From: owner-ecto-digest To: ecto-digest@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: ecto-digest V2 #222 Reply-To: ecto@nsmx.rutgers.edu Errors-To: owner-ecto-digest Precedence: bulk ecto-digest Tuesday, 12 September 1995 Volume 02 : Number 222 The Ecto digest is now being generated automatically. Please send problems and questions to: ecto-owner@nsmx.rutgers.edu. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Neile Graham Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 12:41:14 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Re: Leslie Spit Treeo Laurel was asking about the Leslie Spit Treeo: > I bought an album by the group a few years ago, which really surprised me. > Liked it a lot. Solid folk rock kindof stuff, very very good lyrics in many > cases. Occasionally had a little more twang than I'd like, but still... > utterly charming. I think the album title is DON'T CRY TOO HARD. > > Beyond that album, I never heard the band mentioned anywhere. Have never > seen any other albums... I always wondered if the band was still around or > had broken up or changed names or what... So it was a pleasant surprise to > see them mentioned in the list of artists at the festival. The Leslie Spit Treeo had another album which I like much, much better than _Don't Cry Too Hard_: _Book of Rejection_. It's a little uneven, but the best songs are great--intelligent lyrics, driving rock, and the lead singer, Laura Hubert, has a great, gravelly voice. They lost someone and changed their name to the Spits and just released another album that has had worse distribution than either of the two previous albums. I picked it up in Toronto in June, but it slid into our collection without me paying too much attention to it. I remember liking it but right now I can't even bring its title into my consciousness. But _Book of Rejection_ has some brilliant moments. "River Through My Fire." Wow. - --Neile neile@u.washington.edu ------------------------------ From: Neile Graham Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 12:56:14 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Re: Music vs. Lyrics again Valerie asked: > A question for those of us who are music people. Can you stand dancing to > industrial music? (all beat, few, if any lyrics. The ones that exist are inane, > IMO). I'm a lyrics person, and I've found that it's impossible for me to dance > to any song I can't sing along to. It's a quirk, I know...but I just can't do > it. And I love to dance. No, I don't like industrial music. In fact, I don't like very much music that doesn't have vocals. (I have a few exceptions, mostly in classical music, and of course, Henry Frayne's _Lanterna_ work which is so evocative it has its own voice.) So anyway, even though I listen to the music first, vocals are very important to me. It's just a little less important what they're saying. Oh, and I know what Richard means when he says > What's really strange is when I listen to a song and It has a *really* > strong emotional impact (crying or not), and you just can't place the > emotion, really... but it is still really strong! Yes! This happens to me, too. It feels like it will burst out of my body but it's not any "named" emotion. It's not necessarily sad or not sad or anything. Just powerful. BTW, thanks very much for the testimonial, Richard--it made my day. No, my year. :) - --Neile neile@u.washington.edu ------------------------------ From: ariel_b@pipeline.com (Ariel Brennan) Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 15:57:57 -0400 Subject: Re: songs that make me cry On Sep 12, 1995 09:50:13, 'Richard Holmes ' wrote: >What's really strange is when I listen to a song and It has a *really* strong >emotional impact (crying or not), and you just can't place the emotion, >really... but it is still really strong! Does this ever happen to others? Oh, that happens to me all the time. I have no idea why! Re: You Oughta Know >It seems to be a very powerful song, and connect to very many people and >emotions, hence its popularity. I always thought that it was maybe just >because it expresses what so many might *want* to say, but it isn't >"correct"... but I really think it goes further. That was what I originally thought too, but it seems too intense to be something that simple. >For instance, I actually >*saw* the video (rare 'cuz I don't turn on the tube much)... but at first I >didn't know quite what to make of it. After watching the recording I made of >it, I had various interesting thoughts about it... one of them goes as this... As far as I can tell, it kind of expresses this isolation that one feels after a relationship dissolves. Isolation, coupled with some HARDCORE anger. ;) Alanis seems to be more PO'd than most people would be, myself, I reacted more with sadness and confusion than anger and hate. >well, really its bringing his own actions back to him, such >that he can "have the opportunity" to experience some of the pain he himself >caused. (this is just *one* aspect... I don't want to blather on all day about >it). Oh, please, blather. I'm a dopey eyed Alanis fanatic. Please, blather all day. >But, it really annoys me when Top-40-Alt-Tern-Nut-ive or Modern Rock station >DJs just try to dismiss her as "psycho music" and laugh her off... Not only DJ's and what not, but regular people. It's all over the place, someone posted on AOL (my other life) that she was "obsessive, really scary obsessive". But I don't get obsessive from her, not even in YOK. I get anger, and pain, and bitterness, but not obsession. >Sometimes I detect some of the djs are just a little uncomfortable about the >song... perhaps they feel some of that juju themselves :) It seems to me that a lot of people are uncomfortable with the song. ;> >I have her CD, and some of it is pretty deep in a no-nonsense, straight-forward >sort of way. Amazing. She doesn't mince words, but there is some wisdom there >beyond her years. For me, it's her twisted sense of humor; she's very sarcastic, but everything she says is a truth, whether it's in her own life or in a universal manner. And her music rises and falls with her mood; it's really an incredible experiance. You don't get that from, say, Jewel, who's about the same age, but still writes naive, sheltered fairy tale stuff (don't get me wrong, I like Jewel enough, but you gotta admit, she's pretty naive in those songs.) Alanis appears to have truly lived, and hurt, and learned. >I think also songs can get us in touch with things that we *haven't* personally >experienced, at least not that way or that severely. Alternately, has anyone ever run across a song that's absolutely perfect to a situation you've lived, in every detail? - -Ariel ------------------------------ From: Damon Harper Date: Tue, 12 Sep 95 13:06 PDT Subject: Re: those emotionally charged songs... dirk kastens said: >Incidentally, I've just bought the remastered version of TLLDOB and have remastered? are we simply talking cd versus vinyl here? :) i started with the cd.... in fact, i only really have cds in my music collection. i such a young'un :P >listened to it several times during the last days. It's one of my all-time >favorite albums. "The Carpet Crawlers" is my favorite song off the album >and I had to cry when I heard it for the first time, maybe 15 years ago. yep, i'd say it's up there for me too. the first time i heard it/read the story, i was a bit nonplussed, but it grew on me remarkably. actually, *all* genesis albums have had to grow on me, the only exception to this being _a trick of the tail_, which i loved the moment i heard it. all the others, from their first all the way to _we can't dance_ have taken much time to grow on me, but now i pretty much love them all. i'm more partial to albums before and including _wind and wuthering_, but certainly like their more recent ones too - a lot of it seems to be "pop fluff" but there are certainly examples of their older, more interesting style as well. now old to middle genesis is what i call my "default music", or what i tend to listen to when there's nothing new in which to immerse myself :) listening to _foxtrot_ right now, actually. >Other songs that made me cry are many songs by PG (Mercy Street, Love to >be loved), KT (Hello Earth, All the Love, Walk Straight Down The Middle, >Top Of The City), Genesis' "Ripples" (the most melancholic song >I ever heard: sail away, away, ripples never come back, gone to the other these sound like the sort of things i find most affecting too, though very few such songs actually make me cry. >On some songs it's simply the music that makes me cry, on others it's the >combination of the music and the lyrics. But I will never cry because >of the lyrics alone. i think that's me too - sometimes i feel i view the printed word too unemotionally. combine certain words with music and it can become a very emotional experience. i mean, i've read material that has touched a chord or caused strong emotional response, but nothing that can move me as much as when it's set to the right music... the music is what reaches in and grabs me, and pulls the meanings and emotions in after it. i guess i pay more attention to such things when the music's there to hook me :) damon _/\_ Damon_Harper@mindlink.bc.ca __\ /__ "Doo doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo, Vancouver, BC, CANADA \ / doo doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo." |/||\| - The Cranberries, http://www.dfw.net/~soulmate/damon/paukarut.html "Ode To My Family" ------------------------------ From: "Joanna M. Phillips" Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 16:19:21 -0400 Subject: Re: animation series At 09:26 AM 9/12/95 -0700, you wrote: >> On 8 Sep 95 at 20:14, Steve VanDevender muttered: >> >> > "Matt Bittner" writes: >> > > ...unless you have a great TV. Anybody else looking forward to the >> > > premier of "Pinky & the Brain" this Sunday? Probably the best >> > > animated characters yet. ZOT! >> This is truly the best _current_ animation series. Unless you count >> The Tick, as well... >> >> >> Matt > >the best animation series of all time being, of course, Danger Mouse. > >:) > >kevin Notice that two of the three programs involve mice ! Yeah! ;D - -jo- aka country mousie! <:3 p.s. I LOVE "The Tick" !! :) - ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Joanna M. Phillips | "There are two ways of spreading light: fleur@one.net | to be the candle fleur@genie.com | or the mirror that reflects it." --Edith Wharton ------------------------------ From: VNozick@tribune.com Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 16:52:54 -0700 Subject: Re[2]: animation series Kevin wrote: >the best animation series of all time being, of course, Danger Mouse. > >:) I *loved* this