Retina Sees Rewind

Today’s song is by the band Cave-In, a pretty schizophrenic band with hardcore/mathcore (don’t ask) roots - but I have heard someone describe some of their songs as a harder, more metal Radiohead, which I think fits today’s song, which is on their Planets of Old EP, which I purchased on a whim at
Vertigo in Grand Rapids right after its release in 2009 based on recommendations from their staff. The song Retina Sees Rewind immediately stood out to me and just feels right today...

Curse of the Red Tide

Today song is a brand new gym in my collection. Yesterday, the first album from Legend of the Seagullmen was released digitally, and it is awesome. I don’t know if it’s appropriate to ask who or what Legend of the Seagullman is, but I can tell you that it is thoroughly enjoyable from start to finish.  Featuring Tool drummer Danny Carey and Mastodon guitar player Brent Hinds, along with members from Dethklok, this is indeed a metal supergroup. However,  while the music indeed has metal roots, it is infused with a heavy dash of psychedelia and an even heavier dash of humor. They have the groove from Tool, the psychedelia from Mastodon and the humor from Primus. Imagine churning those three bands through a blender and send the new band to Bikini Bottom as the house band at the Krusty Krab (yes, the Spongebob reference is mandatory here). I am blown away. Enjoy the Curse of the Red Tide.

Little Drop Of Poison

Sometimes you go to a kids movie and get blown away by the music selection. To me, that happened back in 2004, when I went to see Shrek 2. There was a piano in a dark alley bar, and the voice was unmistakeable - it was Tom Waits. And the song was Little Drop of Poison, which I did not know at the time. I finally picked it up on an album when I picked up his Orphans box set - and I thought it would be great to finish the working week up with a Little Drop of Poison...

Joe's Garage

Today's song is about rock bands. While the band in the song do pretty good for themselves, there are many that simply give up along the way - and having played in one of them myself, I completely recognize the beginning of the song. I am smiling thinking back to the days with Coma - three good friends making music just for our own sakes. It was fun and it was honest. We made music we liked - although I think I forced my inner Bono on the other two in my pretentiousness...

All I can say is that we covered Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd. Yeah... My idea. My favorite part is the line "There'll be no more aah aah aah" where the muted aah's that are lined up with the melody on the original became a bloodcurdling scream that forced itself to the forefront in our version. And my attempt at finding my inner David Gilmore. I was never really a lead guitarist. I wanted to be one, and I demanded to play lead guitar on quite a few songs - and the solos were ALWAYS long. And never really good. A couple were ok, but no... There is only so much you can do with the pentatonic scale and limited technical ability... BUT - like I said, it was fun. And there was a chemistry there. The last recordings we made were pretty good - the songs were getting better and better and we played pretty well together.

I have my friend Jørund Hitland to thank for the song today. I knew of Frank Zappa from before after having found the album Zoot Allures in my dad's record collection. But it was in Jørund's cd collection I found Joe's Garage, a rock opera about... Well, I am not always quite sure... But it follows Joe from his beginnings in a garage band that makes it pretty big - and he encounters all sorts of depravity and finds himself in jail before he finally gets out in act three and becomes a compliant member of society. While some of the lyrics are very immature, the music is spectacular throughout. Zappa and his band move effortlessly through various musical styles, and you can hear some of that even within the title track - it is well worth listening to, and the lyrics are pretty good as well.

Hallo Spaceboy

Today's song is dedicated to Elon Musk. I am beyond excited that today is the launch for SpaceX Falcon Heavy to be launched - and with David Bowie's Space Oddity as the soundtrack. That means that song is a little bit too obvious to play, so I started thinking about Space Truckin' by Deep Purple, especially since a red Tesla is part of the cargo for the rocket, but I've already included that song earlier... But the Tesla has Spaceman behind the wheel - while it is a dummy, it provided great inspiration.  So... I found another Bowie nugget - you can never have too much David Bowie, after all...

The launch was a success, and the Tesla's onboard computer screen had two very appropriate words on it: Don't panic. Clearly a nod to Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy. But what impressed me the most was the ability of both of the side boosters and the core to find their way back to earth and land successfully. It was awe inspiring to watch. And my guess is that if someone finds this Tesla in space, their first words would be in keeping with David Bowie: Hallo Spaceboy!

I Must Be In Love

You have probably heard of the fab four - or The Beatles - but have you heard of the prefab four? Barry, Stig, Dirk and Nasty formed the band The Rutles, and they were a great inspiration for the other band from Liverpool - at least according to the mockumentary The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash.

The Rutles was the brainchild of Eric Idle of Monty Python fame and Neil Innes, who started his career with the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and worked closely with Monty Pyhton as well. While they started on the Eric Idle TV show Rutland Weekend Television in 1975, the full mockumentary was released in 1978 featuring Eric Idle as Dirk McQuigley and Neil Innes as Ron Nasty (representations of Paul McCartney and John Lennon respectively). It featured several of the early SNL cast members (Dan Ackroyd, John Belushi, Gilda Radner, and Bill Murray), as well as George Harrison (who also financed the movie), Bianca Jagger, and Michael Palin (of Monty Python fame).

