laying bare his reliance on loved ones and bandmates to get him through the tough times. It's all believable -- you get the impression this isn't the first time Duff has had to wrap up a trashed bandmate and let him thrash it out.



Pity no one was able to keep talking sense into these guys.

Song du semaine: Sara Bareilles, "Love Song"

I hear the response already: "Are you kidding me? Even in this era of unlimited choice in which a big album might sell 40,000 copies in a week, everyone knows this song already!"

Yes, that's true. But I think this song actually deserves its national earworm status, and that's worth celebrating.

Besides, it's brilliant that she wrote something that works equally well as a jab at her record company and a demand for a boyfriend's respect.

Song du semaine: Heart, "Barracuda"

All together now: Dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-duh-duuuuh ... braaang ... bwaaayayayayaya ...

(Yeah? YOU try to take harmonics whammy-barred into submission and represent it in letters. Up next, Alex Lifeson's solo from Subdivisions.)

Heart was a hot band in the '70s and '80s for entirely different reasons in each decade. In the '80s, Heart was "hot" in the sense that they had four freaking top-10 songs off one album, and in the sense that video directors kept diving toward Nancy Wilson's cleavage like X-wing fighters attacking that trench on the Death Star.

In the '70s, they were "hot" in the sense that two good-looking sisters with guitars and powerful voices ("sternum-shattering" was the best description I've read) were a rarity in music in those days -- any day, for that matter -- and they rocked.

Heart built up a solid catalog of songs on their debut Dreamboat Annie -- Crazy on You was a showcase for Ann Wilson's voice and their three-guitar attack, Magic Man had a good groove, and the titletrack was a nice change of pace. This one took them to another level, with Ann Wilson snarling over a ferocious wall of guitars.

You know the song. Enjoy the video.



To see where the band would end up, go back to my old post on Nothin' At All, in which the director makes Nancy look too cute for words, hides Ann's weight gain, makes the poor drummer keep time on a railing and hints that the Wilsons don't have much of a problem dating guys with sister fetishes. Ewwww.

Hard to begrudge a deserving band a fair share of commercial success, but which song would you use if you were making a movie soundtrack today? Yeah, I thought so. Dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-dum duh-duh-duh-duuuuh ... braaang ... bwaaayayayayaya ...

Song du semaine: Fiona Apple, "Fast As You Can"

With all the time I've been spending in Starbucks and Panera recently, I've been subconsciously exploring the depths of the adult-contemporary-alternative-sort of-jazz genre. Panera actually plays a lot of really bad self-indulgent post-bop that makes you want to go back in time and strangle the guy who invented the saxophone. Starbucks plays a mix of Sinatra, Norah Jones, mellowish alt-rock, etc. I'm starting to hear the same songs over and over again, but it's generally inoffensive stuff. Both are OK for background music -- the Panera music is awful but forces me to concentrate on the work I'm doing, which is the idea.

With both styles of music, small doses are good. I went through a brief jazz phase, but it didn't take, apart for a couple of excellent albums by various Marsalises. The Starbucks blend, so popular it has its own XM channel, is fine but occasionally needs a tempo shift and some quirkiness.

Which brings us to this wonderfully quirky, time-shifting effort from Fiona Apple. She's often stuck doing meandering piano-and-vibe songs that don't stick in your head, as if some record exec or producer got the word "chanteuse" stuck in his head and forced her to record whatever he thinks a "chanteuse" would record. Not here. This song is wry and witty, propelled by the great Matt Chamberlain on drums.

Wikipedia goes a little overboard in praising the video, directed by then-boyfriend Paul Thomas Anderson. Some of the camera angles aren't particularly flattering, and the obsession with keeping her face on-screen all the time smacks of a video directed by ... well, her current boyfriend.

But it's not bad, and it sells the song as it should. Embedding is disabled, so follow the link and enjoy.

Song du semaine: BNL/Sarah McLachlan, "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen/We Three Kings"

I'll assume you've all heard this wonderful holiday favorite, but until five minutes ago, I'd never seen it synched up with another holiday favorite.

Enjoy, and everyone have a great religious or family festival of your choosing.

An alternate Dubstar video

I had no idea this existed -- a second video for Dubstar's Stars. This one seems to be some sort of riff on the movie Contact, which came out the same year. (And which I did not see, because I was so freaked out by Close Encounters and the TV show Project UFO as a kid that I simply can't handle anything about alien visitation. Though I somehow watched Independence Day, and I loved Men in Black.)

Here's the video, if Yahoo's weird embedding tool works:



I embedded the other version a year ago. It's low-budget but much better, capturing the dream state of the song.

If you don't care about the video, just click and listen. As I've said at least five times, it's just gorgeous.

