The Hidden Chord

Ch-ch-ch-No More Hidden Chord

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 20:05:10 PDT

To my legions of adoring fans: I am, sadly, shutting down The Hidden Chord Blog. Don't cry, no, please...Now ain't the time for your tears. It was a good run. This is the 41st and final blog entry. Allow me to explain.

Music blogs are quite plentiful. It's hard to be a fresh voice on "the scene", whatever the scene may be. Popular music has changed so much since I first fell in love with it in the mid 1980's. It's so much easier to get your hands on and there's so much of it!!! And there are so many people constantly reviewing it, taking on "different" angles in regards to the old stuff. The advent of the Internet has made the music industry a tad overwhelming. Not that I don't still love it, it's just that, I think my aspirations to be a music journalist would have been more suited to the late '60s, early '70s, than the days of the sprawling fields of bloggers that inhabit our early 21st century times.

Man, oh man, I do love music, though! I thank/blame my dad for this, since it was his Beatles records that my brother and I listened to constantly and it was his voice over the radio that made it something special. Over the years I've had my obsessions: the aforementioned Beatles, Hendrix, The Who, The Doors. I had my Southern Rock phase with Lynyrd Skynyrd, The Allman Brothers, .38 Special. I even caved into some hair metal in the mid to late '80s with Def Leppard and Tesla. Of course there was grunge: Pearl Jam was initially my favorite, but that naturally led to Soundgarden and Alice in Chains...and though I was late to them, you couldn't deny the genius of Kurt and Nirvana. '90s alt-rock was amazing to me. And as I got into college, I came to love jazz...Coltrane still puts me into a different state of mind that I can't fully express through words. And Charlie Parker? Possibly the greatest American musician of all time! I went through a folk phase where I discovered Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, Odetta, John Prine, and one of my enduring favorites: Steve Goodman.

These days my tastes are a bit all over the place, I guess. Maybe slightly favoring "indie rock", but certainly not limited to it. Wilco, Spoon, Radiohead, Fleet Foxes, Arcade Fire, My Morning Jacket, Grizzly Bear...These are just some favorites. It's always been hard for me to pin down my absolute favorites, though. I'm sure I'll be wishing I added a few more later.

Music brings out certain reactions that are more emotional than rational. Writing is primarily a function of rationality, I suppose, so maybe it makes sense that I have a hard time knowing what to write about. Yes, on the one hand there is SO MUCH, but on the other hand, writing about music is like listening to food. If you spend too much time doing it, you're really missing the point.

I've had some fabulous opportunities given to me as a music journalist. I've been lucky enough to interview artists and every so often get paid to write a few sentences about rock & roll. I fell in love with Austin, TX because of music. And it's always been my hope that I could share that passion and pure love and joy of music with others. But then again, it's extremely personal to me. I could tell you all about seeing Lou Reed and Moby duet on "Walk on the Wild Side", but there is a certain sadness I feel when I can't accurately CAPTURE that amazing moment! Even if I had a video camera that day, it still wouldn't have done justice to the actual moment Grumpy Old Lou took the stage!

Maybe I'll still have more to say about music. I'm sure I will, in fact. I just don't want to limit myself to just that. If you want excellent music writing all the time, I'm sure you know where to find it. It's everywhere.

So what now for me? I'm going to start a new blog. It very well may be just called andypulliam.blogspot.com, but don't quote me on that just yet because I haven't checked to see if that's available! Maybe I'll take some time to think of something more creative, but we'll see. Anyhow, the format is mostly going to be open-ended, with maybe a slight more emphasis on fiction writing. I write a lot of fiction for myself, but I think I'm at a point where I'm ready to take the leap and give it, for what it's worth, if anything, to the weird, vast universe that is the Internet. I plan on still writing about music when the mood strikes me. Maybe I'll write some non-fiction essays too. Jeebus knows, I know a lot of interesting people without having to make things up. Who knows? I just enjoy writing and I enjoy documenting the wonderful/bizarre/heartbreaking/troubling/fabulous/ridiculous thing that is life and the human mind/condition.

I hope you'll join me.

But as always, support your local music scene and never stop trying to discover that music that has that power to elevate us to that unexplainable "other" plane. Let me know when you find it!

Andrew Bird Whistles A Lot (this post is about Andre Williams, though)

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sun, 02 May 2010 21:48:15 PDT

Starting off tonight's late-ish post with the title's observation. I'm entering the Andrew Bird portion of the A-Z project. It will mark the first three plus album segment of the project. I'm interested to see how this plays out. I have a lot of admiration for Andrew Bird, if not for the only reason that he was a teacher at The Old Town School of Folk Music, which is one of my favorite places in my favorite city. I like his music, but have never listened to this much of it all at once, so the jury's still out on just how much I like it. I do look forward to the playing of "A Nervous Tic Motion of the Head to the Left", though. Such a great song!

This post isn't about Andrew Bird, though, even though I put his name in the title. Let me fix that. Please pause for about 10 seconds so you can get the proper effect of me fixing that error. Okay, thanks for that. Resume reading.

Andre Williams. Probably a name, you, my vast audience isn't very familiar with. I've got to admit, it's a name that I only recently became familiar with. In fact, I saw him perform at SXSW 2008, and yet it was only after hearing a couple of iTunes songs today and doing some Wikipedia research, that I fully began to realize the importance and brilliance of this man's music.

So the song that kicked off the way too short Andre Williams segment, was called "Humpin', Bumpin', and Thumpin'". If that doesn't speak volumes alone about the nature of rock and roll, I don't know what does! This is classic '60s rock/soul. Think Booker T. and the MG's with an edge. Williams actually wrote one of Stevie Wonder's earliest hits and was one of the largely unsung pioneers of early rock and soul, both on the writing and performing front.

Nicknamed both "Mr. Rhythm" and "The Black Godfather", Williams at one time was homeless on the streets of Chicago, only to rebound with forrays into "Sleaze rock" (???) and country, eventually finding his way back to his roots. A documentary entiltled "Agile Mobile Hostile: A year with Andre Williams" documents the highs and lows of his life and musical career, from his early success with Fortune Records to his struggles with drug and alcohol in the 1980s. I haven't seen the doc, but believe me, I'll be making a point to remedy that soon.

I saw him perform on a hot Austin day at a Bloodshot Records party at SXSW, back in 2008. Here was this older African American man, unapologetically calling out the fact that there were more white people in attendence than he was used to at his shows. Yet regardless of the audience, he played one hell of a show. If you perform a song called "Bad Motherfucker", you better deliver the goods. And oh hell yes, did Mr. Williams ever deliver the goods. This was raw, brutal, life-affirming rock and roll/soul/R&B (whatever you may call it these days) at it's best! This was the year I saw Lou Reed perform, but along with The Ting Tings, Ezra Furman, and Justin Townes Earle, Andre Williams overshadowed the grumpy old punk himself, proving that the history and present state of music, is a tad more complex than perhaps we realize.

Andre Williams' music is music for late nights and places that you shouldn't be at when it's 3AM. But if you're gonna be there, you might as well get it right. It's dirty, it's honest, it's bare boned, get-your-pulse rockin' music! Isn't the subversiveness of it all what the music's all about anyway?

Click on the title of this post for the official trailer of "Agile, Mobile, Hostile"

"Sitting on an angry chair..."

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 14:58:52 PDT

Continuing A-Z, I'm currently on album #2 of the two Alice in Chains records I have on my iTunes collection. More on that in just a moment.

What has gone on since I lasted visited you with thoughts on Al Green? Well, more Al Green, as soothing and positive as ever. By the way, songs really don't sound that different when stuck between other songs. I shouldn't make that bold of a blanket statement, actually. In this case, they didn't. Some songs sound perfect within their original context, but though still good, kind of silly when placed haphazardly within a "Greatest Hits" setting. Take the song "Like A Rolling Stone" for example. Perfect opener to Dylan's epic, "Highway 61 Revisited". Within the "Greatest Hits" format, oh sure it sounds good, but it LIVES on side one of "Highway 61 Revisited". It belongs there. It speaks most powerfully from that original post. Yet I digress. The Al Green listening portion was rather enjoyable.

Albert Hammond, Jr. got on my nerves a little bit. Especially with the ridiculous seven minute instrumental, "Spooky Couch". I do like a few of his songs. "Cartoon Music for Superheroes" is a good song. His stuff is mostly forgettable to me, though.

Why don't I have more Alejandro Escovedo? I saw him live a couple years ago and it was amazing. Yet for some reason, I only have three of his songs in my collection. Most certainly, one of the best three song sequences I've listened to so far during this project.

Two albums worth of Ali Farka Toure, the king of the desert blues singers, one with the amazing Ry Cooder, were definitely interesting, and at times incredible. Yet I think I need to be in a certain mindset to listen to "World Music". Don't get me wrong, I appreciate his music, but two albums in a row of not understanding a single world is rough.

Speaking of rough, that brings me to Alice in Chains. I was wondering how I'd react to listening to this band again. Back in the mid '90s, "Dirt" was in constant rotation on my cheap little boombox CD player that I had for years. However, at the time, I was an angsty teenager, who soaked up all the screams, distorted guitars, adn anger that grunge had to offer. As a man in his early 30s, I'm slightly removed from all of that. I could venture a guess that the last time I listened to "Dirt" from start to finish was probably somewhere around '96 or '97.

What I really worried about was it being painful to get through, and thereby offending my younger self who probably swore that this was the be all end all of music and only old, out-of-touch losers wouldn't get it. Was I now one of those old out-of-touch losers? Partly yes, partly no.

I still appreciated it on a certain level. The songs brought back a lot of memories, but certainly didn't have the same raw, emotional power that they did when I first heard them. I mostly felt sad listening to Layne Staley's dark lyrics, knowing how it would all end up for him. It came as no surprise to anyone that he died a lonely drug addict's death early in 2002. The only surprise, maybe, is that he made it that long.

I will say this about Alice in Chains, though. They were the perfect representative for the heavier elements of grunge. Staley's jagged, rough and pained voice, were the perfect foil to Jerry Cantrell's metal sensibilities. They never had the pop thing going that Nirvana or Pearl Jam had, and they always seemed a tad heavier and darker than Soundgarden. Yet at times, they displayed elements of all three.

Honestly, I think of all the bands I mentioned, Alice in Chains music seems the most dated. I used to love the song "Rooster", but now kind of feel like, "What the hell's he talking about?" Man, I am getting old! I don't listen to music this heavy anymore, so getting through this, though fun in a nostalgia sort of way, has been a little difficult. This is not to say I haven't enjoyed hearing some of it again, it's just that for better or worse, we all seem to grow out of certain stages. I can officially say, right here in April of 2010, my grunge phase is over. Many apologies (or should I say All Apologies) to the sixteen year old version of myself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rs6RefV1td4

Why I'm An Unashamed Fan of Folk Music

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 11:30:14 PDT

Not every blog post is going to involve my A-Z project. Although, right now I'm continuing on and may break in with an observation or two if the spirit moves me. But this Sunday morning, I've decided to take on an altogether different topic.

This morning I've been thinking a lot about kindness and compassion, or the lack thereof that exists in American culture today. Part of this has to do with a series of responses I've read concerning Alex Chilton's death, that have to do with his lack of health care. Many call out Chilton's "laziness" or "poor decisioin-making skills", saying that if he really wanted health care, he should have just bought it. Others point out that, as a man in his late fifities with pre-existing conditions, that health care costs would have been exorbenant, especially for a gigging musician. Chilton was by no means a filthy rich man.

Anyhow, I'm not going to get into the health care debate here. The part that was shocking was the lack of compassion or simple kindness when speaking about this great artist who recently passed away. Meanness. I'd call it that. It's appalling to read people writing things like, "Nobody owes me anything, so why should I care about anyone else?" What?! Is this the type of society we want to live in? Do we really just want to be a bunch of self-important, money-grubbing assholes who think of no one but ourselves? I sure hope not, but judging by the tone of things in our country these days, maybe that's exactly where we are.

From a personal standpoint, I was just let go of a job that was filled with management who had this exact personal "character", if you want to call it that. It was people who felt no need to say "hi" to their employees. I once even actually said hi to one of these guys, and was met with a brief stare, followed by the turning of a back. Who does this? Why is this ever acceptable? They knew nothing of my character, my family, my work ethic. Why? Because they never bothered to pay attention, to ask, to care. They let me go because I "wasn't a good fit". It's an extremely vague and unsatisfying answer, but they're right. I have no desire to fit in with supreme arrogance, heartlessness, ego, superiority, or any of the traits I saw on display every excrutiating day I spent there.

Why do I bring all of this up? How does it relate to anything musical? All of this is directly related to why I'm not afraid to admit, that I'm a fan of folk music. Let's face it, folk music is uncool. Hipsters are far too serious and ironic for it. It's often seen as music for graying hippies and old-time idealists. But let me tell you this: some of the most enjoyable live music experiences I've ever had have come from folk shows. Why? For exactly the reasons it's uncool. It's genuine. It's unpretentious. It's kinder and gentler than the world around us. I've been to folk music festivals on several occasions and it's like stepping into an alternate utopian universe. Are there egos in folk music? Oh I'm sure. But I can tell you of two examples of contemporary folk artists who I love for their profound lack of ego and so-uncool-it's-actually-cool genuineness. I came across these artists at just the right time in my life.

It was during another time of being in a job surrounded by horrible stress, meanness, arrogance, and a startling lack of humanity. A co-worker of mine, a kind guy in his mid-40s, who I got along with very well, invited me to folk shows all of the time. Being a lover of live music, I'd go, just for the experience, but never expected to really fall in love with the music. But the music of Sons of the Never Wrong and Carrie Newcomer stuck with the part of me that craved and still craves a world stripped of ego...A world with more kindness and community.

These were fun shows. And yeah, I usually ended up being surrounded by people who were a lot older than me, but after a minute or two, it really didn't matter. Whenever I went to one of these artist's shows, I just enjoyed myself. You laugh and smile more than at a serious indie rock show. There's a lot more cheesiness and sing-a-long opportunities. In fact, a full-on hipster might just spontaneously combust at one of these shows. But I don't care if anyone knows it: I treasure those experiences and feel a need now more than ever to reconnect with some good ol', fun, silly, heartfelt folk music. The audience members are so nice! The artists are so nice! What's wrong with niceness?

In fact, I fell in love with the vibe so much, that I decided that that was what I was going to do. I approached Carrie Newcomer and members of Sons of the Never Wrong with my enthusiasm, and not surprisingly, they were all nothing but supportive and kind toward me. I left my stable career and began writing songs and playing open mics. I plunged in without much direction and without as much dedication as I should have had to actually make it work, but despite the misgivings I may have toward the decisions I made, I can see why I made them. The kindness and joy was like a drug, after being surrounded by so much of the ugliness on the opposite end of the spectrum.

And here I am, back where I was those years ago. I'm a junkie for the basic, beautiful happiness and kindness inherent in the music of Carrie Newcomer and Sons of the Never Wrong. And maybe you don't understand or don't want to understand. Maybe it's a little too cornballish for your tastes, but I really wish we could all take a deep breath and allow a little cornballishness into our harsh society, if for the only reason, that maybe in doing so, we could actually be better people for it. What can I say? I guess I'm just an idealistic folkie deep down inside.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2lSYPAqF5k&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVha3krnDG8

iTunes A-Z: In the beginning...

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 08:39:53 PDT

So I'm about 40 songs into my overly, pointlessly ambitious project. I suppose I could be doing something more productive with my time...maybe I should be investigating ways to save the environment, or researching cures for cancer, or looking for ways to make money in a time of economic ruin. But instead, I've chosen music, and I guess it's a decision I've been making, for better or worse, for many years now, so why stop now?

Observations? I like A. A. Bondy's songs, but he gets way too chill at times.

A. C. Newman is really great. I knew I had songs by The New Pornographers front man, but I didn't realize I liked them that much. It's definitely what you'd call, stereotypical "indie rock", but it's fun, melodic, in the same vein as the N.P's themselves.