cartoon -- I even brought back 5 minibooks from England with Dangermouse stories in them! And somewhere I have many of them recorded on VHS tapes. The cartoon featured some really _great_ puns. (Ah, I can hear DM now saying, 'Penfold, shush.') If anyone knows of how I can get some animation cells from Dangermouse, please let me know. Usually when I go into galleries around here (Chicago), I get a strange look. ==> Valerie ------------------------------ From: Damon Harper Date: Tue, 12 Sep 95 15:08 PDT Subject: undefinable emotions richard asked >What's really strange is when I listen to a song and It has a *really* >strong emotional impact (crying or not), and you just can't place the >emotion, really... but it is still really strong! Does this ever >happen to others? yes... very well put! i think i know exactly what you mean. really strong as in you can feel your heart thumping away and your face trying to form itself into some unusual shape (well, strong reactions anyway), but really just can't place it, can't define it in terms of a single recognisable emotion. that's happened to me a lot. damon i love this whole thread :) _/\_ Damon_Harper@mindlink.bc.ca __\ /__ "Doo doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo, Vancouver, BC, CANADA \ / doo doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo." |/||\| - The Cranberries, http://www.dfw.net/~soulmate/damon/paukarut.html "Ode To My Family" ------------------------------ From: kerry white Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 17:25:49 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Robert Lovejoy's address Hello, Robert, please send me your e-mail address. I tried and got addressee unknown message. KrW "TV or not TV, that is the question. Whether it is nobler to suffer the lies of outrageous pitch-men, or to slit your throat with an electrocoated stainless steel blade"? WOI ------------------------------ From: beach house tiki god Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 19:21:08 -0400 Subject: Re: hector zazou's "chansons des mers froides" Damon Harper sez: >also you >didn't mention va:rttina, who sing on the opening track, and who, i know, >are at least somewhat ectophilic. though i've never heard anything by them >before myself - now i'd be quite interested in doing so, however, after >listening to "chansons des mers froides" (songs from the cold seas). somewhat? i think they're entirely ectophilic! three of their five albums have been released in america: oi dai, seleniko, and aitara. their first two are only available in europe, as far as i know. they started out as a huge folk ensemble and have slowly pared themselves down to a trio of vocalists and supporting musicians. at the same time, they have blended their traditional finnish folk beginnings with a strong pop streak making for some pretty intense, wonderful and striking music. i haven't picked up the zazou album yet, so i dunno how the varttina track compares to their own work. highly recommended by this ectophile. >hector has another one out that i know >of, "sahara blue", for which i've been looking ever since i heard it - the >first song is performed by anneli marion drecker, of bel canto, whose voice >and style i lovelovelove. can't remember who else is on it though. gerard depardieu, david sylvian, bill laswell, ryuichi sakamaoto, sussam deihim, keith lablanc, barbara louise gogan are just a few of the names that ectophiles might readily recognize. there are quite a few more as well. woj ------------------------------ From: David Dixon Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 16:29:06 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Re: Music vs. Lyrics again On Tue, 12 Sep 1995, Neile Graham wrote: > No, I don't like industrial music. In fact, I don't like very much music > that doesn't have vocals. (I have a few exceptions, mostly in classical > music, and of course, Henry Frayne's _Lanterna_ work which is so > evocative it has its own voice.) Agreed, _Lanterna_ is a fine piece of work. When I was a teenager, I was an avid collector of what's now called "new age" music (though it wasn't called that at the time.. I think that term started to be applied around 1988). Most of it is rubbish, naturally-- I think that's true of all genres of music-- but I do have some recommendations in the "emotionally charged instrumental music" category: Tim Story, _Beguiled_: Really, just about anything by this guy, though _Beguiled_ is his best, I think. Very simple tunes which really set a haunting mood. If you're a fan of Erik Satie, Story's your man. Patrick O'Hearn, _Indigo_: Dark, dark synthesized music from the former Zappa and Missing Persons bassist. Warren Cuccurillo and Mark Isham help out. Chris Spheeris, _Pathways to Surrender_: The first track, "Where the Angels Fly," is a peppy little AOR tune, but most of the rest of the album is much more moody, culminating in a tribal stomp which segues into the Greek Orthodox hymn "Christ is Risen", ending in a really lovely male-female duet. Steve Roach, _Stormwarning_: A *great* live album. Starts out ambient and whooshy, but after a few minutes turns into a sequencer-thon a la 1970's-era Tangerine Dream. The sudden drop-off in the middle of the second side is to die for (you'll know what I mean when you hear it). Intense. Kevin Braheny, _The Way Home_: Created on homemade