From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org (fegmaniax-digest) To: fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Subject: fegmaniax-digest V11 #420 Reply-To: fegmaniax@smoe.org Sender: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk fegmaniax-digest Thursday, December 12 2002 Volume 11 : Number 420 Today's Subjects: ----------------- comics/shu"gazing [Marshall Needleman Armintor ] it's princess leia, the yodel of life [drew ] Ice Cream and the Punk Rock Pantheon ["Rex.Broome" ] Re: Chameleons, Charlatans, Charmander... [Aaron Mandel ] poking my head in the door to say hello... ["Natalie Jane" ] Re: january soft boys dates ["Rob" ] Reap [Miles Goosens ] those underwatermoonlight.com mp3s ["Stewart C. Russell" ] Where They Sell Antique Time Signatures ["Rex.Broome" Subject: comics/shu"gazing > I was wondering, what current comedians do Fegs like and why? With > pre-Christmas stress coming on I could use a few nice mean and raucus > jollies. Also any funny webpages? Or funny, smutty, angry webpages or > just plain wacked ones? You know, stuff to help an overburdened, > bridge-generation, tapped-out, working mom -really- get in the proper > mood for Christmas. The only current comics I have any feelings for are Eddie Izzard (any of his concert videos are hilarious, in particular, _Glorious_, and for what it's worth, his act is entirely clean, except for some innocent four letter words thrown in) and Margaret Cho, whose act isn't suitable for family viewing (e.g., a five-minute riff on fisting). Three profane dead comedians who are an eternal delight are Bill Hicks, and, of course, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore as Derek and Clive. The Shoegazing thing re Bob Mould is entirely accurate. I was tremendously disappointed seeing him for the first time with Sugar (in Nov. 1992) when I realized that's all what he wanted his new music to sound like...and in concert, that's the feeling I got. Not bad, but it wasn't prime concise, bristling, overwhelming Husker Du, who could lock telepathically into a song, implement the appropriate dynamics, blow your mind, and move onto to the next one in the space of 2 1/2 minutes. (See "Powerline," on _The Living End_.) Whenever I hear the word "shoegazing," I shudder and it takes me back to that time in London when the frigging Catherine Wheel opened up for every bloody band I saw, including the Replacements, which made no damn sense at all. I don't consider MBV shoegazers -- a severely limiting genre term for some of the holiest music I've ever heard; you could probably structure a workable mass out of their oeuvre, I bet. Marshall np GBV, _Suitcase_, disc 4 ("Chain Wallet Bitch", oops, it's over.) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 Dec 2002 12:07:37 -0800 (PST) From: drew Subject: it's princess leia, the yodel of life > From: "Rex.Broome" > > The Husker Du / shoegazing comparison brought to mind the early '90's > British band that most reminded me of HD-- and I know I'm gonna get > bitchsmacked for this: Jesus Jones on their first album. Sounded like Bob > Mould with the Bomb Squad for a rhythm section. Of course their second > album sucked and thus they scored their massive international hit, but > "Liquidizer" sounded pretty cool at the time. Well, of course I liked the second album better, mainly because it had some tunes. Part of the third album were OK, too. Is it _Liquidizer_ that told you the bpm for each track? To me that kind of said it all. Not that I ever listen to Jesus Jones any more (though I do have one of those 5/5 split compilations with them and EMF, containing all the songs from either band I would ever need). > From: Eb > > http://rexxo.sytes.net/animutations/hyakugo.swf > > Brilliantly moronic. Not easy to tell if the creator realizes this or not. Yeah, that's a great one. The creator is apparently a kid (he was 13 or 14 when he did that animation) and the song is apparently the theme song from the Japanese Pokemon cartoon. It's spawned countless imitators but accept no substitutes. - -- drew at stormgreen dot com http://www.stormgreen.com/~drew/ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 Dec 2002 12:27:58 -0800 From: "Rex.Broome" Subject: Ice Cream and the Punk Rock Pantheon Ken: >>There is almost nothing better than Breyers Natural Vanilla. It's like freshly dropped snow. :) I'm not really an ice cream fiend myself, but I've been buying tons of exactly that stuff for my pregnant wife. Usually in tandem with pumpkin pie. Our first daughter had vindaloo as her in-utero food of choice; this one