I've already gone through three Daytrotter sessions (A.A. Bondy, Aesop Rock, and Aimee Mann) and have a great deal to come. With Daytrotter, it gives one a chance to hear an artist at a bare-bones, basic, hopefully honest, level. Some sessions are good, some are pretty disappointing, some are just there and nothing more. So far, the Aesop Rock session, of the three, tops the list. Great DJ feature with "DJ Big Wiz Jam".

Adam Sandler's "Werewolves of London" is good. I mean, really good. I knew this already, but upon listening to it during this A-Z project, this fact has been re-affirmed. He does Warren Zevon's memory proud.

Weird neo-hippie, dance around a fire with paint on your face award goes to the two songs I have by Akron/Family: "Ed is a Portal" and "There's So Many Colors". I think I may have gotten high just listening to the songs. I suddenly smell patchoulli too. Why do I have an urge to play hacky sack? I kinda like the songs too, actually. Shhh...don't tell anyone.

The unexpected connection that I made was with an Aimee Mann song called "31 Today" that expresses the sentiment of "I thought I'd have my shit together by now, but I really don't". Maybe not the type of sentiment you really strive to connect with, but hey, that's life. It certainly made me pause and listen to the song, especially since 31 was two years ago for me and strangely, I can still relate. Thanks for bringin' me down Aimee!!!

Ahhhh, but I'm to classic artist #1, of MANY...Al Green. And suddenly that worry and anxiety is melting right away. The good Reverend just soothes you right into a happier, more soulful place. That said, though, I am presented with dilemma #1--repetition. I have Al Green's Greatest hits, and his album I'm Still In Love With You. There's going to be repeats. Do I listen to the same song twice? On the one hand, I say, no. This asinine project is long enough already! Why put myself through needlessness!? On the other hand, though, I wonder how a song sounds in relation to the context it lies in. Does the song, "Love and Happiness" sound different when bookended by "Here I Am (Come and Take Me)" and "Lets Stay Together" as opposed to "I'm Glad You're Mine" and "What A Wonderful Thing Love Is"? I mean, probably not, but what if it does and I skip the experience? Man! I'm going to have to listen to repeats and report back!!!

So that's the state of things here in the early A's. I'm about to hit "Love and Happiness" for the first time, so I better pay attention!

Back to Blogging...The Music Calls

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 08:41:46 PDT

I'm going to start this first blog in over two months with the following statement that I will gladly stand by any day:

I love the band Dr. Dog.

Right now I'm listening to their latest album, "Shame, Shame" and am in love with it! Their last album "Fate" made my "Best of 2008" list, and I'm guessing when I roll out my "Best of 2010" list, this one will be on it. Throwback? Oh yeah, no doubt. But damn! If you're gonna be a throwback sort of band, I don't think you can do it much better than these guys. I was fortunate enough to meet one of the members of the band a few years back at SXSW. He was a really gracious guy wearing a hat, but I don't remember his name. We were waiting in line for the bathroom I do believe (you meet quite a few interesting people waiting in line for coffee and/or bathrooms...just a side observation). I like when the members of a band are as cool as you hope them to be. But even if the dude would have been a total douchebag, I just may have forgiven him for the simple fact that I dig the music so much! I'm rambling, but hey, cut me some slack, I'm slightly out of practice here!

My point? Well, my point is that I really want to be inspired by music. I feel like it's happening less and less these days. And maybe that's partly due to the inevitability that is the aging process. Maybe it's because I have less and less time to listen to music. Maybe it's because there's too much to choose from. Maybe music is just worse than it used to be.

I still believe in it, though. Case in poing: Dr. Dog. Or the new Joanna Newsom. Or Grizzly Bear, Fleet Foxes, Wilco, Spoon, Vampire Weekend, or the odds and ends that still reach me on a level that The Beatles did when I was first discovering rock and roll music back in the '80s when actual '80s music wasn't reaching me.

And I'm rediscoving jazz. I used to be a jazz afficianado back when I actually played trombone in a college jazz group. Once I stopped playing, I kind of drifted away from Bird, Trane, Miles, and Mingus, but of late, I've slowly, but surely started rekindling that old flame. Sometimes music maybe temporarily dormant within us, but I'm convinced that the good stuff never really goes away.

So where does this leave me? What do I do with these observations? I'm hungry for discovery/re-discovery. I have over 10,000 songs in my iTunes collection, many of which I've never heard. Many of the songs I've probably just glossed over or forgotten or taken for granted. Maybe it's time to give each artist and each artist's individual works their proper due. Maybe it's time to listen to every single of the 10210 songs in the collection from A. A. Bondy to Zooey Deschanel. My iTunes library says that it would only take 28.6 days to do this...well of course that is if listening to music was the only thing I did during every waking second of those 28.6 days. So obviously, it's gonna take slightly longer.

The idea's probably not an original one. I'm sure some blogger/writer has done it and written about it, but really, I'm kind of doing it for myself. I really 1.) want to hear what I really have, 2.) want to be inspired by something I haven't noticed, 3.) want to maybe free up some space on my hard drive by deleting the crap...streamlining and simplifying life...never a bad thing. I'm partly inspired by the author, A. J. Jacobs, as well, who read the Encyclopedia Britannica from A-Z and wrote about it (and lived to tell about it...an accomplishment in itself). Maybe I can come up with my own insights/observations on a much smaller scale about something a lot more interesting than encyclopedic knowledge.

Partly I want to do it too so I can give my writing a little direction as well. There's often simultaneously, and paradoxically, both too much and too little to write about. There's often just nothing that grabs me either on the micro or macro scale, at least enough so for me to actually sit down and write about it. But the thing is, I really, really, really do love music and I really do love writing too...so it seems the best way to consolidate the two loves is to undertake this silly, somewhat pointless exercise. As John Lennon once said, "Whatever gets you through the night..." I think most of life really is a silly, somewhat pointless exercise anyway, so I'm just doing what comes natural.

So the next entry will start off with A. A. Bondy's "Among the Pines" and we'll see what transpires as the songs slip by. There'll be a lot of Dylan to listen to, that's for damned sure. I'm sure there will be a lot of crap to sift through, as well. But I'm looking forward to those moments that light up the synapses in my brain that go crazy when good music finds its way from speaker to ear. May those moments be in abundance...for you as well.

Grammy Awards Review (well sort of)

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 14:58:03 PST

I'll come clean right away and let you know that I missed the first hour of the Grammy Awards last night. Didn't see Elton/Lady GaGa, Beyonce, The Black Eyed Peas, or Pink's performance. Missed a few of the early awards. I turned it on right around the time that Stephen Colbert won his Grammy, thanking Jesus since it was for a Christmas album and getting approval from his daughter that he's finally cool. Good acceptance speeches are hard to come by, and this one was about the only worthwhile one I saw. Let me just give you a couple of thoughts on some of the things about the expectedly too long, over-blown, largely dull awards ceremony.

1. Taylor Swift Can't Hit the High Notes.

A big "Yikes" goes out to the weird pairing of Stevie Nicks and Ms. Swift. Stevie Nicks was okay. You kind of know what to expect with her. Her voice has always been slightly gravelly, yet with time, it's gotten considerably more jagged. Fine, that's aging for you. She can still pull off being Stevie Nicks pretty well. But Taylor Swift...well, maybe she should have lip-synched. Or at the very least should have stayed away from the high notes on "Rhiannon". I respect her for writing her own material and for writing honestly, but she's way too inconsistent in every live performance I've seen of her.

2. The MJ Tribute--Mixed Bag.

I do like "Earth Song". It's a tad preachy, but Michael's "message" songs tended to be on the rather blatent end of things. No veils or metaphors with "We Are The World" or "Man In The Mirror". And the artists who performed it did a relatively good job with it. I didn't have the 3D glasses, so I can't speak on that, although I hear the effects were kind of disappointing. It just got plain weird at the end, though (kind of ironic, don't you think, since the same can be said about Michael Jackson's life...so maybe it's fitting). The turning around of the four artists to the pictures of Michael on the screens seemed a bit cheesy. And Lionel Ritchie: Did you really have to do the whole, "Wow, wow!" Maybe that was a genuine reaction, but it seemed odd. And then the parading out of Michael's kids--bizarre. Maybe they wanted to say something. There was something a little creepy and uncomfortable about it, though. In my opinion, they should have had the song and left it at that.

3. Dave Matthews Band--Really good performance, actually.

I say, "actually" because I've been pretty underwhelmed by Dave and/or the band for quite a few years now. And I'm not crazy about their latest album by any means, but they were really locked in last night. Yeah, there was plenty of overdone Grammy production, with the addition of choirs, strings, bands, to the point of having a ridiculously crowded stage, but at the same time, it worked. Maybe it was being up there without there fallen bandmate LeRoi Moore and just the emotional energy of that, or maybe they just happened to be locked in. Whatever the case, I was surprised that I enjoyed it so much.

4. Why Bon Jovi? Why?!

I'll leave it at that.

5. The Lil Wayne, Eminem, Drake performance was unwatchable with constant censor interruption.

I know there's a history between CBS and the Grammys, but really, they might want to consider showing the ceremony on a network that doesn't have to be "bleep ready". It kind of messes up the continuity of a performance when it's constantly silenced.

So there are five thoughts I had on the whole Grammy deal. I honestly don't have a lot to say about it. The Grammys are what The Grammys are--something largely to get riled up about if you're a music fan. You know what I mean. Everyone has their, "Wow, what were they thinking" moment(s). Mostly, by now, all of us know, they aren't to be taken too seriously. Historically speaking, they've been horribly out of touch and/or behind the times, yet every so often, you get a decent performance or crazy enough paring, that it actually works. It was nice to see Leon Russell, yet I could care less about the Zac Brown Band, who he performed with (best new artist over Silversun Pickups, The Ting Tings AND MGMT? Methinks, no), but a legend sighting is cool. Speaking of legends, it was nice that Neil Young finally won a Grammy and was given some serious props at the MusiCares ceremony to kick off "Grammy Weekend". Also, I was very happy that two other of my favorites, Levon Helm and Steve Earle, were winners. So, eh...Thinking back on it, much like I think every other year I've watched The Grammys, I get kind of a bland feeling--like eating an okay burger after it was just hyped as supposedly being one of the best around (an actual experience I had this past weekend, I might add).

The music landscape is about to get a lot more exciting, though, because before you know it, some of the early festivals will be kicking off (i.e. SXSW), which will lead straight into summer festival season. The real pulse of music lies in these things and of course local music scenes and the unexpected surprise places as well.

Best of '09

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 18:57:32 PST

First off, on an unrelated-to-anything-musical note, there comes a time when the phrase "cold and flu season" goes from being a distant concept to an upper respiratory/dripping nose/scrambled head reality. Now is that time. So in a cold medicine haze, I'm going to plunge right into the humble task at hand: telling you the 10 best albums, 10 best songs, a few good movies, and 5 important music news stories of 2009. Oh and it'll be good, maybe because of the meds (or in spite of them...this fact remains to be seen!)!

2009's 10 Best Albums

Before I give you this list, I'll say this about the "album". Supposedly it's dying and/or dead, depending who you talk to. One of the top music news stories of '09, might just be Radiohead's Thom Yorke announcing that the band would no longer be focusing on making albums, but rather stick to singles. But now, so I hear, Radiohead IS working on an album, so what are you gonna do? Frankly I'm happy to hear this because a Radiohead album release creates as much buzz and usually delivers with more consistency than any big budget Hollywood blockbuster (although I hear Avatar is actually good, even though some of the previews make it look like it could have gone the way of Costner's epic failure, "Waterworld"). Albums are still relevant, maybe less so, but until I'm told otherwise, they're still around and still a huge marker of just how good a band is. There were lots of good ones this year, definitely.

My process isn't scientific. Basically, with the help of a scan through of my iTunes collection, I came up with a list of 17 albums that I consistently listened to this past year. I narrowed the list to 10 (with a couple of honorable mentions) and arranged them in a way that I felt makes sense. That is, sense in my mind. Lists as we all know, no matter how hard someone might try to convince you otherwise, are doomed to subjectivity. And, this will be a limited list as well. I haven't heard all of the albums of '09, so I may very well be missing one that I WOULD have made #1. I'll start with the following sub-heading under "Best albums of '09":

Bands/artists who released albums this year that I've heard great things ABOUT, but haven't actually heard:

Silversun Pickups
Passion Pit
Kid Sister
Ida Maria
Neko Case

Maybe the albums from the aforementioned artists would have made the list, maybe they wouldn't have--who the hell knows? I'd thought I'd at least give them a mention because I'd still like to hear them before long. I also haven't heard many that will undoubtedly make the pop charts top 10: Taylor Swift, Beyonce, Lady Gaga, Black Eyed Peas, etc (although you tend to hear the songs off of these albums EVERYWHERE anyway, so you kind of get the idea what they're like). Not to be dismissive of pop music, I'm just probably not the best judge of it.

Top 10 Albums of 2009

10. David Bazan, "Curse Your Branches"

Previous to this outstanding collection of songs of a man in the midst of transition, David Bazan was known for being: A.) the main dude in the band Pedro the Lion and B.) a devout Christian. "Curse Your Branches" deals with the pain, struggle, and anger Bazan faced and continues to face as realized, "Hey, this whole religion thing just isn't workin' out for me." As a friend of mine describes it, it's the perfect companion music to the Bill Maher documentary, "Religilous". His former brothers and sisters in Christ aren't so happy with him, let's just say. The album is quite a statement and the songs are both lyrically thoughtful and enjoyable from a musical sense as well.

9. Vizqueen, "Message to Garcia"

There isn't much mystery behind the sound of Seattle's Vizqueen. It's punk influenced, straight plain ol' rock and roll influenced, up tempo, good music. I posted a link to an article on front woman Rachel Flotard on The Hidden Chord's Facebook page. I strongly recommend reading this. It's a touching story, which makes you appreciate the spirit behind the music.

8. Mos Def, "The Ecstatic"

For awhile there, Mos Def was turning into purely an actor. Not an uncommon transition for hip-hop/rap stars, but still, this is one talented guy musically as well, and he proves it with "The Ecstatic". I said earlier I'm probably not the best judge of pop music. The same probably goes for rap/hip-hop. Why do I like this album? I just kinda do. Mos Def is a great MC and the beats are...see I don't know how to describe them. I just like it, ok!!!!

7. Dirty Projectors, "Bitte Orca"

Hypnotic, at times ambient, a bit experimental--not quite to Animal Collective lengths, but enough to use the label. I don't want to get too far ahead of myself here, but one of the best songs of the year is on this album. Will it be #1? Possibly. What else can I say about this album? It's got that many layered thing that a lot of good indie rock goes for these days. It can be quiet and calming, but then they pull out something that sounds Led Zeppelin-esque. Comfort food for the ears.

6. The Xx, "Xx"

Uh oh, another contender for #1 song of the year is on this album...who will it be??? These kids...well they're just kids for one!!!...are pretty damned amazing with a fairly basic sound. Not a whole lot of layers going on here. Interesting vocals...which is kind of strangse to say because the delivery of the vocals are almost done in a disinterested sort of way. I'll use the term I used above with Dirty Projectors--hypnotic. You can't help but get pulled in. Lots of good beats, simple effects, guitar, drums...and there you have it.

5. Phoenix, "Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix"

This album is beyond catchy. So catchy in fact, Cadillac had to swipe the song 1901 for itself and kill it for the rest of us! Reminded me of what happened with Santogold (or is it Santigold?) last year. Well, at the very least, I hope they got a nice paycheck for it. This is a fun, dance-able, almost disco-ish album at times, that goes by quickly--too quickly in fact.

4. Bob Dylan, "Together Through Life"

This was one weird, yet productive year for the nearly 70 year old Dylan. Early in the year, he releases "Together Through Life", which was co-written with Robert Hunter, who co-wrote much of The Grateful Dead's material. And it's a gem, that is for those who appreciate Dylan's vocal "style", filled with Mexican border-town sounding songs helped along by his amazing backing band. During the summer, he was questioned by police in New Jersey for hanging out in the rain in somebody's front yard (apparently he was looking for Springsteen's childhood home). And most recently, he released a Christmas album. He's a tad creepy and weird, but he's not slowing down, and I hope he can keep going for years to come.

