From: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org (stillpt-digest) To: stillpt-digest@smoe.org Subject: stillpt-digest V2 #209 Reply-To: stillpt@smoe.org Sender: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk stillpt-digest Thursday, November 2 2000 Volume 02 : Number 209 Today's Subjects: ----------------- spike on angel ["Donald G. Keller" ] m/ky halloween ["Donald G. Keller" ] Re: spike on angel [GHighPine@aol.com] Re: spike on angel [meredith ] Re: spike on angel [Todd Huff ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2000 22:54:48 -0500 (EST) From: "Donald G. Keller" Subject: spike on angel Rumor is we have coming up a crossover =Buffy=/=Angel= involving Spike and his past. (I'll say no more in deference to those who don't like spoilers.) I was discussing this with my daughter Deirdre tonight, and she asked a =really= good question: Can Spike fight Angel? Angel is a vampire; so he's a demon. But he =also= has a soul. Is a soul the dividing line? Or is it something else? Doesn't seem to be an obvious answer to me. You =would= want Spike to be able to fight Angel, narratively speaking. What think ye? (By the way, Deirdre really =loves= Spike and is very excited by what's going on now.) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2000 23:07:03 -0500 (EST) From: "Donald G. Keller" Subject: m/ky halloween [I posted this already to the music list I'm on, but since some here know about Kristeen Young and some (not the same some) have said they miss my music reviews, and since it turned out pretty well, at the risk of boring Meredith I'll post it here,too.] Kristeen Young Downtime October 31, 2000 The scariest thought, when I first found out that Kristeen Young was playing a show on Halloween (at Downtime's "Batcave" goth night, to boot), was: what does a woman who treats every night like Halloween wear =on= Halloween? Attend. When I arrived at Downtime (which is in lower west midtown, an awkward subway ride from my East Village hole-in-the-wall), I first encountered Kristeen's band members, in costume themselves on this occasion: bassist Brian as a priest, with pencil mustache and narrow hornrims; drummer Jeff in denim overalls, chin beard, rustic hat and corncob pipe ("I'm from Missoura," he greeted me--i.e. St. Louis). And then I caught a glimpse of Kristeen out of the corner of my eye. As is often the case, it was the "headgear" that first arrested my attention. Her two jet-black braids stuck out about six inches from her head and then bent straight up and a little out at the ends: kind of a Texas Longhorn effect. When I got close enough to speak to her in the din, I could see she'd magic-markered freckles on her cheeks and a big backwards P on her forehead. (Figured it out yet? I asked to be sure:) "I'm Evil Pippi Longstocking!" she revealed. (Mistress of the Wild Hunt, no doubt.) She was wearing a long coat, as she sometimes does before a show, so it wasn't until she got up on stage that the rest of the outfit was revealed: pointy black shoes, black stockings with white stripes, a shiny black overall-bib dress, a white shirt with sparkly stripes...sort of Scandinavian, in an odd sort of way. Black nail polish with white tips (very Drusilla-like, for all you =Buffy= fans). And the true KY final accessorizing touch, a row of eight clothespins running down her spine, from her shoulderblades to the small of her back. (This isn't the first time she's done this. Makes her look like a stegosaurus.) And then she unbent her braids. Data point: when Kristeen's hair is down it hangs past her waist. That will give you an idea of how long the braids were. (It was obvious she'd wound the braids around wire: they were corkscrewed like a narwhal's horn.) Stuck straight out, they extended--what? A foot and a half? Two feet?!? Well past her shoulders, at any rate; farther than the rearview mirrors she sported at one memorable show; at a venture, if she'd extended her arms at shoulder length, the braids =might= have reached her wrists. A sight truly a wonder to behold. Oh, the music? Yeah, there was plenty of that, too. She has moved "Devil Girl," the one song she plays completely solo, to the opening slot in her set, so that she crashes into the opening cluster chord before you're quite aware she's begun. From there she builds up the main riff in a very classical manner from fragments, showing off the keyboard chops she claims not to have. And then she rolls into the main body of a keening ballad. It's a characteristic of the artists we call "ecto" that their ballads are often their strongest work; but though Kristeen has written a handful of very good ballads, it's not her natural mode of expression. (=Her= strongest songs are the most radical ones.) To my hearing, "Devil Girl" might be her best ballad. An older song, it dates from the =Meet Miss Young...