Tuesday, November 18, 2003
More Opinions
Here is the review for the new Shins album I came up with for phiLL and his PhiLL(er), and said online zine's audience. Read it here and/or read it there if it pleases you.
Thanks, phiLL.
The Shins Chutes Too Narrow
I’m in the computer loft’s dark, clinging to a few moments of internet access and listening to the new Shins album Chutes Too Narrow for the seventh time today. It is rarity among pop albums when unique lyrics (only in James Mercer’s backyard are there “barking sparrows”) are less impressive than the shapes and melodies of its songs.
Allow a brief catalogue of textures I have found in this spruce and sweet album: Chris Issak, acoustic Beck, Brian Wilson, Van Morrison, the Shins’ first album, late They Might Be Giants. Wait, maybe that was a mistake: sure, all those sounds are present in scraps and runs, but what makes The Shins a successful pop-rock band is their inventiveness. I will not fail to applaud in this review their attention to the craft of juxtaposition.
In 2001, Albuquerquian foursome The Shins released Oh, Inverted World to eventual and wide acclaim. They sounded like the Beach Boys trapped inside Oscar the Grouch’s garbage can, and it was gorgeous. Most describers were accurate when they applied “eerie” and “echoey” to convey the debut’s mood. So what if the single (and classic) “New Slang” was used in a commercial for the dominant fast-food chain? I don’t think of cholesterol when I listen to it, I hear snow on trees and see the plane that’s taking-off in the video.
For the follow-up album Chutes Too Narrow, the band opts for less reverb and more sonic vibrance. An examination of the cover art foreshadows the playfull production of the content: bright, unconventional, and layered. A violin and a string of honeyed la-da-da-dums contradict the staccatoed rhythm guitar on “Saint Simon,” perhaps the album’s purest melody, culminating in a fugue that mirrors a late optimistic turn in the lyrics.
But mostly, Mercer’s words are those of wise strength despite perceived human failure. “We’ve got rules and maps and guns in our backs but/ we still can’t just behave ourselves even to save our/ own lives so, says I, WE ARE A BRUTAL KIND,” confesses Mercer in the first single, “So Says I.” In the next track, “Young Pilgrims,” he admits, “I know there is this side of me that/ wants to grab the yoke from the pilot and just/ fly the whole mess into the sea.” Many songs are searches for earnest guidance in a modern age. And then we resonate with times we, too, have tested our “metal of doe’s skin and petals while kissing the lipless who bleed all the sweetness away.” I’ll buy lines like these because they scan well and they evoke, despite being obtuse, just enough of the confusing pain within love.
I love how the beginnings of the songs vary. While seven of ten tracks open with the same blank strums, each differentiates quickly: some amble steadily, some skitter, at least one erupts into a sprint at the smack of a starter’s gun, some slowly and acoustically glisten. It is often hard to tell whether Mercer’s guitar or Marty Crandall’s keys are chiming, but I don’t care. Good chiming is hard to find.
I cringe at comparisons involving the phrase “better than.” A considerable chance exists that the music on Chutes Too Narrow will make you happy, regardless of any expectations re: Oh, Inverted World. I will take care to keep my copy of the disc free from scratches and dust, so I can enjoy it for years to come. Take that as an endorsement.
Here is the review for the new Shins album I came up with for phiLL and his PhiLL(er), and said online zine's audience. Read it here and/or read it there if it pleases you.
Thanks, phiLL.
The Shins Chutes Too Narrow
I’m in the computer loft’s dark, clinging to a few moments of internet access and listening to the new Shins album Chutes Too Narrow for the seventh time today. It is rarity among pop albums when unique lyrics (only in James Mercer’s backyard are there “barking sparrows”) are less impressive than the shapes and melodies of its songs.
Allow a brief catalogue of textures I have found in this spruce and sweet album: Chris Issak, acoustic Beck, Brian Wilson, Van Morrison, the Shins’ first album, late They Might Be Giants. Wait, maybe that was a mistake: sure, all those sounds are present in scraps and runs, but what makes The Shins a successful pop-rock band is their inventiveness. I will not fail to applaud in this review their attention to the craft of juxtaposition.