3. Animal Collective, "Merriweather Post Pavillion"

Where do you even start with Animal Collective? Nobody, but NOBODY is doing what these guys are doing. I recently read someone say it would have been the type of thing Brian Wilson would have been doing if he would have been in his "Pet Sounds" prime in 2009. It's experimental, to be gentle, so much so in fact, I understand that they have a hard time recreating their sound live. But, here I go again, it's hypnotic (cold meds are apparently limiting my ability to come up with other adjectives!). Time after time, here has been my experience with Animal Collective, "What the hell is this?! I don't know if I can get into it...I'll stay with it for maybe one more song...", yet suddenly I'm six or seven songs in and I can't tear myself away! Animal Collective is as unique as it gets these days!

2. Grizzly Bear, "Veckatimest"

I'm going to do my best not to use the term "hypnotic" here (even though it is!). I feel like this album comes closest in feel to my favorite from last year, "Ragged Wood" by Fleet Foxes, although that's not a completely accurate comparison. It's rich, airy sounding music, filled with great harmonies that I'm sure would sound even better on vinyl, much like with Fleet Foxes. It's epic-sounding indie rock that pulls you into a different state of mind (a very pleasant one, I must say). I think some commercial has gotten a hold of some Grizzly Bear too, but please corporate America, PLEASE, leave them alone!!! It's too good for you!!!

1. The Avett Brothers, "I and Love and You"

If my friend Phillip Groves is reading this, I'm sure he's chalking this selection up to my "folksy" taste in music. Call it what you will, this album is sooo good, though. These guys started out as kind of a bluegrass fusion sort of band (fused with punk, grunge, country, folk, indie rock), but though they've strayed away from their original sound a bit, they're amazing instrumentalists with tons and tons of energy and quite a few thoughts on love and pain and longing. There are quite a few ballads on here, which normally, I'm not a complete fan of, but the vocals are so strong, harmonies so astounding, and songwriting so complete, that I can't help but forgive their sappy side. There's plenty of banjo still around to satisfy early fans, too, I'm sure. And even though it's ballad-heavy, there are a couple of rockers on here that prove that this band can do a little bit of everything.

Honorable Mention:
Girls, "Album"
Dignan, "Cheaters and Thieves"

Top 10 songs of '09

You'll notice a bit of overlap here with artist's albums and their songs, but I suppose that shouldn't come as a surprise. Great songs tend to make the best albums what they are. Without much explanation (sometimes music just needs to speak for itself), here they are:

10. Poker Face, Lady Gaga (It's fun...so sue me!)
9. I Feel A Change Comin' On, Bob Dylan
8. Supermagic, Mos Def
7. Lisztomania, Phoenix
6. While You Wait For The Others, Grizzly Bear (the version with Michael McDonald is surprisingly good too)
5. Basic Space, The Xx
4. My Girls, Animal Collective
3. Wilco (The Song), Wilco
2. Stillness is the Move, Dirty Projectors
1. I and Love and You, The Avett Brothers

Honorable Mention:
Must Be Santa, Bob Dylan
Lovesick Teenagers, Bear in Heaven

Movies of '09

I haven't really seen a lot of movies this year, to be honest with you. Ye Olde recession has made this blogger cut out certain things. I definitely saw a lot more last year and felt I could therefore rank them better. I have seen a few really good ones, which I'll list in no particular order. I still want to see Invictus and Up in the Air, as well (maybe Avatar too). And Inglorious Basterds when it comes out on DVD. Then maybe I'll change this list:

The Hangover (probably my #1...I know I said I wouldn't rank, but I can't think of a better one this year!)
Star Trek
This Is It
(500) Days of Summer
Funny People

Five (plus one honorable mention...so I guess 6 if my basic addition is correct) music stories that impacted 2009 (not top stories because I'm sure there are probably others, but these are up there for me)

Honorable Mention (or #6 as some would choose to say)--Amy Winehouse is Still Alive

I mean, who would have thought...that's all

5. Kanye Goes Crazy At The VMAs

How do you effectively kill your career? Jump on stage during America's sweetheart's acceptance speech and say Beyonce's video was better. Maybe someone should have watched how many bottles Kanye was downing? Maybe? Who knew alcohol could cause such problems? Dramatic career reinvention is pretty trendy these days, though, so maybe it's a good thing in the long run, Kanye.

4. CD Sales Continue to Drop--Digital Has Yet To Make Up the Difference

No surprise here. Call it a the continuing saga of the record industry. I'm sure the business will eventually settle into some sort of groove (kind of a pun?), but right now companies are still making moves and coming up with strategies on how to make money in the industry. Google, Apple, MySpace, Rhapsody...everyone's been jockeying to get in on the latest attempts to redefine the 21st Century face of music. Will they work? Check back with me at this time, not just next year, but the next several years to come.

3. UK Piracy Wars

They're still a little behind the times in the UK when it comes to piracy. Lily Allen was in the middle of a war of words between those who basically said piracy was bad, but it's a necessary evil, and those who said, "Let's crack down on pirates"...followed by an "Arrr!" I'm sure. No one's too thrilled with music piracy, but unfortunately it's here. US companies are looking at ways to give away and/or make music cheap, but still make it somewhat financially viable for all involved...The UK, I'm sure will take that approach soon as well...whether that makes Lily "Smile" or not (Lily Allen had this song called "Smile" and,... oh forget it!).

2. Live Nation and TicketMaster Merge

Pending government approval that is...because, well, to me, and the folks who check on this sort of thing, this seems like a potential monopoly. I think the government has rules against that. It'll probably get worked out eventually, though, which would ultimately unite the largest concert vendor with the largest ticket agency. They say that, together they're going to be able to better serve the concert going public, but something about this relationship makes me a bit squeemish. We'll see.

1. Michael Jackson Dies

Well...yeah. What else was it going to be? The story isn't complete, of course. I wonder if it ever really will be. If Michael Jackson's life wasn't the epitome of tragedy, it certainly was the epitome of the word "bizarre". And now that he's gone, people are once again appreciating his music. I think we all forgot or took for granted just how much amazing work the man put out. Just another strange, sad twist in the man's career, which is now bigger than ever. I'm sure the saga is going to continue to unfold for a long time, with Joe Jackson never too far from it all, trying to cash in.

That's an extremely condensed version of 2009 according to The Hidden Chord. I'm sure 2010 will be filled with more great music, big names and otherwise. Happy Holidays to one and all.

Oh Right...The decade's ending too...More Lists!!!

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 11:19:39 PST

If you are interested, click on the title of this post and it'll lead you to NPR's list of the 50 most important recordings of the '00s or noughties or whatever we're supposed to call this decade that's wrapping up. A strange, fascinating decade it was, from which ever lens you choose to view it through: politics, technology, culture, sports, and of course music.

The decade has seen the decline of what was supposed to be the be-all-end-all format for music: the CD. I remember when CD's first came out. They were supposed to be indestructable--if you took care of them of course. The sound was supposed to be crystal clear--but then people started to realize that when things become crystal clear, a certain richness is lost. Oh yes, they were expensive. How I remember going into Musicland in the Carl Sandburg Mall in Galesburg, IL and having to lay down $20 for a CD. I think I payed around $24 for the White Album, back in the days when buying a CD meant getting a whole lot of extra cardboard packaging. I ended up having to return it because the package contained two Disc Ones and no Disc Two. Oddly enough, I have since lost one of the discs of the White Album. I wonder if it was Disc One, because I sure could use one of those two copies I once had!

But thing changed, as things have a tendency of doing. There is no Musicland anymore, to my knowledge. Not many record stores, period. Fewer and fewer people buy CD's and the industry is struggling for it. Digital sales aren't yet making up for the difference and piracy continues to be an issue. What will the '10s (what are we supposed to call this decade!) look like for the music industry? Streaming seems to be the future, but who the hell knows? Nobody really saw the total collapse of the CD. I'm still convinced the industry will be okay and maybe even better in the long run for indie artists.

It seems like more music than ever came out during this past decade. Bands are everywhere! The rise of Pro Tools has made it easier for bands to take the crappy music they previously played exclusively in their garages and put it down in recorded form, whether anyone asked them or not! So there's plenty to choose from, some good within the loads and loads of crap. Most of it now comes to us via word of mouth rather than traditional ways, who are some of the other victims of the first decade of the 2000s: major record labels, music mags, mainstream radio (RIP, oh you relics of the 20th Century!!!).

And it just seems like there's more variety than ever before. I haven't done this, but I'd venture a guess that if you put up the most important music of the '90s up next to the most important music of the '00s, you'd see a stark contrast. I read somewhere that as time goes on, music just keeps splintering further and further. Is it the result of the decline of the industry? Is it because people are looking for niche music rather than mainstream fluff? Not that mainstream fluff has gone, nor should necessarily, go away--even it has its purpose. Has hipster culture grown so much that there has to be a constant supply of music that so-and-so only knows about, but is sooo much better than what we, the normals, listen to? My answer to every single one of these questions is: I don't know!

But nonetheless, there was a whole lot of great music released this past decade. I've heard and own many of the albums on the various lists, and some are just so ingrained in us that we may not realize that we know these albums, but we actually can't help but know them! I'm not going to make a list of the decade. I'm having a hard enough time with my best of '09 list. Take on the decade? Nope. But I will give you a few of the albums that were with me quite a lot and/or impacted me greatly during this opening decade of the 21st Century. In no particular order:

Radiohead, Kid A
Wasn't this actually released in '99? I feel like I was still in college when it came out, but I could be wrong. And maybe it's counted as being a part of the '00s because of carry over from '99 to '00? Regardless, it was and remains a classic. It's the album that got me into Radiohead. I had been a fan of The Bends, and of course OK Computer, but something with Kid A just clicked. It was the perfect mixing of electronic and rock music. Thom Yorke in ethereal, emotional top form--backed by sonic richness and just amazing SOUND! I can't tell you how many times I played this one when it first came out.

Bob Dylan, Love and Theft
It's weird how your view of an artist changes as you yourself age and/or the artist him/herself ages. Dylan's music had been all around ever since I remember being aware of music, but it was almost a cliche. Nasally Bob could write a great song, but man he was one awful singer! I couldn't get into it. I loved '60s rock, from a very young age, but I would have gladly taken the versions of Dylan's songs by The Byrds, Hendrix, and the many others, over Bob's. As I got a little older though, I began to appreciate it. I bought all three Greatest Hits records and then '01 rolls around and croaking ol' Bob releases Love and Theft--and I really get it. The songs are somehow just right for his worn out voice. They are songs of an aging troubadour. They are songs of a traveller who's got more travelling to do before his day is done. If Woody Guthrie would have made it to old age, I have a feeling his music would have sounded something like this. The songwriting is still amazing, the band is incredible, and I actually enjoy Bob's voice. Personally I think it's purposeful and just right for the songs.

Wilco, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
This is the album that got me into Wilco and I haven't looked back since. This is an album of texture, experimentation, brilliant songwriting. The album is one their record company, Reprise, famously saw as a failure and thus refused to release, but now is near universally lauded as a must-have of the decade (It was released by Nonesuch Records after Wilco left Reprise). The four song sequence of "Jesus Etc", "Ashes of American Flags", "Heavy Metal Drummer", and "I'm the Man Who Loves You", may very well be among the top few best sequences of songs of any album I've heard. The album was the last with master experimenter, the late Jay Bennett (who died this past year), who was quite often at odds with front man, Jeff Tweedy. Great album cover as well: Chicago's Marina City towers, the corn cob-esque structures that sit on the Chicago River. I know I'm not the only one that refers to them now as: The Wilco Buildings.

Gillian Welch, Time (The Revelator)
This is one of the few albums that I've bought twice. I had it downloaded on a different computer, but that computer crashed, taking with it, most of my downloaded music, including Time (The Revelator). I guess you'd qualify this as country music, but it doesn't fit into the Taylor Swift, Tim McGraw, Rascal Flatts vision of country that is predominant today. It's more in the vein of classic country: Patsy Cline, Hank Williams, etc. But then again, it's not a relic at all. And it doesn't quite fit into any of the sub-genres of country music. Folk? Maybe. Whatever it is, Welch's voice is captivating with every brilliant note and lyric. Her voice is at once heartbreaking, rich with life, other-worldly, part of the past, fore-runner of the future, and the thing of pleasant dreams. It's one of those albums I'd probably buy again if I had to!

Those are probably my main favorites of the past decade--at least the one's that had the greatest impact on my CD player/computer--however the songs may have reached my ears. Here's a few more that were in heavy rotation for me in the noughties. Don't consider this a comprehensive list by any means. Just a few of my personal favorites:

Arcade Fire, Funeral
MGMT, Oracular Spectacular
Spoon, Kill the Moonlight/Ga, Ga, Ga, Ga, Ga
O Brother Where Art Thou Soundtrack
OutKast, Stankonia
Sufjan Stevens, Come on Feel the Illinoise!
White Stripes--any and all!
Bright Eyes--also pretty much any and all!
Flaming Lips--Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
Fleet Foxes--Ragged Wood

Like I said, not even close to being a comprehensive list. I'll probably remember quite a few more that I forgot to put on the list. What did you have blaring out of your headphones, car radio, stereo/computer speakers during the past decade?

Next up for The Hidden Chord--a look back at the best albums and songs of 2009. Also I'll mention a couple movies and top music news stories of the year. Sigh! It's a project, let me tell you!

Love's Fall-Out: Mornin' Old Sport--Mourning Sickness

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 08:30:38 PST

I really don't know a whole lot about the band Mornin' Old Sport. I know the following for sure: they are from Boston, they built a high quality recording studio in a basement, and apparently they sometimes communicate with some sort of sound that is similar to a mating call. To each their own, I guess. The following, I don't know for sure, but can fairly confidently assume, that whoever wrote these songs went through an awfully rough bout with love. Break-ups and break-up songs are just one of those things that are timeless, whether we like it or not.

Before I get into the meat of this review, I'll need to let you know the following: I get a little nervous when someone I know says, "Take a listen to these guys and tell me what you think". As I've said before, there are SO many bands out there. And everyone knows someone whose band is "The next big thing", or "underappreciated geniuses", or blah, blah, blah. But sometimes, there are diamonds in the rough, and I love music enough to really hope the next recommendation I get is one of those.
I won't say that this is one of those diamonds, but there is definitely plenty of shimmering going on within Mornin' Old Sport's seven song EP, "Mourning Sickness".

Now as I said, I can't be 100% sure that this is a "break-up album" a la Dylan's "Blood on the Tracks", but if it's not, there's still plenty here about the mystery that is the "relationship". And let's just say for a moment it is a break-up album and all of these songs refer to one woman, well...let's just say the songs wouldn't paint the prettiest of pictures of this person. From everything I've gathered, she'd basically be a cold, ill-communicative, materialistic, manipulator who always needs to be right. Doesn't exactly make you want to track this girl down on Facebook. But then again, this is all conjecture. It would make for an interesting story, though.

To the music...The EP starts out with the song "You're Right", which opens with a bouncy jazz-like piano intro. If you had to look for a "single" on this EP, this would be one of my choices. It's catchy, up tempo and lyrically clever. The singer is trying to explain himself to, apparently, his ex, yet realizes that whatever he says is going to fall on deaf ears. And it doesn't help that, said ex, has plenty of overly agreeable friends who are willing to tell her that she's in the right, no matter if she was or wasn't. There's some barb throwing going on here, and it certainly won't be the last time in the EP.

The second song is my favorite of "Mourning Sickness". "Sucker" sounds like something straight out of ELO's catalog. It's a spirited bit of pop rock, complete with strings and an infectious tempo. I love it when bands can create a contrast of what the music says, versus what the lyrics say. For example, The Beatles created the peppiest song about a seriel killer that one could ever imagine, with "Maxwell's Silver Hammer". "Sucker" is not really a happy song despite the cheery tempo. It's song about being discarded by someone, but still wanting to come back for more because there are certain things that drive us all wild. It may be against our better judgment, but sometimes we can't help ourselves. It's all too confusing sometimes and I think that's summed up with this line from the song:

"I'm no better 'cause I can't explain the hurt and anger of being tossed away"

So far, so good with "Mourning Sickness". Quite an impressive one-two punch to start the album.

