R.I.P. - Michael Jackson

We headed up to New Hampshire for a short vacation starting last Wednesday and on the way up I pulled up the Jam's Sound Affects on my iPod.

Perhaps because I once read a quote from Paul Weller in which he claimed Sound Affects was intended to sound like a cross between The Beatles' Revolver and Michael Jackson's Off The Wall, I started thinking about Jackson. I said to my wife something to the effect of "someday we're going to find out all the weird stuff that has been going on with Jackson the over past 10+ years, and it won't be pretty." I didn't realize it at the time, but I was talking about what would happen when Jackson died, which coincidentally happened the next day.

Because we were staying in a motel, I had access to cable news (no cable at home), and its weird world of wall-to-wall coverage of major and not-so-major events. It was strange hearing the different takes on Jackson. Depending on who you believe, Michael Jackson was either the closest thing the world has ever seen to a perfect human being (a child-like, innocent and kind humanitarian who only thought of others) or history's greatest monster (a master manipulator, with bizarre, twisted and seemingly insatiable appetites). Of all the people I heard voicing their opinion on Jackson on CNN, MSNBC and Fox, no one outside of Deepak Chopra offered anything close to a nuanced opinion on the man and his personal life. (Chopra clearly had great affection for Jackson as a person, but also seemed intensely aware of his flaws.)

Personally, I do not have any special insight into Michael Jackson, other than to fall back on cliches like "the truth probably lies somewhere in between," which, given the wide chasm between the two camps of opinion, hardly seems adequate either. In any case, the world doesn't need my opinion on who Michael Jackson really was, and not only because I honestly have no idea.

Perhaps the most prescient take on Michael Jackson was offered in episode one of the third season of The Simpsons, in which Jackson lent his voice to Leon Kompowsky, a bricklayer from Patterson, NJ and mental patient laboring under the illusion that he is Michael Jackson. Though Bart is initially let down when Homer brings home a "big white guy who thinks he's the little black guy" instead of the real Michael Jackson, Kompowsky still manages to save the day by helping Bart write a song for Lisa's birthday.

In other words, maybe who Michael Jackson really was matters less than who people (his fans and detractors alike) think he was. Michael Jackson's music has brought joy to millions, and no doubt will continue to do so for many, many years. But he is also there for those of us who need monsters to demonize as well.

Saturn V

I wanted to follow up on the Razorcuts post from yesterday with some music from singer/guitarist Gregory Webster's next band, Saturn V (not to be confused with the surf rock band The Saturn V featuring Orbit, as All Music has apparently done).

Saturn V released a nice single on the short-lived Shimmy Disc pop label, Koko Pop, and an album on Vinyl Japan in 1993, then disappeared. It's too bad, because the small amount of music they released was quite good, similar in many respects to the Razorcuts, although perhaps a bit less twee.

Both the single, Dominator, and the album Skycycle are well worth tracking down if you can find them.

Elvis Costello - Secret, Profane & Sugarcane CD vs LP

Here's another comparison of compression levels from a recent CD and LP release, this time the new Elvis Costello album, Secret, Profane & Sugarcane. When I compared tracks on Mr. Declan Patrick MacManus' last album, Momofuku, I noted that the CD appeared to be considerably more compressed than the LP. That is not the case with the new album. True, the CD looks to be slightly louder, but that is probably just due to a stray peak or two on the LP. Overall, these look (and sound I might I add) quite similar. If anything, the CD probably has a bit more dynamic range due to the lower noise floor, which is as it should be.

This is good news, because neither the LP or the CD suffer from over-compression, something that would have really done serious damage to the largely acoustic music on the album. So score one for the good guys in the ongoing loudness wars.

The LP does have a couple of bonus tracks, so it's still the version to get however.

"My All Time Doll" CD Version

"My All Time Doll" LP Version

The Pains of Being Razorcut

My friend Peter recently turned me onto the latest indie-rock hype band, The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart. If someone had told me before I heard them that they had a retro J&M Chain/C86 vibe to them, I might not have bothered to listen to them. I've heard a few bands recently that harken back to that sound, and inevitably, my reaction has been a cynical "been there done that."

But POBPAH (sorry, but their name demands abbreviation) had a different effect on me. From the first chords of "Contender" I got an instant psychocandy sugar jolt that sent me on a nostalgia trip resulting in me digging through my old records to rediscover POBPAH's antecedents (that is, after I listened to POBPAH twice through).

I had to needledrop my copy of Psychocandy (which itself was thought to be a slavishly imatative album on its original release, but holds up quite nicely on its own terms nearly a quarter century later). I also dug out some of my old british "shoegazer" and C86 albums, including a compilation of music by the Razorcuts called Patterns On The Water: A Retrospective. Patterns has been unavailable for so long it doesn't even show up at Amazon. A more recent compilation R Is For Razorcuts, is also out-of-print and fetching megabucks. (The A Is For Alphabet EP is still available on CD and as a download, so if you dig what you hear pick that up).

Fans of POBPAH will likely enjoy the slightly fey and extremely catchy nature of the Razorcuts' music (although it's not as noisy, for that you need Psychocandy).