likes pie. It'll be interesting to see how that plays out. ________ Ken: >>uh, would it be improper to at least *consider* sleater-kinney's place in the >>punk-rock pantheon? I saw S-K twice this year-- the first time was months before the record came out and they played most of it. This was right after the nominees for the R'n'R Hall of Fame were announced, and my friend Mike and I had just been talking about how, now that artists who debuted in the late '70's are eligible, the Hall of Fame is going to go from being a mildly amusing lame joke to actively snubbing slews of really important artists for years on end. Sleater-Kinney was so good, and we were struck by the certainty that an institution that has yet to recognize the Stooges was probably never, ever going to even consider nominating what is clearly the best live band performing today. And that totally has to do with punk and the class of '77-- to this day, that's the dividing line between the lineage of rock as understood by the mainstream and the "underground", Nirvana and Sex Pistols reunion tours aside-- in fact, that stuff has probably led to punk/post-punk/etc. being even more poorly understood. I know it's not worth bitching about, but it's surprising how those lines still hold. There are an awful lot of rock "reference books" which don't reference artists I consider essential, and that pretty much commences in 1977. Blah blah blah. Anyway, screw the pantheon, I vote we make them the All-Time Kings of Rock and Roll. I just wish their t-shirts came in sizes small enough for my daughter! _________ Miles: >>I had totally run together the Chameleons and the Charlatans I figured that out eventually. Adding to the confusion, yes, they both have sometimes-- and sometimes NOT-- had the "UK" suffix on their US releases, and both have been on the Dead Dead Good label. But they're very different bands, and I can't imagine anyone who truly likes Interpol not at least appreciating any given Chameleons record. Plus now you know that I'm not insane... the link between Interpol and the Charlatans is tenuous at best. >>"they don't sound baggy-pants Madchestery!" I'm glad you brought that one up, since the label "baggy" is one of the few that's more perplexing and uninformative than "shoegazer". Of course, the very worst one is "emo". >>Actually, maybe the mid-'80s UK popsters needed a label or something for >>trendoid purposes -- the Jazz Butcher, Lloyd Cole, Robyn himself Yeah, there is no label for that kind of thing. It's singer-songwriterly, but if you say that people mentally leap back to the '70's, James Taylor, Jackson Browne, Jim Croce. If you say '80's guitar pop, everyone thinks only of bands, be they XTC or the Smithereens. I think the lack of ability on the part of the major labels to break "alternative" solo artists, while they were eventually able to do it with alternative *bands*, led to a pretty weird phenomenon of relatively recognized solo artists feeling they had to rebrand themselves as "bands": see Drywall, Eels, Sugar, Nova Mob, Electrafixion, etc... - -Rex ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 Dec 2002 20:55:37 -0000 From: "The Birdpoo" Subject: Interpol / KoD / Chapter 13 > Date: Tue, 10 Dec 2002 09:18:27 -0600 > From: Miles Goosens > Subject: Interpol > > I finally got TURN ON THE BRIGHT LIGHTS on Saturday... > > I like it. But the Joy Division Joy Division Joy Division mantra from the > press is misleading -- somewhat retro, yes, but this record sounds a lot > more like the stuff I was listening to in 1988-92 than it sounds like the > Joy Division / Teardrop Explodes / Cure / U2 era. Whoever said > "shoegazery" is far closer to the mark. I like the sound of this LP and will pick it up soon. Another band with a palpable Joy Division influence are a UK outfit called Chapter 13. Not sure how well known they are in the US, they barely seem to register over here. I picked up their "The World From Heaven" LP (Saltwater / Drive-In) last year. It's excellent stuff. You could mistake the singer for Ian Curtis; musically they remind me of "Closer" era JD, with a good dash of early New Order. But they're more than a mere tribute band. Funnily enough, I heard their last Peel Session (post-LP) maybe earlier this year. Musically, it sounded much more like New Order c.1983/84. There's progression, presumably with an ironic wink. There's a review of the LP at http://www.splendidezine.com/reviews/may-7-01/chapter.html Inexplicably, it doesn't mention Joy Division at all. > >But the Kitchens of Distinction were barely on the outskirts of the > >shoegaze