Five Songs that American Idol Contestants Should Consider Covering

I am a not-so-closeted American Idol fan. I know it's cheesy, I know that no musician I respect would ever make it out of the prelims, I know it's manipulative, crass, cynical, feed-the- money machine commercial television, but I love it.
However, I will say that, week in and week out, the song choices made by the contestants are so uninspired and insipid that I sometimes find myself itching to see what the Knicks are doing.
So, in the interest of improving the quality of my American Idol-watching experience, and at the same time guaranteeing the wise contestant who takes my advice at least one more week of national exposure, I would like to offer the following alternative song choices. (Note: None of these songs are at all left field. In fact they are all pretty mainstream. They have all previously been covered by mainstream artists. They are just a little more interesting than the usual Tuesday night fodder.)

Jeff Buckley - Hallelujah
This is a Leonard Cohen song made famous by Jeff Buckley, but also covered by K.D. Lang and John Cale, among others.

The Left Banke - Walk Away Renee
This was a hit back in the '60's and has been covered countless times. It deserves to be a hit again.

Patty Griffin - Mary
This is a Patty Griffin song covered very badly by Bette Midler, but nevertheless a truly gorgeous, moving song.

Blue Rodeo - 'Til I Gain Control Again
This is a Rodney Crowell (meaning c&w) song that has been covered by everyone from Van Morrison to This Mortal Coil (one of the best cover bands of all time). This version is by a great Canadien band called Blue Rodeo.

This Mortal Coil - Song to the Siren
This is a Tim Buckley song, covered here by This Mortal Coil (featuring vocals by Elizabeth Fraser, lead singer of Cocteau Twins). I actually like this version better than the orignal.

All these songs can be purchased on Amazon.

Speaking of Paris 1919...

John Cale's Paris 1919, released in 1973 and re-released last year with some additional tracks, is one of my favorite albums of all time. The gauzy beauty of the songs and the sophisticated, complex arrangements make it impossible not to be drawn into the world Cale creates.
Over the years several artists have covered songs from the album, notably Alejandro Escovedo, Yo La Tengo and Hope Blisters.
Here's a new cover of "Hanky Panky Nohow," by Miracle Fortress, from Montreal.
Miracle Fortress - Hanky Panky Nohow

Check out some more of Miracle Fortress' fine music on their MySpace page.
Purchase Paris 1919 on Amazon.

Road Test

Several weeks ago, on an extremely cold Brooklyn morning, at the far end of Red Hook, where Henry and Hicks Streets meet the New York Harbor, I took my automobile road test. Because of some bad luck and a couple of bonehead moves on my part, I had been without a license for several years. Thanks to the wonderful bureaucracy that is the New York Department of Motor Vehicles, I was forced to go through the whole process, from permit through driver's ed through the road test, as if I was a 16 year old kid. It took me a while, but I finally did it. And since I didn't fuck up the parallel parking or run a stop sign, I passed the test, and now I am an officially licensed New York State driver.
To celebrate that fact, I am posting one of my favorite car songs, Tom Robinson's "2-4-6-8 Motorway," a song that was pretty popular when it came out in the punk heyday of 1978, but is rarely heard anymore. I promise to play it at very high volume as I drive at a very high speed over the cracked, potholed surface of the Brooklyn Queens Expressway.
Tom Robinson - 2-4-6-8 Motorway

More Monsterbuck news

Monsterbuck's album, Land of Make Believers, is finally available via their website. I recommend it highly.

