PB&J

And speaking of Dead or Alive, shouldn’t someone as flamboyant as their lead singer have had a less pedestrian name than “Pete Burns”?

I mean, that was the name of my 6th grade gym teacher. Or my crabby neighbor across the street who was obsessed with his bluegrass lawn. Can’t remember which...

No, Pete should have been named Plexi Shiningstar, or Ray D.O. Antenna, or Lockie McGlow, or Sweetpepper Gingersnap, or Mr Mister Mister, or Fishnet Twango, or Pendelum McDuff, or January Flipflop, or “Cowboy” Cal Stern, or Bobbing Flopsy, or Ducker Al-Shoot, or Wickie Fern, or Blanket Cuddleswap...

But not Pete Burns.

YOUTHQUAKE, BITCHES

Satellite roulette.

Brand New Lover— Dead or Alive

OK, we're all in clear agreement that this is actually a better song than You Spin Me 'Round (Like a Record), right?

Kind of like Coming Up Close is a better song than Voices Carry.

The one-hit wonderdome is a place of great whimsy and caprice...

FORGETTABLE FIRE

I’m generally pretty cold to U2. Always have been.

Occasionally I’ll let them in, if they promise to behave, wipe their feet, and leave the messianic crap out in the Mini.

In their journey from young punks, to Christian new-hope rockers, to self-important prigs, to postmodern “R*O*C*K” stars, to Classic Rock icons, the following bits and pieces have resonated with me:

-Two Hearts Beat as One, 12” extended mix.
-Bad (live), from Wide Awake in America. Compare this Christian new-hope version to the self-important prig version of the Rattle and Hum era for a dramatic rendering of that particular trajectory.
-Three Sunrises. Psychedelicious!
-Most of The Joshua Tree, except of course Bullet the Blue Sky. And those last two songs. Otherwise, it’s the perfect version of what it is.
-Lemon. Because, come on— Lemon.

EMPIRE BURLESQUE

I can't tell you anything about Bob Dylan that you don't already know.

Once upon a time I thought he was nothing but a charlatan.

Then I grew up and realized that he was a charlatan and so much more.

And now I'm making plans to see him in concert for the first time.

He is enveloped in twilight, and I am in its early tinge.

I can't tell you anything about Bob Dylan...

ICICLES MELT

Satellite roulette.

Birds Fly (Whisper to a Scream)— The Icicle Works

Suburban New Wave, like its bastard cousin I Melt With You by Modern English.

The sound of days spent studying for the SATs in a 5BR, 3BA split ranch, and nights spent stealing joints from your parents’ stash.

A life sacrificed for the new nirvana...

YES YES YES

True confession Friday.

The other day, I listened to Roundabout. The whole thing, nearly.

I mean, mountains came out of the sky, they stood there, and I kept right on listening.

It helped that every minute and a half or so it basically turned into a different song.

Which explains the original title:

Suite: (i) The Wizard Meets the Gnome and They Dance With Small Sacks of Colored Stones Around Their Necks. (ii) Lotusland Doth Rejoice at No Longer Being Overswept by the Shadow of Pinthorn the Dragon. (iii) The Mouse and the Maid Lie Down Together in the Barley, and Their Dreams Evanesce.

Would history have been as kind to the song if Rick Wakemen hadn’t objected to the implied slaying of Pinthorn in that title?

I guess we’ll never know. I guess we’ll never know...

STILLS GNASH

Satellite roulette.

I’m going to push a button. I’m going to hear a song. I’m going to write about that song.

Didi mau! Didi mau!

Love the One You’re With— Stephen Stills

From 1970, a distillation of why the 60s had to die.

Now, I’m not being fogyish and hating on all the free-love babble, as weedy and opportunistic as it might be.

I’m not denying the patent pending harmonies and the organ-grinding organ, thick and redolent as patchouli.

But “There’s a rose in a fisted glove/And the eagle flies with the dove”?

Is that supposed to be sexy? Or worse yet, sexual?

