Errors-To: owner-ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu Reply-To: ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu Sender: ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu From: ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu To: ecto-request@ns1.rutgers.edu Bcc: ecto-digest-outbound@ns1.rutgers.edu Subject: ecto #419 ecto, Number 419 Friday, 5 February 1993 Today's Topics: *-----------------* Pintos full of beans and other stories Recommendations new music for mike b Re: Recommendations EQUIPOISE SPOILERS! You've been warned Equipoise The fickle finger of function keys strikes again ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 05 Feb 93 14:27:57 CST From: Resigned to being somewhere between 3 and N Subject: Pintos full of beans and other stories WRT Meredith's probe about my personal Ford Pinto war stories: insofar as I can remember the events of 15 years ago, the thing was very prone to oversteering; so I had to work to keep it moving in a straight line as I turned the rather loose-feeling steering wheel back and forth. The most notable thing that happened while I was driving the thing, I guess, was the time I hit a pothole or a bump or something on Lake Shore Drive (since repaved), and the car rose at least a short distance straight up in the air before going straight back down with a pronounced BUMP. I didn't notice whether it continued to go forward as it went up and down, or stayed in the same spot. Now that I think of it, it may have bounced more than once; I really don't remember. Apart from that, the only profound memory I have of it was that one morning after a heavy snow, I had what seemed like an unusually hard time getting it out of the parking space. It has also occurred to me since I started pondering these questions that in the strictest and most tech- nical sense, my rented Pinto was really not a Pinto at all, but rather its trans-divisional clone, the Mercury Bobcat, the Mercury division of Ford being into cat model names rather then horse ones. (It has dawned on me since that when viewed in that light, it suggests an opening for the renascent ecto indus- trial empire to break into the auto business: buy the Mercury division from Ford, and come out with a commemorative model called the Equipussy :-).) ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 5 Feb 1993 16:00 EST From: Sam Warren Subject: Recommendations Michael B. says: >I'm in a strong exploring music phase now and am looking for any and >all suggestions! I highly recommend Julia Fordham. She has three albums: Julia Fordham, Porcelain and Swept. If you want a really terrific mellow album, get Porcelain. She's got a great alto range. Sounds a little like Joni Mitchell at times, too! Are you familiar with Joan Armatrading? I recommend her as well. Her latest is called Square The Circle. Look for her Secret Secrets album. I like it better. If you want a compilation kind of thing, get Track Record. It's kind of a greatest hits package. Have you heard Laurie Anderson's Strange Angels? It's not the best introduction to her, but it may be the easiest to find. AND, it's probably the most accesible. Well, those are the recommendations off the top of my head. >Anyone have recommendations on what would be a good first Joni >Mitchell album to buy? I vote for Shadows and Light. It's a live album, and she sounded pretty darn good live. Plus, it's got several great moments (like a killer drum solo). Maybe the one most people know best would be Court and Spark. It's got Raised on Robbery, Help Me and Twisted. Another favorite of mine. Well, that's my opinion, anyway. ======================================================================== Subject: new music for mike b Date: Fri, 05 Feb 93 16:24:17 -0500 From: jeffy@syrinx.umd.edu Michael B writes: >I also bought my first Enya album "Shepard's Moon". A couple of >friends said buy that one because it's the best and all the others >sound like it. It was o'kay, nothing to die for, but it may grow on >me! You've got weird friends. My own opinion is that _Shepherd's Moon_ is without question and by far the worst Enya album. I rarely listen to it. I have friends who like it a lot more than I do, but I don't think I actually know anyone who says it's their favorite. _Watermark_ is probably the best. _Enya_ is really great but is to some extent better as mood music (not surprising as it's soundtrack material). You also might want to check out the rest of Enya's family with either a Clannad album (_PastPresent_ is a pretty good compilation and weighs in at 70+ minutes) or Maire Brennan's (Maire is Enya's older sister and the lead singer of Clannad) solo release _Maire_ which is quite good. Try to find Pamela Golden's _Happens All the Time_; it's an Ecto fave. Do you have any Innocence Mission or Sarah McLachlan? Jeff ======================================================================== Subject: Re: new music for mike b Date: Fri, 05 Feb 93 16:55:47 EST From: Angelos Kyrlidis Hi, I will second all of Jeff's comments. I have listened to 'Shepherd Moons' 5 times in the last year or so that I have it in my possession, and I don't think I will anytime soon. 