Showing posts with label rickie lee jones. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rickie lee jones. Show all posts

Saturday, July 7, 2012

Journey of the Dumb Naked Kings (July 9th - 13th)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.


It was another enjoyably busy week at work, with a Thursday off to see Miss 5 get her very first honour certificate. It was for writing, because writing and illustrating stories is what she likes to do in her spare time away from school. A tad proud? Yes. She also has a great appetite for reading which she is learning at a rate of knots. I learned a little too late in life that the best way to get smarter is read everything*. *Except the comments.


Revelation started Thursday night and I missed Opening Night for the first time in a while. I will be catching a stack of films this weekend and next though, including The Georges Méliès Project for which I can not wait.


As far as the music goes, I felt like I leaned a little hard on the noisy side last week, so I have deliberately toned it down. So, that's how I ended up with some Tracy Chapman, Rickie Lee Jones, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Gillian Welch and Ryan Adams all in the same list. Talk about a folk backlash. A folklash. To balance the folk, I have some funk from James Brown, some Soul from Alabama Shakes (on recommendation from @sunky) and some rock from the first Japandroids album. Got to have some hip hop too, so say hello to the third volume of Culture of Kings. Finally, I found out that one of my favourite Beck songs was a cover of The Korgis, so I have their album here. 

Check it out:

  1. 50 Cent
  2. Queen
  3. Japandroids
  4. Cypress Hill
  5. James Brown

Song of the Week : Cheap Trick - Surrender



This has been another week almost completely smothered in work. Except I took yesterday off to go see Miss 5 get her first honour certificate (yay!). She got it for being an 'independent writer' because she is always writing and illustrating stories in her own time. So it was great to do the selfish thing and see her collect the award and try and see who was prouder, her or me.


So this song Surrender, which featured on the soundtrack to a cheesy 70s teen melodrama I saw on the weekend (Over The Edge. Matt Dillon looked about 13!), is a tribute to doing the selfish thing. To surrendering yourself to the work you have to do, but never forgetting the things that are truly important. 


It's a decent song in its own right, but unfortunately I think it might be forever associated with this campy film for me now. Not a completely bad thing, but not Cheap Trick's intention, I'm sure.


Toodle Pip, What What!


Thanks for stopping by. If you're in Perth, try and get out to Revelation and catch a film or two. You won't get a better chance to see some of these terrific movies, unless they happen to be one of those that ends up popular and showing in the multiplexes. Who needs Hoyts though when you can get to The Astor and bask in all of its art deco glory.


Stay safe, warm and dry kids. Go Eagles, even if I can't watch the game because I'll be at the movies. Hasala malakim.


Post Script: Eagles won after clawing their way back from a 35 point deficit. It was kind of ironic today since I saw two films at Revelation where people fought against the odds, except the heroes lost. I came home and watched the second half of the West Coast match that I had recorded. The good guys prevailed. Suck it, haters. 

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Playlist : November 21st - 25th, 2011

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

Let's get right into the music after a pretty uneventful week. My next playlist has a rarity from Prince, the soundtrack to Boogie Nights as well as the new Muppet movie, some Billy Bragg because I haven't picked up Fight Songs yet and a tribute to The Velvet Underground and Nico from Beck and some friends.

I've also got a band I only just discovered, The Deep Dark Woods, the KRS One and Marley Marl collaboration, some new Kathleen Edwards and an old Rickie Lee Jones and, because it's been so long, The Doors.




My choice cut for today is Billy Bragg – Never Buy The Sun. I’ve been playing this song constantly all week. I’ve been a fan of Billy Bragg for decades now, because as you know I’m a hard-line lefty and I love a good fighter who takes the rage to the system.

This song is in response to the News Of The World phone hacking scandal. The voice mail of a (it turned out later) murdered girl was hacked by reporters while she was missing. The same reporters paid off cops to get hold of sensitive information. And this was only one instance of hacking in a mass of violations which saw the closure of the paper, owned by our evil ex-citizen Rupert Murdoch.

The chorus line “Scousers never buy The Sun” is a reference to how the people of Liverpool long ago boycotted The Sun newspaper (also one of Rupert’s) because of the way in which they reported the Hillsborough disaster (which if you don’t recall was the human crush inside a soccer stadium where a number of Liverpool supporters died).

I am hoping to soon grab a copy of Fight Songs, Billy Bragg’s latest release from which this track comes. Unfortunately, it’s not selling on his site in download format and I can order the CD and wait for it much cheaper than I can get it on iTunes. So, in the meantime, I’ve been playing this over and over because I really believe something must be done about the state of journalism in Australia, let alone the UK. I won’t get on my high horse here, but really it probably needs nuking from space.

