From: owner-jinglejangle-digest@smoe.org (jinglejangle-digest) To: jinglejangle-digest@smoe.org Subject: jinglejangle-digest V6 #55 Reply-To: jinglejangle@smoe.org Sender: owner-jinglejangle-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-jinglejangle-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk jinglejangle-digest Friday, October 24 2003 Volume 06 : Number 055 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [MLL] Re Elliot - from the Boston Globe [K3285@aol.com] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 12:48:38 EDT From: K3285@aol.com Subject: [MLL] Re Elliot - from the Boston Globe Mary Lou is quoted in this article. Melissa >Elliott Smith, 34; indie-rock musician sang of the downtrodden, misfits By Joan Anderman, Globe Staff, 10/23/2003 Singer-songwriter Elliott Smith, an indie-rock hero who battled drug and alcohol addiction throughout his career, died in an apparent suicide at his home in Los Angeles. He was 34. Mr. Smith's body was found by his live-in girlfriend on Tuesday, according to the Los Angeles County Coroner's office. He had a single stab wound to the chest that appeared to be self-inflicted. Mr. Smith released five solo albums during a career that earned him modest commercial success and wide critical acclaim. He became a fixture on the thriving music scene in Portland, Ore., in the early 1990s as a member of the band Heatmiser. Known for unflinching, emotionally raw portraits of the downtrodden and spare, poetic sketches of self-loathing, Mr. Smith released his debut solo album, "Roman Candle," in 1994, followed a year later by a self-titled disc on the Kill Rock Stars label. Despite the intimate, personal nature of his lyrics, Mr. Smith distanced himself from the singer-songwriter tag. "It's never seemed confessional to me," he said in a 1999 interview with the Globe. "To me, it's more like dreams." Mr. Smith released "Either/Or" in 1997. The following year he moved to New York and met the director Gus Van Sant, who asked Mr. Smith to compose music for his film "Good Will Hunting." "Miss Misery" was nominated for an Oscar in the "Best Original Song" category, and the singer performed the song live during a memorable sequence on the 1998 Academy Awards telecast -- a greasy-haired, guitar-strumming troubadour sandwiched between country queen Trisha Yearwood and chest-thumping Celine Dion. "It was surreal," Mr. Smith said of the Oscar experience. "It was fun to walk around on the moon for a day, but I wouldn't want to live in that world." Mr. Smith was born Steven Paul Smith on Aug. 6, 1969, in Nebraska. His mother was a singer and his father a psychiatrist. Mr. Smith spent much of his childhood in the suburbs of Dallas, where he began studying piano and guitar at age 9 and started composing music at 13. He moved to Portland during high school to live with his father. The Beatles were Mr. Smith's great inspiration -- "A Day in the Life" was his favorite song -- and the scruffy, soft-spoken musician spent his career perfecting a haunting fusion of classic pop songcraft and wistful lyrics, which he sang in a frail, wispy voice. After playing in a Portland band during high school, where he was a National Merit scholar, he attended Hampshire College in Amherst, graduating with a degree in philosophy before returning to Portland. Mr. Smith played all the instruments on his debut album, which he would continue to do on many later projects, and recorded the songs on a four-track machine in his basement. He was an eloquent spokesman for losers and misfits, his early work typifying a lo-fi, do-it-yourself aesthetic. His sparsely recorded, melancholy tunes -- which drew comparisons to Nick Drake as well as Simon and Garfunkel -- made him a figurehead in the indie-rock underground. "I put him up there with Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan," said Massachusetts-based songwriter Mary Lou Lord, who toured with Mr. Smith in the mid-90s. "I was always mortified that he was my opening act. If it weren't for the drugs, what he did to himself, he could have broken down the doors for this generation. He was a master." Mr. Smith signed with the major label DreamWorks in 1998 and released "XO," his biggest-selling album, later that year. "Figure 8" followed in 2000. A far cry from the stripped-down ruminations of his early work, Mr. Smith's last album was his most varied, spanning bitter folk, twinkling saloon stylings, impressionistic choral soundscapes, and driving guitar-pop. He had been recently working on a new album, "From a Basement on the Hill." "Where he was going musically was always exciting. He was two or three steps ahead of everyone," said DreamWorks Records executive Lenny Waronker. "Being around his record-making process was intimidating at times because his gift and his musical knowledge were so great -- as a musician, a singer, a songwriter. Sadly, he was just scratching the surface. We'll miss his music. And we'll miss him. He was a very tender and sweet soul." "The saddest part is that music was a respite for this gentle and fragile guy, and he was just starting to get to a place where he could express himself again in the way he loved doing," said Chris Douridas, host of the NewGround program on Los Angeles public radio and a film-music supervisor who hired Mr. Smith to record a version of the Beatles' "Because" for "American Beauty." "He had been getting clean." Mr. Smith spoke about his struggle with alcoholism in an interview with Under the Radar magazine published this past June, revealing that he had undergone treatment at the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills in an effort to quit drinking. He last performed in June on the second stage at the Field Day festival in East Rutherford, N.J., which was headlined by Radiohead and the Beastie Boys. Mr. Smith was scheduled to perform at the All Tomorrow's Parties festival in Los Angeles on Nov. 9. Mr. Smith leaves his mother, Bunny Welch; his father, Gary,half-brother Darren Welch, and half-sisters Ashley Welch and Rachel. Plans for a memorial service have not been finalized. ) Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company. ------------------------------ End of jinglejangle-digest V6 #55 *********************************