Back to the earlier post from the week -- thanks for all the well wishes. I feel a little embarrassed by it, since it's really all about my hypochondria rather than anything actually wrong with me. But it's nice to know that if I ever were facing some serious shit, I wouldn't be going through it alone. This week, spending 90 percent of my time with a kid whose temperature looked like an old-school Loyola Marymount basketball score, that was easy to forget.

Besides, I'm sure this song would be one of the first things I'd hear in heaven.

Return of the VH1 Classic live blog

Enough brooding over medical conditions I don't have, enough playing out worst-case scenarios in my mind, enough taking MMM Jr.'s temperature. (He's getting better, but he and I are both beyond stir-crazy, even after a trip to Wendy's and the grocery store.) Let's have some fun.

Motley Crue, Don't Go Away Mad (Just Go Away): Haven't heard this in years, and I was fully expecting a good laugh. But it's not half-bad. Vince Neil has the perfect voice for this sort of testosterone-fueled tale of breakup survival.

Bon Jovi, Livin' on a Prayer: Never liked this one. Bon Jovi's recent efforts at social relevance come across with much more sincerity. Perhaps it's because he's an elder statesman of rock, perhaps it's because Richie Sambora ditched the souped-up wah-wah effects, perhaps it's because his more recent charity-minded videos show acts of charity, not four minutes of the band clowning around with its concert rigging. Also note the most absurd truck-driver modulation in recorded history, just to make Jon strain that voice a little harded.

Aerosmith, Walk This Way (live at VMA '94): I doubt Aerosmith could do a terrible version of this classic. They cut loose with panache for the last minute or two, which was a lot of fun.

Kansas, Dust in the Wind: Abrupt change in tone, isn't it? I know Kansas had a bit of internal conflict over the years as some members veered toward Christian rock and others didn't, but aren't this one and Carry On My Wayward Son already as "Christian" as you can get? It's a deserved classic with sobering thoughts. "All your money won't another minute buy" is sound advice.

Stevie Nicks, I Can't Wait: What? Have I heard this? Oh yeah -- I recognize it at the chorus. For a while, I wondered why Stevie was doing a Belinda Carlisle cover. Can I hear Belinda instead? This sounds like a bunch of guys on speed with a bank of synthesizers while Stevie bellows something incomprehensible. The chorus is "I can't wait / Blah blah spinoo when I'm eighty blah two." Geez, all this song needs to be a stereotype of everything wrong with the '80s is a tuneless, screeching guitar solo ... and there it is!

Clash, Train in Vain: Funny how the Clash roared out of England with all sort of punk political hype, and yet they're best remembered for two gleeful romps through tattered relationships. And I'll always remember this for Keith Olbermann's best SportsCenter moment, passing along the score of a San Jose Clash victory and saying the Clash, of course, didn't train in vain.

.38 Special, Hold On Loosely: These guys had a few good songs, even if I'll never understand why they needed two drummers and ... four ... five? ... guitarists to play them. It's not like they're playing Blue Man Group tunes here. They apparently have a single drummer now. The video ends with a shot of the album cover, which was probably racy at the time -- a woman in a tight short skirt, visible only from the waist down, facing the appreciative band. From what I hear, though, the situation didn't go well. She asked which guy is the drummer, two guys answered, and she assumed one of them must be lying.

Queen + Paul Rodgers, We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions: I sense a theme here. We've got three drummers this time -- Foo Fighters' Taylor Hawkins and ... Dave Grohl? Chad Smith? I know Smith joined them for Live Earth, but that looks more like Grohl. Someone has to hold up the drumming while Roger Taylor is wailing his horrifying backup vocals. Sounds great, though.

Bruce Springsteen, I'm On Fire: A forgotten classic from Bruce. Those of you who read the blog often know I love understated passion, and this song has it. Simple taps from the drums, subtle guitar arpeggios and Bruce letting the lyrics do the talking: "Sometimes it's like someone took a knife, baby edgy and dull and cut a six-inch valley through the middle of soul / At night, I wake up with sheets soaking wet and a freight train running throught the middle of my head."

Bruce Springsteen, Radio Nowhere: Once again, it's a classic/current. Get well soon, Danny.

With that, I'm switching over to Fox Soccer Channel, broadcasting an FA Cup game from a stadium has maybe 500 seats but squeezed in 3,300 or so for the first round game. First camera shot has someon wiping the lens.