synthesizers, this is a very calm, beautiful album. Vangelis, _Soil Festivities_: Stunning. Simply stunning. I think it's his most evocative album to date, but close runners-up are: _Opera Sauvage_, _Heaven and Hell_, _Albedo 0.39_... Heck, I even like _Beaubourg_, which is completely melody-less, but fascinating just the same. Those are some just off the top of my head. I'd need my antiquated tape collection in front of me to stir my memory any more. :) D^2 ------------------------------ From: beach house tiki god Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 19:33:02 -0400 Subject: Re: Music vs. Lyrics again VNozick@tribune.com sez: >A question for those of us who are music people. Can you stand dancing to >industrial music? some. not most. depends. the spectrum of "industrial" music is pretty varied from the all-out noisefests of einsturzende neubaten or zeni geva (neither of which are particularly danceable) to the pounding rhythms of, say, meat beat manifesto to the ambient atmosphere of, um, lull or illusion of safety. the death disco stuff (meat beat manifesto, thrill kill kult, etc.) is crafted with dancing in mind and (ahem) i have been known thrash about to it. ;) >(all beat, few, if any lyrics. The ones that exist are inane, IMO). ~~~ of course. ;) woj ------------------------------ From: beach house tiki god Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 20:02:58 -0400 Subject: Re: random blatherings >>>I've always considered the lyrics more important than the beat, is this >>>usual with ecto folks, I wonder? >>not really in my case. lyrics are the last thing (usually) to sink into >Really? Interesting! So what attracts you to a song in the first place? I >mean, if you hear it for the first time on the radio, for example. lots of things. i'm impressed by good musicianship (especially a talented drummer), cool sounds (like kevin bartlett playing e-bow), and catchy melodies (like sarah's "vox"). the most devastating, though, is hard to describe. sometimes, the combination of music, lyrics, tone and everything just strikes a chord with something in my head/heart/soul/whatever. the best word i've found to describe this is that some songs just "resonate" in my being. sounds kinda mystical wacko, but that's what it feels like. sometimes it's the first time i heard a song (suzanne vega's "cracking" or KaTe's "hello earth"), sometimes it's the umpteenth time i hear a song (jane siberry's "sail across the water"). whenever it happens, it's a shiver down my spine, goosebumps on my arms, an itch i can't scratch. gotta hear it, gotta gotta gotta. woj ------------------------------ From: beach house tiki god Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 20:09:00 -0400 Subject: when i was a girl ariel_b@pipeline.com (Ariel Brennan) sez: >When I Was A Boy takes some getting used to. It's not a very accessible >work, but once you've gotten into it, it's in your blood and won't get out. yeah, that pretty much mirrors my experience. meredith had a baptism of fire courtesy of "all the candles in the world". for me, it took some time, many listens and a viewing of the video for "sail across the water" before everything clicked. that video! wow! i'm as much a video person as i am a lyrics person, but that video just knocked me right out. for some reason, i picked right up on the woman on the right end of the row who was always off-time and never in sync. i was stunned when jane, in an interview where she discussed the video, singled that one bit out as one of the key things of that video which, as it turns out, was entirely unplanned! yow! ever since then, the whole album, but especially that song, resonates like the bells of rhymney. woj ------------------------------ From: beach house tiki god Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 20:18:55 -0400 Subject: toons! "Matt Bittner" sez: >Anybody else looking forward to the >premier of "Pinky & the Brain" this Sunday? i was looking forward to it, as i had heard tons of great things about them from many another friend and had not yet seen them on animanics (or wherver it is that they come from). alas, i was kinda disappointed. fortunately, so were said friends, for pretty much the same reasons: a pretty dull plot and characters that staled after 10 minutes. i suspect that in short doses, which i understand is the accustommed delivery method in their native land, they would be great. woj ------------------------------ From: beach house tiki god Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 20:32:56 -0400 Subject: stereotaxic device ItsyBitsyS@aol.com sez: >And last but not least Stereotaxic Device. Kind of makes me think of AG's >Ambient, but more industrial. There are some very cool far away vocals on >some of the tracks and some groovin' hooks. The name of the album I bought >is 100 PER DAY EXTINCT and the theme is definately enviromental and animal >rights oriented. ungh. std is the wife of somebody who used to post regularly to both rec.music.industrial and nm-list. that was so long ago that i have no idea who it is anymore, but i'm pretty sure he is still on the net. they have a couple albums on kk records. the other one is self-titled. there's also a 12" single called "lost land" which came out about the time of the first record (1990). wish i could be of more help. >Kisses if you made it to the bottom of this post. Bye