From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org (fegmaniax-digest) To: fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Subject: fegmaniax-digest V11 #389 Reply-To: fegmaniax@smoe.org Sender: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk fegmaniax-digest Thursday, November 21 2002 Volume 11 : Number 389 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: Various quick takes [Aaron Mandel ] Re: Bands I've seen ["FS Thomas | at work" ] Re: Bands I've seen, 80s fork, etc. [Ken Weingold ] Re: Bands I've seen [Ken Weingold ] Re: Bands I've seen [Eb ] Re: stones 'n' roses [Miles Goosens ] Re: Bands I've seen ["FS Thomas | at work" ] Re: camp van beethoven ["Michael E. Kupietz, wearing a pointy hat" ] Re: spiritus mundi [Aaron Mandel ] Re: Antidisestablishmencontrarianisticoncoclasticism [Miles Goosens ] Re: Oh yeah...THEM too [Christopher Gross ] the miller's tale [Jim Davies ] RE: Kiss my list... ["Roberta Cowan" ] Scott Miller, the Monkees, the Church (0% Donette Thayer content) ["Rex.B] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 16:42:25 -0500 (EST) From: Aaron Mandel Subject: Re: Various quick takes On Thu, 21 Nov 2002, Eb wrote: > Actually, it seems like many of his disciples review his song *titles* > rather than his *songs*. But they weren't expecting to get busted by a man who reviews music's *fans* instead of its *creators*! Later in the post you dissed the actual music for once, so you're off the hook. a ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 16:44:53 -0500 From: "FS Thomas | at work" Subject: Re: Bands I've seen This is all off the top of my head and listed in no particular order, but rather lumped (roughly) by the number of times I've seen the acts: 20+ Club - ---------- Robyn Hitchcock Teens - ------ Bob Mould (15?) Billy Bragg (13?) 2-10 - ------------ Sugar (6?) RH w/The Soft Boys (6?) The Chameleons (2) The Departure Lounge Cinerama The Wedding Present The Descendents All The Circle Jerks Miracle Legion The Ramones The Mighty Mighty Bosstones Richard Thompson Lou Reed Luna Jethro Tull They Might Be Giants Julianna Hatfield Violent Femmes Bjork (inc. another listed below) Stanley Jordon Big Audio Dynamite Van Morrison Lush Throwing Muses Sinead O'Conner Belly Genesis One-Offs - ---------- Smashing Pumpkins Hole Green Day Bjork Paul Weller Neil Young Soundgarden Beck Gene Foo Fighters The Bluetones Reef Ash White Zombie ?? Belle and Sebastian Tonya Donnelly Jen Toomey (Tsunami) Velocity Girl Oasis Paul McCartney Peter Gabriel Midnight Oil The Indigo Girls Tori Amos The Trembling Blue Stars Heavenly Harvey Williams The Strokes RH w/The Egyptians Husker Du Catherine Wheel Yo La Tengo Stereolab Nine Inch Nails The Who Rollins Band Janes Addiction Fresh Young Fellows David Bowie Roger Waters ZZ Top Van Halen Men At Work Billy Joel Chicago The Beach Boys Dire Straits ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 16:47:10 -0500 From: Ken Weingold Subject: Re: Bands I've seen, 80s fork, etc. On Thu, Nov 21, 2002, Eb wrote: > >Ken: > >Honeymoon Suite 1 > > Ha! I would have assumed that I was the only person on the list who > saw this horrible band. They opened for Jethro Tull in 1984, at one > of my very first concerts. I believe this was the very first time I > heard "HELLO, LOS ANGELES!!" onstage. ;) I saw them in 1986 open for Heart. Yes, I admit to seeing that show. Hehe. Oh, I forgot the most embarrassing of them all: Air Supply in 1984. HAH! - -Ken ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 16:49:14 -0500 From: Ken Weingold Subject: Re: Bands I've seen On Thu, Nov 21, 2002, FS Thomas | at work wrote: > Husker Du I hate you for this. - -Ken ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 13:51:15 -0700 From: Eb Subject: Re: Bands I've seen >On Thu, Nov 21, 2002, FS Thomas | at work wrote: >> Husker Du > >I hate you for this. Me too. