Popless Week 27: The Second Half

After
17 years of professional music-reviewing, Noel Murray is taking time off from
all new music, and is revisiting his record collection in alphabetical order,
to take stock of what he's amassed, and consider what he still needs.

I'm
taking a brief respite from the big topics this week in order do one of my
periodic "state of the project" updates. (Next week I'll be writing about
religion, so gear up for that one.) We're now past the halfway point for
Popless, and as I move into the second half of this project, I confess I feel
better knowing that I'm closer to the end than the start. Popless has been a
rewarding experience so far, primarily for the opportunity it's given me to
organize my thoughts along with my music collection. But come next year, I
won't miss spending every weekend engaged in marathon writing sessions that
last from Saturday morning to Monday noon (broken up by trips to the playground
with my kids, during which I'm usually wearing headphones and carrying a
notepad)*.

And
yes, I am starting to miss new music.
I'm not missing the hype-cycle, in which a record can go from the most
important piece of music of the year one week to being all but forgotten a few
weeks later. (Is anyone still talking about the new My Morning Jacket? A month
ago they were all over TV and the entertainment magazines, but I haven't heard
much about them since.) Still, there are albums out there I'm anxious to hear (including MMJ),
and I'm looking forward to getting back to that old feeling of putting on a new
record for the first time and feeling my way through it, one song at a time**.

One
question I've been torturing myself with, though: When I start listening to new
music again, will I still be diligent about sorting and purging? I don't know
about you guys, but I'm kind of a mania for order when it comes to my media.
You wouldn't know it to look around my house, where piles of CDs and DVDs crowd
every corner while my actual CD and DVD cabinets sit largely bare, but the
reason for the disparity is because I'm so persnickety. I'm trying to store my media in such a way
that I can add and subtract pieces easily for decades to come. I'm trying to
keep it simple, while also creating some groupings that will help me think
about my movies and my records in new ways. (Should I file Blade Runner under sci-fi/fantasy, or
noir, or '80s, or Ridley Scott?)

I'm
trying to do the same with the music on my computer. I'm keeping my favorite
albums intact on CD—and I have a lot of favorite albums—but I'm also using iTunes
and my external hard drive to organize artists into playlists that can be
easily loaded onto my iPod when this project is done, and creating genre-based
playlists for all the odds and ends. And there's where it gets tricky. Like, how should I file this song?

In
the abstract, it doesn't matter that much. If I dump it into iTunes, I can pull
it up by "The Members" or I can pull it up along with all the other songs on
Rhino's No
Thanks
anthology (which is where I sourced it), or I can just put my whole library on
shuffle and let "The Sound Of The Suburbs" come up wherever. I can even assign
it to multiple playlists without wasting any extra storage space. But that
doesn't suit me. I want there to be one perfect playlist that The Members' "The
Sound Of The Suburbs" belongs on.

So
where does it go? I could file it on the "70s" playlist, but most of that one
consists of soft rock, bubblegum and glam, and "The Sound Of The Suburbs" would
clash in that company. It's not quite edgy enough to be on the "artpunk"
playlist either, and it's too polished for "indie rock." Nor is it "garage" or "heavy"
or "noise." Ultimately, I filed it under "modern rock," because even though the
bulk of that playlist is made up of pop-punk, Britpop and emo from the past 15
years, The Members sounds more like those bands than any other catch-all
playlist I've created.

Does
anybody else fuss around like this with their music collections? My wife
quietly tolerates my filing frenzies, but other friends of mine have mocked me
mercilessly for the various lists and indexes and classification codes I've
been concocting since my teen years. But to me, it's just an extension of the
baseball card collection I had carefully arranged into folders, or the full collection
of NFL team pencils that I used to lay out on my bedroom floor in order of the
current standings. Why have a collection if you can't obsess over how best to
display it?