So okay, I've been there and done that, but POBPAH is good enough to make me want to go back and do it all over again. They deliver what some of these other neo-shoegaze bands don't: excellent songs that transcend the formula. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some footwear to contemplate.

I Asked For Water (S/he Gave Me Gasoline)

I've noticed more and more formerly out-of-print music has been made officially available for download, even without a reissue on CD or LP. This is a great thing, and something that I have advocated since starting this blog. But it does present a certain dilemma for me in so far as there is increasingly less interesting out-of-print music for me to write about.

But every once in a while, I am shocked to discover a really great album that is unavailable in any format and fetching high prices on the used market. Such is the case with Lucinda Williams' eponymous 1988 album.

It took Lucinda Williams eight long years to follow up her first album of original material, 1980's Happy Woman Blues. Perfection takes time. Williams had grown enormously as a songwriter, singer and performer during the interval between albums. Unfortunately, it would take another ten years for the music buying public to figure out what those of us lucky enough to hear this album (released on Rough Trade a couple of years before it went bankrupt) already knew: Lucinda Williams is a genius.

"Changed the Locks" was released as a single, and is one of the stand-out tracks on an album full of stand-out tracks. The lyrics are at once harrowing yet ambiguous. It's clear that Lucinda's protagonist (or is it just her?) is on the run from a relationship gone very wrong. She's hiding from something so powerful and all-consuming that she's gone so far as to erase her identity and move heaven and earth in order to start over. She never fully articulates why, although she perhaps drops a hint with the line "so you can't knock me off my feet." Does she mean that figuratively, or literally? Or both?

One thing is clear: whoever or whatever she is hiding from in this song has scared the hell out of her, and hearing her sing about it, it scares the hell out me too. Lucinda's deliberate pacing and careful delivery turns a song that in lesser hands could have been the audio equivalent of a Lifetime movie staring Valerie Bertinelli into a masterpiece.

Tom Petty covered "Changed the Locks" on the She's The One Soundtrack. He does a fine job, but this is a case where the change of gender really damages the song on some fundamental level. Having a man sing the song reduces the ambiguous tension at the core of its power. And before anyone objects that "men get trapped in abusive relationships too" (yeah, I know I saw that episode of Montel), cut me a break. I just can't buy this as a guy's song.

"Crescent City" is a beautiful love letter to New Orleans, and just another damn fine song. But every song on the album is a classic.

In 1988 Lucinda Williams sounded fresh and ahead of its time (or perhaps refreshingly behind the times). The passing years have done nothing to diminish that impression; it sounds just as fresh and vibrant today, even after a flood of mediocre alt.country/Americana/No Depression/Whatever releases have created a codified market for this kind of music.

**UPDATE: According to posts on LucindaWilliams.com, it appears there is a long-delayed deluxe edition of this album in the works, possibly due in September.

George Jones - Musicor Years

Great news from Bear Family:

George Jones' classic Musicor recordings have been out of circulation for years while a lawsuit was resolved. Jones' Musicor recordings were never issued systematically or in full until now! Jones' Musicor recordings were never issued in premium sound quality until now! This CD boxed set includes all-time classic George Jones hits, such as 'Love Bug' (revived by George Strait), 'Take Me', 'Four-O-Thirty Three', and 'Walk Through This World With Me'. Includes two complete George Jones sessions with false starts and alternate takes. Be there with George in the studio! The first of two boxes that will eventually include every Musicor recording, except the duets with Gene Pitney (available elsewhere on Bear Family)! -- These were George Jones' truly classic years. After more than a decade as one of country music's top stars, newfound maturity and soulfulness augmented what was already the greatest voice in country music. The six years from 1965 to 1971 that Jones spent on Musicor Records were marked by personal turmoil and unprecedented success, but through it all he kept minting one country standard after another. This is the first part of Bear Family's comprehensive two volume edition of Jones' complete Musicor recordings, covering all sessions from 1965 until mid-1967. Until now, the Musicor sides were randomly packaged and many were unavailable, but the two Bear Family boxes (plus one CD of duets with Gene Pitney available elsewhere on Bear Family) will tell the complete story. Here are the fabulous original albums, including his tributes to Dallas Frazier and the duet albums with Melba Montgomery, plus such all-time George Jones standards as 'Things Have Gone To Pieces', 'Love Bug', 'Take Me', 'I'm A People', 'Four-O-Thirty Three', and one of the greatest ever country classics, 'Walk Through This World With Me'. It's all here in stunningly restored sound together with ten previously unissued recordings, including fabulous early versions of 'Love Bug' and 'Take Me', recorded in Houston. -- In all, this set includes 142 songs on five CDs, plus two complete sessions from Houston with false starts and alternate takes. -- This set includes liner notes by Rich Kienzle and a complete discography by Don Roy, Kittra Moore, and Richard Weize.

I probably have a dozen of George Jones' Musicor LPs, but not anywhere close to all the music he recorded for the label. Also, while the quality of the songs on these albums tends to be quite high, the LPs themselves are another matter. The condition of the LPs is variable (not all of Possums' fans are also audiophiles apparently), and there are many, many tracks that are repeated across LPs. Anytime I buy a Musicor album I didn't already own I get on average three or four new songs because of the high percentage of repeats.