Enjoy. Fight the power!

Toodle-oo
That's it for the week. Play nice out there kids. Take care of each other and maybe do something nice for someone, eh?

May your weekend be awash with perfect moments. Hasala malakim.

Thursday, October 13, 2011

Playlist October 17th - 21st, 2011

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

This week has been fairly unspectacular. I've spent a lot of it in a haze of hayfever/flu drugs while I fought off epic sniffles. I'm almost recovered now though, thanks for asking.

To the music and this week I have a band I just discovered, Real Estate, though they're not new. I have a soundtrack from a so-so indie sleeper; the latest from funky jazz rap outfit Us3; some Nas; a Rickie Lee Jones classic, Prince's 20Ten record that he released via the Daily Mirror in the UK, some good old-fashioned Sonic Youth and more.

See what you think
  1. Digable Planets
  2. Fela Kuti
  3. Superstar Quamallah
  4. Toy Box Scholars
  5. Horse Feathers



My song this week came from the free Spin playlist for October. I don’t know this band, but this song makes them sound like Weezer maybe spent some time in the studio with Bush of all bands. What I like about it is it wouldn't raise an eyebrow if you took it back and released it in the early to mid 90s. When the kids are ripping off that kind of sound and doing it well, I’m not sure if that’s a good sign or not, but I like how it sounds.

There’s an obvious 90s vibe running through with the quiet loud distortion of it. Even the arpeggiated guitar under the verse. It makes me think that nostalgia is moving faster than ever before, but then I remember that 1991 was 20 years ago and that’s about how long nostalgia usually takes. There’s still a little bit of current style about it too, with an epic harmonised refrain of Ooooos and the swelling of instruments into that wall of sound orchestration we’re used to from Bon Iver, Polyphonic Spree etc.

TGIS
Well that's me for another week. I trust your week will be sunshine and lollipops; or at the very least, a light breeze and good coffee. If you get a chance, stream the Real Estate LP on NPR if you like mellow surf pop. It's quite an enjoyable listen.

Take care out there kids. Don't let the Man turn you around. Hasala malakim.

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Playlist July 11th - 15th, 2011

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

This week's list has a little bit of a classic rock vibe. I think that has something to do with my slow and steady descent into Audiophile hell. There's no denying that rock music had a certain sound to it in the 70s and that was largely to do with wanky audiophile sound engineers and the nerdy audiophiles who collected records and built great component systems. And the quality of the music, of course.

So what I've got is some classic, remastered Queen, some Steve Miller, a Stax compilation, ABC from the Jackson 5 (that I recently bought my oldest daughter for her 5th birthday on vinyl), two of my favourite Hip Hop LPs from Brother Ali and Pegz, plus some early Ratcat and U2. I threw in the new The Grates and a Rickie Lee Jones for good measure :
  1. Gillian Welch
  2. Nightmares on Wax
  3. Son Volt
  4. Bias B
  5. The Autumn Defense
Song of the Week : Sex Pistols - God Save The Queen
Because this week has been so stressful, everything has pretty much played as wallpaper to my crappy days. I haven’t really heard anything apart from in the car and at home. Earlier in the week while riding the exercise bike in my office, I watched a DVD I have of a Classic Albums episode – this one on the Sex Pistols – Never Mind the Bollocks. It’s a great episode and I recommend you search it out if you haven’t seen it. You can tell by the interviews and the old footage that the Pistols were just a bunch of ratbag kids who were only in it for a laugh, while McLaren was a business man who saw dollar signs in everything but in particular controversy.

This week’s SOTW is a song that clearly made #1 in the UK but was never recorded as such because it was banned. When the papers would list it in the charts, the title and artist would be blacked out or left off completely. I chose this song because it’s astounding nowadays to think it would cause so much controversy. A bunch of National Front members beat up on the band and the sound engineers at a pub because of the song. If you listen to it though, now it’s virtually safe to play to kiddies. Not even NINs controversial Closer raises much of an eyebrow now. And maybe, just maybe, that’s why rock is dead – because nobody can set the world on fire with any shocking ideas any more. Damn you Internet… damn you all to HELL!

TTFN
This weekend is a long one for me, as my very generous employer has given us all Monday off as reward for hard work. I'll be making the most of my surprise break with a trip to the Zoo with the munchkins and the wife. It better not rain!

Whatever you're doing, I hope it's a lot of fun. Peace man, right on.