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 16:00:48 -0600 From: Miles Goosens Subject: Re: stones 'n' roses At 12:17 PM 11/21/2002 -0800, drew wrote: >> From: Dr John Halewood >> >> the thing i find particularly strange about the Pitchfork list is it's >> curious assessment of British acts, at least to UK ears. The Stone Roses >> album regularly gets voted top album of all time while it barely makes it >> into the Pitchfork top 40. > >I'd like to think that the top album of all time would >have a vocalist who could sing on it. Woo hoo! Preach on! I'd like them almost as much as I like Duran Duran if they had a stronger, more charismatic voice out front. But probably not more than that. :-) >I don't have an intelligent case -- I just trust my ears, >and they were pleasantly surprised with Sweet F.A. in >particular and even Lift (which had to grow on me). I >never really enjoyed anything from Earth Sun Moon and >bought it mostly to complete my collection ("No New Tale >to Tell" is OK), Not even "The Mirror People"? (I like the faster electric-er version best.) "Here on Earth"? "The Telephone Is Empty"? Waaah. >and Express annoyed me so much on the >first listen I haven't yet given it another chance. I'd >heard it was amazing so I was bitterly disappointed. >Maybe it will grow on me over time. It's certainly the most over-the-top thing they ever did, but I love it to death. Is "Ball of Confusion" on your copy? The recent CD reissues move it over to a 7th DREAM bonus track (which is chronologically more correct) and un-graft it from EXPRESS. I like it too, but just in case it was an obstacle... (EXPRESS gets the "USA mix" of "Ball of Confusion" as a bonus track.) >Too bad "The Reflex" sucks! (Bring it on, Miles. :)) Hee! The album version sucked to high heaven, but the (wait for it) re re re re re re re mix rocked. I like a lot of 12" mixes from that day and age. And some of the b-sides... heck, two of my favorite Prince tracks ever are the long-version b-sides "Erotic City" and the amazing "La La La, Hee Hee Hee." Lemme tell you, the 7" b-side versions that went on THE B-SIDES (the third disc of the '90s Prince hits collection) don't even begin to show how great those tracks are. >I was so glad when Greatest came out and FINALLY included "New Moon >on Monday," one of my favorite Duran tracks. "New Moon" was the beginning of the end for me -- I remember seeing the video for it (which also meant hearing it for the first time) and thinking "man, this is some endless, directionless, boring crap." It still seems incredibly un-hooky to me, like they were trying to invert the "Hungry Like the Wolf" riff, but the chemical reaction got out of control and turned everything eggshell colored. SEVEN AND THE RAGGED TIGER was one of those records that was so dull that it made me forget why I had ever liked the band in the first place. FWIW, I think the two '90s "comeback" singles, "Ordinary World" and "Come Undone," are just transcendently good, among the best things they've ever done, and, heck, among the best singles of the decade. The actual album they come from is about four songs too long, but that hardly makes it unique in the post-'88 world, and like COSMIC THING by the B-52's, it's far more than I ever expected from such a (relatively speaking) fun, disposable band so far into the game. later, Miles ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 17:03:36 -0500 From: "FS Thomas | at work" Subject: Re: Bands I've seen After having admitted to seeing Husker Du, Eb and Ken--in unison--murmured: > > > >I hate you for this. It was on the Warehouse tour at the West Hartford Agora. Great, great show. Loud as hell. I seem to remember my fillings aching for a few days afterwards. Some clown chucked a beer bottle at the stage maybe half way into the set. It hit the drum kit and broke one of Hart's symbols. The ride, I think. He got up and walked off. After about a ten minute intermission he came back--pissed--and finished the set. - -f. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:08:35 -0800 From: "Michael E. Kupietz, wearing a pointy hat" Subject: Re: camp van beethoven At 12:41 PM -0800 11/21/02, drew transmitted: >> True, although my opinion is that looking solely at the widely, >> commercially popular music, every decade has it's cheese, lots of it, but >> the '80s pop music scene was particularly abysmal compared to decades >> before or since. I think popular music in the '90s, f'rinstance, has had >> its share of moments of true excellence. > >I dunno...I think it depends on where the cutoff for "widely, >commercially popular music" is and what country you're looking >at. I heard piles and piles and piles of shit in the 90s on >commercial radio, personally, and am going to have real trouble >trying to be nostalgic for that decade in the future, at least >as far as music is concerned. Thinking back on some of the >major trends -- grunge, generic alternarock, ska, swing revival, >nu-metal, the rise of Mouseketeer pop -- I just get a horrible >aftertaste in my mouth. To me, "widely, commercially popular music" generally means what