*Footnote
1: Although I
have two more trips scheduled that might disrupt my schedule a little
(including a stretch in Toronto that will necessitate another "gap week"), I
believe I'm on pace to finish listening to my entire collection by the end of
the year. That seemed impossible when I was still stuck in the "D"s in the last
week of March, but here it is week 27 and I'm in the middle of the "M"s, which
is the last letter in the first half of the alphabet. There are some monster
letters ahead: "N" and "W" should each take two or three weeks, and then "P," "R,"
"S" and "T" might take up to a month each. But I'm not expecting to turn up
much in "O," "Q," "U" or "V," and "X," "Y" and "Z" should breeze by. And then
of course, there are the number bands, but there aren't many of those either,
so I'm optimistic. Then again, I almost have to be. I really don't want to be grinding my
way through The 5th Dimension in January of next year.

**Footnote
2: The new
music prohibition officially ends November 1st, by the way. That's
about the time last year that 2007 releases stopped trickling in and 2008
releases started, so that will be roughly one year without new music. When the
time comes, I'll be asking for suggestions about what I should pick up, and
then I'll be taking a belated look at 2008's best at the beginning of 2009, as
a kind of epilogue. And then back on the bandwagon.

*****************

Pieces
Of The Puzzle

Marshall
Crenshaw

Years
Of Operation
1979-present

Fits
Between Buddy
Holly and Peter Case

Personal
Correspondence
There haven't been too many debut albums more perfect than Marshall Crenshaw, a charming throwback to
doo-wop and mid-'60s West Coast Pop, steeped in reverb and cooing background
harmonies, but with enough post-new-wave edge in songs like "Cynical Girl" and "I'll
Do Anything" to keep any fan of Talking Heads and The B-52s happy. Crenshaw's
second album, Field
Day, was
almost as good, in spite of the heavy-footed Steve Lillywhite production. Field Day was actually the first
Crenshaw album I owned—I found it in the cutout bin at a mall record
store, and bought it because I'd heard Crenshaw's name bandied about by rock
critics—and it took me a while to hear anything in that record but
excessive echo and cutesy melodies. It helped when I found Marshall Crenshaw at a used record store and
spent weeks immersing myself in its clean sound and boyish regret. On that
album Crenshaw sounds like a man who's had some bad breaks in love and emerged
chastened but still resolute. (Resolute in his faith in pop, anyway.)

Enduring
presence? There
haven't been too many artists who have fallen off as dramatically from their
debut as Marshall Crenshaw, who's spent much of the last 25 years recording
album after album with one or two good songs surrounded by a lot of
filler—just like the bands Crenshaw loves. That said, I have a soft spot
for Downtown, Crenshaw's third album,
recorded with T-Bone Burnett in 1985. The songs aren't as strong as those on
the debut (though "Yvonne" and "Blues Is King" are both killer), but the sound
is as noir-ish and smeary as the picture on the album's cover.

Marvin
Gaye

Years
Of Operation
1961-84

Fits
Between Nat
King Cole and Isaac Hayes

Personal
Correspondence
Here's another artist I discovered thanks to a Rolling Stone list. As I recall, the
magazine's 1987 list of the best 200 albums of the past 20 years had What's Going On in the Top 5, which surprised
me, since all I really knew about Gaye at the time was that he'd been killed by
his dad shortly after the corny "Sexual Healing" was all over the radio.
Luckily for me, that Rolling
Stone list
roughly coincided with Motown's 25th anniversary celebrations, which
meant record stores were flooded with cut-price reissues and special editions
of Motown classics. I got What's Going On for something like five bucks on cassette, and even
more than the record's socially conscious lyrics—which, to be honest,
aren't exactly deep—I was taken with the fluid sound of that album, which
was like something out of my pop fantasies. I'd written a short story back in
1986 that featured a fictional band that played epic-length shows where the
songs all ran together in a kind of mega-medley. (Sort of like Side Two of Abbey Road, but four times as long.) What's Going On was the kind of album my
fictional band would've recorded. Stripped to its essence, What's Going On only has about three or four
actual songs on it; the rest are reprises and vamps that take off from what
Gaye's singing about and extend it into the realm of the abstract and
emotional. In some ways Gaye's tuneful wails show more shades of anger, sorrow,
and memories of former joy than anything specific he sings. Hearing What's Going On for the first time also
helped me to understand the origins of the orchestrated R&B; sound that was
so common in TV shows and movies in the '70s. Mainly though, I was fascinated
with how it all fit together, like a musical puzzle. It was the album I'd been
dreaming about.

