…with predictable results. Even the girls can’t save this sad abomination; I couldn’t make it past one minute. According to this guy, the song was conceived as a duo with Bart Simpson for an upcoming Simpsons movie, but the producers declined, feeling that “Bart, after all, has some standards to uphold.” Indeed. Instead, it landed on Baywatch. I might have saved this one for Loathsome Thursday, but this stands in its own category of awfulness. I hesitated to post it at all.
Win A Date With Renfield, Beta Version
A recent domestic rocky patch got me musing about what post-marital life might look like, should it happen. I’d like to think that I’m now sane enough to be just fine on my own. But should the desire for companionship once again override my better judgement, my premarital criteria of hotness and brains would need revising: at my age one can’t take hotness for granted, and brains in the wrong person can be dangerous. That leaves common interests, so please find below my solution for sifting through the applicants:
Submit a substantial response to at least two prompts. Cities refer to their music. There are no right or wrong answers except for #5. Choosing the incorrect answer for #5 will result in immediate disqualification regardless of the overall quality of the response. Some pairs may seem strange or are not true opposites. Deal with it.
1. Beatles or Stones?
2. Elvis or Chuck Berry?
3. Stax or Motown?
4. Nashville or Bakersfield?
5. LA or San Francisco (60’s)?
6. New York or London (‘76-‘77)?
7. Kinks or Who?
8. Ramones or Heartbreakers (Johnny Thunders)?
9. Clash or Sex Pistols?
10. Replacements or R.E.M.?
11. Strokes or Libertines?
12. Bach or Handel?
13. Mozart or Beethoven?
14. Mozart or Haydn?
15. Mahler or Brahms?
16. Radiohead or ____?
I call upon the Bastardate to complete #16. Such is Radiohead’s reputation (one criticizes them at one’s peril) that they must be included, yet I cannot think of a band of their era that inspires similar devotion. Maybe you Xers can. Feel free to add pairs as well.
I left out jazz because, although I can’t expect hotness, I certainly wouldn’t exclude it.
Straw Into Gold/Belated Catchy Tuesday
This song uses something very close to Pachelbel’s bird-brained Canon for its verses, then, unlike the original, actually does something with it.
Are You Lonesome Tonight?
Yes, hopes Sam Kinison in a classic rant. He sings surprisingly well.
RIP
Lamont Dozier, age 81, pop genius of Holland/Dozier/Holland team.
Just Another Loathsome Thursday
For the most accurate description of this foul, embarrassing, overly emotive piece of 70’s “sensitive singer/songwriter” manure, I defer to Dave Barry:
…”Sometimes When We Touch,” sung by Dan Hill, who sounds like he’s having his prostate examined by Captain Hook.
Loathsome Thursday
Meet Loathsome Thursday, the dark step-sister of Catchy Tuesday. We all get confronted by songs that seem fiendishly calculated in all details—dumb melody, bone-headed lyrics, sappy production, cloying singing—to send us into a sputtering, incoherent, lunch-throwing, china-smashing rage. “Wildfire” is one such song for me. Note that YouTube comments are turned off, so I’m not alone, although I will note that other postings have plenty of “greatest song ever written” comments. I will also note that this song was included in Dave Barry’s excellent Book of Bad Songs, where it was pointed out that a killing frost is a light dusting that will kill your tomatoes but not obscure the ground. No one ever “got lost” in a “killing frost” who would not also get lost in July.
I’d love to hear what songs rankle you bastards. Sometimes everything I’ve heard by certain acts gets under my skin. Jimmy Webb (who gets called a genius), Dave Matthews, Michael McDonald, America, John Mayer, The Captain and Tennille…and many more no doubt. A special chamber of horrors gets created when those people cover each other. The Captain and Tennille’s vile minor hit, “Muskrat Love,” was originally by America. Just execrable.
If you enjoy any music or artists I’ve mentioned, please do not take offense, and please continue to enjoy them. The opinions expressed herein are my own and not necessarily those of Los Bastardos Reunidos Media Holdings, LLC.
Goldbergs
I’m sure you all have a lot of music you have to hear a few times a year. On my list is Bach’s Goldberg Variations. I’m kind of addicted to theme and variations pieces, and this is one of the best, inventive and resourceful as hell. Bach can get too dour and Lutheran for me, but not here. Consists of an aria, 30 variations, then the aria again at the end. The common theme is not the aria but the bass line, which is repeated in every variaton, although not always overtly. The melodies of the variations are not necessarily related to one another. A huge range of material from a single bass line. Reminds me of how many rock songs use the same bass/chord structures a million different ways. But these are all from one work by one guy.
If I’m in the mood to hear a crazy young person play it, I go to Glenn Gould’s 1955 recording. This record made him an overnight sensation, and I would guess that it’s the #1 selling classical album of all time. If I’m in the mood to hear a crazy middle-aged person play it, I like GG’s 1981 re-make. When I want to hear it played by someone from this planet, I like the one posted above.
Musicologists wet their trousers when Bach is played on a piano instead of a harpsicord. They shit themselves too if the pianist is as individual and “inauthentic” as GG. All the more reason to love these records.
A musicologist is a man who can read music but can’t hear it. -Sir Thomas Beecham
Without music, life would be a mistake.-Friedrich Nietzsche
Cults Cults Cults
I’ve posted twice on them. Here’s a third. They excel at hooks, often recycled 60’s girl group ones. Who cares? Not I. Two albums, Cults and Static, are worth playing all the way through. I think I was underwhelmed by the others, but I sampled them quickly so could have misjudged.
Decisions, Decisions
If you’ve ever wondered why there are a thousand different recordings of some music, here’s Leonard Bernstein showing why: there are a thousand different ways to play it. Printed music can only tell you so much. Of course, some of those thousand recordings are copying one another, but with these guys you always got something unique. They had their off days like anyone, but when they were on…