Personal vs Public

There is some music I like that I have no doubt the rest of the world will like too. It seems like a no-brainer, and if I discover it before it becomes a hit, it's only a matter of timing. Lily Allen and Voxtrot come to mind as examples. And if other people seem slow in discovering that kind of music, I will campaign hard for it, whether that means talking to friends or blogging about it or ramming it down people's throats on mix cds.
But there is another kind of music about which my feelings are much more private. It is music that means a great deal to me, but which I'm not necessarily interested in sharing with others. It's not that I want to hide the music or keep it from becoming too popular, it's just that I don't really care if other people like it.
I think that what makes the music personal for me is the impression I get that the music is personal to the artist. My sense is that Lily Allen and Voxtrot are making music with the audience in mind. (Not that there is anything wrong with that, and not to imply that they are pandering in any way.) But there is music I hear which I believe the artist has made for himself or herself, and for which the audience is secondary.
Every artist wants an audience, on some level. But I do feel like certain artists are more inward-looking, and the music they create is made more for their pleasure than for that of any other listener.
This kind of music hits me on a personal level, divorced from the criteria by which I usually decide if I like something (interesting lyrics, great melodies, distinctive vocals).Case in point is a band called Lewis & Clarke, from Delaware Water Gap, PA. Lewis & Clarke is really one guy, Lou Rogai. His music is ethereal and acoustic and sometimes downright pretty, but is always anchored by self-possessed vocals and long, drone-based, meditative guitar lines.
I was introduced to his music when someone posted a cut from a live album he released last summer from a radio show in Philadelphia. I downloaded one of the songs on a Friday afternoon, and then downloaded the rest of the album (WPRB Live) from emusic.com, and listened to it on my Ipod over and over again on my way to the country that night. I found myself encased in Rogai's world, with one song sliding into the next as if each was an extension of the last.
Later, I bought both the American and European version of Bare Bones and Branches (also available from emusic.) And while listening to Bare Bones may not be quite as powerful an experience as my initial experience of listening to the live ep, the music continues to sustain me in a deep and rich way.The point is, I love the music, but I don't have a stake in others loving it. (If this is a characteristic of Rogai's music, that's too bad, in a way. It would be a shame if his music was defined by the fact that the people who loved it had no urge to pass it on to other people. It's possible that, all over the world, there are isolated individuals, unaware they share this passion, listening to Rogai's songs in solitude, with no desire to share them with other people.)Having said all that, I should note that I put this song on a bunch of mix cd's at Christmas time, (before I realized I didn't care if other people heard it) and it turned out that one of the people I gave a cd to, my friend Dannette, loved it so much that she put it on a Valentine's Day mix. So much for the purity of isolated experience.
Lewis & Clarke - Before It Breaks You

I'm trying to think of other artists to whom I have responded like this. Off the top of my head, what comes to mind is Steve Reich's Music for 18 Musicians, John Cale's Paris 1919, and just about everything by Townes Van Zandt.

Visit Lewis & Clarke's website.
Purchase Lewis & Clarke's music on emusic.

Miscellaneous

I haven't posted anything recently because I haven't felt that excited about anything I've heard. I like the new Arcade Fire album, Neon Bible, a lot, but so much has been written about the band and the album, both online and in the mainstream press, that there hasn't been much to say. (Although I found it interesting that Win Butler went to Exeter, the prep school I attended, for better and worse, in the '60's. Exeter was where I was first exposed to a lot of great music, everything from the Seeds to John Mayall to Jimi Hendrix. It was also where I first played in a band - the Psychosomatic E Train, a Mothers of Invention rip off that featured the New England Prep heavyweight wrestling champion playing stand up bass as if it was a Fender, and also featured Benmont Tench, later a member of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, on keyboards.)
The only other comment I would make about Neon Bible concerns the Prefab Sprout references on "No Cars Go." Horns, strings and harmonies are all strongly reminiscent of Jordan: the Comeback, Prefab Sprout's 1990 double album. I've never been that enthusiastic about Prefab Sprout. (I've always associated them with late '80's, early 90's English bands like Deacon Blue, Blue Nile and Everything but the Girl, that I've actually liked a lot more.) But this is the second musical reference I've noticed in the past month, so I'm starting to pay more attention.
Prefab Sprout - Carnival 2000

Other things I've heard recently that I felt like playing more than once: a cover of Love's "Message to a Pretty" by an English band called the Duke Spirit. I have never heard a Love cover I didn't feel was worthy of posting. Love rules, and I applaud any band that seeks to carry that message. This one reminds me of Mazzy Star's cover of "Five String Serenade."
The Duke Spirit - A Message to a Pretty
Click here to purchase Duke Spirit's ep "Covered in Love."