Song du semaine: Men at Work, "Overkill"

Do you ever think about death? Yes. Sure you do. A fleeting thought that drifts in and out of the transom of your mind. I spend hours, I spend days... - and you think this makes you a better person? Look, when the shit comes down, I'm gonna be prepared and you're not, that's all I'm saying. And in the meantime, you're gonna ruin your whole life waiting for it. (Source)

I had a bit of a health concern this week. To call it a cancer scare would be a little melodramatic. Narcissistic, even. Perhaps even Malignant Narcissism.

The ingredients for this week's disaster: A twinge in my belly that felt like it could be a hernia, a trip to urgent care, a lonnnnng wait there, a rushed visit with a doctor who ordered a CT scan, a resulting tender spot, a history of atypical moles and a 21st-century phenomenon called cyberchondria.

See, with the Internet now providing a ready source of mildly reliable medical information, all of our worries can be magnified. Every Web site has to list the worst-case scenarios in this litigious society. That headache you have? Well, it could be from the bump to the head you got a few minutes ago when you were in the kitchen and didn't notice a cabinet door was open. Or it could be an advanced metastatic cancer that originated in your pancreas. Sure, one is more likely than the other by a factor of a few hundred thousand, but susceptible minds have a hard time absorbing the odds.

Here's another factor -- as someone who spends far too much of his personal and professional time following sports, I've grown accustomed to happy endings in medical dramas, and that didn't happen this week. Basically, if an athlete survives the initial trauma, he always exceeds medical expectations. Bobby Hurley not only survived his traffic accident, he returned to the NBA for a couple of years. Kevin Everett is apparently taking a few steps. So I went to sleep Monday night fully expecting to read the next morning that Sean Taylor had awakened in the hospital and was identifying his assailants. When that didn't happen, it threw my sense of medical reality all out of whack.

I knew I was being ridiculous. Yet I couldn't quite convince that loud nagging voice in my head. When I stopped listening, it metastatized to my stomach and claimed most of my digestive system. That gave me a good excuse to call for an appointment with my actual doctor.

She was able to take a better look at the situation and reassure me that it couldn't possibly be what I was fearing. We had a good talk about cyberchondria, Sean Taylor, the Washington sniper and actual medical conditions.

So I'm glad I held onto this song for an appropriate week. It's an ode to paranoia with tasteful understatement and one of the most beautiful choruses ever written. Ghosts appear and fade away ...

Song du semaine: Police, "Synchronicity II"

"I would like all of you to come out and support my new band, Scrantonicity II. We are in no way associated with Scrantonicity."

Synchronicity II was much more than a convenient pop-culture reference for Kevin's band on The Office. It was the Police's hardest-rocking song, a distinct departure from their playful punk and righteous reggae. Andy Summers cranked up the squealing guitar, Sting's bass brooded like Roger Waters (the man, not his bass), Stewart Copeland went for full power, and Sting's lyrics unleashed the inner demons of a family bring crushed by an unfulfilling life.

It's brilliant. And everyone loves the video, which seems to be set in a post-apocalyptic trash heap:



Sting's way with words is on full display here. The narrative -- a simultaneous telling of suburban frustration and a monster rising from a dark Scottish lake -- is compelling in its own right. But Sting makes it better with impeccable word choice. Mother chants her litany of boredom and frustration. They're packed like lemmings into shiny metal boxes. The factory belches filth into the sky.

Surely there's a grammatical term for using a verb as a metaphor as he does with the factory belching. Sting uses that technique beautifully in The Wild Wild Sea: "The grey sky, she angered to black." This is why I finally realized, somewhere around my senior year of college, that I'd never be anything but a hack songwriter by comparison, thereby sparing the world some awful late-80s whiny alternative bullshit about 20something angst.

(Sting does use two references to suicide. I'm not nit-picking. I'm just looking for an excuse to reference a great Robert Wuhl bit on making Born to Run the state anthem of New Jersey. He notes the double references to suicide and builds up to the great line of any state anthem, "We gotta get out while we're young!")

Brilliant stuff, brilliantly delivered by a sneering Sting while Copeland and Summers thrive outside their punk-reggae comfort zone.

Live-blogging VH1 Classic

Been a while, hasn't it? I'm doing some work with the dial at Channel 237, so let's have some fun.

Blue Oyster Cult, Burnin' for You: Likeable if unexceptional riff-rocker. Video is four, five, 10 guys with guitars, plus a drummer in zebra pants. And some fire, in case you forgot the name of the song.

Neil Young, Heart of Gold: I like the song, which is the only thing keeping from me a rant about Neil's status as one of the most overrated performers/songwriters in rock history. Southern Man actually makes me sympathize with Skynyrd. Cinnamon Girl makes no sense. Like Bowie, he's gone through different phases; unlike Bowie, he seems ill at ease in all of them. But this one, at least, is worthwhile. Good classic folk song. Video is a bunch of hippies strumming guitars.

