Hmm, talking about sitar music and Mozart operas in a blog entitled “Blogging in Yemen” is a little silly. I have lots of other things I’d like to blog about music, so I’ve started a new one just for my music ramblings. I’ve started it out with an ABBA clip that is, well, interesting… You can see the new blog here.
The song “Cracked” by the bouncing souls has really hit a nerve. The lyrics, unfortunately, say it all….
I’m gonna crack one day
I’ll just leave and go my way
They might say I quit
Ask me if I give a s***
I’ll put it out and place one bet
The day I crack I won’t regret
I know it’s time to be a man
And deal with things the best I can
In fact I’m only seeing red
Every time I turn my head
Empty vessels staring back
Life is getting to me lately
As you can clearly see
And I don’t think I stand a chance
There’s no place I can go
To leave this behind
This f***** up world
Is all there is on my mind
This I how it had to be
Something’s changed
Inside of me
No place I can go
To leave this behind
This f***** up world
Is all there inside of my mind
This I how it had to be
Somethings changed
Inside of me
I always want to run and hide
Dig a hole and crawl inside
It’s not that I’m feeling blue
I’m sure you got your problems too
I’m not a jerk, I’m not a d***
Maybe just a little sick
One of these days I’m gonna snap
Then you’ll know that I’m cracked
In fact I’m only seeing red
Every time I turn my head
Empty vessels staring back
Life is getting to me lately
As you can clearly see
And I don’t think I stand a chance
No place I can go
To leave this behind
This f***** up world
Is all there is on my mind
This I how it had to be
Somethings changed
Inside of me
No place I can go
To leave this behind
This f***** up world
Is all there is on my mind
This I how it had to be
Somethings changed
Inside of me
.. but I damn near cried when I heard “The Legionnaire’s lament” by the Decemberists. They are one of Tami’s favorite groups, but I never really “got it” until I heard this song. I really identify with the visions of home and the chorus. SIGH… Get me out of here!!!
And I wrote my girl
Told her I would not return
Terribly taken a turn
For the worse now I fear
It’s been a year or more
Since they shipped me to this foreign shore
Fighting in a foreign war
So far away from my home
If only summer rain would fall
On the houses and the boulevards
And the side walk bagatelles it’s like a dream
With the roar of cars
And the lulling of the cafe bars,
The sweetly sleeping sweeping of the Seine.
Lord I don’t know if I’ll ever be back again.
La la la la dam
La la la low
Medicating in the sun
Pinched doses of laudanum
Longing for the old fecundity of my homeland
Curses to this mirage!
A bottle of ancient Chiraz
A smattering of distant applause
Is ringing in my poor ears
On the old left bank
My baby in a charabanc
Riding up the width and length
Of the Champs Elysees
If only summer rain would fall
On the houses and the boulevard
And the side walk bagatelles it’s like a dream
With the roar of cars
And the lulling of the cafe bars
The sweetly sleeping sweeping of the Seine
Lord I don’t know if I’ll ever be back again
If only summer rain would fall
On the houses and the boulevard
And the side walk bagatelles its like a dream
With the roar of cars
And the lulling of the cafe bars
The sweetly sleeping sweeping of the Seine
Lord I don’t know if I’ll ever be back again…
Be back again,
Be back again,
I’ll be back again
When a particular performer is hyped to the heavens, I instinctively hesitate to listen simply because the reality rarely lives up to expectations. There is a Lebanese singer that goes by the single name “Farouz” that is a prime example. She is considered a national treasure of Lebanon and is revered all over the arab world for being an amazing singer. She is credited with helping to speed along the peace process during the Lebanese civil war. She said that she would not put on another concert until they got their act together, and it seemed to work to some extent. Now that’s power… Anyway, to use a British expression, she’s crap. I honestly do not understand what the fuss is about. She has a very average voice, limited range, and her phrasing doesn’t seem overly special.