There is band from Wales that I've been enjoying a lot, called Los Campesinos! They sound like a cross between Arctic Monkeys and Camera Obscura. Very hyper verses and very sweet boy-girl harmonies in the chorus.
Los Campesinos! - We Throw Parties, You Throw Knives
Los Campesinos! website: www.loscampesinos.com/

The Grammies were lame, what else is new. I'm glad the Dixie Chicks won a bunch of awards, even though I think Taking the Long Way Home is their weakest album. But in honor of all those trophies, I'm posting a version of Townes Van Zandt's "Snowing on Raton," sung by Pat Green, a country singer/songwriter very popular in Texas and unknown everywhere else, and Natalie Maines, the Chicks' lead singer.
Pat Green and Natalie Maines - Snowing on Raton

Also on the Grammies telecast, Mary J. Blige sang a song I hadn't heard in a long time, Barbara Ellison's "Stay with Me, Baby." The first version of that song I ever heard, back in the late 60's, was by Terry Reid, the English singer who was supposedly offered the job of singing lead in Led Zeppelin, but turned it down to pursue his solo career. Good thinking.
Terry Reid - Stay With Me, Baby

Sunday Post #2

Joao Gilberto - Aguas de Marco

Paper Moon

One of the first bands I discovered on MySpace was Paper Moon, from Winnipeg, Canada. I have probably put their song. "String of Blinking Lights," on more mix cd's than any other in the last nine months. And their album, Broken Hearts Break Faster Every Day, is entertaining, jingle jangle pop of the highest order.
Besides making great music, the members of Paper Moon are very charming, at least as far as I can tell from reading their periodic blog postings on MySpace. Here is the latest example:

After wending our lazy way through the lush meadows of Q-94's Top 30, running up and then gleefully rolling down the grassy hills of the Top 20, and finally finding ourselves riding the Zipper and eating greasy, sugary treats at the glorious carnival of the Top TEN, it's time to go home. The rides are shutting down, the barkers have stopped ceaselessly urging you to show how much you love the "little lady" by winning her a giant stuffed penguin, and Samson, who runs the travelling show, is telling the rousties to "shake some dust".

Technically, we're still IN the top ten (as we are currently #10), but we knew this time would come eventually, and three concurrent weeks in the Top Ten was more than we hoped for. I wonder what the next "single" will be?

SXSW is fast approaching. All you Austin friends, be sure to make it out to the Co-op Bar on March 14. We're also playing an industry BBQ on Friday at 5pm, but I'm not sure if that's open to the public or not.

I would certainly be at their show if I was going to SXSW, and I strongly recommend that, if you are in Austin, you go hear them.
Buy Paper Moon cd's on the band's website: http://www.papermoon.ca/
Visit their MySpace site.

And check out "String of Blinking Lights."

Sunday Post #1

The Postmarks - Goodbye

(Photo by Tina Barney)
The Postmarks available at amazon.com

No I Was Wrong - This Is the Flavor of the Moment

Forget it, Donovan. it's all about Three Dog Night, the most successful cover band of all time. (And I mean that in a good way.) For two nights this week, Three Dog Night was all over the tube.
Wednesday night, the hills and valleys of the Lost island were alive with the sound of "Shambala" as Hurley and Charley careened crazily down an impossibly steep hill in a beat-up VW bus. Then on Thursday night, those crazy kids from American Idol did a cheesy Up with People version of "Joy to the World."
Can SXSW be far behind?
Three Dog Night - Shambala
The Best of Three Dog Night is available at Amazon.com

