STATIC and FEEDBACK
Posts tagged column
Revisiting the mechanical world of walkmans and cassettes
What began as an experiment in the wake of a dead iPod turned into a love rekindled with a gloriously imperfect format and an outdated music player.
Radiohead has had a number of lyrics over the years burrow themselves into my subconscious. In high school, a line from OK Computer’s “Paranoid Android” hung with me, one with at least two meanings that left me scratching my head, wondering if it was a condemnation or a clever play on a premise:
“AMBITION MAKES YOU LOOK PRETTY UGLY.”
Goodbye to the White Stripes
When a band is finished, folks want to know what the defining moment was. If given three or four minutes to describe the White Stripes to the unfamiliar, where to turn? Was it “Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground” or “The Denial Twist?” The piano rumble of “My Doorbell?” Their live performance of “Seven Nation Army” and “Death Letter” at the Grammys?
It could be any of those. But since this is my forum, the White Stripes discussion begins and ends with their performance of “Let’s Build a Home” on Conan O’Brien in 2003. Finishing of a week in which the Stripes were Conan’s musical guest every night, Jack and Meg kicked into a bit of southern boogie from their second album, De Stijl.
Immediately, Jack White is nearly off the rails. Wringing every tortured note and chord out of a beaten-to-hell guitar, he’s the 21st century incarnate of the head-cuttin’ blues man storming into the dance hall to show off his chops. It’s not refined, it’s not pretty and it’s not clean, but it’s a blast, and it’s real. After about three minutes, Jack makes a bee line for Conan’s desk to tear up some slide action. On the way back to the stage, the guitar cuts out, he tosses it, grabs the mic and jumps into Son House’s “John the Revelator.” Crash, thud, bow, the end. It was musical carnage.
It’s the greatest four minutes of television I’ve ever seen.
Is Cake topping the charts such a bad thing?
This week, Cake set a record by selling the fewest records (44,000) to ever top the Billboard album charts. We can’t say we’re all that bothered by the whole thing.
Ever get in to the car and can’t think of what to listen to because you’re actually in a good mood for once? No? Well, regardless, it happened to Nick. Here it is.
Keith Richards, captured in a moment of calm
Nick Tavares shares one of his favorite pictures in music, the above shot by Jim Marshall of Keef Riffhard busy creating in the studio in 1972.