I dunno, maybe she has a commanding stage presence, or maybe I have only listened to her worse quality stuff, but because of the hype, I was expecting to be blown away. Last night I finally got around to listening to Maria Callas. She’s another that has been hyped, even long after her death. Folks, sometimes people do live up to the hype… She was amazing. The first thing I listened to was the “Queen of the Night” aria from the Magic Flute. It’s a difficult piece, many singers can’t really handle the technical issues. Not only did she have zero problems, but she managed to be extraordinarily expressive, and her voice… dear God, what a voice! It was like an aural ballet, effortless, graceful, and it seemed to shine. Even people that don’t like opera would have to be impressed with that performance. I was conducting in my chair, cutting her off, slamming into the next note, etc. Of course that is a total fantasy, from what I read about her, there wasn’t a man alive that could control her. Lucky for all of us she had the chops to be able to get away with being the template for all bitchy, domineering sopranos. I’m going to be listening to more of her stuff soon…
I got some music from my housemate Karl and I’ve been listening to some of it. It’s a real mixed bag, he has everything from obscure Romantic pipe organ music, to lots of dj/dance stuff. I’ve been erasing a lot of the DJ/house/trance stuff, it just isn’t my cup of tea. I’ve also been erasing all of the German hip-hop I come across. It all sounds totally ridiculous to me. They all cop the attitudes of the good American performers, but none of it is very convincing. I just listened to a German version of Ghetto Superstar, at least that was the background beat. The guys rapped over it and sounded like they were making complete fools of themselves. They were saying something about getting stoned and saying some disparaging things about Paris. I erased that pretty quick…
Some good, new things for me include The Fu-Schnickens (which sounds like a German band but aren’t), a Morrissy album I hadn’t heard before, and various things from odd and assorted one hit wonders. My newest guilty pleasure has to be “Jenny From the Block,” by Jennifer Lopez. Yes, I know that was out years ago, and yes, I know it’s pop trash. I did say it was a guilty pleasure:-) If I run across anything really amazing that I had never heard of before I’ll let you know.
OK, since several students have asked me about listening to music, I wondered if I could put together a series of songs that I could use. Songs can be a great way to be introduced to common phrases that do not make literal sense. They can also be helpful in introducing cultural differences, especially when it comes to gender roles. So I went through my collection on my computer looking for decent songs. Here’s the trick, not only to they have to be easy enough to understand, they couldn’t have any swearing or explicit content. Ok, that eliminates a lot of my collection right of the bat… Then there is the problem of dealing with haramm things, this means that there can’t be:
1) Any references to sex at all, explicit or no. If it was obscure enough that even the teachers wouldn’t understand it might be ok…
2) Any references to drug use. If a song was only about the negative consequences it might be ok…
3) Any references to dating or being in a serious relationship outside of marriage.
4) Any bad things said about God or religion.
5) Any overt mentioning of Jesus as God or a savior. This means pretty much any reference to Jesus…
I skimmed through all 15,768 songs on my hard drive and I came up with a list 18 songs long. Here it is:
A Matter of Trust by Billy Joel
Act Naturally by the Beatles
I’ve Just Seen a Face by the Beatles
Yesterday by the Beatles
Stand by your Man by Tammy Wynette
Mr. Pitiful by Otis Redding
We’re not Going to Take it by Twisted Sister
She’s Always a Woman to Me by Billy Joel
Sparrow by Simon and Garfunkel
Three Little Birds by Bob Marley
Thought I knew you by Matthew Sweet
Message in a Bottle by the Police
It’s not for me to Understand by Willie Nelson
Crazy and I Fall to Pieces by Patsy Cline
Spirits in the Material World by the Police
America the Beautiful/This Land is your Land by the Limelighters
Irish Blood, English Heart by Morrissy
I thought about adding “Sound of Da Police” by KRS one, but I thought that he might be a little tough for them to understand. I’m sure that I’ve forgotten a bunch of songs, but it is actually more difficult than you might think to find songs like this. Inevitably, when I found a song without swearing, it was too “opaque” for nonnative speakers. I can rationalize the love/ex-love songs with the idea that it was occuring inside of a marriage. Marriage problems are certainly a common enough thing here for them to identify with them. Similarly, songs about loneliness, longing, and regret are fair game as long as there aren’t any sexual overtones to them. Does anyone out there have any other suggestions?
We all get songs stuck in our heads sometimes. If it’s in the middle of the day, and it’s some sort catchy pop tune, it can be a little aggravating, but a little fun too… On the other hand, if it’s at 3AM and the song is dark and disturbing, it’s a real problem. I’ve got “Berry” by Hole stuck in my head. That’s Courtney Love’s band and it’s off their first album “Pretty on the Inside.” You know you’re in for a good time when the first line of the song is, “Do you want to ride my death machine?” Of course it’s the chorus that’s stuck in my head…
And when I die
won’t you
bury me?
Cause baby
I bury you
deep
inside me.