The next song slows things down a bit and introduces song 1 of 3 that predominantly feature the banjo. There are a lot of instruments featured on this EP. In fact, before I go any futher, I will say that these are well-orchestrated pieces. Knowing very little about the band, as I said earlier, I can only guess this, but it seems like whoever put these songs, and the EP together, knows what they are doing musically speaking. Who knows? Maybe it's all of the band memebers as a whole. Yet, I digress...The name of the next song is "The Most Dramatic Queen in Town" and the banjo and tempo remind me of The Avett Brothers, which are currently up there as one of my favorite current bands. Lyrically, the song seems to be dealing with someone (an ex-girlfriend maybe? a random acquaintance? a fictional character?) who is so completely obsessed with materialism that she misses the big picture and only sees herself, despite the people in her life that have their own struggles right in front of her face. This fact only seems to be a downer to HER image and HER wants and needs, rather than a wake up call to how life really can be to adults. "You're 18 and still just a child," says the repeated lyric at the end, in an accusatory tone. In reality, though, 18 is still a child, even if the rest of the world tells you otherwise. Cool slide guitar at the end, as well.

I'm with what the band's doing up until this point. At first, I saw this next song, "Out Matched" as my least favorite of "Mourning Sickness". I find the vocalist to be a bit crooner-sounding, which distracts from the lyrics (more on that in a moment, though). I also feel like the song goes on for a bit too long. Once again, there are some surprises in the arrangement, but on first and second listen, I just didn't get it. My third time through, though, was primarily to check out the lyrics of the EP and I've got to say, I was pleasantly surprised that "Out Matched" is probably the strongest lyrically. The song seems to be about trying to figure out why a break-up happened. Who was to blame? Why did we have to play the games that we played? What should have been said but wasn't, but now comes out through second and third hand accounts? Does it matter? There are some really cool lines in here about night, including this one which might be my favorite line of the whole album:

"The night she's a passerby, a runaway"

I really did have some difficulty with the vocals, but this one definitely grew on me.

Next comes a short instrumental piece entitled, "Intermezzo", which basically contains some choral sounding voices, some strings, and the last of the banjo picking. Seemed like a nice way to wrap up that little section of music--almost a bookend, or at the very least, I feel like it was an interesting idea, and maybe even away to continue the musical continuity of the EP.

I said, at first "Out Matched" was my least favorite of "Mourning Sickness", but I actually think it's the next song, which is called, "Broken Lip Service". I guess I was kind of hoping for another bouncy little rocker after the previous three slower tempo songs. And once again, I guess I don't get the vocal style. The crooner style reminds me a little of Antony and the Johnsons, which maybe just means it takes a bit of time getting used to, because I tend to like some of their material. However, I feel like it takes a little something away from the song on the whole. I was a bit confused here with the lyrics as well. It would seem that the singer is having some sort of internal crisis concerning his ex. She speaks what seems like truth, then takes his hand, which feels right, but something about the kiss makes him wants to believe everything she says, but that in turn reminds him that he doesn't beilieve. And I think there might be some reference to fatherly physical abuse as well, but I guess I miss the connection. It is still well arranged, and structurally sound, but I have a hard time with this one.

The last song on "Mourning Sickness" is perfectly placed and redeems any criticism I might have with the prior two songs. "When the Bomb" is a straight to the point, almost Ben Folds sounding, account of what will happen to the singer when "the bomb" drops. "Im ready for the nuclear war," he sings. And I'm pretty sure it's the metaphorical nuclear war, but maybe it's the real deal. Maybe it's just the realization that all of our pain and suffering when it comes to sour relationships don't really mean a whole lot after all:

"But right before it hits, oh God
My heart will be unbroken
'Cause after the explosion
This will all be unimportant
And I won't give a damn
That you never loved me back"

Metaphorical bomb or not, that's another solid barb thrown in the name of love gone bad. The song ends with an epic sounding build and culminates with some nice fuzzy, nuclear fall out-esque distortion, and there you have it. After the bomb drops, all of this "Mourning Sickness" regarding lost or pained love, can be wiped away and forgotten. Time to start fresh, because there's little choice but to move on after everything's been obliterated.

On the whole, I really like this EP, despite the couple weak points. The music is solid and, as I said, the arrangements are engaging. There are a lot of interesting surprises throughout. I do wish there were more songs along the lines of the first two, though. But overall, it's good pop rock, with some sharp, biting lyrics, some brilliant in fact, concerning the crazy, fragile, unstable, yearning thing that is the human heart.

Grade: B

myspace.com/morninoldsport

Thoughts on Live Performances

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 10:40:47 PST

Those who know me or have ever read anything I've written, probably know about my Steve Goodman obsession. For those who don't know, Steve Goodman was a Chicago-born singer-songwriter, best known today for penning the tune played after every Chicago Cubs home victory, "Go, Cubs, Go". He also wrote classic songs such as "City of New Orleans", "Banana Republics", and "You Never Even Call Me By My Name". He died of leukemia in 1984.

Why am I bringing up Steve Goodman in my blog today (considering that I have spoke of him so much...yeah you probably get it, I love the guy's music)? Because I happened over this:

http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/steve-goodman/concerts/bottom-line-march-30-1977-early-show.html

First off, Wolfgang's Vault is an incredible website that allows you to stream, free I might add, many a classic concert, by many a classic artist. It's a pretty incredible site (giving away free stuff is the way to go these days, I've said it once, I'll say it again). Two Steve Goodman concerts, recorded on the same day in New York in March of 1977, when I was just 2 months old, are featured here. Being a Goodman fan, I lept at the opportunity to hear one of his live performances.

The thing about Steve Goodman, is he was for all intents and purposes, a commercial failure. He was INCREDIBLY talented, but poorly marketed and really his albums were way over-produced. But live...wow! I'd heard a couple of live performances and own the one live concert dvd that is available for purchase, which is really what hooked me on his music. The man was a true performer in every sense of the word. His voice had such amazing range, being able to handle gentle ballads, the soulful and bluesy, folk sing-a-long tunes, and just about anything else. His guitar playing was astounding. I've really never, ever heard a style like his--one which covers the rhtythm and lead parts all in one, while also providing at times, a distinctly percussive element. And his stage presence was electric. He was a master storyteller with a quick wit. Listen to the concert and you'll hear it all.

There are a couple of things that you hear in Goodman's performance that you just don't hear with anyone around these days. First of all, incredible phrasing. Phrasing isn't really something you hear a lot of people talk about, and really when it comes to most pop and rock, it's not an issue. The lyrics of most popular songs tend to be fairly basic and are thus set to the, usually pretty standard 4/4 time signature, in a fairly comfortable, easily digestable way. But to me, a master at phrasing can make an enormous difference. Phrasing is often times a term reserved for jazz, which makes sense, I suppose, because generally speaking the rhtyhms are more varied and arrangements are more complex, so naturally this lends better for either interesting vocal or instrumental phrasing. People like Ella Fitzgerald were masters at taking lyrics and making them float and dance in ways you never thought possible. For pop/rock purposes, Bob Dylan is quite adept at phrasing. You sort of have to know what you're doing phrasing-wise when you have lyrics like this:

"While preachers preach of evil fates
Teachers teach that knowledge waits
Can lead to hundred-dollar plates
Goodness hides behind its gates
But even the president of the United States
Sometimes must have
To stand naked. "--from It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)

Alright, so I'm a Dylan fan, too and don't mind extolling my love for his music every chance I get either. But lyrics like that don't necessary flow easily into a pop song structure. A little creative phrasing is needed and Dylan, along with Steve Goodman if you take a listen, are masters of this.

Another quality of Steve Goodman, which once again fits with Dylan (surprise, surprise), is his ability to take a song and make it into something completely different from the version you hear on the record. I know some people are more than content to hear a band play a song exactly like they're used to, but what's the point? Artists who have the ability to make a live performance into a true unique experience, are few and far between. We live in times where so many artists lip synch to an auto tune version of themselves to make them sound perfect at every performance. But why, I ask? Why am I going to pay ridiculously high prices to see you live, when I could hear the same thing sitting at home away from sweaty drunk dudes who are constantly bumping into me who are shouting along to every lyric, making it difficult to even hear your oh-so-perfect performance? To be in your presence? That's cool for a minute or two, but gets old real fast when I know how this whole show is going to go down by the time you lauch into your third song.

I think the beauty of live music is its unpredictability, its "in-the-moment" quality, it's potential to both fall apart and to transcend at the same time. I saw Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers around '94 or '95, and Petty, the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer that he is, accidentally repeated a verse in the song "Into the Great Wide Open", which wasn't supposed to be repeated. Oh well. It happens. It didn't take anything away from the show, which stands as one of the best concerts I've ever been to. It almost enhanced it in a strange way. Now to know this about the Goodman concert, you'd have to be familiar with his albums, but trust me, he takes what's on there and makes it into something right for the moment in time. And Goodman has a cold during this performance, but he keeps right with it and makes it into a one-of-a-kind experience that was most certainly different from his previous show and the one he would do after this one. That's what artists and performers do (right?).

And okay, maybe some of Goodman's material sounds a little cheesy for our "oh-so-serious" sensibilities. He sung folk songs, yes, but he sung a lot more too. Can I ever see someone being taken seriously these days opening a show with "Red, Red Robin" or having a song called "Chicken Cordon Blues"? Maybe on the folk circuit, yes, but not on a mainstream level. You may now be shaking your head in embarrassment, but stay with me if you will. I don't care who you are or how deep and/or serious your music tastes are, listen to this concert and you will find something that you enjoy within it. Not only was Goodman one hell of a musician, he played with joy, to make people laugh, smile, have a good time. I like a ton of indie rock, but I sometimes feel like so much of it is stripped of pure joy. And yes, there's something maybe a little old-fashioned (the title of one of Goodman's songs, by the way) or corny about a lot of his music, but I don't see one thing wrong with that. Aren't we allowed to like the artsy along with the plain ol' fun?

Sure, music tastes are subjective, no doubt about it. Maybe you'll listen and just won't like it. And that's fine, even though you're obviously wrong. But at the same time, you have to respect what the man did within a live setting. He was a genuine, all-around showman. He could engage a live audience like none other. I can think of no one around these days who can lay such a claim. Not even the aforementioned Mr. Dylan. My advice to artists these days would be to consider what it means for someone to buy a ticket to see you live. Someone is taking their hard earned money, which is even harder to come by in times like these, and paying you for a memorable, enjoyable performance. Even with a local band, who you pay less for, you still are forking over some cash with hopes of an EXPERIENCE. I never got the chance to see Steve Goodman play live as he died when I was just seven years old, but from hearing from others who did see him, I've only heard rave things about being witness to one of his incredible shows. Imagine that for a minute. Twenty-five years after the man left this earth, people still talk about the greatness of his shows! Some of that was raw talent, of course, but some of that was learning the craft of not only being a musician, but an all around performer who takes risks night in and night out. Give me an imperfect, yet energized performance any day! Today's performers, take heed!

3 Songs on Shuffle

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:29:29 PST

Here's how this works. Make sure iTunes is on shuffle and see what three songs end up playing. Write about said three songs. Nothin' too bewildering about the process of this particular entry. I'm starting out this morning with The Beach Boys and "Wouldn't It Be Nice" and seeing where things lead me. Almost scrapped the idea entirely, though, to listen to all of "Pet Sounds". Such a great album! But no, this is an excercise in discovery and re-discovery, so here goes:

Jesus Don't Want Me For A Sunbeam, Nirvana, Unplugged in New York
Wow! Haven't heard this track in so long. Probably played this album 800 + times when it first came out. It was actually the album that made me REALLY get Nirvana. This was a talented band and this was the album that captured the sentiment that this was not just some loud rock and roll band. This song is not a Nirvana original and many of the songs are more reflective of Kurt and the band's diverse music tastes, rather than the actual catalog. Kurt's sounding great and the band sounds tight. A lot's being said about Nirvana once again, with two major recent releases ("Bleach" 20 year anniversary re-release and a new concert DVD). And I'm sure there will be plenty more being said within the next couple years since soon it will have been 20 years (!) since the release of "Nevermind", which still stands as THE classic album of the last 20 years. A band like Nirvana hasn't been seen since, nor probably ever will be.

Smiles (Single Version), Spiritualized, The Complete Works Vol. 1.
I came to this band late as well. Much less known of a band to come to late, though, but certainly not a minor act. I really liked their most recent release, "Songs in A & E", which was more reflective than much of their earlier work, which is understandable considering co-frontman Jason Pierce's near fatal illness, which heavily influenced the tone of the record. This is largely an instrumental song, that kind of has a "Satisfaction" riff going on. There's plenty of distortion and guitar effects in this tune that starts slow and builds to a blood vessel rupturing burn right around the 3:45 mark. The word for this is, "cacophony" (just like using that word)--horns, manic drums, strings?. Smiles all around, indeed.

Oceans & Streams, The Black Keys, Attack and Release
I mentioned these guys in my last blog entry. This is soul music meets grungy, dirty rock and roll music. The Black Keys could have been a late '60s psychedelic garage band. Their music's got that raw, jangly (one of the more overused rock descriptors, but hey, it works) sound to it. There isn't too much to say about this track. It's straight ahead rock and roll. I like the new stuff that's filled with layer upon layer, but sometimes it's also nice to curl up with a nice, stripped down, rock song. I'll take it!

Those songs go together really well, actually. My iTunes collection on shuffle is a better program director than most on modern rock radio! Probably isn't an accident that the songs go together so well. Technology is scary smart sometimes. I'd like to see it write reactions to each of the songs it plays, though! Ha! Gotcha, computer! I better not antagonize it.

How about a link to something Nirvana. From the aforementioned concert DVD "Live at Reading/1992", here's a song from the aforementioned album, "Bleach". I'll also put it up on The Hidden Chord FB page. Become a fan today!

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

Cliched Songs for Bad Weather and Other Stuff About Good Music

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 09:50:34 PST

Just so you know, it's a gloomy, rainy, generally nasty day outside here in Chicago. It's getting to be the time of year that the weather officially gives us midwesterners its annual beat-down. Not fun, but it gives one plenty of extra time to curl up under a blanket, get a steaming cup of coffee (Irish or not...but the Irish version is a whole lot more fun) or cocoa or hot cider or tap water, and read your favorite blog. Today's post is rather disjointed, so prepare for a little bit of this and that without much direction!

I fired up the ol iTunes this morning with "Riders on the Storm" by The Doors. Kind of a predictable choice for a stormy day, I know, but I hadn't heard the song in awhile and it brings back plenty of memories--Wisconsin wilderness camp counseling for one, driving down the highway in the midst of a storm when the song comes on and helps punctuate the night with a little extra creepiness and potential for sinister happenings, etc. Jim's voice was/is the night. The song has the extra effect of the "whisper track", as after The Doors recorded the song, they had Jim whisper the song for overdub purposes, and the effect is pretty brilliant if you ask me. Does anyone listen to The Doors anymore? I feel like they've faded from our collective music consciousness to a certain degree. I'm not The Doors fan I once was, but I think there's still plenty of brilliance to be found amidst the cliches, at times weak lyrics, and Morrison drunkenness.

Just downloaded tracks from Them Crooked Vultures and Bear in Heaven. Them Crooked Vultures is the supergroup consisting of John Paul Jones (Led Zeppelin), Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters, Nirvana), and Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age). It's good when the music lives up to the hype. The last supergroup that I was excited to hear was Audioslave, but honestly, apart from one or two songs, I was pretty disappointed. So of course, being burned before, I came at this one with interest, but a touch of skepticism. It's actually good, though. It's what you would hope from two guys who were part of two of the most amazing bands of all time--good rock & roll music. My advice for supergroups is this (since I'm sure they care about my opinion): don't get cute, just play the damn music. Dave Grohl's been doing the extra poppy Foo Fighters thing for a long time now and JPJ, well I'm not sure what he's been doing besides the one Zeppelin reunion show, which came after Page/Plant had been snubbing the dude for years. But together with Homme, the result (at least the three tracks I've heard) is pretty engaging. The song I just had on, "Scumbag Blues" is a great rock song, complete with a funky organ riff. I'm interested to hear the rest of the album.