Mott the Hoople - Brain Capers

Mott the Hoople achieved its greatest commmercial success after David Bowie "discovered" them, gave them the song "All the Young Dudes," and produced the album on which that song was included. But I believe Mott was at its best on the four albums prior to that, culminating in Brain Capers, released in 1972, an album that is, in my opinion, a hard rock classic. (Hard rock was a genre, not a casino hotel in Vegas, in those days. I don't remember exactly how it was defined, except that hard rock meant good rock, and plain rock could mean anything from America to the Grateful Dead. I don't think the term soft rock had been invented.)
Mott was never a band that could be easily classified. Their first album, called Mott the Hoople, came out in 1969 on Atlantic Records, and I suspect that the record company thought they were getting the next Humble Pie or Spooky Tooth. However, one could see that Mott was anything but the standard issue English blues rock band ( even if they did do an instrumental version of "You Really Got Me"). Their albums were chaotic and messy, with instruments and vocals flying all over the place, sometimes out of tune, sometimes buried in the mix. Their frontman, Ian Hunter, was a sunglass-wearing keyboard-playing Bob Dylan wannabe with a punk sneer. Their choice of covers reflected a post modern sensibility years before anyone but Lou Reed had the right to lay claim to that term: Sonny Bono's "Laugh at Me!" Doug Sahm's "Crossroads!" Melanie's "Lay Down!" Plus, their bass player's name was Overend Watts!
(I saw Mott at the Boston in the summer of 1970 at the Boston concert venue, The Ark, opening for Ten Years After. Of course, Mott blew them away. I remember I had to dodge Hunter's piano, which fell off the small stage during "You Really Got Me.")
Brain Capers captured all the joyous chaos of their previous albums, and yet rocked even harder. The vocals were more intense, the guitars shrieked with more urgency, and the rhythm section pounded away with more fire and assurance.
More importantly, Brain Capers also marked the maturing of Hunter as a songwriter. The obvious Dylan references were there, but they were clothed in truly great pre-punk rock music.
Brain Capers, like the previous three Mott albums, was produced by Guy Stevens (who appropriately enough produced the first three Clash albums). His ability to communicate the sense that the music was this close to flying completely out of control, and yet never allowing that to happen, was one of the reasons the Brain Capers may be one of the hardest rocking albums of all time, unmatched except by a few classics like Raw Power and The Clash.
"The Journey" is the centerpiece of Brain Capers. It is over nine minutes long and is, in some ways, a classic power ballad, with a long intro, slow build-up and several big crescendos. But one of Ian Humter's songwriting gifts, clearly evident in this song, was his ability to stay very personal even when the power chords were flying. That's why the song still sounds fresh.
Mott the Hoople - The Journey

Brain Capers is available from Itunes and Amazon.com

Story of a Band Chapter 2

A few months ago I posted a note about my nephew Robby Miller's band, Mister Loveless. Mister Loveless just recorded a new song called "Good Story," and posted it on their MySpace site. As good as their first album was, I think this song shows amazing growth in Robby's singing and songwriting. It's also a great showcase for the maturing of the band as a whole.
I feel like Mister Loveless exists for all the right reasons. It is made up of people who got together to play music because music is the only thing that makes sense to them. It is the only thing worth being passionate about. I believe they would walk through fire to be heard, and yet at the same time, they would shut it down overnight if they didn't feel like they were growing both as individual artists and as a group.
It is fascinating to watch this band grow; I can't wait for the next chapter.
Mister Loveless - Good Story

Mister Loveless' MySpace site

Flavor of the Moment

In the space of five minutes, I saw two commercials featuring songs by Donovan. One was for Fruity Cheerios ("with a touch of real fruit flavor") and used the song "Happiness Runs." I switched channels and came upon a GE commercial that used "Catch the Wind." There was nothing terribly original about either choice, but they both worked well in context. Is it time for a Donovan revival?
Donovan - Happiness Runs
Donovan - Catch the Wind