Enduring
presence? As
much as I still love What's
Going On, I
confess that I've had less success in carrying my Gaye fandom very far beyond
that album. I like a handful of the pre-WGO singles, and a handful of the post-WGO singles, and I appreciate the
divorce opus Here,
My Dear (but
mostly in theory). I'm also frequently surprised by how much of Gaye's music I don't like. I could go the rest of
my life without hearing "Let's Get It On" again, and I feel Berry Gordy's pain
every time I hear one of Gaye's attempts to leave soul behind and become a pop
crooner. (I wish I hadn't ponied up the dough for Hip-O Select's limited
edition of At
The Copa.)
Still, Gaye had a beautiful voice and an artist's soul, and I can't think of
too many artists who wouldn't take a hit and miss career like his if it meant
one of those hits would be one of the most perfect albums ever recorded.

[pagebreak]

Material
Issue/Matthew Sweet

Years
Of Operation
1985-96/1986-present

Fits
Between Cheap
Trick and Matthew Sweet/Marshall Crenshaw and Material Issue

Personal
Correspondence
If Material Issue frontman Jim Ellison hadn't killed himself, I imagine that he
and his power-pop outfit Material Issue might have a career today not unlike
fellow traveler Matthew Sweet's: a lot of side projects and soundtrack
appearances, interrupted by the occasional album and tour that play mainly to
the cult. Or maybe Ellison would've outpaced Sweet. Like nearly every other
rock fan, I first started paying attention to Sweet with the 1991 release of
the near-miraculous Girlfriend, with its roof-raising sound
and grabby songwriting, and I followed him closely on the albums that followed,
even as the returns diminished. Material Issue, by contrast, released a debut
album with great songs and punchless production, then followed it up with a
more radio-friendly record that sounded depressingly shallow, before pulling it
all together for 1994's crisp-sounding, relentlessly catchy Freak City Soundtrack. After Ellison's suicide,
Rykodisc released the posthumous demo collection Telecommando Americano, which showed that the band's
pop sense was evolving. Ellison was arguably on an upswing before he died,
while Sweet has trailed off and plateaued. Or maybe that's just selective
perception at work, because Sweet's still around to disappoint, while the
records Ellison never made will always be perfect.

Enduring
presence?
Power-pop is an especially tricky genre to finesse, because the very quality
that defines it—big, sparkly hooks—also makes it hard to take in
large doses. Both Material Issue and Matthew Sweet are guitar-driven pop-rock
classicists, both have flirted with mainstream success on occasion, and it's
hard not to argue that songs like Material Issue's shimmering ballad "I Could
Use You" (off the sublime Freak City Soundtrack) or Sweet's rocked-up, ecstatic "Evangeline" (off the
classic Girlfriend) should've been massive hits
in their day, and should be pumping out of car stereos even now. But the public
has spoken, and the public just doesn't go for this kind of stuff in a big way.
Lord knows why.

Meat
Puppets

Years
Of Operation
1980-present (off and on)