Meat Loaf, Two out of Three Ain't Bad: Video is from VH1's Storytellers, which is wrong on so many levels. I'd listen to Mr. Loaf talk about Bat Out of Hell, sure. Maybe have a good fistfight with Jim Steinman just for old times' sake. But this is a crap performance of a crap song. He's sitting, he's struggling with the melody, and he's doing hand gestures I'd associate with Sarah McLachlan emphasizing a particularly tear-jerking lyric in Hold On. As Crash Davis would say, "C'mon Meat. Bring that weak-ass shit."

Def Leppard, Love Bites: I have to apologize for VH1 Classic here. You don't usually get a quartet this weak. I don't mind Leppard ballads in general -- Bringin' On the Heartbreak is an overlooked classic, even if the remake could make you long for the days when synthesizers existed only in labs. This one prototypical Leppard -- awkward lyrics balanced by strong vocal harmonies and solid subtle riffs.

But please don't ever play this on Storytellers or Unplugged or anything that would deny Phil Collen use of the whammy bar.

Bruce Springsteen, Dancing in the Dark: The closest I can come to relating this song to anything in my life is the vague thought that Family Ties officially jumped the shark when Courteney Cox replaced Tracy Pollan as Alex's girlfriend. But at least Cox wound up with a great show later.

Bruce Springsteen, Radio Nowhere: Hey, they snuck a "Classic/Current" into the mix! It's a better-than-average song transformed into something truly good by the E Streeters' sense of urgency. Great playing from Weinberg and Clemons here. Biggest flaw is that Bruce, even moreso than usual, is singing as if his teeth are glued together. The video is nothing more than the band playing in a sparsely lit room, which is plenty. Great to see these guys play.

John Cougar Mellencamp, R.O.C.K. in the USA: I always have to laugh at this song. Not because of the Renaissance Man scene, but because I wrote a truly juvenile parody back in the day. All you have to do is switch two letters and fill in the verses. The last one is a lot of fun. The video is a little overbearing, opening and closing with Mellencamp in some sort of mock interview about how great all this music was.

The Police, Synchronicity II: I'm tempted to do a Beavis and Butthead-style "Yes!" here. I'm not sure Sting ever wrote a better song, and the performance is perfect in its blustery chaos. Sing along now: "The factory belch-es filth inTOOOOO the sky!" The video works, too - Sting, Andy and Stewart dressed up like kings of a post-apocalyptic landfill, all looking angry, until the camera zooms over a dark Scottish lake. Many miles away -- or is it?

The Cars, My Best Friend's Girl: Live version. Not bad, since these guys could all play, but whenever I hear this, I wish it was Just What I Needed, which has a few more novelties and a terrific Elliott Easton solo. Hmmm ... quick download here ... there. What's next?

Night Ranger, Don't Tell Me You Love Me: Opening with the band's logo floating over train tracks as if introducing the band -- necessary in these pre-Sister Christian days -- the video settles into a rather silly performance clip with wind machines, leaves and smoke. (Except during the guitar solos, when they're all sitting on a train in black and white like some Agatha Christie murder mystery.) The song, though, isn't half-bad. Bassist Jack Blades, thankfully, gets the call on lead vocals instead of drummer Kelly Keagy. The band thunders as if they have something deep to say. They don't, but if you pretend they do, it's a solid rocker.

Rod Stewart, Hot Legs: Also set on train tracks for some reason, as if Stewart's positing himself as an old bluesman. Dude, you're not singing She Caught the Katy. The band looks incredibly bored, though bassist Phil Chen tries to get into it by chewing on a piece of hay during his mini-solo. Perhaps they knew they were a year or so away from filming Do Ya Think I'm Sexy?

Ozzy Osbourne, Shot in the Dark: How many sort-of metal songs open with "Out on the street." This is your typical girl-goes-to-concert, girl-gets-headache, Ozzy-makes-dramatic-entrance (begging the question: "Where was he during the first verse?"), Ozzy's-glare-exacerbates-headache, girl-turns-into-metal-she-demon. Let this be a warning to everyone: Taking Ozzy Osbourne seriously will give you a headache and affect your vision. In rare cases, you may turn two-dimensional. Moreso than you already were.

They're playing Space Oddity now, but I think that's enough. We'll try this again sometime, hopefully with a better selection of videos.

Cover versions that shouldn't work

Take overstated ladies man Tom Jones. Add the understated cool of the Cardigans. Hand them the drum-driven Talking Heads classic Burning Down the House.

"Gee, Beau," you say. "I bet that sucks."

You bet wrong. Enjoy.

I'm white, and I'm capitalizin' ...