In 2001, Albuquerquian foursome The Shins released Oh, Inverted World to eventual and wide acclaim. They sounded like the Beach Boys trapped inside Oscar the Grouch’s garbage can, and it was gorgeous. Most describers were accurate when they applied “eerie” and “echoey” to convey the debut’s mood. So what if the single (and classic) “New Slang” was used in a commercial for the dominant fast-food chain? I don’t think of cholesterol when I listen to it, I hear snow on trees and see the plane that’s taking-off in the video.
For the follow-up album Chutes Too Narrow, the band opts for less reverb and more sonic vibrance. An examination of the cover art foreshadows the playfull production of the content: bright, unconventional, and layered. A violin and a string of honeyed la-da-da-dums contradict the staccatoed rhythm guitar on “Saint Simon,” perhaps the album’s purest melody, culminating in a fugue that mirrors a late optimistic turn in the lyrics.
But mostly, Mercer’s words are those of wise strength despite perceived human failure. “We’ve got rules and maps and guns in our backs but/ we still can’t just behave ourselves even to save our/ own lives so, says I, WE ARE A BRUTAL KIND,” confesses Mercer in the first single, “So Says I.” In the next track, “Young Pilgrims,” he admits, “I know there is this side of me that/ wants to grab the yoke from the pilot and just/ fly the whole mess into the sea.” Many songs are searches for earnest guidance in a modern age. And then we resonate with times we, too, have tested our “metal of doe’s skin and petals while kissing the lipless who bleed all the sweetness away.” I’ll buy lines like these because they scan well and they evoke, despite being obtuse, just enough of the confusing pain within love.
I love how the beginnings of the songs vary. While seven of ten tracks open with the same blank strums, each differentiates quickly: some amble steadily, some skitter, at least one erupts into a sprint at the smack of a starter’s gun, some slowly and acoustically glisten. It is often hard to tell whether Mercer’s guitar or Marty Crandall’s keys are chiming, but I don’t care. Good chiming is hard to find.
I cringe at comparisons involving the phrase “better than.” A considerable chance exists that the music on Chutes Too Narrow will make you happy, regardless of any expectations re: Oh, Inverted World. I will take care to keep my copy of the disc free from scratches and dust, so I can enjoy it for years to come. Take that as an endorsement.
Supply
She came back to school as a three-ring binder
full of poison grammer in cursive,
clapping her hands to homework.
Her death was like a sonnet, but
there is no wit in writing about cars anymore.
There were cracking ribs and ink-sketchs and days
for the bouyancy of the images
climbing on a river's back,
heckling the sinking metal corpse.
The story and not the satirical feet bound to the pedal.
The ugly and the collated alike, blessing the wind
full of la-da-dum-dums,
cloves of hair spilling
hay-like in the rain.
Slowly reading with her blue toes in the current.
She came back to school as a three-ring binder
full of poison grammer in cursive,
clapping her hands to homework.
Her death was like a sonnet, but
there is no wit in writing about cars anymore.
There were cracking ribs and ink-sketchs and days
for the bouyancy of the images
climbing on a river's back,
heckling the sinking metal corpse.
The story and not the satirical feet bound to the pedal.
The ugly and the collated alike, blessing the wind
full of la-da-dum-dums,
cloves of hair spilling
hay-like in the rain.
Slowly reading with her blue toes in the current.
DW Bitch Log, Entry#2
DW calls a fire drill because he suspects that sudden initiative erases three months of neglect, but it's done spur-of-the-moment, with no procedure for accounting for all the students. He tells them to gather with their last-period teacher, but some students have free periods at that time. When the question was put to him about where such students should meet for attendence, he could only reply, with that fucking fake-disarming grin, "that's something we'll have to work on." Being "pleasant" and self-deprecating/honest is only cute when you don't fuck-up on a daily basis.
At least I have been granted my request for an additional class next trimester. It's an English elective: (Ethnic) American Literature. We're gonna take Harold Bloom in all his conservative lameness and discuss the multiculturalism of American literature. I'll be drawing from many Colgate classes for material and discussion.
One more thing...A few weeks ago, I think he tried to create an "in" with Amanda and I dring lunch. The discussion was hovering around teenage misbehavior, and he recalled his career as a teenage "party-animal" whom all the local police knew by name. So cool.
DW calls a fire drill because he suspects that sudden initiative erases three months of neglect, but it's done spur-of-the-moment, with no procedure for accounting for all the students. He tells them to gather with their last-period teacher, but some students have free periods at that time. When the question was put to him about where such students should meet for attendence, he could only reply, with that fucking fake-disarming grin, "that's something we'll have to work on." Being "pleasant" and self-deprecating/honest is only cute when you don't fuck-up on a daily basis.