Because, I have to say, that “rose in a fisted glove” image is pretty damn terrible either way.

Take a bath, hippie.

I ENVY YOU, SO MUCH ROCKING TO DO

My goal yesterday was simply to blog Yo La Tengo’s Sugarcube video.

Before I even set about to do that, I learned that the Sugarcubes were going to be reuniting for a single show.

Sugarcubes, sugarcubes everywhere...

Now, I actually kind of sort of really disliked the Sugarcubes back in the day. Bjork was obviously a cool force of nature, but I couldn’t stomach the hectoring Sugarcube, the one I call Sven. “That leetle girl showed great interest in all the mo-tor crashes in the neigborhood...” Shut the fuck up, Sven.

Anyway, YouTube was being all uncooperative, and wouldn’t let me blog the YLT video. So instead, I’ll just describe it for you.

It opens on the highland moors, a great mist washing over three lone figures draped in red. The mist rises, and finally clears, revealing... Yo La Tengo! They smile knowingly as the opening drums trip in. There is then a quick cut to the band riding in the cab of a pickup, crossing the George Washington Bridge. It must be the 4th of July, because this huge, awesome American flag is hanging from one of the towers of the bridge.

The footage is then sped up, like one of those videos where you watch a flower bloom, and when it finally slows down the band are set up on a softball field in Edgewater, New Jersey, with the Manhattan skyline as their backdrop. They continue to rock, and a mist comes in off the river and envelopes them as the song comes to a close.

Oh man, it’s just so cool.

I didn’t really do it justice, so feel free to head over to YouTube and search for “Yo La Tengo Sugarcube”...

I GOT IT

Dear Yo La Tengo,

We first met over 13 years ago, when you released Painful. I was living down in Charlottesville, and I heard From a Motel 6 on TJU.

I loved the Dylan reference in the title, the Velvets reference on the noisy bridge, and the reserved post-punk cool of the vocals. I made a few mix tapes that year, and this had a spot on all of them.

Thing is, I wasn’t as charmed by the rest of the disc. I liked Georgia’s turn on Nowhere Near, and I guess I was impressed that you included an Only Ones cover that was not Another Girl, Another Planet. But really I didn’t often play it from end to end.

Still, I was involved enough to buy Electr-O-Pura, with its bedeviling hyphens, when it came out a couple of years later. This time, it was Tom Courtenay that grabbed my attention. And again, unfortunately, not much else. It was starting to feel like my late 80s relationship with The Wedding Present.

When I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One came out (and sweet Jebus, has it really been 9 years?) I was naturally wary. The reviews were good, but they usually are. But I decided to give it one more shot.

Well, I’m glad I did, because you really got me with this one. It was waaayyy expansive and way terse at the same time, and I dug it from start to finish. I’d say that with ICHTHBAO you created one of my top 15 favorite albums to date, and for that I’m most grateful. And that Sugarcube video kicks ass.

From this high, I went back to being mostly nonplussed by And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out, so much so that I confess that I didn’t even purchase Summer Sun.

And now it is late September 2006, and I am vulnerable to all manner of autumnal melancholy. You guys fit that program perfectly (Autumn Sweater and all that), so yesterday I picked up I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass.

I’ll drop you a line sometime soon and let you know how everything worked out.

Best regards,

Sliced Tongue

ELEGY

Some of the last poems that I wrote tracked the dissolution and death of my brother.

Time and tide had abraded my lyricism, and turned my verse angular and ironic.

Taurus

Have you ever seen
The ashing of a soul?

The agent fire
Beating its black wings

To rise above
The trespass of a song

Jeff showed up for Thanksgiving dinner with a bloated belly, sitting high on his thin frame. My mother, who had seen this before in dramatic close up, knew instantly that he was in real trouble. I tried to reassure her that it was a simple beer belly, but to her the complexities were clear.

A month later I was called to the emergency room. The slow course of suicide was beginning to have its effects.