world, anyway. Hell, The Death of Cool reminded me as much > >of *Husker Du* as of shoegaze.... > > Boy, I don't see that one. I always thought that filing KoD under the > "shoegaze" label had more to do with chronology and location than with > actual sound, but on the other hand, they fit better there than elsewhere. I wouldn't personally list KoD as a "Shoegazing" band at all. For a start, they started releasing records a couple of years before the tag was invented. I think the Chameleons reference that somebody mentioned is more apt. I saw KoD a couple of times live. Sadly missed... Although I felt "Strange Free World" was their peak. Keg http://www.btinternet.com/~birdpoo ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 Dec 2002 16:28:46 -0500 (EST) From: Aaron Mandel Subject: Re: Chameleons, Charlatans, Charmander... On Wed, 11 Dec 2002, Miles Goosens wrote: > OK, I realized when record shopping at lunch today that I had totally > run together the Chameleons and the Charlatans, and my "Madchester/baggy > pants" reference belongs with the latter band instead of the former, I feel a relief (at having your comments make more sense now) similar to when, recently, I realized that dmw was raving about Slow Jets, a completely different band from the mediocre Warm Jets who I'd heard earlier. a ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 Dec 2002 13:28:44 -0800 From: Eb Subject: Re: Shocking Reap + Gabriel >Mary Hansen of Stereolab, in a road accident... Wow!! That's awful!! I never knew she was Australian, until now. I had enough trouble figuring out whether to call the band "British" or "French"! Kinda interesting how many Fgz were itchin' to talk about Interpol...glad that I brought them up, I guess.:) I verrrrry spontaneously saw Peter Gabriel, last night. The venue was close, and my thought process was literally "Oh, 'Gilmore Girls' and 'Buffy' are reruns?? All right, I'll set the VCR for '24' and zoom over to the Pond and see if there are any cheap scalper tickets out front." I got there just before 9 pm, well after the posted 7:30 starting time. (Was that when "the doors opened," or when the music started? I don't know.) Shortly after arriving on the (now, mostly deserted) outer grounds, a scalper asked me if I needed a ticket. I said, yeah, maybe.... He asked how much I wanted to spend. I said $25. He then pitched me a 12th-row center seat for $40. I gritted my teeth, and was hemming and hawing about whether it was worth that much to me, but then I heard the music start from outside. Time for a quick decision. So, I sighed and relented. It's hard to bully a scalper about charging too much, when you're getting the ticket for less than a third of its face value ($130). As it turned out, I got it for $39, because I was literally holding almost exactly $40: $39 in bills and a buck or so in change. He didn't want any jingle in his pockets, so he simply took the cash. Later, I heard that all the nosebleed $45 people were moved down to much better seats by the ushers, so...I'm not sure whether I got much of a bargain. On top of that, arriving late meant that I pretty much missed "Darkness" (the only track on Up which I don't get bored with!) while finding the right gate and my seat. Meanwhile, I was thinking "Darkness" was the first song as I watched the rest of the show, but very late in the night, a found friend of mine told me the first song was actually "Here Comes the Flood." Which really sucks, because I like "Flood" better than *any* other song included in the setlist. I assume the performance was probably stark, Gabriel-solo-with-keyboard, which is why I couldn't hear it from outside. This show poetically marked 20 years of concert-going for me. This was December 10, 2002, and my first concert was Peter Gabriel on December 15, *1982*. Practically 20 years to the day. Actually, I bought a last-minute ticket for *that* show too, come to think of it - -- I was so young and naive that I didn't realize you should buy concert tickets as early as possible! My seat was excellent, but the magic just wasn't there from the start. Gabriel seemed weary at seeing another half-empty house (the Pond has floor seats and three tiers...the upper tier was entirely empty and the other two were maybe 75% full), and his pre-song introductions were labored, overpracticed, cornball and stale. One of those deals where you *know* every speech will inevitably end with the...song...title...pronounced...dramatically. Everyone in the band wore solid black, which wasn't too visually appealing. The setlist? Whatever. Mostly sluggish Up