'Watermark' is *so* much better. If Jeff got his Equipoise today, there is a *remote* chance that mine is waiting for me at home. Which brings up the question: WHY AM I STILL HERE (at MIT that is)? :) Other slightly rougher musical recommendations: Arson Garden, Tribe (I wonder whatever happened to their new album... Hope they make it. Boston bands tend to have one/two major label releases that flop, and then they get dropped by the label and return to the club scene, or disband (see O Positive, Cavedogs). Hopefully _Abort_ was successful enough to prevent this from happening with them.) Angelos (who wishes the ecto industry comes up with a new Happy music beeper, that would get set off when stuff from AG is in the mailbox, and let you know it's time to stop what you are doing and *rush* home :) or maybe the equivalent to the Zephyr notification system here on athena that goes 'You have new mail' whenever something arrives at the mit po) ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 5 Feb 93 13:59:01 PST From: tsai@ikos.com (Finney T. Tsai) Subject: Re: Recommendations :> :> I highly recommend Julia Fordham. She has three albums: Julia Fordham, :> Porcelain and Swept. If you want a really terrific mellow album, get :> Porcelain. She's got a great alto range. Sounds a little like Joni Mitchell :> at times, too! It's pretty surprised that Julia Fordham hasn't received much attentions here. She's an excellent excellent British singer/songwriter. IMHO, the album "Julia Fordham" is her first one, it's also her best one yet(sounds like a golden rule). Almost every song is great. Julia was very successful at depicting a modern woman struggling among the job and lovers. Go get this one. I used to tape it for friends. Almost everyone just *LOVED* it! :> :> >Anyone have recommendations on what would be a good first Joni :> >Mitchell album to buy? :> I'd rank Joni's works as: 1. Spark and Court 2. Blue 3. Shadow and Light 4. Whatever else "Spark and Court" is a masterpiece. And who can forget "All I Want" in "Blue?" -finney --------------------------- Where's the ocean Where's the moments I once knew inside my heart? -- Toni Childs ======================================================================== Subject: EQUIPOISE SPOILERS! You've been warned Date: Fri, 05 Feb 93 17:01:11 -0500 From: jeffy@syrinx.umd.edu Well, okay, so maybe that wasn't enough warning. Here's some more: If you don't want anybody's opinion to cloud your first listen, quit now! Wow. What a cool album! Like Vickie, I don't think _Equipoise_ stands much chance of becoming my favorite Happy album...that's probably _Rearmament_ with _Ecto_ running an incredibly close second. That said, I _do_ think, also like Vickie, that this could be The One that really breaks Happy. "Runners" is a great song for single release and I think it could do really well. Musically, the album is a natural growth out of _Warpaint_. Still very electronic. Happy's getting much better at texture, though, and there were a few places on my first listen where my first thought was "Bel Canto!" This to me is a Good Thing. I sadly miss the days of her acoustic finger picking, but there's no question that she can write damned good music in this genre. In fact, my current favorite on _Equipoise_ is probably the most electronic, and the first Happy Rhodes song to feature a serious vocal effect. Way cool! _Equipoise_ features a much better use of BVs than _Warpaint_ did. Vickie has mentioned that Happy uses much more of her upper register on this album, and that's true--but it applies mostly to the BVs. Her voice is as wonderful as ever in _every_ register! The sound quality is superb, and like on _Warpaint_, very good use is made of the full left-right spectrum. The sounds flows around inside your head and bounces from ear to ear. Lyrically, Happy continues to grow into a storyteller instead of a chronicler of her internal trials and tribulations. She takes on global issues including environmentalism, genocide, and feminism. I've already mentioned my favorite on the album. Its name is "Cohabitants" and I think it's one of the most