Compulsion

Do not worry about the cups--
They are in the 2nd drawer,
Prone, interlocked,
On top of your cassettes
And the box of sour gum + hard candy.
Do not worry--
They preceded you by a bottomless age,
And will float past your death
To eternity.

We sat in Jeff's room at Mt Sinai Hospital, biding the time with small talk and periodic glances up at an elevated TV. The murmur of passing daytime talk shows filled the empty holes in the conversation.

He was propped in bed, a new liver sewn inside to yank him back from the edge. And still he was typically condescending and gruff, particularly to my mother. He fussed about things of no consequence, culminating in a blowup regarding some misplaced cups.

When my mother left the room, I shot him a look informed by a mix of plain disgust and pity. “She drives 100 miles to see you here almost every fucking day, and you treat her like this?” I hissed, “The way you've always treated her.”

I drove back home with my mother, still furious at Jeff's behavior. “I know he loves me,” she said, “And he doesn't have anyone else. I'm his mother.”

Elegy morphine

Are you
worthy of
the putrid swans

whose sooty wings extended
War with
Grace

The funeral was quiet and quick. An urn with Jeff's ashes was interred not more than 200 yards from the altar on which the service was offered, in the graveyard on the grounds of the 'Neath the bell tower church.

Because my father was in the army, my mother has a plot reserved for her in the local national cemetery. But she waived that right some years ago, opting instead for a spot on the church grounds right next to my brother.

My life as a poet ended about a dozen years ago.

I live now a narrative life. A life that requires narrative. A life that could not stand on lyrics.

But I will never forget who I was, I will never forget what I was:

A poet...

LYRICAL BALLADS

Rice Farms

Ably, with a tongue of dust
Came the riders of a golden knit,
With an eye of smoke and a tender trust—
The women were more lovely for it.

They ambled precious on the wing,
Those lyric young undaunted,
And I could not but softly sing
“The women are more lovely for it.”

This Rice Farms was half a mile down the road from the church referenced in ‘Neath the bell tower.

When I was 16, a couple of my friends took horseback riding lessons there on Saturday mornings, and I would walk over to watch.

Black Pants

When the cream goes bitter on the spoon
The children stray, children stray.
The tailor sings his folly tune
And we slip away.

And we fall flat from the bastard’s hand
On such a day, such a day.
We turn the dirt off our shoulders and
Shhh... slip away...

I see now that this is largely “about” transcending decay and death.

Also, all of my pants were black. It was not a goth thing. It’s just, all of my pants were black.

I have typed up three different ways to summarize this post, and each one reads like an apology.

An apology for being anachronistic. An apology for being a poetaster.

But you know what? I’ve decided not to apologize...

DISARRAY

Forgive the indelicacy of today’s post, but it is all in the service of delivering some important information:

Poetry can get you laid.

Prism

Dance a broken step with civil disguise,
Give not a handsome tremble to the blacking rise,
Lay no bed in the violet waves of winter.
Things established are demonic vice,
Disarray, a ritual blend.
Dance with me angel!
Dance a broken step!

A couple of years after I wrote this piece, I met a girl. She was a statuesque bottle-blonde surfer, entering her sophomore year. She liked LSD and scaring her parents.

We spent only a couple of weeks in each other’s company, and I’m left with a disjointed collection of memories:

A night spent house sitting, in a den that was literally crawling with crickets...

A night out with some of her friends to see The Deceivers...

Meeting her parents as they sat and watched Matewan on video...

I thought back to this poem when I first met her, so I wrote it out longhand and dropped it in an envelope, along with a crystal prism I snatched from a decorative lamp.

She melted, and I confess I did not discourage the idea that the poem was custom written for her.

When she went back to school, we continued for several more weeks with a flurry of regular phone calls, effusive letters, and new poems.

But soon she returned to her broken steps, and I to my civil disguise...

NO COUNTRY

I once believed that I remembered every word I ever wrote...

Then one day several years ago, I was going through some manila envelopes stuffed so full of papers that their seams were splitting.