material, except for "In Your Eyes" (a crowd waving its arms in unison comes off kinda pathetic, when the room is half full), "Sledgehammer" (he wore a bulky black jacket festooned with large flashing lights, for a gone-showbiz ambience), "Mercy Street," "Solsbury Hill" (sung while riding a folding silver bicycle around the edge of the stage), "Secret World," "Downside Up" (from OVO) and, uh, "Here Comes the Flood." Nothing at all from Gabriel's masterpieces, the third and fourth albums. Frankly, the staging was more interesting than the music. I can't remember whether other Fgz have already described this stuff from previous dates, but...basically, the show was "in the round" on a stage about, oh, 40 feet in diameter. The outer ring of the stage had the power to slowly revolve, which allowed the band to rotate while playing, depending on whether the instruments were set up in the center or on the edge (*lots* of instrument and microphone movement by orange-jumpsuited stagehands during the night...they emerged from trapdoors in the stage floor, like mysterious Oompa Loompas). However, the stage's central feature was a large circular rig hanging overhead, which concealed several versatile functions in a quite economical way. First, an iris opened and a large parachute-materialed "egg" was lowered to hang in the air. Images were projected on this...the same images projected on the video screens. In the night's most creative bit, a catwalk later lowered past the egg, hanging about 10 feet above the floor. For "Downside Up" (get it?), Gabriel and his quite pretty daughter (on fairly trivial backing vocals) came out with mountain-climbing chestwear and clipped themselves upside down, dangling underneath the catwalk. Then, they were dragged on a track around the catwalk's edge, simulating upside-down walking (which Daughter did much better than Gabriel, I noted). Later, the catwalk lowered past the egg to the floor -- this was used on the banal "Barry Williams Show" single, where Gabriel moved around the catwalk with a rolling television camera, shooting himself and the audience for the video screens. After the catwalk moved upward again, the egg's outer coating was lifted away, revealing a gray sphere. More images were projected on this, including one simulated "moon" depiction. Then, in yet another metamorphosis, the coating of the sphere was peeled away to reveal a giant, clear-plastic bouncing "hamster ball." It had a hole on each side, and this was lowered on *top* of Gabriel. He climbed inside, and for one song (I forget which one), he sang while rolling himself around the edge of the stage. I don't know how he avoided rolling over the edge -- I think maybe the ball is just so large and heavy that it's easy to control. He also *bounced* the ball in place at times, actually getting airborn. As with the "Solsbury Hill" bicycle, this was a cute visual gimmick, but had no thematic resonance. Seemed kinda silly and stunt-like to me. I would have happily traded some of these visual props for more moments of Gabriel simply stalking around in his long-discarded "demonic" persona. He really offered no interesting body movement at all, beyond finally duplicating some of the big-stepping choreography from his "Sledgehammer" video (along with bassist Tony Levin and guitarist David Rhodes, Monkees-style). That takes care of the evolving stage permutations, I think. Oh wait, there's a little more. The very center of the stage could lower, and one tune featured the Blind Boys of Alabama singing from this pit. (The Blind Boys were one of the two opening acts, which I missed seeing entirely.) Another later song placed the drum kit down there. And at another point, a circular curtain lowered around the drummer to create sort of a "spindle" in the stage's center. Oh, one more quick bit: On "Mercy Street," Daughter wistfully rode around the outer ring in a rowboat. I have very little to say about the singing/musicianship itself. Always competent, never inspired. Because the material was so downbeat for the most part, Levin (introduced as "The Emperor of the Bottom End") didn't have much to do. Really, nothing else worth saying. One guitarist occasionally played pretty lines on some sort of ethnic flute/recorder. OK, fine. If my first Gabriel show was "utterly amazing" and the second one (So-era) was "very good," this one was "just OK." Presuming this tour will force Gabriel to move to smaller venues, it will be interesting to see him in a more intimate setting in the future. Eb np: Birdsongs of the Mesozoic ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 