Bear in Heaven came to me as a recommendation from a friend. Most of my music comes from friend recommendations, these days actually. Pitchfork, everyone's favorite snobbish music site, also gave the album high marks. I guess you'd call it "indie pop"? Maybe "indie rock"? The description is so vague that you might as well just say it's music with guitars, drums and a singer and effects and "is that a synthesizer?", and you'd be just as, if not more descriptive than you would be by using those weak labels. Regardless of what you call it, pretty good stuff, indeed! As is "in" these days, the band's sound is packed with many a layer. Elements of electronic music, "alternative" rock, atmospheric Animal Collective type stuff...a blog I read compares them to A Place to Bury Strangers without the darkness (I'm really not too familiar with A Place to Bury Strangers, so I don't know if that's accurate or not). I can imagine hipsters dancing badly, trying to look oh-so-much-better-than-the-rest-of-the-world to this music. Despite that, I'm gonna go with a recommendation with this one.

Ramona Falls, "Intuit" is also an excellent album that I've got in heavy rotation right now. I guess you could put them in a similar category as Bear in Heaven, but more on the indie rock side and less electronic and effects heavy (although there is some of that). It still has that atmospheric feel to it, but it's more echoey and almost orchestral at times. On one or two tracks, the lead singer starts sounding a little like Antony of Antony and the Johnsons. Check out the video for their song "I Say Fever". Highly recommended.

The Black Keys are getting ready to release a rap-rock album. The term rap-rock makes me squeemish, yet from what I hear, it's the jangly guitar/psychadelia of The Black Keys, mixed with rap from MC's the calliber of Mos Def and Raekwon. So good rap-rock? Release date is November 27 and it's called Blackroc. Hoping for good things from this one.

That's it for now. Just a little randomness for a rainy day. To sum things up, still, no one is making money in the music industry, ticket prices are too high for big name acts, but there's still a lot of great music to be discovered.

Check out this little piece from Bear In Heaven and La Blogotheque from 2006...Once again this isn't linked, so just copy and paste into your browser. Trust me, it's worth it...It's arty and fabulous:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3a9rlg19IQ

"One Fast Move or I'm Gone"-- Jay Farrar and Benjamin Gibbard's take on Kerouac's "Big Sur"

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 10:46:07 PDT

"'One Fast Move or I'm Gone' so I blow $8 on a cab to drive me down that coast, it's a foggy night tho sometimes you can see stars in the sky to the right where the sea is, tho you cant see the sea you can only hear about it from the cabdriver--'What kinda country is it around here? I've never seen it." from "Big Sur", Jack Kerouac 1962.

I'm a bit obsessed with the Jay Farrar/Benjamin Gibbard collaboration, "One Fast Move or I'm Gone." It could very well be due to the fact that I'm a Kerouac fan and a fan of the novel which it is based on, "Big Sur". It could be that I'm a fan of Jay Farrar and all of his projects (Uncle Tupelo, Son Volt). Maybe I'm pleasantly surprised with Benjamin Gibbard, he of Death Cab for Cutie fame, a band that I don't really hold in too high regard. Maybe it really is a good album.

It's a Jay Farrar album, really. He "wrote" the songs. I put "wrote" as a quotation because many of the lyrics are direct quotes from Kerouac's novel. I guess you could say Farrar developed the musical score. It is actually the score to the film, "One Fast Move or I'm Gone", which is a fascinating look into how the novel came about and what Kerouac was going through at the time.

For those that don't know Kerouac's works, first of all, I'm sorry. Second of all, they are less works of fiction, than literary expositions on actual events that happened in Kerouac's life. It was his thought that all of his novels were just chapters in his overall life story, which he entitled, "The Duluoz Legend". This particular chapter, is probably one of the darkest, grittiest, horribly truthful chapters in that "Legend".

It is three years after the publication of "On the Road" and Kerouac has been constantly barraged by all that comes with being crowned "King of the Beats". Women want him. Men want to be him. Everyone wants to have a drink with him and Jack NEVER turns down a drink. In fact, he uses alcohol more than ever during this period. He very well may have been the first celebrity in our modern celebrity obsessed culture.

In an attempt to dry out and escape from the pressures of his new found fame, he takes the California Zephyr (a train I've taken many a time from Chicago all the way west to Galesburg, IL) west to San Francisco to spend some solitary time at Lawrence Ferlinghetti's cabin in Big Sur (Ferlinghetti is still alive and well and very much a part of City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco, which he founded. His first hand accounts add a ton to the film).

But upon reaching San Francisco, Jack goes on a drinking binge and all is not well. He eventually does make it to the cabin, and for a moment or two, enjoys the solitutde, but then finds himself bored, lonely, and surrounded by death and all that can be sinister and terrifying about nature. The story will bounce back between San Francisco and the cabin, which Kerouac returns to, this time with others, for more drinking. His old road buddy, Neal Cassady joins the cast of characters as well, though, Kerouac speaks with regret of all the time that has gone by between them.

The book is about alcoholism, madness, lonliness, the nature of human relationships, with a touch of optimism, as well, though. Where many of Kerouac's novels move quickly, filled with bop rhythm, bounding along like a Charlie Parker solo, this one plods a little more. I don't say that in a negative way. It just has to, considering the subject matter. There is plenty of trademark Kerouac free-flowing style, yes, but rather than being about the high of Saturday night, "Big Sur" is largely about the morning after.

In fact, before downloading this album, I listened to some samples and read some customer reviews. One of the main criticisms seemed to be that Kerouac is known as a jazz author. How can one take a mid-tempo, at times alt-country-ish album, to seriously be a reflection of any Kerouac writing?

I think the people who made those comments probably have yet to pick up "Big Sur". And I'm not saying you have to know the novel to appreciate the album, but it certainly wouldn't hurt.

The album, like the book itself, is a mixture of hope and despair. Appropriately enough, most of the despair fueled songs (Breathe Our Iodine, San Francisco) are sung by Jay Farrar, who has the deeper, slightly gravelly voice, suited to lonesome country. While the more upbeat songs (California Zephyr, These Roads Don't Move) are sung by the more melodic voice of Ben Gibbard. There are exceptions to the rule, but this formula works very nicely to reflect the mood of the book. I'm definitely a Jay Farrar fan, but the one criticism that I've had of him is that his voice can sound a little monotonous after awhile. Having someone to break that up, lends well to the overall feel and pacing of the album.

A couple of the songs fall flat, "Final Horrors" and "The Void" are okay, but I could do without them. The first track and last track are probably my favorites. "California Zephyr" with its cross-country rail journey optimism and "San Francisco" with it's dark, dingy feel and mournful harmonica. "These Roads Don't Move" and "One Fast Move or I'm Gone" are also favorites.

Maybe I can't be objective about this album. The combination of Kerouac and Farrar speaks right to my tastes. At the same time, though, I did have heightened expectations, which I will say were mostly fulfilled. The acoustic songs are fairly simple in form, but they allow Kerouac's words and textures to sit front and center, which I think was the point. If you don't know "Big Sur" you should at the very least be a fan of Jay Farrar's work to appreciate this album, I think I can safely say that. Some Death Cab for Cutie fans may be disappointed, actually.

It's been forty years to the month since Jack Kerouac died as the result of his alcoholism. With this knowledge, the book can at times be a very hard read. The ironic thing, though, is that without his fast living, hard drinking, and need to live life with a voracious appetite for all things, his books would not have happened. And those works have inspired so many, from Farrar and Gibbard, to Jim Morrison, Bob Dylan, Patti Smith, and myself (not that I dare try to include myself with the likes of those great artists!). It's a strange world we live in, but I'd say a much better one for Jack Kerouac having been in it. I'll leave the last words to him:

"Something good will come out of all things yet--And it will be golden and eternal just like that--There's no need to say another word."

Concert Review: Dignan, The Rocketboys, So Long Forgotten, Warehouse City

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:43:06 PDT

Martyr's--Chicago, IL, 10-15-09

Let me set the scene for you for a moment. It is October in Chicago, but at the time of the concert feels like November/December with the cold bite in the air. The rain is light, but of late, it's felt like what I imagine London feels like (never been there, but I've seen movies): rainy, blustery, kind of dark most of the time. Here it is a week and a day later and we'd been visited by temps in the 60s and 70s and actually a sunny day or two. Rainy again now, though. This weather'll mess with you. That's Chicago for you, a giver of generous little moments, yet unafraid to smack you in the face with cold, cold reality.

But going to see live music on a Thursday night at Martyr's has a way to make one forget about the weather conditions. It's particularly exciting when several bands are on the bill, and I'm only familiar with one. The potential for discovery is as prevalent in the air as the chance for all sorts of precipitation and/or weather calamities. Nothing surprises me anymore in these parts.

The show actually starts nearly on time, which is a rarity for rock shows of any size. The first band that comes on is So Long Forgotten from Champaign, IL. I'm sure it must be weird to be first on a four band bill. I'm one of a handful of people in the club, which is a decent place to see a show. It's basically one large rectangle of a room. A pillar partially obscures my view, but that's because I'm at a table by the window. The tables on the floor and the bar have unobscured views, unlike some places where no matter where you're at, you have something blocking you. At past shows I've seen here, the sound hasn't been great, and I think that tends to be true if the band playing is generally loud. So Long Forgotten is pretty loud. Screaming hard rock type of band. Has the feel of a band that could have fit in with the late '90s hard rock scene: Korn, Tool, Deftones, etc. Not bad, but not really my type of music anymore. They have a couple of good songs, but once again, the volume thing is an issue. It was strangely quiet between songs and I could tell the lead singer was a little nervous with "between songs banter". Part of that probably had to do with the fact that there was probably no more than 15 people in the club at the time, 10 of whom were probably in the other bands.

A strange scene has also been building at the window directly behind me. A crowd of probably about eight younger looking people bundled in blankets are pressed up against the window watching. They clap at the end of songs and seem to be trying to enjoy the show despite being stuck in the elements. At first I thought they were smokers (oh how I'm grateful of the city wide smoking ban!), but it becomes clear, and this was confirmed to me later, that they are underage fans of one of the bands. I feel slightly guilty sitting probably no more than four feet in front of them, in the warmth of the building, drinking a beer. But I will say, that's dedication. Hopefully whatever band they were there to see rewards them well for their loyalty. In the end, extreme loyalty like this is what the 21st century rock act needs more than anything.

So Long Forgotten ends and as Dignan (who is the band I specifically came to see) sets up, a friendly young guy starts chatting me up. I probably should have known from his indie rock haircut and clothes that he was in one of the bands, but it wasn't until he revealed he was from Austin that it became clear. Sure enough, Justin is in the band The Rocketboys, who would be playing after Dignan. And either he knows instinctively or through being in a touring band for awhile, that making connections with people is what music is all about. Friendliness to new faces is what every band should strive for, second in importance in my opinion, only to making sure you put forth quality music. We chatted about Austin, one of my favorite topics, and South By Southwest (or South-by as insiders like to call it), about Dignan, who happens to be their tourmates.

Justin reminded me of the guys from the band The Shackeltons, who are a band from Pennsylvania who I met at SXSW one year and had the chance to feature on a podcast. Friendly, enthusiastic, unpretentious, and just seeming to enjoy the life of a touring musician. Guys like this get a kick out of talking to fans and talking about what they do. For a minute they can kind of feel like big shots, which is mostly pretty uncommon considering the amount of bands out there now that they have to compete for attention with. So it was nice to meet the guy and at the very least, whether he knew it or not, it achieved the goal of piquing my curiosity about his band. I have considered leaving after Dignan, but now I wanted to see what The Rocketboys were about too. Personal connections go a long way.

Dignan came on, and from the beginning of their set, it was clear that this is the type of band that fits this venue: one that uses dynamics rather than playing one very loud volume. Dignan is a band that creates a mood with its music. It is filled with texture and layers. Definitely elements of Fleet Foxes and Grizzly Bear at work, but to leave it at that would be doing an injustice to them. There's a certain originality I can't quite put my finger on, as well. They have a guy who plays accordian for god's sake! He also picked up a trumpet and played some xylophone as well. It's "landscape" type music--painting a rich pastoral scene, rather than right to the point music, which has its place and purpose, but looks to thrash you directly in the head. Also got a chance to talk to a couple of members of this band, who seemed really tired, but also very humble and appreciative that I'm a fan of their music. In fact, they genuinely seemed surprised that I came for them. "How did you hear about us again?" is what one of the members asked be, in a state of genuine puzzlement.

The Rocketboys were up next and they turn out to be of a similar vein as Dignan. Working dynamics, xylophone usage, hell a couple of their members even LOOK like they could be in Fleet Foxes. With six members, there are a lot of these Rocketboys, but they use their numbers well. The only criticism I really have for them and for Dignan is that the lyrics aren't quite on par with the music. And maybe that's just something that will develop, as both of these bands seem REALLY young. But this is the type of music that one doesn't have to know a single lyric to appreciate. I've always thought that Radiohead is much the same. In fact it is quite difficult to understand Mr. Yorke at times. Difference is, though, that when you do get around to hearing Radiohead's lyrics, you realize, "Wow! These are good too!" Radiohead's been around for slightly longer than these guys, though. I'm not saying either will ever be on par, but with time, who knows.

I do like the general direction that indie rock has been going in during the past couple of years. As I said before, there is definitely a time and place for loud rock and roll, but the richness and texture of Fleet Foxes, Grizzly Bear, and those in the same vein, such as the two aforementioned bands that played at Martyr's, makes for an interesting, multiple times listenable experience.

The last band of the night was a band called Warehouse City. I guess they're local to Chicago, but the other bands on the bill hadn't heard of them. Pretty much straight ahead rock and roll, with a touch of blues and Jack White sounding guitar solos. It was good, but didn't really fit with the other bands of the night. They said it was their last show ever, but who knows, maybe it was and maybe it wasn't. Rock bands are known to say things that aren't exactly true. The high point of their set was a cover of Sam Cooke's Your Love Keeps Liftin' Me Higher. Energetic, bar band rock and roll at its finest. But still, the bookends of this evening were a little out of place compared to the middle two.

There you go! That review took me over a week to complete. Life kind of piles up and you put things on the backburner and, oh well! It's my blog, I don't have to explain anything! If you're still with me here at the end here's what's (hopefully) in store for this blog:

Excited to take a listen to the Jay Farrar/Ben Gibbard collaboration, "One Fast Move or I'm Gone." which is a musical interpretation of Jack Kerouac's darkest novel, "Big Sur". I'm a big Jay Farrar fan and Kerouac is my favorite writer, so I'm intrigued by this. Especially intriguing is the collaboration with Death Cab's Ben Gibbard. I am no fan of Death Cab for Cutie, let me just say that right here. but I've previewed a little of this album and I've liked what I've heard thus far. Next blog will probably be a review.

Also, podcast collaborator Joao Morlett has expressed eagerness to get to work on a new podcast. He apparently has a lot to say about a dear departed musical icon who apparently made a tape while talking to his rabbi (what???). Anyway, I'll see if I can coordinate the schedules of Joao and the supremely popular Phillip Groves, whose talents far surpass this humble blog/podcast, but hopefully he'll grace us with his presence. Maybe we'll add a couple more to the mix too. And maybe a second microphone to the mix. And a mixer to the mix. Look for, conservatively speaking, a December release date for that.

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3 Songs on Shuffle (Live Sufjan Stevens by Clicking Here!!!)

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 10:00:19 PDT

October is almost here and I feel like I sense Autumn before I actually feel it. Maybe the date on the calendar just triggers some switch in my brain that recalls fallen leaves, apple cider, and brisk days of Autumn's past. Who knows?