The envelopes were filled with four or five years worth of my poems, some crammed onto found pieces of stationery, some written and rewritten on expansive lined paper.

I thumbed through all the old familiar files, the Xs and arrows on each page helping to reconstruct the essential DNA of all the old familiar words.

The final page that I found in one of the envelopes contained the following, with not an X or arrow in sight:

'Neath the bell tower sits a well,
Where colonies of uniform grass
Awakened, bend and draw to glance
Upward at her knell.
'Neath the bell tower sits a well.

'Neath the bell tower they converge--
Brassy children sprung out from mothers' side,
Agitated by restraining ties,
In her toll there are none to be heard.
'Neath the bell tower they converge.

'Neath the bell tower I stand,
A-cast in silent revelry,
Prizing the four winds' buoyancy,
And the clap of her simple hand.
'Neath the bell tower I stand.

It was instantly clear from the subject matter that I had written this, a remembrance of my boyhood churchgoing days.






















But that moment of clarity was clouded quickly by a betrayal of memory. This was the only poem in the reams of paper that I just did not recall.

I lost my equilibrium as I tried to bring back the experience of writing the poem, in an effort to place it in my personal timeline. But I was never able to elevate the experience much above the category of a light fever dream.

And as I made my peace with that fact, my dizziness was tinged with a bit of sadness. I thought back to that 21/22-year old with a formal 9th grade education, aspiring to be an impractical poet.

Who, with Hopkins and Yeats in his head, but without steady knowledge of sprung rhythm or scansion to get him through the night, wrote on through that night nonetheless.

Some of it is embarrassing for sure, but some of it has a luster partially borrowed, partially earned (“Colonies of uniform grass/Awakened, bend and draw to glance” and “Prizing the four winds’ buoyancy/And the clap of her simple hand”).

Welcome to poetry week on the Tongue...

TO HELL WITH POVERTY!

I had planned on bookending the pre-Labor Day Billy Bragg clip with a post-Labor Day Gang of Four clip, an intention that lay dormant until I read this phrase in the Washington Post yesterday, delirious soft-soap newspeak for “torture”: irregular interrogation methods.

WHEE!

Into every life, a little bit of this must fall...

GOING DOWN TO THE HONDA SHOP

I ran over a broom today on I-95, somewhere near Ft. Meade.

That's right-- a fecking broom.

I think this means that my car and I-95 are now officially married...

DAMAGED GOODS

I have an order sitting in my Newbury Comics’ shopping cart. It’s been there for a couple of days now.

One of the items in the cart is the new Broadcast comp, The Future Crayon, which has occasioned me to take this role as the Prince of Denmark.

To buy or not to buy, though, is not really the question. I will buy. The question turns more on how I will buy...

I can click the order button over at Newbury and have delivered to my door an 18-track CD for $12.95 plus whatever portion of the shipping will be attributable to one disc in a multi-item order.

Or I can one-click my way to a 20-track download of the same CD over at iTunes for $9.99.

So the math that counts here is as follows: iTunes offers two extra tracks and costs about $3.50 less. Seems like a no-brainer.

And yet. And yet.

And yet I pause...

I’m still enough of a pop-culture fetishist that I prefer to drop my dimes on tangible objects.

I like the anticipatory struggle with the CD wrapping, which can be as challenging as prying a Giger alien off a host face.

I like sliding out the accompanying booklet to see what manner of liner notes have been provided, and reading through them at the dinner table.

I like the game of sliding the booklet back into the case under the little plastic nubbins that will ultimately keep it from shifting around all willy nilly. Shit, I ripped a corner!

I like to see if there was any effort to screen print a personality onto the actual face of the disc.

I like to see the final results of all the artistic and practical decisions that went into creating the object in my hands.

And yet I pause...

WORKERS PLAYTIME

And here’s to you, Billy Bragg.

Because lines like “Here comes the future and you can’t run from it/If you’ve got a blacklist, I want to be on it” got me through the dark end-days of Ronald Reagan’s America.

Waiting for the great leap forwards...