Dec 2002 14:52:05 -0800 From: "Natalie Jane" Subject: poking my head in the door to say hello... Hola, feglings - It's a rainy winter here in dear old Portland and I sit here with freezing hands and a sluggish heart. I have no idea what's been happening on the list and I suppose this message will be entirely irrelevant. But hey - that's me all over! So I think I unsubscribed about four months ago. During that time, my musical taste has shifted and Robyn and XTC, though still beloved, have been relegated to a back burner, at least for the time being. In fact, I even *sold* (or tried to sell) some of my extraneous Robyn and XTC records - like "Storefront Hitchcock" and XTC's single compilation, "Fossil Fuel." The store refused to take "A Star for Bram." I guess I can't blame them. Anyway, these days I primarily listen to Elliott Smith and Wilco. I also recently got all hot and bothered about records by Ryan Adams and Uncle Tupelo, which makes me wonder if I'm turning into an alt-country fan. Probably not, but you never know. All I know is that Wilco's Jeff Tweedy (he of the cracked, yearning voice and goofily cute good looks) is now my current future husband. I'm so fickle... but what Martin Phillipps doesn't know, won't hurt him. (Speaking of which, James, I bought "Kaleidoscope World" and I don't care much for it so far. Maybe it'll grow on me.) Other news items of note: *I "stroked a greasy ray" at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. It showed its love for me by rearing out of the water and splashing me with its fins. I felt exalted. *I am still awaiting word of my acceptance or non-acceptance from Birthingway College of Midwifery. *I wrote a gig review for when I went to see No. 2 in August, but it's out-dated now. I haven't really seen any shows lately, except for a band called Destroyer who were unlistenable. *My novel is about to go through another session of heavy re-writes after having been eviscerated by a British friend. (Part of the novel takes place in England, and I got a lot of stuff wrong... *sigh*) *I reckon you're all getting ready to post your "top ten of the year" and since I've mostly been buying older stuff, I think mine would look like: 1. Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot 2. The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots 3. Interpol - Turn on the Bright Lights .. though I'm sure there's something I've forgotten. I wish I could put the new Apples in Stereo on there, but it's pretty dull, unfortunately. Um, I guess that's all. your big furry pal, n. (not re-subscribed, e-mail me privately if you want to respond) _________________________________________________________________ Protect your PC - get McAfee.com VirusScan Online http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=3963 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 14:45:39 +0000 (GMT) From: Michael R Godwin Subject: Re: Improbable psychedelic colours You may remember I was trying to download that Floyd video for 'Scarecrow' from the Pathe site. I have at last succeeded at: http://www.britishpathe.com/downloadfile.cfm?filefp=e/e0008C5F8-7930-1DF8-A0A240 16C0A87836/00004232.WMV&filename=407.06.WMV Let me know if you can access it. Mainly Roger and Nick jumping around, but there is one exciting bit where Syd picks up the scarecrow and plants it in a river. This version has "British Pathe Preview" stamped across it - - you have to pay for a hi-res copy. - - Mike Godwin n.p. Scarecrow PS Apparently the recently-published volume featuring the best of Crawdaddy magazine includes an article on raga rock. Should have read that before getting into a discussion about it. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 06:56:45 -0800 (PST) From: "Eugene Hopstetter, Jr." Subject: The half-albino hermaphrodite lobster Nope, it's not the title of Robyn's new solo album, but an actual, half-albino, hermaphrodite lobster. It does bear a striking resemblance to some of his recent outfits, however. Quite a site to behold: . Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now. http://mailplus.