Of course I'm gonna hold on to those LPs, if for no other reason than to keep all those beautiful pictures of George in all his buzz cut, nudie suit splendor. Now how about a complete Starday/Mercury set?

Bob Dylan - Together Through Life

If you're trying to decide if it's worth shelling out for the new Dylan double LP versus the cheaper CD, these pictures might help you decide.

"Beyond Here Lies Nothing" CD Version

"Beyond Here Lies Nothing" LP Version

I've kind of burned out on talking about what these differences mean (see previous posts tagged "loudness wars" for my thoughts on this subject). On average the LP version of this track has about 4 dB more dynamic range than the CD. This despite the fact that technically (as I've mentioned before) CD is capable of around 30 dB more dynamic range than the LP.

The difference between the two versions isn't as dramatic as I remember it being with Modern Times, so perhaps we're seeing some progress. But at around -11 dB average RMS the CD, while not the worst offender in the loudness wars, is still (in my opinion) too loud to sound really good. By comparison, with the peaks normalized to 0 dB, the LP version is around -15 dB average RMS, which allows for a more exciting, dynamic presentation.

The pressing quality of my LP was pretty good with only a few stray clicks and pops. I could quibble with the packaging: shoving two 180 gram LPs into a single, flimsy cover will quickly lead to seam splits. For $26, a gatefold cover would have been nice, but at least the CD is included as a bonus (if you can call it that).

BTW, I'm really loving the music. Dylan just keeps reaching further and further back in time for musical inspiration. But you don't need me to tell you Uncle Bobby is great and that he's on a serious late-career roll.

A Request...

Sony/Legacy has a reissue request feedback forum. You can go there and request specific reissues. Users can also "vote" on other requests. I put in a request that Sony start using their original analog master tapes rather (or at least hi-rez DSD digital copies) for their LP reissues. I don't see much point to buying an LP that has been mastered using a CD resolution digital file (which is apparently what Sony has been using for their recent LP reissue series).

So if you agree that it would be preferable to master LPs from the original analog master tapes, stop by the Sony/Legacy forum and vote for this request. You must register, but the process is quite painless, you can even use your google/yahoo/AOL ID.

While you're there you can also vote for my suggestion to reissue Sly Stone's High On You and Heard Ya Missed, Well I'm Back. You can also put in a request for vinyl reissues of some of Bob Dylan's more recent albums, and a reissue of Neil Diamond's complete Bang recordings, or add your own suggestion.

Great Moments In Flexi-Disc History

While searching for the Kendra Smith flexi-disc, I came across this one, given away with a different issue of The BOB Magazine. I had totally forgotten I had this, but it's a good one.

The A-side "I'll Meet You Halfway" by Redd Kross is an outtake from 1993's Phaseshifter. It sounds to me like the boys were going for a kind of Neil Diamond vibe here (quite sucessfully, I might add). This also appeared on the B-side of "The Lady In The Front Row" 7" single (but not on the 10" EP that I own, go figure).

Side two has a then 48 year-old Moe Tucker performing "Teenager In Love" accompanied by her daughter Kate on violin and sax. Like everything else Moe touches, the results are completely charming.

The other B-side track, "So So Sick" appeared in a slightly different version (titled "So Sick") on Unrest's fantastic 1992 album Perfect Teeth. I believe this version also appeared on a limited edition Teenbeat 7" box set of the album. It's criminal that Perfect Teeth, one of the best albums of the 90s, has fallen out-of-print. It's not even available as a download, although a compilation of some of the better tracks and rarities from the same period, B.P.M. (1991-1994), is available at iTunes. "So So Sick" (possibly the same version as this one) is also available there, presumably sans flexi-disc induced distortion. Once again, I've done my best to clean up the sound without negatively impacting the music, I hope you enjoy the results.

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Kendra Smith - Alle Morgens Parties

I'm still here.

I recently got a request to re-up Kendra Smith's German language version of "All Tomorrow's Parties," which I originally posted long ago. It's worth hearing again, but I thought I would also take the opportunity to re-record the track, and apply some of what I've learned about digitizing vinyl in between time. This was taken from a flexi disc given away with The BOB Magazine. It's never going to sound like the kind of recording audiophiles use to demo interconnect cables, but I think it sounds a lot better than the first time I did it. (Long time readers who downloaded this back in 2006, let me know what you think).

I don't have a lot to add to what I said originally, which wasn't much to begin with. It's uncanny how fully Kendra Smith and Steve Wynn were channeling The Velvet Underground when they recorded this track back in 1981. If I didn't already know better and someone told me this was an alternate take from the Velvets' session that produced the Norman Dolph acetate, I would believe it. Slavish imitation? Sure, but also great.

I'd like to apologize to my regular readers for not posting in a while. I've been suffering from a case of what might charitably be called writer's block. But I'm going to keep posting, if not necessarily at the rapid pace I once did.

Alle Morgens Parties (click to download)