I, is a move about in my little personal Mikeycosm, hear on the radio and TV when I'm not going out of my way to look for the "alternative" - college radio, highly specialized or narrowly focused formats, etc., and includes anything I might hear a randomly on the street or in a club that I didn't go to specifically for a certain band or type of music. In the '90s, that would include: Radiohead "OK Computer", Liz Phair "Exile In Guyville", G. Love & Special Sauce (first album), just off the top of my head - three albums I consider unqualifiedly great. Also Tool "Undertow", which is not great but definitely very good, even Marilyn Manson "Antichrist Superstar" which is surprisingly good for a faux-rebellious "major-label product"-type offering (think of an updated version of the niche Billy Idol occupied in '82 or so, for lack of a better example.) Plus the continued happenings on the Hip Hop front, which only started to come into its own (in my opinion) in the late '80s, with Public Enemy doing Chuck Berry to The Beastie Boys' Elvis. I think of Tupac "Ell Eyez On Me" off the top of my head, which I love, and - ok, I'm not going to try and defend this, it's just my opinion, and strictly a guilty pleasure at that - Eminem's "Slim Shady LP". Why beat around the bush - let's just say it seems to me that anything Dr. Dre touches turns to gold. Or - an even guiltier pleasure I hardly ever admit to anyone - Busta Rhymes' "When Disaster Strikes". And that's just the hugely popular acts, on a smaller scale there's Dr. Octagon "The Octagonecolegist", for one. All this is just off the top of my head. While you could argue that some of these are analogous to, I dunno, Bauhaus cranking out several great records and achieving a good measure of popularity and influencial stature, I would argue that none of the music scenes in the '80s which you could draw parallels to were anywhere near as widespread, vital, and present in the collective consciousness as hip hop. Maybe rock from REM or U2, in the earlier days or each. I don't get into electronica/club/DJ music, but I respect it on certain levels as a very interesting phenomenon - I feel it's exactly where rock was in the mid '60s, a genre where it was possible for teenaged kids to start in their garage and become a (relative) superstar on the strength of their skill and a little bit of luck, without requiring corporate backing to make it big. It's still open to experimentation (within the genre), it hasn't become standardized and corporatized yet. Plus it's the first time since the Jazz Age that large numbers of kids are listening to a largely instrumental format, which I find very interesting. Granted it really goes back to the 80s or even the 70s but I feel it really came into it's own as a 90s phenomenon. Did you know that in 2000, turntables outsold guitars? Now, not all of this is my favorite music, when I get home from work tonight I'm going to fire up "Warchild", not "Slim Shady". (Well, I might fire up G. Love.) But it is almost all stuff I got turned on to through the mass media or through hearing it in public somewhere. The '90s worked better for me in that way than the '80s. Wow, look at that. Once again I sat down to write one sentence and wound up spewing a whole lot longer than I intended. >Now I'm dying to know, both about the 90s band and the 80s band. >At least email me offlist! Alright, alright. At 3:42 PM -0500 11/21/02, Poole, R. Edward transmitted: >I feel like I'm double counting with the combined "surfer rosa"/"come on >pilgrim" CD No, that's ok, two vinyls on one CD is like a menage-a-trois, it still counts as two. Mike - -- ======== We need love, expression, and truth. We must not allow ourselves to believe that we can fill the round hole of our spirit with the square peg of objective rationale. - Paul Eppinger At non effugies meos iambos - Gaius Valerius Catallus ("...but you won't get away from my poems.") ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 17:13:26 -0500 From: "Poole, R. Edward" Subject: Antidisestablishmencontrarianisticoncoclasticism Eb: >Seems like my most "canonical >iconoclast" view of late is that I enjoy the second and fourth Weezer >albums a lot more than the (hit) first and third ones. err, hate to tell you, but "Pinkerton" (no. 2) is widely regarded by fans and critics as their best, whatever the band and record sales figures might otherwise suggest. and, besides, it is their best work. "good life" is my fave. I suggest you adopt Led Zep's "Presence" and that post-Keith Moon Who record, and Gang of Four's distressingly awful "Mall" and maybe that new Breeders dics and "Little Creatures." 