The movie is incredibly funny, but to me, the best part is how well the songs are written. I believe it was my friend Stein Pettersen who said that the genius of the music is that you really think you are hearing The Beatles without quite placing the song - and that is on full view in today's song. It is funny - and it is just like The Beatles. Except it isn't. It is The Rutles with the song I Must Be In Love with the immortal line, "I feel good, I feel bad, I feel happy, I feel sad..." That's all the emotions you need to know in one line. I will be eternally grateful to Stein and Kjell Pettersen for introducing me to the brilliance of The Rutles!

Dear Janet Jackson (Superbowl Edition)

So... Today is the Superbowl, and yet again it is super, as it does feature my favorite team, the New England Patriots. People are not always understanding why that is my team, since I live in a state which has the ultimate of underdogs, the Detroit Lions, but it really is pretty simple. While I moved to the US in 1999, I didn't start watching football until 2001. My first two years, I was busy adjusting to a new life in a new country, getting my associate degree, working a little on top of that, and eventually fatherhood. Then we moved to Michigan in 2001, I had a Monday-Friday job, and some more time on the weekends, so I decided to start watching football. I didn't know much about any rules, but there was this one team, without any superstar whose quarterback got hurt and replaced by someone who barely got drafted a couple of years before. That was the New England Patriots and Tom Brady. So without any real geographic allegiances, I was drawn to this team because of their story that year - and their focus on the team rather than individuals, coming out on the field as one, rather than announcing superstars (mainly because there weren't any). And it stuck. I was hooked.

And no, my favorite Patriot was never Tom Brady - although I can't think of anyone I'd rather have as a quarterback. My favorite Patriot of all time was Tedy Bruschi. To me, he was the heart and soul of the Patriots until his retirement in 2009. He was scheduled to sit out the 2005 season following a stroke not too long after he won his third Superbowl, but he came back to play in a Monday Night Football game against the Buffalo Bills on October 30 that year - and the impact his return had on the team cannot be overstated. After starting the season 3-3, they did win that game, and ended up 10-6 for the season. They lost in the divisional round that year, but this year they are back in the Superbowl - against the Philadelphia Eagles.

Of course, not all Americans watch the Superbowl for the football - watching the ads has long been a sport of its own, and then there's the halftime show. This year's performer is Justin Timberlake. Now he is married and a family man, but back in 2004, he was dating Janet Jackson, and their performance together became quite the controversy - and the topic of a song by Richard Thompson. This is a song that in the Norwegian tradition would be considered a nidvise - which really is a satirical song in the ballad tradition, often mocking the main character. And mock he does. Please enjoy a good laugh as the warm-up to the Superbowl - and the halftime show - with Richard Thompson's Dear Janet Jackson.

Test Pilot

Sometimes when bands disband, I am ok with it. They have run their course, maybe even released a couple of rather crappy albums, and it's just time. Then there are bands that just get better and better, and then suddenly they are gone. Israelvis from Trondheim was one of those bands. They have not formally disbanded, but they really haven't done anything since 2010, when they did one concert and released a single - and their last album, The Israelvis Effect was from 2005. Granted, the last release before that was Eurosis from 1996, and I was lucky enough to catch them live around that time as well. But after 9 years gestation, The Israelvis Effect was an absolutely mindblowing album. I consider it their most complete release, and I would consider it a really spectacular way to finish a career - except I hear so much promise for even further development, especially seeing how they developed from Eurosis (which also was a great album, mind you).

From time to time, I take The Israelvis Effect out and listen to it - and if I only want to hear one song, I play Test Pilot. And if anyone who knows anyone in Israelvis happens to be reading this... Please, just please, let's have some more music. They are one of Norwegian rock music's best kept secrets. Versatile, funny, and innovative. And great musicians. And always focusing on quality over quantity, which is why I cherish their albums as much as I do.

Weak

This is a genre-hopping week, I think. However, today's song is really one of the gems of the 90s. Skunk Anansie was considered an alternative rock band - and their biggest claim to fame was the song Weak from the album Paranoid and Sunburnt from 1995. Their lead singer, Skin, finds what for me is the perfect balance between pain and anger on this song, and what eluded me before is the incredibly warm and bluesy guitar tone on the main riff. It is interesting listening back to some of these songs with ears that have had 20 more years of listening to music. It still hits me emotionally - this was one of my favorite songs of the mid-90s - but I am also appreciating more of the work that went into the different layers of the song. If you had asked me about the guitar sound before listening back to it, I would have sworn they used heavy distortion, but for most of the song that is really light and main guitar is clean. It's funny how memory tricks you from time to time. Oh well - I keep blabbering on when all you really need is to hear this song. Weak by Skunk Anansie is that good!

Isak

I have a great little song for you today. I have had the pleasure of seeing Baroness live twice now, and the next time they roll into town, odds are I will see them again - that's how good I think they are. Baroness has quickly risen to be one of my favorite metal bands - and their debut album, simply called Red Album (they have since released Blue Record, Yellow/Green, and Purple) is a great debut album - and the song Isak just simply blew me away. And so I feel like sharing the song with you today - but not just in the original version...

I have also included a live version from Philadelphia in June 2017. The only member that has been a constant in Baroness - and who is featured on both tracks - is singer/guitarist John Dyer Baizley. The latest update saw Pete Adams (guitar) leave quietly and on very friendly terms and Gina Gleason arrive. With the second vocals on Isak being in the higher register, I was excited to hear her take on it, and while there are shakier moments with the newest member in the live version, it still rocks (and yes, that is a long tuneup in the beginning...)