Fits
Between ZZ
Top and The Grateful Dead

Personal
Correspondence
I've mentioned before my high school friend who used to loan me his punk
records, typically without my even asking for them, and often before he'd
played them himself. I usually treated those records similar to the way I'd
later treat the promo CDs that publicists sent me: If I liked the first track,
I'd listen to the whole record; if I didn't, I'd skip ahead, giving each song
at least a minute of my time. At the end of the process, I'd find some open
space on a cassette and record the songs that left an impression. Only twice
during that stretch did I ever stop the record before the first song even
finished, put a tape in right away, and record the whole album immediately. It
happened with The Replacements' Let It Be (though I owned Tim by that point, so I was already a fan), and it
happened with Meat Puppets' Up On The Sun. In the case of the Meat Puppets, I was mainly
shocked into acquiescence. Judging by the band's name, and their association
with Black Flag's SST label, I expected something more hardcore or avant-garde,
not this laid-back country-rock boogie. If it weren't for the slurred, off-key
vocals, much of Up
On The Sun
could pass for a kicked-up Grateful Dead (another band that couldn't sing all
that well, now that I think of it). Meat Puppets dominated my first couple of
years in college, for odd reasons. I met a couple of guys in my dorm who were
huge Meat Puppets fans (and huge Cerebus fans, but that's another story), and while we
never became friends, hanging out in their room one night listening to Mirage convinced me to venture
beyond Up On
The Sun and
buy the complete Meat Puppets catalog, which I could afford to do because I'd
received a belated scholarship check. What I didn't realize at the time was
that the scholarship check was for the full year, not just the quarter, and by
the time I burned through it buying records and pizza and tickets to shows, I
didn't have enough money left to buy books for winter quarter. (I skated by
somehow, borrowing the readings from classmates.) A couple of years before they
signed to a major label and made their life-changing appearance with Nirvana on
MTV, I saw Meat Puppets live, on the Monsters tour. It was an under-attended show because Billy
Bragg was playing that same night (and because fans generally didn't like Monsters as much as I did), but it was
a hell of a performance. I remember a double-time take on "Touchdown King" that
knocked me flat. Plus, the show ended early enough that I could make it down
the street and see Billy Bragg too. A great night in Athens.

Enduring
presence?
Meat Puppets' post-Nirvana years have been marked by tragedy, waste, and a lot
of mediocre music, though the core MP sound—snaky guitar, chugging
rhythms, nasal vocals, acid tinge—has remained strong enough that they
can usually be counted on for one or to memorable songs per record. (Even on No Joke!) Still, their enduring legacy
is that short stretch of superb albums on SST, and the way they represented
(along with Minutemen and Black Flag) the promise of post-hardcore and indie
labels to expand musical horizons and deliver idiosyncratic masterpieces.

Mekons

Years
Of Operation
1977-present

Fits
Between The
Clash and Hank Williams

Personal
Correspondence
One of my first real experiences with feeling misled by rock critics came when
I bought the Mekons' 1985 country-punk album Fear & Whiskey. I just didn't get it right
away. I thought the sound was cruddy, the vocals were terrible, and the songs
were weird and unsatisfying—not a bit like the futurist version of
country I'd been led to expect by the likes of Spin magazine. But whether you want to call it a
well-placed faith in rock critics or a lamentable willingness to be lulled into
conformity, I stuck with Fear
& Whiskey
and eventually grew to love every off-key yelp, screechy fiddle and incongruous
drum machine. Fear
& Whiskey
isn't my favorite Mekons album though; that would be The Mekons Rock 'N' Roll, a riotous, tune-packed
analysis of how conventional pop and rock paradigms reinforce the status quo.
It's a brilliantly conceived record, and "fun" in its own perverse way.
Unfortunately, I lost my copy years ago and have never gotten around to
replacing it; but the Fear
& Whiskey
song "Country" is in a similar vein, both sonically and conceptually. In "Country,"
the Mekons nod to the genre they're working in, yet use the title also to refer
feelings of nationalism, and whether they mean anything to two drunken lovers.

Enduring
presence?
Though I drunk the Kool Aid on Fear & Whiskey and Rock 'N' Roll, generally speaking I haven't been wildly pro-Mekons.
A lot of my initial complaints upon my first exposure to the band still
pertain: They're sloppy, they're prolific to a fault, and Jon Langford's cocky
insistence that he knows what's best for society and for music can occasionally
cross the line from inspiring to obnoxious. Still, between all the out-of-print
or hard-to-find albums, EPs, singles and side projects, the Mekons have left
quite a trail of tasty breadcrumbs for new fans to follow. This is a band in
bad need of a box set.