80's -- still: it just occurred to me: where are the Butthole Surfers? Them and Camper, previously discussed, seem the most glaring omissions to me. - -ed np: fIREHOSE "Brave Captain" ============================================================================This e-mail message and any attached files are confidential and are intended solely for the use of the addressee(s) named above. This communication may contain material protected by attorney-client, work product, or other privileges. If you are not the intended recipient or person responsible for delivering this confidential communication to the intended recipient, you have received this communication in error, and any review, use, dissemination, forwarding, printing, copying, or other distribution of this e-mail message and any attached files is strictly prohibited. If you have received this confidential communication in error, please notify the sender immediately by reply e-mail message and permanently delete the original message. To reply to our email administrator directly, send an email to postmaster@dsmo.com Dickstein Shapiro Morin & Oshinsky LLP http://www.legalinnovators.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:13:46 -0800 From: "Michael E. Kupietz, wearing a pointy hat" Subject: Re: Bands I've seen, 80s fork, etc. At 1:40 PM -0700 11/21/02, Eb transmitted: >>Ken: >>Honeymoon Suite 1 > >Ha! I would have assumed that I was the only person on the list who >saw this horrible band. They opened for Jethro Tull in 1984, at one >of my very first concerts. Bzzzzz! I saw Honeymoon Suite on that tour too. Ugh. I was happier not remembering that. Fortunately next time I saw them Tull got Friends of Fairport to open. - -- ======== We need love, expression, and truth. We must not allow ourselves to believe that we can fill the round hole of our spirit with the square peg of objective rationale. - Paul Eppinger At non effugies meos iambos - Gaius Valerius Catallus ("...but you won't get away from my poems.") ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:17:25 -0800 From: "Jason Brown (Echo Services Inc)" Subject: RE: camp van beethoven > To me, "widely, commercially popular music" generally means what I, is a > move about in my little personal Mikeycosm, hear on the radio and TV when > I'm not going out of my way to look for the "alternative" - college radio, > highly specialized or narrowly focused formats, etc., and includes > anything I might hear a randomly on the street or in a club that I didn't > go to specifically for a certain band or type of music. You really feel that way? Or are you just reading from some sort of hipster guidebook? But what the fuck do I know I own not one but two Britney Spears albums. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:22:04 -0800 From: "Michael E. Kupietz, wearing a pointy hat" Subject: Re: Antidisestablishmencontrarianisticoncoclasticism At 5:13 PM -0500 11/21/02, Poole, R. Edward transmitted: >I suggest you adopt Led Zep's "Presence" Waitaminnit, "Presence" *is* my favorite Zep. Well, one of my favorites. I don't do "Face Dances", though. Mike - -- ======== We need love, expression, and truth. We must not allow ourselves to believe that we can fill the round hole of our spirit with the square peg of objective rationale. - Paul Eppinger At non effugies meos iambos - Gaius Valerius Catallus ("...but you won't get away from my poems.") ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:22:39 -0800 From: Tom Clark Subject: Re: Bands I've seen on 11/21/02 12:05 PM, Ken Weingold at hazmat@hellrot.org wrote: > Peter Criss 2 I'll give you Ace Frehley, but this needs some 'splainin. - -tc ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 17:23:06 -0500 (EST) From: Aaron Mandel Subject: Re: spiritus mundi On Thu, 21 Nov 2002, drew wrote: > > They Might Be Giants/Lincoln* > > The review was kinda overblown but I don't have a problem with the > album. The blurb made me smile in recognition. "Quirky" is usually one of those adjectives like "shrill" that claims to be descriptive but just means "I think it sucks". There are times I've wished TMBG were just John Linnell's baby, though. Flansburgh has written no small fraction of their best songs, and the two of them clearly work together well, but Linnell amazes me more, and I think Flans has written most of the