Currently listening to a band called Girls. The song album, which is called "Album" (catchy title), is very good. A lot of old influences at work--'60s rock and soul definitely. Will probably be giving this another listen soon.

Song 1: Come On! Feel the Illinoise!, Sufjan Stevens
Title track from Sufjan Stevens' great 2007 album. This is the guy who of course claimed he wanted to make an album for each of the 50 states. He's done one for Illinois and for Michigan, so if he was being truthful, he's got some work to do. Sufjan's music is filled with a lot of interesting stuff--polyrhythms, horns, bells, layering of textures, mood shifts. It's kind of like an indie rock symphonic piece. Being from Illinois, the album is extra fun (current part of the song is talking about being approached by the ghost of Carl Sandburg), but this was pretty well-loved outside of my homeland, so I hear. Apparently Sufjan is getting ready to release an all instrumental album soon. Can't wait!

Song 2: Possum, Phish
Ok, I'm not a huge Phish fan. I liked their album "Farmhouse", but jam bands occasionally get on my nerves. Maybe you need to be on 'shrooms and at their concert to "get" a 25 minute all out jam. Can't you accomplish it a little quicker? I mean, these are rock chords they are jamming on, not complex jazz chords. There's only so much you can do. All right, I'm sounding a bit elitist. On the other hand I do like improvised music and a lot of their songs are fun. They're pretty good musicians, even though Trey Anastasio's voice is kind of hit or miss. I downloaded this for a couple of their covers, which they provide ample amounts of. I'm always intrigued by cover songs. I like to see what direction a band takes with the work on a artist that may be completely different. This tune I think is a Phish original that clocks in at a mere 8:25. It's all right. Good fun rock and roll. I still prefer The Dead, though.

Song 3: Strange Condition, Pete Yorn
I guess the iTunes is giving me some live stuff to work with. This was somewhat of a radio hit. It's got a lot of pop sensibility to it. I like this version. Pete's voice isn't as polished as the album version. Little bit more gravel and drawl in it, which I enjoy a lot more than hearing someone hitting every note spot on. He gets his point across a lot quicker than Phish. Not to say that I'm particularly bowled over by this performance. I think I've heard this song too many times to have a lot of opinion on it.

There's three songs for you to ponder, as you ponder the advent of Autumn, as well. Nothing particularly Autumny about the above three, but I think songs have a way of taking on a different life in different parts of the year. Are summer hits as powerful during the winter? If the song "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley would have been released during autumn rather than summer, would it still have been such a big hit?

The songs playing right now are actually a lot more interesting than 2/3 of what I just wrote about. Oh well, shuffle'll help you and it'll let you down sometimes too. Enjoy your Sunday!

Click on today's blog title for a live performance of Sufjan Stevens performing the song "The Man From Metropolis Steals Our Hearts".

Anarchy in the UK: The Fight over File-sharing on Stage in Great Britain

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 13:52:45 PDT

If you're not up to speed on the Lily Allen's "controversial" stand on file-sharing, check this out:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2009/sep/24/behind-music-industry-war

If we're going to be honest with ourselves, we all know that file sharing is not good for musicians, at least the way it exists right now. At least from a short-term financial standpoint. And for those trying to break into the business, short-term is really all they have, as the majors have little tolerance for sitting around and watching to see if a band develops. Now, file-sharing may create a substantial buzz for a band, which is great publicity and all, but shouldn't said band be receiving some royalties for every time their song is downloaded?

I'm bringing up the old debate, though. The fact is, the music industry blew it and now they're backpedalling, trying to figure out a way to get out of this mess. Faulting the individual file-sharers isn't the answer. The technology exists, it's easy to use, people love music, so of course they are going to do it. Maybe it's illegal, but virtual illegality seems a lot less harmful than actually walking into a Virgin Megastore (when there were such things) and tucking a copy of Led Zeppelin IV under one's shirt and walking out the door. And is it really that different than making a mix tape for a friend and passing it on?

Well yes, because now you can make mix tapes for thousands and thousands of your "closest" internet buddies. Maybe the file-sharing sites themselves should be sending out checks to ASCAP, BMI, the RIAA, or directly to the bands that are downloaded the most. Send someone some money! But obviously they aren't making enough money beyond a trickle of ad revenue to make the checks amount to anything substantial.

I was actually reading up on Frank Zappa yesterday and read something very interesting. Apparently in the mid to late '80s, he had an idea of transferring music via phone or cable lines, directly to the music consumer, with built in software that would account for royalty collection. Zappa dismissed it as a bad idea, but who knew, he was 20 years ahead of his time.

That's where the music industry blew it. They sat on their pot of gold that they earned from ripping off consumers with overpriced cd's and they assumed that it would last forever. If they would have been forward thinking enough in the early to mid '90s, they would have developed the software that could have set the standard for the digital age of music. Instead they watched in horror as the Napsters, Kazaas, and Pirate Bays of the world took the lead. They whined and sued and panicked, but it didn't stop the natural progression of technology and the inevitable destruction of the old order, which continues to this very day.

All this clamouring over who's right and who's wrong seems a little silly to me. Yeah, it does kind of make it hard for new artists to make it when there is little income for them, yet it doesn't mean that it can't happen or that the solution is in somehow ending file-sharing, because that certainly isn't going to happen.

Really, the music industry is facing the same problem that the whole of America is facing: how do we get money flowing like it used to when we actually manufactured stuff? Technology and progress are wonderful things, but they create a lot of challenges and questions. There's no sense fighting it. The best thing to do is to embrace it and start thinking creatively.

I think beyond gimmicks, it's going to be about 1.) quality and 2.) creating an experience that people can't get on their own. I read a quote from Joel Madden of the group Good Charlotte that encapsulates the whole "experience" issue:

" my biggest frustration is that kids today won't get the same excitement I did running to sam goody or tower and buying the album I'd been waiting for, running home and opening it reading it the whole way thru while I listened. That's why we are here in the first place. The experience. Seems like its gone."

That particular "experience" may be gone, but that doesn't mean new, maybe even better experiences can't be formulated. Here's a novel idea: how about creating experiences that don't rip off the consumer like the Sam Goody's of the world were notorious for (almost $20 for a CD...come on guys!). Record labels and artists are going to have to create that experience through websites and through innovative approaches that connect them closer to their audience than bands in the past could ever dream of. It may not be the same as unpeeling the cellophane off of a vinyl record or cd jewel case, but I think there are unlimited directions one can go in with the internet when it comes to creating an "experience". Forget the old ways, guys and gals, it's time to embrace the 21st century and start creating new experiences. Just like they say in one of my favorite movies, the ever-so-cheesy, yet heartwarming, "Field of Dreams": People will come. I think it's going to take the right combination of giving away tons of music, creating a whole lot of interesting concert opportunities, maybe re-inventing the idea of the fan club, and creating website content that blows people away. Oh yeah, and it's gonna take a whole lot of serious legwork, too, but in the end, people will come. And if you give them something to be excited about, they'll even pay for it! Just watch.

Eventually the industry will find its footing. And I hope the ones who benefit in the long run are the hard-working, talented artists and the fans. Let the backward thinking big-time executives and major labels fall by the wayside!

The Working Musician and Fall Releases (part 1)

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 11:00:23 PDT

I just realized that over the past two and a half to three years, I've flown four times--twice to Austin, TX and twice to Orlando, FL. Upon return from my two Austin trips, I had a lot to say about music and I had a lot of new music to listen to. Upon my return from my Orlando trips, not so much. I just returned yesterday from my second Orlando trip in two years, and I guess it's well known that you don't go to Florida for the music scene necessarily--unless you REALLY like Disney music and/or High School Musical, which I guess still qualifies as Disney music, but instead of cartoons, one gets over-caffienated high schoolers singing about everything.

But if you are at Disney World and really want to hear music, the place to go is to Epcot Center and their World Showcase area. In addition to all the food and souveniers (I know, I was shocked too...Disney World is commercial!) from the countries represented, you usually get some regional musical flavor as well. I briefly listened to a decent sounding Celtic Rock band in "Canada". Oh, they had to cheese it up a bit for the Disney crowd, but the music was actually good.

There was also the requisite mariachi band in Mexico, oompah band in Germany, and Japanese drumming group in, where else, Japan. I didn't get to see the British Invasion group in the UK, which would have been interesting at the very least.

I wonder about these groups. Do they enjoy their jobs? Do they like having to play the same songs over and over and over, and do the same act over and over and over? Does the tourist crowd ever get to them?

But then again, they have steady gigs, which few working musicians can lay claim to. Many people questioned The Roots when it was announced that they would be the house band for Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, but their response was that it's a steady working gig and there is something reassuring about that.

This wasn't an unknown band saying this, it was one of the most well-known/respected hip-hop groups of recent memory. A solid gig is a solid gig these days. I'm sure for the most part, the theme park performers are probably grateful to be able to play music for a living, even if they do have to caricaturize themselves a little. If I know musicians, I'm sure they have their own side projects away from the parks as well, which is probably what keeps them sane. I mean, The Roots still tour and all. I doubt being second fiddle to Jimmy Fallon is their one and only ambition.

I think what we fail to comprehend sometimes is that there are, quite literally, thousands upon thousands of working musicians--most of whom the mainstream public has never heard of, nor will ever hear of. But they are scraping away to make a living because that's their calling and they can't imagine doing anything else. Even before the recession, these people were struggling. The recession only made things worse, like it did for most everyone. It's too bad there aren't more opportunities or grants for working musicians, but as I've said before on this blog, we are not an Arts friendly nation. We are a nation that loves The Arts, but one that struggles to support artists. It's a weird contradiction, but one that exists nonetheless. As I've also said before, too, the music industry is going through quite an identity crisis right now, and no one is getting paid all that well. The top tier guys'll be okay, but the ones to worry about are the unknowns, the sidemen/women, the behind-the-scenes songwriters, the performers that schlep around to shitty bar gigs night after night in hopes of a few more fans and maybe a couple of dollars.

Keep your theme park band job if you've got it!

Okay, so Fall is here and I feel like Summer's releases were a bit lackluster. Nothing jumps out at me really. Grizzly Bear and Wilco hold the title of my favorite releases so far this year, but beyond that, sure there are things I've liked (Empire of the Sun, The Xx), but where is the album that hijacks my speakers? Fall has some promising candidates (no Arcade Fire or Of Montreal/MGMT collaboration on the list--two of the ones I was looking forward to the most for '09. What happened guys???).

Here are some of the standouts on the Fall list. I'll post a link to the full list, as posted by Rolling Stone Magazine, on The Hidden Chord's Facebook page (tell your friends!):

Pearl Jam (9/20): From about 1992-2001, these guys were my favorite band. They still put on a good show apparently, but even though this album is getting some hype and I've heard a couple decent tracks from it, I just can't get excited about it. They've got one of the exclusivity deals too (Target I believe?), which makes me cringe a little bit. Grunge is dead. Long live the spirit of "Ten".

Monsters of Folk (9/22): Released today is a collaboration between Jim James, M. Ward, Conor Oberst, and another guy. Oh I could look it up, but the three aforementioned are amazing enough for me to not care who the forth one is (sigh! I couldn't stand being a shoddy journalist--fourth guy is Mike Mogis, Conor Oberst's bandmate from Bright Eyes). Supergroups can be extremely hyped, then extremely disappointing (thank you very much Audioslave). Othertimes, though, you get some interesting results (Temple of the Dog--should have stuck with that one, there Chris Cornell!). I've heard a track from these guys, and it sounds good. Interested to hear what else they've got!

The Avett Brothers (9/29): "Emotionalism", their 2007 album, is one that I can listen to over and over. The group is bluegrass at its core, but strays off into punk, grunge, rock, and does so without compromising their amazing musicianship. In a way, they are in a similar vein as My Morning Jacket, in that, they have their Southern roots, but definitely aren't afraid to stretch out a bit, either. Very much looking forward to "I and Love and You".

Ugh! Alice in Chains are releasing a new album. I understand the want and/or need to keep a band alive after the death of a member of your band, but Alice in Chains without Layne Staley seems pretty pointless to me.

One word: Creed.
One reaction: why?
One hope: this album bombs terribly and Scott Stapp goes away.

There's a lot more going on this fall, but I've rambled on quite a lot already, so I'll do a "Fall Releases, part 2" very soon.

Here's a link to the song, "The Fixer" from Pearl Jam's release, "Backspacer". Not a bad song not a great song either. It's solid. Video's directed by Cameron Crowe. Even so, why am I not that thrilled by it? Maybe "Ten" was just too good of a way to start for Pearl Jam. What do you think of this one? Sorry, once again, you've got to copy and paste!

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

3 songs on shuffle (Ezra Furman Video by clicking Here!)

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 10:01:12 PDT

Starting off today listening to Grizzly Bear. Veckatimist has got to be one of the best albums of '09 so far. Possibly the best. Harmonies that are crazy good, musicianship and arrangements that are stunning. Hell, they can even make Michael McDonald sound good (find the Grizzly Bear song, "While You Wait For the Others" feat. Michael McDonald...weird that it's so good). After this track ends, we'll go straight into the second edition of, "3 songs on shuffle" courtesy of the official iTunes library of The Hidden Chord!

Private Affair--The Virgins
A Daytrotter discovery. I've heard this one a few times actually. Really like it. Kind of has a Killers/Franz Ferdinand/Modest Mouse kind of feel to it. The guy's voice kind of sounds like Elvis Costello at times. Great little shuffle beat to it too. Dance-rock is always fine by me. It's a tricky thing to pull off, but I dig this one a lot. Sounds a little like "Shakedown Street" by The Grateful Dead at times too. "In the summertime, I'm gonna lose my mind". Line sticks out because I can understand it (the guy kind of mumble-sings) and because summer's ending (or ended I guess), but also because, what a better season than summer to lose your mind?

Moon Light Drive--The Doors
I believe this is a demo version of the song off The Doors box set that came out around '97 or '98. Moon Light Drive is apparantly the first song that Jim Morrison shared with his UCLA film school buddy Ray Manzarek on Venice Beach. The Oliver Stone biopic documents the fabled meeting. It's kind of weird Beach Boys sounding. It's a very simple song that ends up on their famous self-titled debut. "Let's swim to the moon, let's climb through the tide. Penetrate the evening that the city sleeps too high." Not sure exactly what it means, but The Doors had a way of combining the mystical, surreal, and dark with the magic of rock and roll. Didn't always matter if you understood it or not. "You reach your hand to hold me, but I can't be your guide." Like Jim and The Doors themselves, the song's rather allusive.

The Dishwasher--Ezra Furman and the Harpoons
Song starts off with familiar (too familiar) restaurant sounds. First person account of being a lowly dishwasher. "You won't catch me walkin' home from work cryin'". Maybe you want to cry when you're walking home from your thankless service job. Oh, I've felt it, but you don't cry. You make sure you don't let the people who are getting ready to party on a Friday night, while you're going home, notice your anguish. They most definitely have more money and better jobs, but you carry your head high and keep telling yourself that it'll get better one day and that at least you try to be a decent person. Your work is honest, someone's gotta do it, as the song says. Who wants to eat off dirty dishes. Ezra's voice is filled with anguish. He's really got a very expresive, high-pitched, un-traditional voice that is perfect for a song like this.

There you have it. First two are good end of summer songs, while the third is just a good song in general. I first learned of Ezra Furman back in Austin in 2008, when he played The Velvet Underground's "Heroin" at a Lou Reed tribute concert. Had to have been one of the single most amazing performances of any single song that I've seen. Found a video of it on You Tube, and it still seems pretty cool, but for many performances, you really have to be there to fully appreciate it. Click the title of this blog entry to take you there...I think you'll like it.

Actually that whole day was filled with a lot of "Wow!" moments. The great part about it too was it was all free. You didn't need a wrist band, badge, or cash. It irks me when big time acts charge so much. But the funny thing turns out to be, that the best moments usually don't happen at gigantic stadium shows that people have paid hundreds of dollars to see. They often times happen in little dive bars, free venues, and places you least suspect them to happen. That's the magic of music for you!