Feist and A Girl Called Eddy

It's hard not to like Leslie Feist, dba Feist. The most prominent member of Broken Social Scene, she released a great record two years ago called Let It Die that was post modern pop at its most assured and sophisticated, featuring covers as disparate as the BeeGees' "Inside and Out" and "Tout Doucement," a song best known (at least to me) for the version by Blossom Dearie. Before that, she collaborated with Peaches, Gonzales and Kings of Convenience.
Lately she seems to be focussing more and more on the blues. I recently heard her kick-ass live version of the Nina Simone arrangement of "See Line Woman," and the download she has made available from her soon-to-be-released album, The Reminder, is very bluesy as well.
As cool as Feist is, and as much as I like her, I need to remind you of A Girl Called Eddy, who shares many traits with Feist, and released an absolutely brilliant self-titled album a year or so earlier than Let It Die came out, an album I would describe as "Dusty Springfield Sings Truly Sad Songs by Burt Bacharach, Produced by Scott Walker." (In fact, it was produced by the great English singer-songwriter, Richard Hawley.) There is a deceptively languid sadness to her songs that draws you in and then spits you out, leaving you emotionally spent. (That's what music should do, right?)
Perhaps because I feel like A Girl Called Eddy hasn't received the recognition that Feist has, I have a deeper appreciation of her music.
Feist - My Man, My Mountain
A Girl Called Eddy - Tears All Over Town
(Check out the little lift from Prefab Sprout in the middle of "Tears All Over Town," it's awesome.)

Purchase cd's by Feist and A Girl Called Eddy at Amazon.com.

Another Excuse to Mention Asobi Seksu

Asobi Seksu, Brooklyn's 21st Century answer to the Ronettes, and the only band whose t-shirt I own, are on tour and playing Bowery Ballroom tonight (2/21) at 8:00 PM. Their album, Citrus was one of my favorites last year.
They are offering a live cd at their website.
Asobi Seksu - Then He Kissed Me

Jonathan Lethem's Article in Harper's Magazine

Jonathan Lethem, author of the very fine novel, Fortress of Solitude, has a fascinating piece in this month's Harper's, called Ecstacy of Influence. In it, he explores the nature and morality of appropriation of artist's work by other artists.
I think we are all inherently appalled by the idea of plagiarism, in any form. Yet, as Lethem says, there are many acts of plagiarism that are, in fact, works of art themselves, and that (in his words) ultimately "make the world larger."
As Lethem points out, many art movements of the 20th and 21st centuries embraced plagiarism in one form or another. Surrealism, Dada and pop art all borrowed freely from the real world, in ways that could easily be interpreted as stealing.
Writers like William Burroughs (and, up in the ivory tower) Pound and Elliott championed the lifting of quotes from other sources to make double points, contextual and symbolic.
It is impossible to overstate the importance of appropriation in both classical and popular music. As Lethem says in his article, blues and jazz are part of an "open source" culture, in which new ideas develop directly out of old.
Pop music is, by its very nature, plagiaristic. There is undoubtedly a totally original chord sequence out there, but it is rare. "Sweet Jane" is an amazing song, one of the greatest songs ever written, in my opinion. Yet it's basic chord structure can be found in hundreds of other songs. And that does not detract in any way from the beauty of "Sweet Jane." If anything, it magnifies it.
In the early '70's, I was living in Albany, New York, working in a record store. I became acquainted with a group of SUNY Albany music students, and one day I went with them to a music lab on the campus. Someone there was painstakingly splicing audio tape together, and when he played it back, I heard a wonderful collage of drones, sound effects, voices and, buried deep in the mix (although it wasn't called that at the time) a snippet of Tommy James' "Mony, Mony." I had never heard anything like that before, but it instantly made sense to me. The idea that you could put together a bunch of already existing sounds, including a piece of a pop song that was, certainly at that time, something barely worth listening to, to create a totally new piece of music, was exhilarating as hell. It was simultaneously high art and pop culture, composition and commentary.
A year later, after I had moved to New York City and started a rock band called Jack Ruby with one of those Albany music students, my principle contribution to the group's first magnus opus, "Bored Stiff," was the line "I couldn't hit it sideways," which I lifted whole from the Velvet Underground's "Sister Ray." I didn't (and don't) see that as plagiarism at all, because I felt that by singing that line, I was sending a message to people who would hear the song: those who recognized the origins of the line got Jack Ruby (and Jack Ruby got them), and those who didn't weren't worth our time.
Today, technology has made it possible to create entire songs (whole albums, actually) out of samples and splices of other music. (Listen the The Avalanches, posted below.) There is no question in my mind that the composers and musicians employing this methodology are expanding the definition of art.
Lethem's article explores all this, and many other things. It's thought provoking and provocative, entertaining and educational.
(My only objection is to his unnecessary epilogue, which is a Rick Moody-esque list of footnotes in which he proudly demonstrates that much of the article was written by lifting sentences and paragraphs from other writers.)
The Avalanches - Frontier Psychiatry
Jack Ruby - Bored Stiff (1974)
(Please note: I appropriated the "ivory tower" reference from Bob Dylan's "Desolation Row.")