Men
At Work

Years
Of Operation
1979-85

Fits
Between XTC
and The Police

Personal
Correspondence
The first new (not used) album I bought with my own money was Men At Work's Cargo, and in just about every way
possible, it was an experience that helped codify my rituals of buying and
absorbing a record. I'd asked for and received Business As Usual for Christmas, and cheered
Men At Work's Best New Artist win at the Grammys in February, and only two
months later the radio started playing a new Men At Work song, the more mature
and moody "Overkill" (arguably the band's best). I can't remember how I got the
money, because I was only 12, didn't have a job, and was still getting a fairly
pathetic allowance of two dollars a week, but due to the benevolence of some
grandparent or another I had the 10 bucks I needed to buy Cargo the week it was released. I
remember riding home from the mall, scrutinizing the cover for all its visual
gags:

And
I remember poring over the lyric sheet, and noting to my brother that one of
the songs with the fewest words was the longest on the record (which for some
reason I took as an indicator of quality, proving that Men At Work weren't just
some dopey pop band). Then I got home and put the record on, starting with "Dr.
Heckyll And Mr. Jive," a song that I can't listen to more than 15 seconds of
today, but that I thought was way cool when I was 12. (Just like the
intolerably goofy "Be Good Johnny," from Business As Usual.) "Dr. Heckyll" was the third
single from Cargo (following "It's A Mistake,"
which was released when the album came out, in June), and I thought it was neat
that I'd been listening to the song for months before it hit the radio. And I
thought it was neat that there were great songs on Cargo—like the angular and
New Wave-y "Upstairs In My House"—that weren't on the radio, but that I knew. Thus music snob was born.

Enduring
presence?
Listening to Little River Band two weeks ago, I started thinking about how a
lot of mainstream Australian rock doesn't really sound like anything. Men At
Work's new wave leanings give them more of an edge than some, but they're still
basically meat-and-potatoes: a well-practiced rock band with a keen pop sense
and no particular agenda. Their albums are filler-full, but their hits are easy
to like even now.

Mercury
Rev

Years
Of Operation
1988-present

Fits
Between Neil
Young and The Flaming Lips

Personal
Correspondence
I back-doored my way into Mercury Rev, via The Flaming Lips. I'd unaccountably
ignored their first two acclaimed LPs (as well as their less-heralded third,
which may actually be my favorite), but after Mercury Rev's Dave Fridmann
produced the Lips' The
Soft Bulletin,
and after the raves that attended the release of the Rev's Deserter's Songs, I finally caught up with the
band, in one fell swoop. I like Deserter's Songs just fine, but nowhere near as much as 1995's See You On The Other Side, a stylistic leap forward
that presages a lot of what Fridmann would do with The Soft Bulletin, as well as serving as a kind
of DIY answer record to Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon (right down to the sax
solos). Earlier Mercury Rev albums courted a funhouse atmosphere, but See You On The Other Side takes in the whole carnival,
from the freak show to the top of the Ferris Wheel. It's one of the great
forgotten classics of mid-'90s alt-rock.

Enduring
presence?
Having had its thunder stolen some by The Flaming Lips' ascendancy, Mercury Rev
has seemed to me to be a little adrift since Deserter's Songs. The follow-up All Is Dream was an enjoyable retread, but
a retread nonetheless, and then The Secret Migration sounded at once bombastic and
thin. I hope their upcoming album is a course correction, or else See You On The Other Side might be seen as the moment
Mercury Rev took a turn for the conventional, and ultimately for the worse.

*****************

Stray
Tracks

From
the fringes of the collection, a few songs to share….

Maria
McKee, "Can't Pull The Wool Down (Over The Little Lamb's Eyes)"

I'm
not sure whether I'm more disappointed by Lone Justice's inability to follow
through on their early promise, or Maria McKee's inability to record another
album as stunning as her 1989 self-titled solo debut. Though every bit as
state-of-the-art glossy as Lone Justice's efforts, Maria McKee sports stronger songs,
seemingly tailored to Mitchell Froom's alternately warm and clanky production.
The gospel undertones and triumphant dynamic of "Can't Pull The Wool Down"
never fails to lift my spirits. After a rough journey, McKee ended the '80s
with one of the decade's best songs. And almost nobody noticed.