really "quirky" material. (Except "Particle Man", if I remember correctly. Fuckin' Particle Man.) > > From: Jeff Dwarf > > > > New Order/Brotherhood or Low-Life -- both are far better than PC&L > > Really? That's disappointing. I was just about to go > pick up PC&L. Low-Life I'll agree with but I never liked > Brotherhood. PC&L was a nice tight album in its original eight-song form. I love "Blue Monday", but I don't think there's anywhere you can put it on the album where it doesn't break the flow. The standard solution ("Blue Monday" after what would have been side A, "The Beach" after side B) is as good as any, I guess. Anyway, don't let Drew deter you. Buy it. Is anyone else starting to get a lot of Feg messages out of order? Three times today I've seen responses precede their original mail. a ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 16:32:27 -0600 From: Miles Goosens Subject: Re: Antidisestablishmencontrarianisticoncoclasticism At 05:13 PM 11/21/2002 -0500, Poole, R. Edward wrote: >I suggest you adopt Led Zep's "Presence" and that post-Keith Moon Who >record, and Gang of Four's distressingly awful "Mall" and maybe that new >Breeders dics and "Little Creatures." Can I have PRESENCE, MALL (kicks all sort of ass, making up for the flaccid HARD, though not for the Who's flaccid IT'S HARD, as referenced above -- however, the MALL follow-up, SHRINKWRAPPED is deadly dull), and LITTLE CREATURES, please? I'll even fill out the Cabbage Patch adoption certificates for them. I'd even take the Breeders if it wasn't produced by St. Albini, whose last great production work came on SURFER ROSA. Albini productions RID OF ME and IN UTERO I like, but it's *despite* him. It's like his production work is all about dogma instead of all about getting the best sound for the artist and the material. Though to spread the blame, the artists who choose him to work the boards aren't getting a pig in a poke, they're asking him to make them sound like crap. later, Miles ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 17:32:51 -0500 (EST) From: Aaron Mandel Subject: Re: Antidisestablishmencontrarianisticoncoclasticism On Thu, 21 Nov 2002, Poole, R. Edward wrote: > err, hate to tell you, but "Pinkerton" (no. 2) is widely regarded by > fans and critics as their best, whatever the band and record sales > figures might otherwise suggest. and, besides, it is their best work. > "good life" is my fave. My Weezer story: "El Scorcho" was about a friend-of-a-friend of mine at school (at least, this FOAF was a half-Japanese cellist, with a red-headed friend, who played in the Gilbert & Sullivan pit and had classes with Rivers Cuomo, so one may assume...) but it wasn't Green Day who she'd never heard of -- Cuomo apparently told her he was in Weezer, and she'd never heard of them, and he thought that was hot. No word on if he actually stole her diary. I remember hearing a convincing identification of who the girl in "Pink Triangle" was, but I don't recall it leading to any good behind-the-scenes gossip. a ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:42:11 -0800 (PST) From: "Eugene Hopstetter, Jr." Subject: Re: Oh yeah...THEM too > Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 00:40:11 -0700 > From: Eb > Subject: Oh yeah...THEM too > > Skinny Puppy (sucked beyond my tolerance threshold...one of the very > few shows by a major name which I've left before its finish...totally > unable to understand certain Fegs' idolization of this crud) Lemme guess, you saw them during their last tour (in, what, 1993 or so), right? Yeah, they blew chunks for that tour. I got the tickets for free but left early anyway. Which was a *huge* disappointment. I had seen Skinny Puppy twice on their first US tour, in 1986 and 1987 (Severed Heads opened at one and Edward Ka-Spel at the other), and that first show ranks as one of the best I've ever seen. Loud, violent, bloody, absolutely creepy. Analog synthesizers played at gut-rattling volumes, bleeps and blorps swirling all around the building, cEvin Key making sparks with a chainsaw on an oildrum, Nivek spitting blood and damn-near stabbing my eyes out with railroad spikes, and that creepy keyboard player (Bill Leeb?) up on stage right with his big old weird white hair. It took me two days to shake the misanthropic mood that show put me in. But then they got popular, lazy, picked up a narcotics habit or too, the Mall Goths got hip to them, and they just lost it. . Yahoo! Mail Plus  Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now. http://mailplus.