From YouTube's tireless efforts to archive everything on video, it's pre-stardom Jim Carrey on In Living Color with the definitive Vanilla Ice parody ...



Now if only they'd find Kelly Coffield's Paula Abdul impression.

Guitar heroes, '80s video style

Apologies to Captain Video, Aldo Nova, Chevy Nova ... heck, just about everybody.

"Greetings, Mr. Nova. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to star in a video convincing viewers of a new network called MTV that you are a guitar god.

"You will be given a low budget for this video, most of which will be spent on the helicopter.



"The rest of the budget will be spent on the laser you'll shoot from your guitar to open the warehouse.



"You will be joined in the mission by a nerd carrying that guitar ...



"... plus a big-haired emoting drummer ...



"... a keyboardist who seems surprised by his five seconds of screen time ...



"... and a generic guitarist, generic bassist and maybe 10 people gathered in the warehouse.



"Be warned that you may be attacked by a crazed woman following director's orders to, quote, go nuts, unquote.



"We suggest that you attempt to escape using the following methods. First, go out into the street to pontificate on material excess. To demonstrate the bling-bling lifestyle, we have procured one bad-ass Pontiac.



"You may also use the famous Nova disappearing act ...



"... or you may simply dissolve into what we call the pre-Photoshop vortex.



"If that fails, we suggest you misdirect the attacker with a single-entendre lyric mimicking the timing of Krusty the Klown's 'Tonight, I'm going to suck ... (pause) ... your blood!'

"Oh, wait, we're sorry. That's Heather Nova.



"Good luck with the mission. Or whatever -- hey, do you have her number?"

Enjoy ...

Fun at the zoo

Great leaping meerkat!



Great ... standing meerkat!



Gibbons -- like roosters but much louder and more mobile.

Semi-live blogging VH1 Classic

I've got a bit to do this morning, so I'm sorry if I don't look up all the details on some of these ...

Aerosmith, Crazy -- Was this the first or the last of the "Crazy / Amazing / Cryin'" trio that unfortunately defined Aerosmith's late career along with Don't Wanna Miss a Thing? Can't remember, and instead of looking it up, I'm checking IMDB to see what the heck is up with Alicia Silverstone ... oh, right, that Miss Match sitcom, a couple of art films, some Scooby-Doo voiceovers, married an alleged rock star and will be in some upcoming NBC sitcom called The Singles Table.

Herbie Hancock, Rockit -- I'd like to do a reality show about the filming of VH1 reality shows. In this episode, some eager young producer shows up at Hancock's door and says he's doing something on one-hit wonders. Hancock smacks him upside the head with memorabilia from his decades with Miles Davis and his Academy Award for best original score.

Journey, Wheel in the Sky -- Love the flares. Can't see old Journey without thinking of the Behind the Music in which a whining Steve Perry says he never felt like he was really in the band.

Billy Squier, Everybody Wants You -- Great rock voice, one of his better songs.

Alanis Morissette, Head Over Feet -- Tremendously talented singer-songwriter who seems hell-bent on doing weird stuff from time to time to make sure she's not too popular. This video -- the longest closeup of someone's face since the last Phil Collins album cover shoot -- falls in that category. But it's a such a sweet, earnest ballad that I don't really mind.

Lionel Richie, Truly -- Speaking of ballads, this one blows Hello out of the water. Lush melody, sung with tasteful understatement until he lets loose on the chorus. Actual audible piano. (Pet musical peeve of mine -- all those unbearable R&B ballads in which they think the occasional chord change on electric piano is a suitable substitute for actual background music. Not just R&B -- Bonnie Raitt does it too.)

Rolling Stones, Start Me Up -- I never liked this song, but I guess I have to give it its due. Instantly recognizable opening riff, good Bill Wyman counterpoint. I just get tired of it by the time they hit the hand claps in the chorus. The video is one of those 1980ish "performance" videos with the guys in a studio against a dark backdrop, apparently lit with one or two simple floodlights. You can see Mick's ribs through his striped purple sleeveless V-neck (with white jeans -- you don't see those much any more). Keith and Ron ham it up as always, while Charlie Watts seems to be laughing at them and Bill seems to be asleep. And hey, they leave in the "You make a dead man come" line. Ah, simpler times.

Linda Ronstadt, It's So Easy -- I love Linda for her Muppet Show appearance in which Miss Piggy takes out her wrath on Kermit for being so obviously smitten with the guest. Near the end, Linda tells Kermit she didn't realize he and Piggy were so in love, and she'd never stand in the way. Kermit: "Well, you may know that, and Piggy may know that, but the vote's not in from the frog." The video? Another performance clip, though they might actually be on stage. The band seems to be the same gaggle of California studio vets who spent much of the 70s and early 80s plodding their way through Warren Zevon albums. Poor guy deserved better.