Only A Beatles Blog

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 09:27:58 PDT

So The Beatles are back. Rock Band game, remastered albums... Recently a friend asked via Facebook (where else?), "Have the Beatles sold out?" Well, they did have an album called, "Beatles For Sale". Maybe they sold out many years ago? My answer is this: Comparitively speaking, no. I think a band like The Beatles became bigger than its name long ago, so it's really hard to differentiate between what is selling out and what is just Beatlemania that has been going on since the early '60s. Keep in mind that this is one of the few band that turned down reunion gimmicks time after time after time, most recently in 2000, apparently, when Universal offered George, Ringo, and Paul a multi-million dollar offer to do one show. They quite obviously turned it down. I think that constitutes a very non-sell-out attitude toward your band.

But that's not what I want to write about today. Partly, I feel silly trying to contribute anything to the discussion about The Beatles. Anything and everything has already been written by people who are far better writers than me. But also, there's part of me that could probably write every single blog about The Beatles (or Bob Dylan) because I have been a life-long fan and really, though, my favorite songs and albums have changed over time, I've never tired of them. What I want to talk about is how one gets to that point of fandom. Can video games and remastered CD's carry on the legacy of The Beatles to future generations?

I really don't think they can. While I'd love to check out the Rock Band game and hear the remasters, I think that's mostly because I'm already a fan and am curious. Becoming a fan, I'm convinced, has everything to do with friends turning you on to a band and/or having magical experiences related to the songs of a particular band. It's a person by person, very individual process. You can't ram your music down someones throat and expect them to like you. I didn't get into grunge in the early to mid '90s because of media hype. I got into Pearl Jam because of my cousin, Mark. I later got into Nirvana because of conversations with my friend, Amy. Similarly, I can't imagine being a true, hardcore, life-long Beatles fan without experiences that are unique to my own life, not because of a particular reissue or hyped-up cross-marketing scheme.

I became a Beatles fan for a couple of reasons. First off, my dad was a dj on a local radio station, when I was a just a small town kid in Wataga, IL. By that time, The Beatles were already fodder for "oldies" stations. This was twenty plus years ago! My dad was (and still is) a huge Beatles fan. He would play them anytime he could and in fact spent one Thanksgiving Day (??? I think. I may have gotten the holiday wrong. Help me out here dad!) playing nothing but the Beatles for hours on end. But it was one particular time he played one song that sticks with me. I remember him asking me before he left for work one day, if there was anything I wanted to hear on the radio. And I said I wanted to hear, "Hey Jude". I must have been like 10 or 11 at the time. Man was I a cool kid! I sat by the radio, filled with anticipation, and waited for Paul McCartney's voice to ring out over the ancient speakers I listened to music through.

But before Paul's voice, came my dad's, and I'll never forget this, saying, "This one goes out to Wataga." Cue Mr. McCartney and the band. I loved that he put it that way. It wasn't, "This one goes out to my son, Andy", it was a more mysterious statement, but I was in on the secret. In fact, that moment may very well be one of the main reasons I went to broadcast school years later! It was magical, it was personal, it was The Beatles! And the song has remained extremely personal to me ever since.

One of my other early moments of Beatles indoctrination came from listening to them with my older brother. Particularly, we used to sit in his room and listen to my dad's scratchy LP of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band". Man, we must have listened to it thousands of times. We both, to this day, could probably tell you exactly where the record skipped. These days, I see very little of my brother, and quite honestly, we are far different people, but I always cut back to those days in my mind. Pre-cd (I know for a fact that when both of us eventually bought cd players, Sgt. Pepper was one of the first cd's we each bought) days of a kid sitting around with his older brother, who he idolized, digging music that came from a different universe--trippy, ethereal, melodic, fun, singable...it was all there.

Even though, those were the two big ones, I've had so many other moments that relate to the music of The Beatles. Countless times singing to a song on the car radio or on a dock of a lake on a summer day. Sitting around with music people talking about our favorite songs. When I still played open mics, one of my best performances came at a packed folk music-oriented open mic in the suburbs of Chicago. I kicked off my two song set with, "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away". I can't explain how it felt to have all of these people, many of whom were professionals, singing along with me to this song that I love. It gave me the confidence to deliver a solid rendition of one of my own songs.

And I've got to imagine, that this is how most people became Beatles fans, or fans of any band for that matter. Music is a supremely personal experience and while I hope that the Rock Band game and the remasters create some new fans, I think it's more complicated than that. The future of music lies on creating experiences for people, not necessarily in the physical product. New bands should get wise to a couple of things. First of all, get good. The Beatles were so good because they played together for hours and hours on end (without their stint in Germany, they may have been just another British Invasion band). Second of all, make personal connections with your fans. Don't push the issue, but meet your fans, talk to them, be accessible, make songs from your heart and soul. Say what you will about Twitter and Facebook and 21st century technology, but one of the positives about it, is that fans of an artist have a unique way of connecting to their favorite bands or singers, in a way that was never possible in the past. And artists have a unique way of marketing their music and creating one-of-a-kind experiences--secret shows, specially autographed merchandice--because of these social networking sites.

With music, first and foremost, it's about the MUSIC. But also, it's about creating personal experiences that people will remember for the rest of their lives. And I don't know if The Beatles did that purposefully, but their music has had the power and timelessness to be able to create those moments for myself as well as millions of others. Maybe you can't recreate that. Maybe it just has to happen. So while new Beatles "stuff" is great, it's not what makes them amazing or what will keep them alive for generations.

It's scratchy records, older brothers or sisters, moms & dads, summer sing-a-longs, the late night bar juke box on a night out with friends, FM radio on a roadtrip. It's moments that stick with us for a lifetime.

Random Thoughts for a Saturday Morning

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 08:37:48 PDT

Happy Labor Day weekend to one and all. I'll be celebrating by working tonight. I'm curious, what are the best songs about working? What are your thoughts?

Labor Day weekend is the unofficial last weekend of the summer, so I hope you all have some spectacular festivities planned. If you don't, might I suggest one to those in the Chicago area: the Chicago Jazz Fest in Grant Park, which goes on today and tomorrow.

I've often wondered how this fest can be so packed with people every year, but then you never hear anyone talking much about going to jazz venues or concerts. I suppose part of the charm of Jazz or Blues Fest is that you can sit around the lawn in Grant Park, enjoy some expensive food and beer, and spend time with your friends on a beautiful Chicago day--which as most know, we only get a handful of all year. The music almost becomes an after-thought. In fact if you walk around, you'll see a great number who definitely have no interest in the music itself and are merely using it like a soundtrack playing in the background, which is fine I suppose, but personally I don't get it.

Jazz is America's one true artform. It is spontaneous, at times energetic, at times thoughtful, at times a canvas of aural color, tone, and nuance. But to be truly appreciated, it needs to be LISTENED to. It takes work, but once you develop an ear for it, jazz will reward you time and time again. It's hard to shift between pop music and jazz music, as pop can be listened to very passively, and while you might even miss things with pop if you're not careful, you can still appreciate it on a certain level while doing about ten different things at once, as we Americans, the Kings and Queens of Multi-tasking tend to do. I encourage you to go to Jazz Fest and just listen. If you can't get there, get yourself some Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Charlie Parker, and Billie Holliday albums and do the same. "Kind of Blue" by Miles and "Blue Train" by Coltrane are good starting points. Give them a couple of real, fully devoted listens and I think you'll get something out of them. Then if you're feeling really adventurous, check out "A Love Supreme" by Coltrane and "Bitches Brew" by Miles. Any thing by Charlie Parker is amazing. I recommend "The Quintet at Massey Hall", though, which also features Dizzy Gillespe, Bud Powell, and Charles Mingus (who may very well be one of the greatest American composers of all time).

That's my jazz rant of the day. I wanted to talk a little bit about Dylan playing 3 shows at the end of October, which coincides with the release of his Christmas album, but I'll save that for later.

Oh and did you know that the Sony Walkman outsells the iPod in Japan? I know it's the modern version of the Walkman, but in my mind I have visions of hip Japanese youth carrying around the big 'ol '80s style tape deck Walkman! Hey, I made some great mix tapes in my day! In a way, I kind of miss it.

And also, I'm thinking of the Dylan song, "Idiot Wind". Just wanted to let you know. Long story. Might have to do with politics, might not.

Oh, and here's some Bird and Diz, once again I'm technology stupid, so you might have to copy and paste this into your browser since I can't figure out how to create a link!!!

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

3 Songs on Shuffle and more (Click here for Vivian Girls Video! Yay!)

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 10:22:03 PDT

I'm working on reinventing this blog. For no good reason other than I like music and writing and like writing about music probably more than any other type of writing. So I want to have regular features, rather than just random occasional rants. Maybe I'll keep doing the random occasional rants too, but I found myself ranting less and less, so time would go by and suddenly it's been nearly 4 months since I wrote an entry. So for today, I'm doing a "3 songs on shuffle" experiment. Fire up the 'ol iTunes library and let it shuffle to 3 songs and see what happens. I like seeing if songs link to each other in any peculiar way. I also just like the discovery process of listening to my library on shuffle. I have a whole lot on here that I've never heard or haven't heard much, so I wanted to mostly do a stream of consciousness approach to writing about it--attempt to capture the moment of listening to music. And then maybe go back and add on some further impressions. So here is todays "3 Songs on Shuffle". Sometime soon, I'll have a new feature as well. Would like to reprise the podcast very soon as well. If you are reading this, PLEASE, let me know and spread the word if you like what you read. I have an ego that needs to be inflated!!

You Don't Know What Love Is (You Just Do As Your Told)--The White Stripes
The infectious hooks of the White Stripes open up this song which is in the vein of the classic type of "I'm gonna tell it like it is because I don't really care anymore" song. There's a few good ones in this vein. Dylan's "Positively 4th Street" possibly being the best. This one is pretty good, though. A couple of really good lines here, the title itself being one, the opening line being another (In some respects I suspect you've got a respectable side), and a line in the chorus as well (Just as a child of ten might act but you're far too old). I like a good "tell it like it is" song. And everyone knows the type of person who can't tell the difference between infatuation and love, who goes along with whatever the other person says, just because they say it and are supposedly in love with that person. Usually pretty unhealthy stuff happens here. One person dominates and manipulates, why the other is blindly pulled around in the name of "love". Good one Jack White! Love the typical Jack White high register guitar solo at the end of this White Stripes classic!

Don't Ya Tell Henry--Bob Dylan and the Band
Levon Helm of The Band takes vocals on this up tempo shuffle off of the classic, "The Basement Tapes". I definitely hear a little New Orleans influence on here. I could listen to The Band all the time. They had the unique ability to draw upon almost every type of American popular music of the last century and meld it into something fresh and alive. And to me, much of it sounds fresh and alive forty years plus after the fact. I'm not too familiar with the song, but there's nothing on "The Basement Tapes" I don't like. So big ups to this one as well. Why isn't music like this made anymore? Maybe it is and the landscape is just too crowded with crap to realize it. I don't really know. Oh and a connection to the previous song: Jack White was frequently playing with Dylan there for awhile, I think it was last summer, during Dylan concerts. There's a couple of weird dudes, but man, they both can play some music!

Where Do You Run To--Vivian Girls
I don't know a whole lot about Vivian Girls, which is one of the fun parts about listening to music on shuffle. I do know they are on Chicago's Bloodshot Records label, which is a plus for me already, as I love a lot of what Bloodshot puts out and also Bloodshot has some of the best SXSW parties. Back to the song. Pretty good. Kind of your basic straight ahead rock song. I don't know how to describe the beat other than kind of '60s pop rockisk (think "That Thing You Do!" and you've got it). The verses are hard to understand and but the chorus, which repeats the title of the song is clear and it's cool how they build upon it with harmonies. Vocals kind of seem Veruca Salt-ish (If you try to sing "Seether" with the opening strains of this song, it actually works pretty well...pretty sure it's in the same key) or Ravonettes-ish. Emotionless in a way, at least until the chorus, which it should be apparent, is my favorite part of this one. I think this might be a little bit of an accusatory song as well. "Where do you run to baby, why do you leave me all alone?" Maybe in a similar family to the White Stripes song. Not exactly siblings, but possibly cousins. They're both kind of angry, but this one actually asks for an answer rather than just ranting at someone. Although, I think maybe it's a rhetorical question. Either way, good dance-able pop rock. Would have fit right in on the "Pulp Fiction" soundtrack.

I included a link to a fun little Vivian Girls vid for ya too. Click on the title of the post. I'm not tech savvy so I didn't know how to embed it on here. But still...Enjoy!

Thoughts on Green Day and the Lonely Silence that Accompanies Music Blogging

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 22 May 2009 12:55:21 PDT

It has been three months since my last blog. Forgive me readers, for I have let you down.

Here's the problem, though. To use the plural word, "readers", is to exaggerate the nature of my blog, which I suppose is partially what led me to not writing any entries. I kind of alluded to that in my last entry as well. Life is not sunshine and lollipops for musicians or budding music journalists.

So I stopped, which is something in my last entry that I said I wouldn't do. But what can you do? I've done a lot of things I said I wouldn't do. I remember thinking the high-and-mighty-colllege-graduate thought, "Ha! I'm so glad I'll never work at a restaurant ever again" as I left a part-time serving job to pursue substitute teaching full-time, on the road, to what I presumed to be a long and fruitful career as an educator. Fast forward a decade and I've been working at a restaurant longer than I have worked at any teaching job, or any other type of job for that matter. Oh well.

And then there was the whole swine flu scare (sorry, H1N1--although I find it a lot harder to channel my hypochondriac fear and anger toward the letters H and N and the number one, than when I could blame it all on pigs. The only imagery H1N1 brings to my mind is the game Battleship, which I have nothing but fond feelings for. Sigh!). I had been battling what was presumably bronchitis for quite sometime, but it wouldn't go away and I just wasn't feeling up to doing a lot. Just about the time I was ready to shrug it off as a particularly virulent cold, the whole bring-out-your-surgical-masks-and-bathe-in-purell-and-don't-watch-cable-news-channels-unless-you-want-to-be-convinced-that-you-are-going-to-die-a-horrible-black-death-esque-death-flu-scare came along. But it turns out I'm ok.

What's my point? I don't really have one. I'm basically justifying the life of a lazy writer. I mean, I don't get paid for this. I don't have a deadline. And readership is way down. Not that it was ever up. How does this relate to music? Bands are going through many of the same feelings of inadequacy and frustration. And maybe they are also going through bouts of hypochondria as well, but I don't have any solid evidence of it just yet.

What I do know is two things are clear with the music industry. One: There are too many bands vying for attention in a marketplace that isn't what it used to be. I can't imagine promising bands being able to realize their full potential, what with the lack of label support, the recession, and the millions of other factors that make it damn near impossible to make long term plans for your band's development.

Two: Bands with money, label support, and marketing campaigns are more visible, it's true, but seem just as clueless as the rest. I'm going to take Green Day as an example. Here is a band that's been around a long time. Who would have imagined this band that came out of the '90s post-punk pop-punk revival, along with the likes of The Offspring, Rancid, and Blink 182, would still be around to make a record called, "21st Century Breakdown".

I think the title is supposed to refer, at least partially, to the mess we are in as a country right now. But it would be an apt description of the music industry, as well. The money machine that was the record industry is broken and I don't think anyone knows yet the right way to fix it.

How has Green Day made it so long? Here's a band that once sang, "I've got no motivation". Seems like they've found a whole lot of it somewhere along the line. And indeed, they found the motivation to change their sound, which has given them the staying power to become veterans of the industry. Some would say they sold out, which, yeah, I think that would be somewhat fair to say. They always had pop sensibilities, but they gradually shed every ounce of punk street cred in favor of songs like "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" and the ultimate cringe-inducing radio hit, Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) (please, oh please, when I die, I really don't care what music people choose to play--well, ok, I kind of do--but I'm going to put it in writing for all to see right now: Do Not Under Any Circumstances Play That Song At My Funeral. Over the past decade, when someone dies, you get the inevitable montage of someone's life backed with that horrible song. That is not a tribute to that person! In fact, to me it shows a laziness towards respecting someone's memory that someone would choose a song, so generic-sounding, which really isn't that profound a statement on living or dying, rather than a song that has specific meaning to said departed person's life. Why don't you just play "My Way" while you're at it for God's sake!).