frightening things Happy has written. Certainly up there with something like "He's Alive" (which isn't necessarily scary until you see the picture of Alice...;-) It's like the a jumble of all the scary monsters, made all the more scary because it's hiding in the protaganist's body, destroying her life and mind by hiding within 'til there's no one around. The diptych of "He Will Come" and "The Flight" is marvelous, and particularly fitting for the recent release of _Dracula_. It really plays up the romanticism and passion in Gabrielle's freeing of the vampire from it's eternity of hell. It's wonderful to be able to _really_ hear it after that tantalizing glimpse at the Philly show. As Vickie said, "Mother Sea" is gorgeous and features beautiful piano playing by Martha Waterman (of "In Hiding.") I don't know if Happy's been listening to old Genesis records, but I swear that this song sounds like it was a collaboration with Tony Banks. It's uncanny! There are too many highpoints to talk about right now, and I'm still on an adrenalin rush. Jeff ======================================================================== From: wrp@ivy.paramax.com (Bill Pringle) Subject: Equipoise Date: Fri, 5 Feb 1993 17:03:40 -0500 (EST) Message from ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu included: Vickie said: > Is it up to the standards of quality of the other albums? Absolutely! > > Is it *Happy*? Oh yes, you bet! (As in, has she changed her style > dramatically? No.) > > Will other Happy fans love it too? A presumtious YES! > > Which albums is it "closest" to? Warpaint...absolutely. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I must agree with everything Vickie said! Lenny let me hear the CD last week when I was in 21st Century Sound, and it is great! I am looking forward to getting my own copy. Quite good! -- ============================================================================ Bill Pringle Software Tools Paramax Corporation Voice: (215)443-7500 X4023 Internet: wrp@ivy.paramax.com UUCP: ...!uunet!mimsy!widener!gvls1!wrp%ivy ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 05 Feb 93 16:19:24 CST From: U15289@uicvm.bitnet Subject: The fickle finger of function keys strikes again As appears to be my occasional fate, I somehow hit the send function on the keypad en route to the add line key. (It is fortuitous that the _Laugh-In_ 25th anniversary special is this weekend, thus suggesting a title for this exercise in spin control.) Rather than bore everybody with a clone of the full text just sent out, let me resume around the point where the wedge was driven into the second paragraph, even as I was working on setting it off from the first paragraph. The inten- ded transition point between the two will hopefully be inferrable from the visual appearance of the line lengths. [graf 1 culminates in...] hard time getting it out of the parking space. [begin graf 2 here] It has also occurred to me since I started pondering these questions that in the strictest and most tech- nical sense, my rented Pinto was really not a Pinto at all, but rather its trans-divisional clone, the Mercury Bobcat, the Mercury division of Ford being into cat model names rather then horse ones. (It has dawned on me since that when viewed in that light, it suggests an opening for the renascent ecto indus- trial empire to break into the auto business: buy the Mercury division from Ford, and come out with a commemorative model called the Equipussy :-).) It is probably appropriate that these recollections should come on the same day that my real cat went on a binge of digging in the dirt (ah there, Peter Gabriel :-) ) in which certain plants around home were potted. The lesson of both episodes is the same: if there's currently no storm to share, the kitty can easily create one :-). WRT Finney's question on Rosalie Sorrels, his one on Ingrid Karklins having been answered already: I don't know if she hails from Texas initially, but she's been living in Idaho these past many years. (So, as it happens, does Carole King, which means that residency in that state is not an unconditional guarantee of appealing mainly to the musical intelligensia like ourselves :-).) Her music itself, what I know of it, could best be described as being in the feminist folk genre; I should add that it isn't among the so-called "Women's Music," though it no doubt appeals to afficianados thereof. She's appeared on Garrison Keillor's show on one or two occasions. My subjective sense is that Happy and Kevin are doing one of two things: eithe r they're sending the orders out in the order of receipt, or they're giving priority to the orders from