Simple Minds, Don't You Forget About Me -- Alive and Kicking is their masterpiece, and they had a few other highlights (She's a River), so I'm always a little disappointed when this song comes on. But it's not bad, and it's nice to know these guys got their moment in the soundtrack spotlight. Besides, I love Mel Gaynor's drumming -- here and in Alive and Kicking, he gives such a dramatic presence to the fadeout.

Gerardo, Rico Suave -- I'm mesmerized by the way this guy wears about eight different outfits that still manage to leave his pecs and abs exposed. One of the weirdest Weird Al moments -- the video for Taco Grande, in which he simply superimposed his song over Gerardo's video. So Gerardo points to a dancer's leg and says "Taco." But here's something you should know about Gerardo, from Wikipedia -- "Now an A&R executive at Interscope Records, Gerardo was responsible for bringing Enrique Iglesias to the United States in 1998."

Cheap Trick, Tonight It's You -- Ah, the dark period for Cheap Trick in which they didn't have original bassist Tom Petersson. I saw them opening for Robert Plant soon after Petersson rejoined and they had a massive hit with a song they apparently grew to hate, The Flame. I could've skipped Plant. Cheap Trick was great. This video ... well, the woman's boyfriend is busy watching boxing, so she puts on headphones and dreams of Robin Zander. Not convincing. Much better are the Target ads with Bun E. Carlos trading drum riffs with Torry Castellano from The Donnas.

Which were almost as cool as the Luscious Jackson Gap ads.

And I'm going to leave you with that instead of searching for something profound on Stray Cat Strut or Heart's Alone.

Boys Don't Cry ... the band

Quick post today before I get to a long day of Annoying Stuff I Have To Do:

From VH1 Classic this morning, one of those songs that I hadn't thought about in 15 years or so but can recite from memory upon hearing the first bit. It's Boys Don't Cry's I Wanna Be a Cowboy.

If, like me, you had repressed all memory of this campy drum-machine, spoken-word hit and its preposterous fantasy video, take a look ...



You can also see it at the keyboardist's site.

It's such a random song that I'll have to go with random observations:

1. I guess the main difference between seeing this at age 16 and seeing at age 30... (cough) ... is that I now see a cowboy-themed video and immediately start looking for gay subtext. I'm not sure they get any closer than "Camping on the prairie / Plays havoc with my hair." Today, I guess we'd call that metrosexual subtext.

2. I like the way the woman in the video smiles even as she yells "help!" A lesser actress would have made it seem more like an actual hostage situation and less like a bit of silly -- possibly kinky -- fun.

3. Lemmy is in this video. Let me repeat ... Lemmy. The guy from Motorhead who strums his bass like a guitar and spits out Ace of Spades plays the bad guy. As Butt-head said, "He's Lemmy. He can be in any damn video he wants to."

4. Boys Don't Cry's Wikipedia entry currently makes this claim: "The song has been described as the perfect musical realization of a spaghetti western movie." By whom?

5. Also from Wikipedia: One guy worked with a couple of Yes-sters, including Jon Anderson, and two guys sued Paula Cole over Where Have All the Cowboys Gone? I'd have sued her over I Don't Want to Wait for attempting to refashion grammar in own image (it's "say a little prayer for ME," Miss Precious). Rolling Stone, though, says it wasn't Cole's fault.

6. Oh, they also sued Kid Rock. No word on whether they sued Jerry Seinfeld for saying "I don't wanna be a pirate!"

7. The lead singer remade the song a decade and change later.

This was followed by the Rush video for Limelight, one of several from the Moving Pictures/Signals era in which someone figured they'd just run cameras while the guys were in the studio and do some fancy split-screens. And maybe splice in some shots of Geddy on stage in a cape.

Ode to one-stick percussionists

I suppose that shouldn't be plural. I only know of one one-stick percussionist, not counting Sheila E. when she puts a stick down to make a couple of sexy gestures before whipping through a few cowbell-and-timbale patterns. (Seriously -- Sheila E. can play.)

The one-stick percussionist here is the woman in Was (Not Was)'s classic video Walk the Dinosaur.




I'm guessing she could also play. Even though Stereogum dismisses her as a "token, cowbell-hammering female ... wearing David Byrne’s blazer instead of a cocktail dress," I'm guessing she wouldn't have been hanging with the Wases if she didn't have some chops. I'm sure that's news to the Stereogummers who think Was (Not Was) "paid for their hubris with obscurity," which just goes to show you why I prefer to read music bloggers like Jason and Jefito who ... you know ... know something about music and research what they don't know.