But whatever your opinion on Green Day's career decisions, they've done just fine for themselves and are still around--everywhere, yes EVERYWHERE--with their new album.

This is where the whole "visible, but still not knowing what's going on" thing comes into play. It's the philosophy in today's music industry to find clever ways to insert a band's music into people's lives since no one listens to the radio anymore and MTV hasn't played a video in probably 20 years. So you get music in commercials, on tv shows, in ringtone form...basically blaring at you from every direction. But does it help?

Somewhat I think. Feist was certainly helped with an iPod campaign. Iron and Wine, Joanna Newsome, and even Bob Dylan, have watched their sales jump a bit after a particularly memorable commercial (made memorable perhaps because of the music only). But here's my question: When is it too much?

This Green Day album has been shoved down people's throats for quite some time now, particularly the track, "Know the Enemy", which is a decent, kind of Clash-ish sounding track (it even contains one of those non-sensical noises that punk/ska is famous for--you now, along the lines of, "Oy,oy,oy!" or "Ay oh let's go". It sounds kind of like "oh yeah", but slurred so it comes out like "ahhyeawwwll" which makes me think of struggling to get a bit of phlegm out of your throat, or maybe the sound you make right before throwing your guts up. I'm not sure. I'll let you know when I find out for sure. It may be that it's an actual lyric. I'm too lazy to look up the lyrics), but one that I am now thoroughly sick of, before I even felt like it occured to me to buy it. Not only have they played it on the traditional late night circuit, but it's on Comcast On Demand, they played it constantly on ESPN last month to promote the NBA Playoffs, I think they have a deal with Verizon too. I'd say Green Day has found the motivation they lacked in the '90s.

I see what they are trying to do, and I don't know, I'm no expert, maybe it'll work. But is this what it has come to? Not having any other options to expose people to your music other than ramming it down their throats 24/7? To me it smells of desperation and a certain sense of cluelessness. Is that the best the music world can give us? God, I hope not.

As I said earlier, Green Day has already given up most of their punk credibility, but when a band is so over-exposed, it's hard to take them serious when they stand up for a belief like the one they expressed on their appearance on The Colbert Report. The band will not be selling their album at Wal-Mart because of the censoring the notoriously conservative big-box retailer would do to the album. I can respect that on the one hand, but on the other hand, you've let everyone and their second cousin use your song in every possible way. You're in a cell phone campaign. It almost seems a little silly trying to make a stand against big 'ol mean Wal-Mart when you've let your music become so corporate already.

But what's a band to do? Green Day has made it this long, so they must be doing something right. Maybe this is how it has to be done. Maybe our twitterized culture is so attention span-less and distracted by so many other things, that the only way artists can have a chance is by metaphorically smashing people in the head with their music until the public finally says, "Ok, ok I'll buy your damn song as long as you promise to make it stop!!!".

The song is pretty well smashed into my head, but I still don't have that much desire to buy it. I get the feeling that's what a lot of people are saying about it. "Know the Enemy"? The music industry is its own worst enemy right now.

Does anyone care about music anymore?

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 10:23:34 PST

I just finished watching "Almost Famous" for probably what was the 10th or 11th time, maybe more. Besides the fact that it has a great soundtrack, essential to a good film if you ask me, it captures the joy and passion of rock and roll. It speaks to what it means to be a fan of the music, first and foremost. It also captures a time that doesn't exist anymore. It's the time when people still cared about the music.

One of the funnier segments has the rock critic Lester Bangs (played flawlessly as usual by Phillip Seymour Hoffman) declaring rock dead. This is set in 1973 mind you. William Miller, the Cameron Crowe character, replies that at least he's there for the death rattle. So if 1973 was the death rattle, what does that leave us with in 2009? The rotting corpse?

That would be fitting, considering the times. Every industry is feeling the recession (which by the way, when does a recession become a depression, please let me know). But the music industry's been suffering pretty consistently for years now. I'll spare the details. We know them all by now. I watched the concert scenes in the film and thought to myself, "That's when rock and roll was what it was all about." Kids went to rock shows. They played rich vinyl albums. Yes, full-length albums filled with texture on so many levels: sonically, lyrically, spiritually.

I feel like music is kind of an after-thought now. People have their iPods and listen to music, I don't doubt that, but these days, it's like you're sharing a secret language when you find someone who wants to talk music. I'm not referring to talking about the artists who make the Grammy cut or who came out of American Idol, I'm talking about really talking about the MUSIC--underground bands, cutting edge artists, experimentalists, those who really know what it means to produce amazing works.

I worry about the future of rock and roll and popular music in general. It's fine to me when the major labels start to go under. I tend to feel like, "Well serve's 'em right for ripping us off for so long!" But when I hear about indie operations, like Chicago's Touch and Go, having to cut back, I cringe. If the indies can't make it, who's going to befriend the real artists? If it really takes 10,000 hours for anyone to become proficient at anything (see my previous post relating to the book, Outliers), how can anyone make it that long if there's no viable way to make a living?

Real fans of music are the ones who need to save it. I've said it before and I just said it again. We can't let it die. I'm not so naive to think that it will ever be like it was, but if those who care about good music just stand by and do nothing, I think things can only get worse. What does that mean exactly? Hell if I know. Maybe we should buy more music and see more shows. With what money and what time, though, right? I'm a firm believer that when something captivating comes along, people will support it. But then I come back to the question, "How can up-and-coming musicians make a living?"

There are billions of bands out there. But 95% of these bands are either really crappy or just doing this as a hobby and will quit after a short amount of time, after making the realization that they can't get gigs, no one's buying their cd's, and no one cares about their myspace page. Maybe with time they could get better--to the point that they can make quality, captivating music, but there are careers to think about. Rock is dead. Music is something you listen to, not do for a living. Maybe it never was actually, but now it's harder than it ever has been.

I think one problem is how this country views the arts. In European countries, it's like a foregone conclusion that the arts will be funded. Here, if legislators call for increased funding for the NEA, there is an outcry like people are calling for the funding of puppy slaughterhouses. There is a view by many that the arts are a simply a diversion. What type of society doesn't value art? I know President Obama's got bigger fish to fry right now, but how about establishing a Secretary of the Arts cabinet level position, like Quincy Jones and many others have suggested? How about we look into ways the arts can help fuel our struggling economy? How about more grants for independent artists, whether they be rock musicians, writers, visual artists, conceptual artists, etc? How about we fund arts programs in schools for once?

Ok so I'm getting a little off point. I'm guessing the government's not going to step in anytime soon, even though I think President Obama cares about the arts and may pursue some arts funding initiatives in the future. The inauguration festivities are evidence of that. Where does the indie musician/average music fan/indie music business owner/indie music journalist go from here then? I think some collaberation needs to happen where the minds meet and a new paradigm is established. The rock/pop scene of the '60s and '70s is dead. You can't go back. But we can't just stand by, throw our hands up in the air and say, "Oh well!". To me that's like standing by and watching a good friend get continually beaten, but doing nothing.

The world of music is a big mess right now. Guys like Live Nation and Ticketmaster think they're the ones to save it by merging, but that's not going to help the average fan or average band. It's still the world of the big dogs, though. I know as someone who tries to be an independent journalist, I'm not taken very seriously. I applied for press credentials for this year's SXSW and was granted them, provided I pay $135 for a wristband, which is a "press rate". That's serious money for a guy with no operating budget. I'm just an indie voice. Tack that on travel expenses, recording equipment expenses, rental car, and food, and what you have is a very expensive trip. And your average band faces a similar dilemma. Yeah this is the place to be to get exposure and to network, but most bands aren't getting their way paid. I'm not sure if I'll be making the trip or not.

I'm not saying that SXSW will miss me, but it begs the question, "What happens when the indie artists, writers, labels can't afford to make it to these things?" It goes with the previous question about how one can make a living as a musician. What happens when producing art becomes a game of who has the most money, rather than producing art itself? Everyone loses, that's what happens. Especially when no one has money in the first place! Alternative voices and ideas get shut out. Then you're stuck with the same old tired voices that ran the industry into the ground and continue to do so.

I kind of think this is a test. This is a test for those who truly love music. How creative are those who love music willing to get to save it? I'm just one blogger/podcaster, though, who struggles to even get his friends and family to read/listen! It's a frustrating landscape and the situation is the same for bands. The market is oversaturated. Too many bands, too many bloggers. There's nothing new or interesting so I think people turn to other things, rather than digging for the new or interesting.

So let's review the situation: no money for musicians, companies supportive of indie musicians are cutting back or folding completely, an oversaturated landscape exists with thousands upon thousands of bands (mostly crappy) to choose from, no government help for artists trying to make a living, the big industry guys are consolidating their powers. Hey kids, wanna start a rock 'n roll band? Why bother, right?

I kind of feel that way about this blog sometimes. Why bother when thousands of others are doing the same thing, probably better than me? Why bother when sometimes I have only one or two readers at a time (thanks for reading, Mike!)? The answer is that I love the music. It's like how the "Almost Famous" character, Russell Hammond replies to William Miller's question, "What do you love about music?" He answers, "First of all...everything." It's an illness, it really is. But I heard too many Beatles records as a kid, have been to too many great concerts, have felt transformed by it all too many times to count. I love being around the scene. Hell, I even love the egotistical, self-righteous musicians who pour on the charm and make big promises to you, but just want you to make them look cool (that's another aspect of the music industry that "Almost Famous" captures spot on).

Chances are, I'll find a way to get to Austin. Maybe it'll be like going to a wake this time around, I don't know--celebrating what was, with all of the other people who love music just as much as I do. I don't think it has to be that way, though. It's time for the little guys at the bottom, though, to offer some life support. It's time to start thinking outside the box, to use a tired old cliche. I don't have the answers to the industry's ills, but I'm not willing to give up yet. There's too much at stake.

One For My Hometown.

pulliam.andy@gmail.com (Andy Pulliam) — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 12:47:07 PST

I've never been out to the cities out east like NYC, Boston, Baltimore, Philly, or DC, but I have been to a lot of different cities and have yet to find one better than the one I live in--Chicago. I mean, come on, the president's from here. How much better can it get?

It's an unseasonably warm day here in Chi-town. I just got back from walking all over the place. Probably about five miles if I had to guess, but it's just a guess. I walked past Wrigley and down to the lake, which we Chicagoans tend to forget about during the winter months, but man did it look stellar today! I walked back and stopped to have lunch at Harry Caray's by Wrigley, where a cute bartender talked me into spending too much money on a delicious burger, loaded with toppings. She said I would probably fall in love with her because of how good it would be and yes I did.

And now after a couple of lunch beers, a full stomach, and sore legs, I'm ready to write! Yes, this is still a music blog. I'm working up to it.

Two music related things crossed my mind as I was out wandering. One, the warm weather is getting me psyched for SXSW next month. If I had to choose a second favorite city in this nation of ours, it would be Austin, TX. I will be heading down for my 3rd annual trip to SXSW next month. Austin deserves the title of "Live Music Capital of the World". I haven't been to every live music city in the world, but I can't imagine it getting much better than Austin. The airport even has great live music for god's sake! The image I always cut back to in my mind is the first time I ever walked down 6th St. and soaked in the beauty of live music coming out of most of the buildings I walked past. Now I know part of it is solely for SXSW, but part of it is the real deal. This is a city that embraces the wonder that is live music. Put it together with the weird characters, friendly people, delicious food, and beautiful scenery, and you have near perfection. At least from a guy who ends up there once a year.

As I walked around Chicago today, I thought about how underutilized this city's rich music history is. Chicago is the home of the blues. It is one of the cities where America's only true original artform, jazz, developed. It has been home to several great rock acts, like The Smashing Pumpkins, Liz Phair, Chicago, among others. It has produced rappers like Kanye West and Common. It was the home to Chess Records, which released records from Muddy Waters and countless legends. It produced The Staples Singers and Buddy Guy. It has an underappreciated folk/singer-songwriter history that produced, in my oh so humble opinion, three of the greatest singer-songwriters of the 20th century--John Prine, Steve Goodman, and Michael Smith.

Why doesn't Chicago take more advantage of this rich history? Why isn't there an entertainment district like 6th Street where one can hear live music blaring out of every building? Oh sure, Chicago has some great venues like The Empty Bottle and Schuba's. It has also hosted Lollapalooza for the past few years now, but I still thing the city could cash in quite a bit more if they just embraced the music culture that exists here. Here's a call to Mayor Daley and the Chicago City Council: look at what you have. Utilize it. Why not a Chicago Music Hall of Fame or museum. Take a lesson from Austin. Chicago should be one of the premier music cities in the world, but I'm not sure if it is at this point. The history is there, but as for the present, one word: underutilized.

Second thing I thought about as I walked around The Windy City today, and yes it is pretty windy today (even though the nickname did not come from the gale force winds that usually add insult to injury this time of year)--the aforementioned, Steve Goodman.

My mind often wanders to Steve Goodman when I walk past Wrigley Field, especially on a spring-like day like this. Steve Goodman was and is the epitomy of Chicago and Chicago Cubs fans. He lived and breathed this city. He wrote songs about his horribly underachieving favorite baseball team, about the crooked towing companies, about the famous original machine-politics mayor of Chicago. He had that wry, honest Chicago way about him, much like other famous citizens of this city--Studs Terkel and Mike Royko for example. Goodman and I were never Chicagoans at the same time, as he died in '84, a decade and a half before I would become one down to my bones, but still I feel as if I can identify with him. That speaks volumes to his immense talent.

So as I walked past that great baseball shrine on Clark and Addison, I thought about the man who composed the song that plays now after every Cubs victory. I looked at the stadium, which is being touched up in preparation for the season that is just two months from its beginning, and I could almost hear the refrain, "Hey Chicago, whaddya say, the Cubs are gonna win today". And as I walked past the statues of Ernie Banks at Clark and Addison and Harry Caray at Addison and Sheffield, I thought to myself, "Steve Goodman should be here too."

I propose that a Steve Goodman statue should be put up at the entrance to the bleachers, right at the corner of Sheffield and Waveland. What a more perfect place for the man who encapsulates what it means to be a Cubs fan. I picture the statue being the diminutive Goodman seated with his guitar, wearing a Cubs hat and blue Cubs jacket, seated in the stands singing, "A Dying Cubs Fans Last Request". If I'm not mistaken, and it's been awhile since I've read Clay Eals' amazing Goodman bio, "Facing The Music" so I'm not positive on the facts, Goodman did a piece for a local tv station where he is doing just that. The picture is vivid in my head.

Goodman knew what it was to suffer with the lowly Chicago Cubs. Yet he also knew the joy of being a Cubs fan. Who else, but a hopelessly die hard fan, could write such an optimistic song as, "Go, Cubs, Go". Here is a man who sat in the bleachers on many a warm summer day. He would occasionally bring his guitar and play for the fans. The man bled Cubbie blue and had a deep abiding love for the game of baseball. What better representation for all of the true Cubs fans, than a statue of Steve Goodman. And why not? There stands a statue of a non-player at Sheffield and Addison already. Why not one just down the block too. Maybe save the corner of Clark and Waveland for a Ron Santo statue. Then it's an even two and two. This team as much as any is about the fans as much as the players themselves.

This day is a real tease! Much like the Cubs making it to the playoffs. You know they are going to lose, just like you know that this day is just one glorious anomoly in the midst of another harsh Chicago winter. But in this city, you take advantage of what you have, when you have it. You don't think Mayor Daley's going to milk the Obama connection for all it's worth in his mission to get the 2016 Olympics? Please! He's all over it. It's time the Cubs and the City of Chicago to do the same and embrace the amazing music that is associated with them. There's nothing like Chicago anywhere around. It truly is "My Kind of Town"!