= era, but is unrecorded. It's more poignant, expresses more vulnerable feelings, than her usual aggressive power (though the piano part as usual is strongly rhythmic). Killer Vocal Moment #1: The second time through the verse, when she gets to the latter half, sung in her highest register, she lightens the accompaniment and slows down the pace. In the loud but very clear acoustic that night, her voice, nearly a cappella, floated out over the space with angelic beauty. Killer Vocal Moment #2: And she comes out of that part and into the chorus with a loud, midrange, wavering wail fit to curl the hair. Now, if I say that the first moment reminds me a bit of Kate Bush, and the second rather more of Tori Amos, or if I say that "Devil Girl" is slightly reminiscent to me of the former's "Under the Ivy" and the latter's "Here. in my Head" (three songs which I adore), it's more as a listener's guide to those who haven't heard the song. Clearly Kristeen Young is one of the most individual (idiosyncratic!) composer/performers around; you'd never mistake even this more "normal" song for anyone else. She followed with "Mouth to Mouth" from =Enemy=, the first of her programmed (the keyboard plays by itself!) songs, where she takes center stage to do the lead-singer thing. (Those who have seen her perform may remember that one of her stage moves involves dipping her head down to one side as she grabs the microphone. This time she managed to get her arm caught over her braid, and couldn't get her head back up until she untangled herself. That was the last mishap of the set, though.) Then back to the keyboard for the "Kashmir"-like "Take Me." Killer Vocal Moment #3: The "bridge" of the song is the verse, wordless and an octave higher, full-bore operatic, holding the last note across the transition to the cascading descending figure of the chorus. Purely thrilling, never more so than this time. Then straight into "Incubator," also programmed, though the music box/harpsichord countermelody is played live. It's probably her masterpiece; no matter how many times one sees her perform it, it's always a little boggling to see the apparent ease with which she negotiates the minefield of squeaks and register breaks that constitute the vocal line. Killer Vocal Moment #4: The wordless end of the chorus goes up a minor triad then slow trills off the top note. Her recent habit has been to treat the triad as a slow glissando (rather frightening) and double or triple the trill until her breath gives out. This time she held the note at the top of the glissando so long she could only trill once or twice. Fascinatingly different every time. "Saviour" is a newish song, played at the keyboard. Unusually for her, the keyboard sound is wash-y and spacy, the verse more major- key and melodic, and the chorus darker and more rhythmic; it also features as bridge-coda a striking minimalist keyboard solo. The peak of the set, as I hoped, was the two brand-new songs, both programmed, that she introduced at her CBs Gallery stand last month. Slightly the newer of the two is "Touch Tongues," the darkest song she's written since "Skeletons," with a slow, ominous beat and icy staccato minor chords. Kind of a trip-hop feel: imagine a cross between Portishead's "All Mine" and Tori Amos' "Cruel." But the vocal is pure KY. The verse is a rapid, hectoring rant, though in a sense like operatic recitative (by the end of each line she's singing a clear pitch); the chorus mixes in a major chord in alternation, and the vocal is slightly warmer, but the mood remains chilling, especially when she frames the chorus with an eerie vocal fanfare. Tremendously gripping throughout. And then straight into the very different "Top Rock Girl." Here the comparison, of all things, is the Red Hot Chili Peppers: funky little repeated riff under the verse, fiercely syncopated rhythm breaks, blazeup into power chords for the chorus. Though it's all keyboards, one can easily imagine it being played on loud guitars (there's even a line in the chorus about playing the piano like a guitar). The vocal line bears an initial resemblance to "Incubator": cartoony tone, stuttering stops and starts; but on the whole