That said, I'll admit that I've spent a lot of time pondering the question: Why didn't she have another stick, at least to keep up appearances? If my college percussion teacher insisted that I have four mallets in my hands even for the simplest marimba parts, shouldn't she have two sticks? Instead, she's just standing there, one arm stiff against her side.

Until ...



Heyyy! Fancy move!

If she could dance, of course, I'm sure she would've been "walking the dinosaur" with the dancers, cowbell in one hand and stick in the other. She could always wander over for the occasional cymbal crash -- which is surely superfluous, since the band had a drummer in the back who seemed perfectly capable of hitting the cymbals.

I played percussion for three years in a wind symphony, with occasional appearances in pit orchestras and a symphony. That included some boring parts. In a typical rehearsal, percussionists sit around for about 20 minutes. Just when you think you're going to play, the conductor quickly waves a hand so the group can go back over that tricky passage the third clarinet section just isn't getting. And that "part" sometimes consisted of one good thud on a bass drum.

But never -- not once -- can I remember going one-handed.

Maybe men are just too self-conscious to play such a small part in a song and video, especially when the repeated close-ups draw such attention to the fact that you're adding only slightly more to the sound than the guy in the Mighty Mighty Bosstones who just bounced around on stage all the time. A typical male probably would've cracked the cowbell against his head all night.

And so, almost 20 years after the fact, we salute you, One Stick Percussionist. You did more with one stick than most of us accomplish with two hands and all the gear we can buy.

One-song VH1 Classic live blog

No time to do a full-fledged live blog, but one video just can't pass without comment ...

WOMAN ON STREET (slightly panicked): "What's going on in there?"

STEREOTYPICAL SOUTHERN COP: "I wouldn't worry about it, ma'am. It's just dem Damn Yankees!"

(Damn Yankees? Hey, I heard about this band! They've got Tommy Shaw from Styx! And Jack Blades -- well, Night Ranger sometimes rocks! And Ted Nu ... NUGENT!! This'll be some badass rock here!!!)

Cut to Jack Blades, wearing sunglasses that look like some sort of lab equipment. He sings: "I don't wanna hear about it ... anymore ..."

Oh, thank heavens the police have this under control!

This video goes through more phases than Pfiesteria:

- Cops cordoning off the street with a 10-48 in progress -- '80s supergroup shooting a video for a power ballad

- Band is suddenly outside, possibly because the director realized they're not shooting Sunglasses at Night, and the band looked silly wearing shades in the house

- Unknown couple making out. Apparently some sort of Romeo & Juliet storyline ... I wasn't really paying attention.

- Nugent reminds us that yes, he really did join up with these guys. He steps onto the porch to play a solo that causes electrical appliances to short out and soda cans to tip as if shot by BBs.

- Unknown couple is being chased by ... the police? Not sure. (Coincidentally, Don't Stand So Close to Me is now on.)

- Someone's on Death Row for some reason. Blades and Shaw still emoting about being taken high enough. So apparently, this woman is on Death Row for ... what? Not selling drugs? "Having been found guilty by a jury of your peers for failing to give '80s rockers a steady supply of coke and pills, you have been sentenced to death ..."

- And apparently Nugent is the priest reading Scripture as the woman is carted off to whatever execution method this state uses? He stops ... he mugs for the camera.

Oh, that badass Nugent! Just when you think he's gone all soft on us, there he is, subversely playing a Death Row priest!

Rock and roll!!!!

Live-blogging VH1 Classic, revisited

Another morning with the TV ...

Blondie, Call Me -- Looks like one of those "videos" compiled from various bits of home movies years after the fact for purposes of fleshing out a DVD release. It's basically a love letter to Debbie Harry. She's on stage, she's walking around New York, she's goofing off at a photo shoot, she's at the beach. Even those of us who grew up with a crush on her (in other words, all men between age 34 and 80) might find it a little tedious. And it cuts off just as Jimmy Destri is getting into the synth solo. Poor Jimmy. I remember seeing a live Blondie video in which his keyboards had some sort of sound problem, cutting off the first few seconds of the solo while he looked perplexed.

John Fogerty, The Old Man Down the Road -- To fully appreciate this video, you have to remember the air of mystery around Fogerty at this time. He had been hiding out from the public for years. So a video in which he makes brief, curious appearances was perfect. Great concept, too -- a guitar cord snakes for miles through a bunch of incongruous scenes. There's a man on a dilapidated porch, then a jaded woman in a limo, then a married couple dancing on a lonely road. Good stuff, though tech geeks will wonder if they at least gave Fogerty a monitor. He's miles away from his amp, for crying out loud.