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 22:46:24 +0000 (GMT) From: crowbar.joe@btopenworld.com Subject: Darren Darren Someone, Drew, I think asked about anti-Durannie attitudes to the Monkees. Well, to mind the Monkees were a laugh, and the melodies were lovely, and there's something about them coming out the Beatles/Byrds/Beach Boys nexus which bespoke quality, over the obvious cheesiness of the TV/manufactured format. The Durannies were po- (and pancake) faced Brummies, who seemed to come from the third-rate-Bowie/ Roxy-retread nexus. And not even Bowie does third-rate Bowie very well... Ironically, my first TV job as an actor was in a spoof fashion review of the '80s on Jonathan Ross's Last Resort prog, and I was dolled up as the New Romantic. They had a couple of fashion critics commenting on the various styles, and one remarked of New Romanticism. 'Well, it was always overweight gas-fitters from Watford (read Peoria...) who dressed up like this wasn't it...?' Which summed it up for me. Strange to relate, The Creatures were also on the show and Siouxsie said that she thought I looked more like Gary Glitter than a New Romantic. Which, at the time, I took as a compliment. Joe ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:48:29 -0700 From: Eb Subject: Re: Oh yeah...THEM too >Gene: > > Skinny Puppy (sucked beyond my tolerance threshold...one of the very >> few shows by a major name which I've left before its finish...totally >> unable to understand certain Fegs' idolization of this crud) > >Lemme guess, you saw them during their last tour (in, what, 1993 or >so), right? Nope. Halloween night, 1988. >Loud, violent, bloody, absolutely creepy. Analog synthesizers played at >gut-rattling volumes, bleeps and blorps swirling all around the >building, cEvin >Key making sparks with a chainsaw on an oildrum, Nivek spitting blood and >damn-near stabbing my eyes out with railroad spikes, and that creepy keyboard >player (Bill Leeb?) up on stage right with his big old weird white hair. It >took me two days to shake the misanthropic mood that show put me in. And this is a recommendation? Eb ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 18:02:26 -0500 (EST) From: Christopher Gross Subject: Re: Oh yeah...THEM too Gene (via Eb): > >Loud, violent, bloody, absolutely creepy. Analog synthesizers played at > >gut-rattling volumes, bleeps and blorps swirling all around the > >building, cEvin > >Key making sparks with a chainsaw on an oildrum, Nivek spitting blood and > >damn-near stabbing my eyes out with railroad spikes, and that creepy keyboard > >player (Bill Leeb?) up on stage right with his big old weird white hair. It was probably Dwayne Goettel, also known as the one who died in 1995. I think Bill Leeb (aka Willhelm Schroeder) was gone by then, and I know Dwayne had white hair for a while. Check out the 1988 (?) concert video "Ain't It Dead Yet?", if you can find a copy. Although I never saw Skinny Puppy, I did catch Ogre's tour last year with cEvin Key on drums. He's mellowed a bit, but he still managed to lacerate himself on stage. Good times! - --Chris ______________________________________________________________________ Christopher Gross On the Internet, nobody knows I'm a dog. chrisg@gwu.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 23:17:19 GMT From: Jim Davies Subject: the miller's tale > I think Miller's most notable achievement is his ability to impose > external conceptual conceits on material too trivial to deserve such > vanities. Now maybe some think this is a "major" achievement, > but...not me. Actually, it seems like many of his disciples review > his song *titles* rather than his *songs*. > The guy's voice is wretched (only partially excused by his willing > acknowledgement of this), he's crippled by his lack of a melodic > attention span, and his ideas about arranging music never evolved > past 1984. Enough said. Oh, not quite enough said :^). Some of these arrows hit home, but I don't think that Sebastian Miller is due for martyrdom just yet. There are moments in the Loud Family/Game Theory canon that are unmatched and unmistakeable. `Throwing the Election', `Regenisraen', and `Sleeping Through Heaven' are perfect excuses for the functional abstraction of game theory. There's only one song on `Plants and Birds and Rocks and Things' that is anything less than perfection. Okay, I have to admit that the last four Loud Family studio albums