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 09:09:57 -0500 (CDT) From: gSs Subject: Re: "I'll cut off my dick and feed you with it!" On Tue, 10 Dec 2002, Asshole Muthafucka wrote: > . the pages look ok except there needs to be more pictures of Erin. you fucking hold-out. gSs ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 10:43:55 -0500 (CDT) From: gSs Subject: Re: poking my head in the door to say hello... On Wed, 11 Dec 2002, Natalie Jane wrote: > Anyway, these days I primarily listen to Elliott Smith and Wilco. I also > recently got all hot and bothered about records by Ryan Adams and Uncle > Tupelo, which makes me wonder if I'm turning into an alt-country fan. every american is an alt-country fan and all women are closet-bisexuals, except for my mom. she had intercourse once but didn't like it. i'm comfortable with that. wilco and lucinda williams are right on top for me, for now. it will probably get old like a new lover. though I have been hanging on to all three for a quite a while. and oooooh dylan. i would probably marry him if he didn't look so much like a man. he probably smells too. gSs np, hello stranger - emmylou harris "...everytime i ride the sixth and fourth street car, i can see my baby peepin' through the bars. he bowed his head and he waved both hands at me, he's prison bound and longin' to be free. yeah i'll see you when your troubles are like mine. i'll see you when you haven't got a dime, weeping like a willow and moaning like a dove..." ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 17:28:25 -0000 From: "Rob" Subject: Re: january soft boys dates On 11 Dec 2002 at 14:00, dances with virgos wrote: > that note in http://www.thesoftboys.com/news.html about the uncertainty > for the uk gigs in january has been taken down so, presumably, the date > confusion has been cleared up. here's what is listed there now: > > UK: > Sunday, Jan 26 - Bristol, Fleece & Firkin > Monday, Jan 27 - Oxford, The Zodiac > Tuesday, Jan 28 - Brighton, Concorde 2 > Wednesday, Jan 29 - Cambridge, The Boat Race > > woj Hmmm, so what happened to Manchester on the 30th, I wonder? I hope it's being rescheduled, I'm already committed to seeing The Delgados on that date. Rob ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 12:27:36 -0600 From: Miles Goosens Subject: Reap Given the number of BUFFY/ANGEL fans on these lists, I'm surprised this hasn't made the rounds: Glenn Quinn -- Doyle on Season 1 of ANGEL, and Mark (Becky's husband) on ROSEANNE. OD'd, apparently. later, Miles ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 13:59:44 -0500 From: "Stewart C. Russell" Subject: those underwatermoonlight.com mp3s I just remembered that, just while we were in the frenzy of emigrating, I subscribed to underwatermoonlight to get the mp3s. They don't seem to be there any more; what happened? Stewart ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 14:19:22 -0500 From: dances with virgos Subject: Re: those underwatermoonlight.com mp3s one time at band camp, Stewart C. Russell (scruss@sympatico.ca) said: >I just remembered that, just while we were in the frenzy of emigrating, >I subscribed to underwatermoonlight to get the mp3s. They don't seem to >be there any more; what happened? good question. if anyone has them, please let me know. i subscribed, downloaded the lot of them and then lost them in a laptop disk crash earlier this year. *sigh* +w ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 2002 13:33:33 -0800 From: "Rex.Broome" Subject: Where They Sell Antique Time Signatures Kay: >>As a non-musician Im really ignorant of this stuff. I dont know why -- but >>my prejuidice is to think of weird timings as just show-off stuff, "look >>what we can do." I associate *changing* time signatures more with showoffery than "odd" ones. But there's really no good rule of thumb there. I'm catching more and more of that kind of stuff in really earthy music. >>I would put money on the chance that once we get lots of gadgets with voice >>recognition, people will loose most of their induvidual inflections and >>vocal quirks. Regional accents will lessen and disappear. In time we'll >>have trends in speech like we now have trends in fashion. I think this has already been happening for a while. When I was in high school in WVa in the '80's, the kids spoke an unholy collision of our native semi-southern accent and California "valley girl" inflections-- what is now commonly called "upspeak", rendering all statements questions. >>We may even start talking to each in language that has been ammended to fit >>voice recognition--things like including unneccisary code inflections for >>those homo-thingamegiggies in face to face communication. I think a cool spy skill would be the ability to dial phone numbers by vocally imitating the sounds of the tones on touchtone phones. Or the ability to vocally log onto an ISP and mentally decode the digital information coming back at you. Also super-breath that freezes people solid. - -Rex ------------------------------ End of fegmaniax-digest V11 #420 ********************************