Phil Collins, You Can't Hurry Love -- One of those early Collins videos in which the "concept" is that he is both the lead singer and two backup singers. To avoid distraction, the director puts nothing else in any frame. We think that's what Phil would've wanted.

Romantics, What I Like About You -- Four guys playing on stage, likely unaware that they were recording a rock standard. The drummer/singer flirts with the camera, oblivious to the fact that he's not exactly a good-looking guy. And his technique is unconventional, to say the least. Left hand on the hi-hat, right arm pinched against his body as he barely clears the rim on the snare. Charming stuff.

Ashford and Simpson, Solid -- Strange song. Unforgettable pop hook, dropped into an odd key-shifting morass of synths and drum machines like a piece of filet mignon dropped into a Hardee's cheeseburger. The video features the two of them singing uncomfortably toward each other.

A "plot" floats in and out. Oh, she's scared? She's looking around at the approaching gang of toughs. Oh no! But he's reassuring her. And here they come -- oh, they're the backup singers! What a relief.

Patti LaBelle, New Attitude --The director clearly didn't know how to deal with the way LaBelle's hair filled the whole frame. So it's LaBelle's hair, cut to dancers, cut back to the hair, back to the dancers. Hair, dancers, hair, dancers, fingernails. Thank goodness for the fingernails. Without them, the video might have been boring or something.

Peter Gabriel, Superstition ... er ... Sledgehammer -- Such an original video for such an unoriginal song.

Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush, Don't Give Up -- The entire video is a hug between the two singers, with one of those fake "sun" backdrops so common in the '80s. It's a sweet song, though I was never all that enamored with the complex rhythms of the verses.

Roger Waters, Hello (I Love You) -- Waters has apparently done a spinoff of Is There Anybody in There? for a new film called The Last Mimzy. VH1 Classic just happened to have an ad for that film, which appears to be about a couple of kids getting telekinetic, interdimensional power of some kind. Seemed like fun, but then add Waters wailing like he's recording a sequel to The Wall, and I don't know what to think. IMDB says the kids are going to a "strange and sometimes terrifying world," but with Rainn Wilson in the cast, could it be that terrifying? The video had a few clips from the movie and a couple of the kids in the studio with Waters while he goes over the orchestral score and lays down the tracks. Wikipedia has a quote from Waters -- something about the clash of man's best and worst instincts and a child's innocence winning the day. It's no wonder our kids are under such pressure these days -- all our films demand that they save the world with their innocence. That has to get tedious.

(Interesting ad for Tommy Shaw and Jack Blades -- separately of Styx and Night Rangers but together of Damn Yankees -- doing an acoustic tour and singing Yes' I've Seen All Good People.)

Then we shift into "Classic/Current," in which they pair old and new videos by the same artist.

U2, One -- The least interesting of the videos for this song -- the one with Bono sitting with a drink while dull scenes unfold elsewhere. My favorite was the running buffalo, which was a beautiful image of fragile but enduring life.

U2, Window in the Skies -- Gotta have a montage! This one splices together footage of a bunch of Hall of Famers performing. A lot of Elvis, a bit of Beatles, some Stevie, the Ramones, Nirvana.

Filter, Hey Man Nice Shot -- Might not hear it much on the radio these days, but this is one of those songs that'll stick in your brain for a while. The brooding synth-bass verses give way to a classic-rock guitar cascade in a screaming chorus. And it's a memorable topic for a rock song -- the press-conference suicide of a scandal-plagued politician. Lyrically, the semi-ironic detachment doesn't seem to work these days, but it's still powerful musically.

Army of Anyone, Goodbye -- I didn't think Filter was still around, and this is indeed frontman Richard Patrick's new project with a couple of former Stone Temple Pilots. It sounds ... exactly like an STP song with Richard Patrick singing instead of Weiland. It's riff-driven rock with a change in tone for the chorus, almost the opposite of Nirvana's typical "soft verse, loud chorus" approach. The video is mostly a performance clip, particularly when drummer Ray Luzier cuts loose at the end. This could be put to effective use in a dramatic TV or movie scene, but I can't imagine putting it in heavy rotation on the iPod.

Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson, Folsom Prison Blues -- Classic tune, but I can't hear this without thinking of Krusty the Klown singing, "I'm just visiting Springfield Prison, I get to sleep at home toniiiiiight." Willie plays a little acoustic solo.

Johnny Cash, God's Gonna Cut You Down -- Obviously, "Classic/Current" stretches the definition of "current."

Red Hot Chili Peppers, Give It Away -- I wish they'd follow this with the Weird Al parody instead of some dreary, de-funked meditation on California. Oh well. I'll just bob my head to this one for a bit and then get to work.

Good morning to all.