At least I have been granted my request for an additional class next trimester. It's an English elective: (Ethnic) American Literature. We're gonna take Harold Bloom in all his conservative lameness and discuss the multiculturalism of American literature. I'll be drawing from many Colgate classes for material and discussion.
One more thing...A few weeks ago, I think he tried to create an "in" with Amanda and I dring lunch. The discussion was hovering around teenage misbehavior, and he recalled his career as a teenage "party-animal" whom all the local police knew by name. So cool.
Sunday, November 16, 2003
recent media o' mine
Raymond Carver What We Talk About When We Talk About Love short stories.
The Return of the Secaucus 7 dir. by John Sayles. The film ripped off by The Big Chill. Incredible writing of character and truth in the advent of passing 30. This one hurts, and will hurt more in a few years, but in a wise way.
The Wrens the meadowlands Via Gary and pitchfork, an incredible rock album. Great textures and and melodies. Decent writing. Kinda like Built 2 Spill but not as esoteric or sterile. Singer delivers dangerously close to throaty "emo" but to no fault, especially since the lyrics don't suck. Epic-y. Actually, this is a could-be Jeff Buckley album.
to be read/reading: Henry James The Turn of the Screw There's always time for a ghost story, and I'm reading this in anticipation of reading the new Steward O'nan book when it's released in paperback. Dostoevsky Notes From the Underground Been meaning to get to this one for a while. There's also some Flannery O'Conner stories I've got waiting, and the last novel from Dave Eggers.
But mostly, I'll be reading exam essays this weekend. Yikes! Maybe I'll post the essay options the day of the exam for your thinking and writing pleasure.
Raymond Carver What We Talk About When We Talk About Love short stories.
The Return of the Secaucus 7 dir. by John Sayles. The film ripped off by The Big Chill. Incredible writing of character and truth in the advent of passing 30. This one hurts, and will hurt more in a few years, but in a wise way.
The Wrens the meadowlands Via Gary and pitchfork, an incredible rock album. Great textures and and melodies. Decent writing. Kinda like Built 2 Spill but not as esoteric or sterile. Singer delivers dangerously close to throaty "emo" but to no fault, especially since the lyrics don't suck. Epic-y. Actually, this is a could-be Jeff Buckley album.
to be read/reading: Henry James The Turn of the Screw There's always time for a ghost story, and I'm reading this in anticipation of reading the new Steward O'nan book when it's released in paperback. Dostoevsky Notes From the Underground Been meaning to get to this one for a while. There's also some Flannery O'Conner stories I've got waiting, and the last novel from Dave Eggers.
But mostly, I'll be reading exam essays this weekend. Yikes! Maybe I'll post the essay options the day of the exam for your thinking and writing pleasure.
Lone
Internet access is still paltry here at The School. There has been no connection in my humble appartment for a week and a half, and I'm currently alone in the computer loft above the library in the quiet main academic building that has been this year re-dubbed the "Digital Arts Studio" in some euphemistic scheme to make this place look less of a sham than it is.
Everything seems a sham lately.
It's not the new technology guy's fault, mostly, it's the fault of the shoddy network installation committed here in the last few years. Temporary fixes and poor ethics have left the campus-wide network a shabby assemblage of loose wires, dead-end ports, and e-death. It's kinda like Tatooine. Still, you'd think after two and a half months (not counting all summer) something could have been purchased, some feasible plan could be been enacted, to connect the school to the other parts of the world.
Education: this year, with the new faculty and sharper students than last year (at least in my classes), I feel the education occurring is pretty incredible. The biggest shame here is the administration: it's asking too much of too few people. They underhired after last year's decimation of half of the staff.
At this point, I will establish a new feature to this 'blog: the DW BITCH LOG. There is a new Head of Upper School, and he angers me daily with his phony professionalism and general incompetence.
DW Bitch Log, Entry #1: Characterization
DW is barely 40 and recently married to a similarly liberal woman whom I think is creative and acute. His biggest offense is his false professionalism. As colleagues have agreed, it is as if he's attended (or led) seminars on how and when to laugh, how to be firm politely, and how to be a complete asshole with a smile. In staff meetings, he's always anally "managing time," stepping in and stopping a petty argument or discussion "that could be discussed later in a committee" (that will never happen) "so as not to waste this time with other matters that can be handled later." It's not that this housekeeping isn't efficient, it's the smugness with which he wields this ability to save us all from digression.