Oh Sweet Nuthin'

A friend of mine told me recently that he thought I was posting too many medium tempo songs on Be Hear Be Now, that it was getting all "Morning Becomes Eclectic." This post is not going to change his mind, since it is based on Sweet Nothings - Love Is a Mixtape, a sweet, medium-tempo Valentine's Day mix of love songs from artists on the Nettwerk label.
There is some stuff that's a little iffy (Barenaked Ladies) but there is also the Submarines, the Weepies and Great Lake Swimmers, a Canadien band with a new, already heavily-blogged album coming out in May called Ongiara.
I'm posting "Your Rocky Spine" by Great Lake Swimmers, partly because it's a great song, but also because Great Lake Swimmers recorded a song last year called "I'll See You on the Moon" for a an anthology of kid's music by indie bands (called I'll See You on the Moon), and it is one of my family's favorite car songs - it's the place where my taste meets my son's taste.
Great Lake Swimmers - "Your Rocky Spine"

Babies

I am posting this song in honor Johan Agebjorn, the producer of Sally Shapiro's sparkling Italian-Swedish disco pop records, who just had a baby girl, my friends Lew and Ina, who are now in China adopting a two-year old boy, and my wife Sara and our little Nemo, due in June.
Lovin' Spoonful - Younger Generation

Lily Allen

Lily Allen's album, Alright Still, was finally released in the US this week. (It was released last summer in England, and quickly went to the top of the charts.) As many people know, Lily Allen was one of the first MySpace success stories. She dropped a couple of demos on her site and very quickly started collecting friends and hits at a rate that freaked out the mainstream record business, leading to major label envy and then major label success. (Whether she can duplicate that success in the US remains to be scene. So far, her fan base here seems to consist mainly of a few lonely bloggers and and some hipster girls.)
Whatever. Lily Allen has everything going for her: she is smart, pretty, genuinely funny (in an English Sarah Silverman way) and she writes very witty pop songs. Whether she makes it in America is beside the point.
Since everything on her album has been posted and reposted several times over, I'm attaching a mixtape she posted on her own website last year. It contains bits and pieces of her own songs, as well as a lot of her obvious influences.
Lily Allen - Mixtape #2
(Warning: This file is almost 60 mg. That's pretty big.)
It's been interesting to observe the Lily Allen phenomenon at my office. I work at a company that edits television commercials. Last summer I started pushing Lily Allen songs on the editors, trying to get them to use her music as needle drop. Initially, I met a lot of resistance. Most people weren't familiar with her and didn't listen that closely; the people who had heard of her thought she was an English Britney. As time went on, an awareness of her began to seep through. All of a sudden editors are using her music in rough cuts. You can hear her music being played behind closed Avid suite doors. If you took a poll of the editors and their assistants (who are younger and maybe more aware of whatr's going on in the world of music), she has gone from a "Who's that?" to "She's awesome."

Hot Air Balloonists

I came across this band on MySpace months ago, listened to their posted songs, loved them. Also loved their name and their logo (pictured). Periodically, I've tried to find out more about the band, via Google and Hype Machine. No luck. And very few clues on the MySpace site. No band members listed. No other website listed. Once in a while they would post an announcement of a concert. I emailed them via their MySpace email address and asked for more info. No response.The best I could do was listen their songs (and only on their MySpace site, since there is no cd and no other place to find the songs.) Finally, they made "Cosmos" available for download. I love this song. I listen to it a couple of times a day, and still haven't gotten sick of it. It is great dream pop, with a perfect melody and an arrangement that make you feel like you are indeed floating over a small mountain range in Europe in a hot air balloon as the sun comes up.
Hot Air Balloonists - Cosmos
Visit the Hot Air Balloonists MySpace site.