were then a disappointment - at least at first. `Soul drain', er, rocked, however. But I'm now in love with `Interbabe Concern'. `Not expecting both contempo and classique' is halting. And I like the post-live CD, `From Ritual to Romance'. It's again a conceit, but it's half naked, and it makes an excellent noise. Is he too clever for his own good? Where will the conceit lead him next? Has he been lost too many times in beautiful company? How will fatherhood work out for him? Whatever, I'm really glad Scott Miller is out there, and making music. x Jim p.s. I found somewhere to purchase Loud Family stuff - www.125records.com. This led also to the discovery of Paula Carino, whose `Aquacade' CD is neat. And the Loud Family t-shirts are neater than they look on the web. Comfortable and elegant. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 18:28:38 -0500 From: "Roberta Cowan" Subject: RE: Kiss my list... >I'll raise my paw as someone who has seen Kiss live. Alas, it was during >their no make-up period. I actually saw them once also though it was by accident. They opened for Aerosmith when the originally scheduled band (Argent) backed out. And they wore makeup and they rocked! It was pretty early in their career though. Roberta ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 15:42:56 -0800 From: "Rex.Broome" Subject: Scott Miller, the Monkees, the Church (0% Donette Thayer content) Eb: >>I think Miller's most notable achievement is his ability to impose >>external conceptual conceits on material too trivial to deserve such >>vanities. Wow, you certainly you must be the only person to own all (much less any) of his records and dislike them so much. I can see a beef with his production style, but when you knock Miller's melodic sense and praise Billy Corgan's in the same post, I get the feeling that you must understand "melody" differently than most of us. I'm surprised you like "Mellon Collie", as to me it is the definitive "overpraised because it's big" record. Also worst title for any album ever until Corgan himself upped the ante with "MACHINAthemachinesofgod" or whatever. (Not to add ammunition to the "Scott-Miller-fans-only-pay-attention-to-the-titles argument, but... )) _________ Drew: >>Question for the anti-Durannies: do you like the Monkees? Ummm... yeah, I do. But they weren't the fake band of *my* youth, so that may be it. The first Monkees LP was one of the few "rock" albums my family owned when I was a kid and I spent a lot of time with it. (Probably affected my preference for guitar sounds and harmonies more than I know.) The Monkees also had some good songs. I'll admit I like bad '60's pop better than okay-ish new wave, for a host of reasons possibly more social or sociological than anything else. Hey, I never claimed my taste had any rhyme or reason... ___________ Miles: >>I think more of the later Church than the typical fan, and to me the >>best of the later records is (brace yourself) SOMETIME ANYWHERE I was braced but that's still a doozie. The Church in general are sort of a guilty pleasure of mine... fairly guilty, but when good, also very pleasurable. However, I'd be surprised if I ever listen to that particular record all the way through again. >>if you could change the lyrics to "Business Woman," would be totally sans >>blemishes D'oh! And there's the only song I like on it! >>I wonder if the difference between early and late Church fans is "fans of melody >>& concise songwriting" vs. "fans of more moody, impressionistic stuff that's more >>about atmosphere." It's an oversimplification, but it might be a workable theory. Well, there's something to that. I like a lot of stuff that sounds sort of like the later Church (cf. most 4AD bands) but I didn't expect such an utter dearth of hooks *from* the Church. It throws too much focus on the lyrics, which were going from bad to worse-- Steve Kilbey's puns are really hard to take. The irony is that they really do those soundscapes well, and the guitars do sound great... I would probably like it if someone else was singing or writing the lyrics (not Billy Corgan, though). However, I really, really liked "Hologram of Baal"-- it was an ideal marriage of old and new style Church. The followup was a snooze, and I see that they're now releasing a two-disc ambieant remix version of it. Hooo boy. - -Rex, who doesn't want to talk about his Mary Willson-Piper albums ------------------------------ End of fegmaniax-digest V11 #389 ********************************