He's basically a smug intellectual who's bitten off too much of a job to handle. I feel sympathy to an extent, given this is his first time in such a huge role of leadership and with kids and all, but he has made no attempts to ingratiate himself...strike that, no earnest, genuine attempts to ingratiate himself with anyone. He speaks down to everyone, but with that fucking smile. Grrrr.... What is worst is that he doesn't even perform his job within any reasonable measure of success. I mean, there will always be things that won't get done, but he's lazy even though he creates this elaborate image of being a tireless worker. Oh, the strain in his eyes.
One more tidbit, his use of his purple "vocabulary." As if it weren't lame enough to throw words like "recalcitrant" and "modicum" into memos and school addresses, he also has this ridiculously pretentious affectation where he raises all these parts of his body — his eyebrows, his nose, his heels off the ground — when he uses one, as if to suggest I will cast this brilliant word upon high for you underlings to consider. Pretty neat, huh? grrrrr.
More grumbling to come.
The rest of now
Chelsea and Soho yesterday with Amanda, Gary, and Em. We saw so many people: Pat Smear, Nick Prior, Ewan MacGregor.
I unlease my term final on Thursday. I think they will enjoy.
Thanksgiving, I'll be homing it, but returning Friday to find The Bradfield.
Welcome back, Flynn.
Internet access is still paltry here at The School. There has been no connection in my humble appartment for a week and a half, and I'm currently alone in the computer loft above the library in the quiet main academic building that has been this year re-dubbed the "Digital Arts Studio" in some euphemistic scheme to make this place look less of a sham than it is.
Everything seems a sham lately.
It's not the new technology guy's fault, mostly, it's the fault of the shoddy network installation committed here in the last few years. Temporary fixes and poor ethics have left the campus-wide network a shabby assemblage of loose wires, dead-end ports, and e-death. It's kinda like Tatooine. Still, you'd think after two and a half months (not counting all summer) something could have been purchased, some feasible plan could be been enacted, to connect the school to the other parts of the world.
Education: this year, with the new faculty and sharper students than last year (at least in my classes), I feel the education occurring is pretty incredible. The biggest shame here is the administration: it's asking too much of too few people. They underhired after last year's decimation of half of the staff.
At this point, I will establish a new feature to this 'blog: the DW BITCH LOG. There is a new Head of Upper School, and he angers me daily with his phony professionalism and general incompetence.
DW Bitch Log, Entry #1: Characterization
DW is barely 40 and recently married to a similarly liberal woman whom I think is creative and acute. His biggest offense is his false professionalism. As colleagues have agreed, it is as if he's attended (or led) seminars on how and when to laugh, how to be firm politely, and how to be a complete asshole with a smile. In staff meetings, he's always anally "managing time," stepping in and stopping a petty argument or discussion "that could be discussed later in a committee" (that will never happen) "so as not to waste this time with other matters that can be handled later." It's not that this housekeeping isn't efficient, it's the smugness with which he wields this ability to save us all from digression.
He's basically a smug intellectual who's bitten off too much of a job to handle. I feel sympathy to an extent, given this is his first time in such a huge role of leadership and with kids and all, but he has made no attempts to ingratiate himself...strike that, no earnest, genuine attempts to ingratiate himself with anyone. He speaks down to everyone, but with that fucking smile. Grrrr.... What is worst is that he doesn't even perform his job within any reasonable measure of success. I mean, there will always be things that won't get done, but he's lazy even though he creates this elaborate image of being a tireless worker. Oh, the strain in his eyes.
One more tidbit, his use of his purple "vocabulary." As if it weren't lame enough to throw words like "recalcitrant" and "modicum" into memos and school addresses, he also has this ridiculously pretentious affectation where he raises all these parts of his body — his eyebrows, his nose, his heels off the ground — when he uses one, as if to suggest I will cast this brilliant word upon high for you underlings to consider. Pretty neat, huh? grrrrr.
More grumbling to come.
The rest of now
Chelsea and Soho yesterday with Amanda, Gary, and Em. We saw so many people: Pat Smear, Nick Prior, Ewan MacGregor.
I unlease my term final on Thursday. I think they will enjoy.
Thanksgiving, I'll be homing it, but returning Friday to find The Bradfield.
Welcome back, Flynn.