It’s a frightful conflagration of sex, heroin use, violence and hopelessness. At this point in the album, she is feeling the accumulated weight of all of her (and other people’s) decisions and is lashing out. She ends the song with a lament/realiziation about her boyfriend the heroin dealer, “When you fall for the garbage man, you end up in the garbage…” Leaving off the obvious rhyme “can” from the end makes the word “garbage” just hang out there. She forsook cleverness with the rhyme in order to hammer home her opinion of her life and friends. The next song on the album is one of the most terrifying drug songs ever penned IMO. Luckily, that song, “Loaded” is not going through my head…
I’ve always compared that album to Orwell’s book “1984.” You can’t say that you enjoy reading “1984,” but you have to admit that it’s a powerful work. “Pretty on the Inside” is not for the faint of heart, it is one of the most brutal albums I’ve ever heard. It’s almost a concept album, the “main character” is introduced in the first song “When I was a Teenage Whore” and is promptly kicked out of her parents’ house. She goes to live on the street and becomes a literal whore, gets hooked on heroin, and it goes downhill from there. There isn’t a bit of sugarcoating, every song gets darker until at the end you almost hope she dies, then maybe the pain will end. If I picture a friend, high school classmate, or family member in the character’s place, I feel literal pain when listening to this, tears are not uncommon for me. The real power of this is the idea that as painful as this is to listen to, people actually live with these situations and feelings. We just get a peek of that life, that’s the reason to listen to stuff like this, to develop emphathy. The entire album is a monument to self loathing. The character never thinks much of herself, and she can never bring herself to forgive anyone, including herself. The writing is amazing and Courtney puts on one hell of a performance. A little too good as a matter of fact. There is so much pain and bile on this album that you can’t help but wonder if she made any of it up.
The calls to prayer are still going on outside, I need to think of another song, another album, another something. I can’t fall asleep with thoughts like this…
I went through and added links to the songs and videos on my Never Hear Great Songs and video pages. Now you can actually hear, and sometimes see, what I’m talking about. Links weren’t available for all songs, and some of them are things put to the original song. I never would have expected to see the Crystals set to some Anime, but there you are. Of note is the ultra rare video of “Freedom of Choice” by Devo and a mesmerizing performance of James Brown at his peak. You can see my Never heard great songs here, and my page on music videos
. Have fun!
It’s been over a week since I listened to anything, and my mind is starting to react. It puts music front and center, anything and everything reminds me of some song. My father ordered some “Red Mullet” for dinner last night. Of course my first thought was Bowie, Ziggy Stardust. I’m an alligator, I’m a momma poppa coming for you! I’m a space invader, I’ll be a rock and rolling bitch for you! Earlier today I started humming “Beauty school dropout” from the Grease soundtrack. I mentioned that I had no idea why that album would pop into my head, then my father said, “Well, you are in Greece..” Oh yeah…
I had a run of really bad covers the other day. It started in the taxi, there was a Greek version of one of those ubiquitous FM songs that I try to ignore. Of course I could almost remember the lyrics “something something never get old. something something really don’t care, etc.” It drove me nuts, but it’s a terrible song and I’ve never liked it, being in Greek didn’t help it at all. The next morning, the hotel was playing Natalie Merchant’s version of “Space Oddity.” Later on I heard Phil Collins’ version of “You Can’t Hurry Love.” I’m willing to forgive Phil, he’s a pop hack and “You can’t…” is a classic pop song, but “Space Oddity?” Why anyone would ever cover this song is beyond me. It’s not a very good song, but it had some meaning… when it was released. There are very few types of songs that Natalie is capable of singing well, and she may well have sung them all at this point. “Candy Everybody Wants,” “Carnival,” and “San Andreas Fault” are the ones I can think of. She did do an acceptable cover of “Every Day is Like Sunday,” it suits her voice and style of delivery. Unfortunately for her, Morrissy is the king of that type of singing. Plus, his voice brings all of the baggage of his previous works which really adds to the melancholy…
What other more or less random songs have popped into my head? Hmm, well there’s “I Dig Rock and Roll Music” by Peter, Paul and Mary, I think it’s called “Sunshine Day” by the Brady Bunch, “Straight On” by Heart, “Coming Down the Mountain” by Jane’s Addiction, “Parallel Universe” by the Ret Hot Chile Peppers, and even what I think is Bach’s prelude and Fugue in D #5. Sigh… I’ll be listening again soon, I’ll need it, God only knows what will come into my head next…
I still remember John Chancellor telling us that ‘Elvis Presley, the ‘king’ of rock and roll, has died.” Of course since I was 6, I had no idea who he was, but if you’re going to interrupt my TV program for this and announce it to everyone, I figured that he must have been pretty important. Later on that night I saw the crowds that had been filmed (yes, this was before video was in widespread use) at Graceland on the 6 o’clock news. That’s when I knew that he was special. It took me a while longer to really appreciate him of course, but now I have some inkling why all those people were so upset. It’s been 30 years, unbelievable.