bye. smooch smooch. woj ------------------------------ From: Richard Holmes Date: Tue, 12 Sep 95 18:14:39 -0700 Subject: Smitten & How to get their CD Hi, I just got the Smitten $5 CD, and I mistakenly made the check out to "Smitten / Not Happy Records"... which was a mistake.... Damon sez to make it to Damon Fries, and send it to him at 332 220th Ave. San Francisco, CA 94121 He said that a couple of checks came in made to Not Happy Records, and that he's unable to cash them, as they haven't been incorporated yet. I haven't had a chance to listen to it yet, but it has 4 songs that were mentioned previously here. - -Richard. ------------------------------ From: Neal Copperman Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 22:47:09 -0400 (EDT) Subject: Re: TV (Nation) & Movies I've seen a number of Egoyan films, and Exotica is certainly the most accesible of them. Not my favorite though. I rather liked the one that came after the adjuster, whose name I can't remember (though I could look it up if anyone really cared). I thought Exotica was frequently intriguing, but that it never really added up to anything in the end. Played heavily on a sense of dread and foreboding, without giving a reason for it. Still found it entertaining and intriguing though, just not as much as I had hoped for. Neil pegged him pretty well... > Focusing on alienation in urban settings as > themes, and looking at the idea of the camera as the cold dispassionate > third party observer. Stuff that plays well in rep cinemas. Almost all of his films deal with some sort of voyerism, or non-personal communications (video teleconferencing, answering machines, one way mirrors, ...). Exotica is actually warmer than most. > > The film that first brought him a fair bit of publicity was the Adjuster, > about an insurance adjuster. In between Exotica, his most recent and > successful film, and the Adjuster he did a film shot largely in Armenia > called Calendar. I really disliked Calendar though. Totally left me cold, and the repetitive format of scene after scene was tiresome, and once again didn't go anywhere. Plus it's clumsily filmed, which isn't true of his other films. > As I recall his wife, Arsinee Kazanjian, has been in all three films. His wife is the pregnant woman in Exotica. > > That's all the Egoyan trivia I can think of. Unfortunately, I can think of a little more :) He came to greater prominance when Wim Wenders won the Palm D'our (sp?) at Cannes for Wings of Desire. He gave his prize money to Atom Egoyen, claiming that the money would be better spent by a struggling artist who was making great films, rather than someone established like himself. I guess this was on the basis of the Adjuster, and this money was used to make the film that I particularly like (and can't remember). After Exotica came through here, a local critic claimed that Egoyan had learned how to make one good movey. Unfortunately, he keeps making the same one. I agree he dwells repeatedly on the same things, but he does treat them differently in each of his films. And in Exotica some of his characters actually talk TO each other. Probably more than anyone wanted to know.... Neal ------------------------------ From: Neile Graham Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 20:08:52 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Jewel Ariel sez: > For me, it's her twisted sense of humor; she's very sarcastic, but > everything she says is a truth, whether it's in her own life or in a > universal manner. And her music rises and falls with her mood; it's really > an incredible experiance. You don't get that from, say, Jewel, who's about > the same age, but still writes naive, sheltered fairy tale stuff (don't get > me wrong, I like Jewel enough, but you gotta admit, she's pretty naive in > those songs.) Alanis appears to have truly lived, and hurt, and learned. People might get the impression of naivete about Jewel from _Pieces of You_ (though "Daddy" and "Hey Little Sister" are exceptions) but I think the naive songs are exceptions in Jewel's work. When I first heard the Innerchange tape I assumed Jewel was in her thirties or so, simply because of the sophistication and wit of her lyrics, and of the evidence of knowledge about human nature they show. And once you've heard "Nicotine Love" you'll see how powerful and gutsy she can be. I think this naive thing is something Jewel cultivates a little herself because she does strongly believe in the power of positive things, like beauty and innocence and being sensitive. Anyway, I think Jewel is far better-rounded than you would guess by _Pieces of You_, which is why I think they made some poor choices when putting that album together. I wouldn't say the anger Alanis shows is exactly maturity--to me it's the anger of a young person "You Oughtta Know" shows--hurt and spiteful. Not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just something different from maturity. I guess I would contrast her anger with Marianne Faithfull's in "Why'd Ya Do it?" Anyway, I like the anger of both songs a lot. And "Nicotine Love" scares me badly. - --Neile neile@u.washington.edu ------------------------------ End of ecto-digest V2 #222 ************************** ======================================================================== Please send any questions or comments about the list to ecto-owner@nsmx.rutgers.edu