it's not quite as eccentric. Which suits the song: the chorus is big and full of hooks, and it makes sense that she's thinking of it as a possible single. It generates tremendous rhythmic excitement, especially in the battering transition to the chorus; it's a real kick of a song. The previous batch of programmed songs ("Year of the Woman" and "Skeletons" in addition to the other three she did at this show) had been written about three years ago, and these two new ones are the first since then; all of them are among her best work. They allow her to layer in more keyboard parts than she could play live, and frees her (since she isn't playing simultaneously) to recomplicate the vocal line as well. It's a mode that really shows off her compositional skills. The last live-keyboard song was the bluesy, triple-time "Breasticles," with its pitch-wheel inflection at the end; the set closed with a slightly scrappy version of the barn-burning "Have you ever worked with anything HI-TEK?" (And the minute she left the stage, she bent the braids back up again.) I've been lucky enough to see her perform often this year, so the shows blur together a bit, but this was certainly a terrific one, in the high-average range. Even with the steep entrance fee and the fact that I had to skip an Elysian Fields show, it was an extremely satisfying trip. The news is that she's busily recording, but no clear end in sight (not before 2001, surely). It should be a fine new album: among the songs she =didn't= play at this show (but has played at other recent shows) are the upbeat, hook-y "Automatic Love" and "Startripblazer"; the rousing, well-named "Reveille"; the triplet (pun intended) siblings of "Breasticles," "For the Record" and "Monkey on My Breast"; and the brooding, labyrinthine "Valuable," one of the best of the batch--I'm really sorry she seems to have stopped playing it for the nonce. And for people living within range, she'll be at CBGBs on December 7th; there =might= be a November show as well. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2000 23:58:31 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: Re: spike on angel In a message dated 11/1/00 7:57:07 PM Pacific Standard Time, dgk@panix.com writes: << Can Spike fight Angel? Angel is a vampire; so he's a demon. But he =also= has a soul. Is a soul the dividing line? Or is it something else? >> It has been stated that Spike can hurt no =living= creatures, and it has been repeatedly stated on ANGEL that, soul or not, Angel is "dead." Gayle ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 02 Nov 2000 00:13:00 -0500 From: meredith Subject: Re: spike on angel Hi! Gayle responded: > It has been stated that Spike can hurt no =living= creatures, and it has >been repeatedly stated on ANGEL that, soul or not, Angel is "dead." So are demons "dead", then? I didn't think so, but I may be wrong. We've seen Spike bashing plenty of demon heads since he got neutered. +==========================================================================+ | Meredith Tarr meth@smoe.org | | New Haven, CT USA http://www.smoe.org/~meth | +==========================================================================+ | "things are more beautiful when they're obscure" -- veda hille | | *** TRAJECTORY, the Veda Hille mailing list: *** | | *** http://www.smoe.org/meth/trajectory.html *** | +==========================================================================+ _______________________________________________ Why pay for something you could get for free? NetZero provides FREE Internet Access and Email http://www.netzero.net/download/index.html ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2000 22:04:37 -0800 (PST) From: Todd Huff Subject: Re: spike on angel - --- meredith wrote: > Hi! > > Gayle responded: > > > It has been stated that Spike can hurt no > =living= creatures, and it has > >been repeatedly stated on ANGEL that, soul or not, > Angel is "dead." > > So are demons "dead", then? I didn't think so, but > I may be wrong. We've > seen Spike bashing plenty of demon heads since he > got neutered. > I got the idea it was just humans he couldn't hurt. Spoilers for Spike upcoming below: - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Both Buffy and Angel will have some neat flashback stuff going on in a couple weeks, involving Spike, Drusilla, Angel, AND the Master (hurrah!). __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? From homework help to love advice, Yahoo! 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