people they know well. I have not been home today since well before the mail was delivered; but while the stage may have been reached when it could go either way, it probably is less than even money that I'll be next, at least not just yet. For all that, Vickie well deserves to bask in the status of owning Equipoise copy number 1, thus adding one more element to the array of footnotes that she is to the splendid history of ecto, Happy, and the rest of this constellation of phenomena. Speaking of which: Vickie, do you suppose that H&K's new operative, Michelle, has been apprised yet of the existence on earth of Stuart Rosenberg, Ray Nordstrand, and the rest of the names I've dropped periodically to H&K and to Suzanne? I sure hope so; they could do much to give airplay to the new disc. I did, in fact, see a small item about the Russian mirror in space in yester- day's Sun-Times. I wonder if they're testing it today by aiming it at Chicago; it's unseasonably warm today, and the indoor thermostat settings are still oriented toward more traditional winter weather. Tomorrow it's supposed to go from near 50 back down into the 20's, and stay there for the next several days. All this also reminds me that it was scarcely a year ago that Sergei Krikalev, then seemingly the forgotten man of former Soviet space science, was a thread in these pages. Last October, _The Midnight Special_ on WFMT played a song about him to the tune of "MTA," the original of which our discussions had also touched on. It seems strange to me that anyone would malign the Moog Synthesizer, whose only crime is being primitive in comparison to today's models. Like it or lump it, this primitive machine and its music proved inadequate to keep Command Records alive. I am nonetheless surprised to hear that there was a label with the Stereolab name; when I was the age to have memories of the type that many of us are now admitting to, this was Vanguard Records' trademark for garden-variety stereo records. It seems kafkaesque, in retrospect, that this distinguished center of classical and folk music should have ended up in the hands of Lawrence Welk's company, though to their credit they have kept much of the old catalog alive. Dirk's conceptualization of the Ecto-Walkman seems, in some ways, in a league with the redoubtable Air Guitar, only it actually plays Happy's music. Just goes to show you that anything is possible in the imagination. :-) Michael, I'm sure Angelos will join me in commending Laura Nyro's music to you. Of her sundry Columbia Nice Price albums, I lean toward _Eli and the Thirteenth Confession_ as the recommended primer. Hers is a fine old Urban American sound that nicely counterbalances the ethereal/pastoral sound of much of the product of that other Sixties mainstay, Joni Mitchell. WRT to the latter, let me hold a good thought, as Marilyn Monroe used to say, for her (JM, not MM) 1975 album _The Hissing of Summer Lawns_. The inside cover photo, at least on the LP version, isn't half bad either :-). She also did some interesting experiments with jazz on the _Mingus_ album. Another thing you might try to get is _Last Autumn's Dream_ by the 70s English art-rock band Jade Warrior. It's a musical idiom much like ecto is built on, only with men. It's on the Line label from Germany, and so costs through the nose; but if you get it in conjunction with Laura Nyro's midprice stuff it should average out to something approaching normal. Off to brave the rush hour load factor on the CTA, to see whether the imposs- ible has happened and the post office has delivered me something (I'm sure you can guess what, in the context of today's traffic on ecto) expeditiously for once :-). Mitch ---------------------------------- "All sex and no gender." --Someone's characterization of Marlene Dietrich, related on last night's _World News Now_ "Cow gives birth to bovine baby." --Headline in a supermarket tabloid, related in the "Today's Papers" segment of the same show ======================================================================== Subject: Re: The fickle finger of function keys strikes again Date: Fri, 05 Feb 93 17:41:27 EST From: Angelos Kyrlidis Hi, Just got a call from Efi that Equipoise is *indeed* at home. She even found time to write me a letter in response to the letter I sent her with my order. YIPPEEE!!!!!!! :) :) Off I go to Equipoise heaven! Angelos ======================================================================== The ecto archives are on hardees.rutgers.edu in ~ftp/pub/hr. There is an INDEX file explaining what is where. Feel free to send me things you'd like to have added. -- jessica (jessica@ns1.rutgers.edu)