[pagebreak]

Mark
Eitzel, "Atico 18"

Immediately
after the dissolution of American Music Club, AMC mastermind Mark Eitzel threw
himself into a series of collaborative solo projects that found him pushing
toward places that he couldn't quite reach. Neither Mark Isham, nor Peter Buck,
nor the rhythm section of Sonic Youth provided the consistent spark of
inspiration that Eitzel received from the eclectic American Music Club
ensemble, and so Eitzel's first three solo records were good for a few
outstanding songs and far too much depressing filler. The outstanding songs on
those records though—like this delicate acoustic sketch of two men
discovering a deeper love for each other just by sticking together, day after
day—are as good as anything in the American Music club catalog. (Also
great: Eitzel's album The
Invisible Man
and its signature track "The Boy With The Hammer," a sad and funny character
study of an attention-seeking youngster. Drawing inspiration from fellow gay
troubadour Stephin Merritt, Eitzel fuses his lovelorn laments to accessible pop
and dance music arrangements, emerging with something as peculiar and
passionate as anything he's ever written.)

Mark
Kozelek, "Find Me Ruben Olivares"

I'll
be giving Red House Painters a big write-up later (and some ink to Sun Kil Moon
too), but I can't pass Kozelek by without stopping to say hello. This solo
track makes fine use of Kozelek's dreamy voice, and his facility with patterns
and repetition. I was delighted the other day when I heard a Kozelek song on
the Nick Jr. show Yo
Gabba Gabba,
but I wasn't surprised. I can't think of too many musicians who'd be better at
calming toddlers down than Kozelek.

Mark
Olson & The Creek Dippers, "Cactus Wren"

Mark
Olson left The Jayhawks when his bandmates' chart-topping ambitions led them
toward jangle-pop sheen and away from the earthy country-rock that first
brought them together. Olson retreated into the wilderness with his
folk-rock-darling wife Victoria Williams, and over the past decade, he's released
periodic dispatches under the name "The Creek Dippers," each with a raggedness
reminiscent of Neil Young's '70s-era post-Harvest records. With Williams trilling in the background
like a latter-day Nicolette Larson (or perhaps like Emmylou Harris to Olson's
Gram Parsons), the singer-songwriter opens his doors to the communal
everybody-come-over-to-play school of music, which he then populates with
characters uncomfortable with their habitat. Olson takes a relaxed brand of
mountain music then accentuates distortion and echo, instilling pretty melodies
with a hint of foreboding. He may have fled an oppressive creative environment,
but he can't stop singing about people who aren't where they want to be,
physically or spiritually. The old hill folk used to have a name for his kind
of gloriously sad music: "high lonesome."

The
Marlins, "(Everybody Do) The Swim Pt. 1"

A
proto-disco bongo-and-piano rhythm gives an unusual timbre to this surprisingly
haunting song, which is more about the counterpoint harmonies of the lead and
background vocals than about learning new steps. All we're told is that "a guy
named Jim" created The Swim as a modified form of The Monkey, which presumably
means that rather then jerking your arms up and down, you slide them in and out
in a horizontal fashion. But there are regional variations: The Backstroke in
Philadelphia, The Paddle in Boston, and so on. No wonder we had to call on
Martha & The Vandellas to unify the novelty-dance schism.

The
Marmalade, "I See The Rain"

Here's
another nugget from Nuggets—the UK
version—and as the title implies, it's a kind of perversion of sunshine
pop. The melody and the harmonies are every bit as bright and pretty as any
late '60s happymaker, but the bass thumps like thunder and the guitar rumbles
in like a nimbus cloud.

The
Mars Volta, "Drunkship Of Lanterns"

Any
out-of-context passage of The Mars Volta's debut LP De-Loused In The
Comatorium
would probably sound shrill and pretentious to even the most adventurous rock
fan, but taken as a piece, the record's free-flowing synthesis of Santana, Yes
and Metallica is overwhelming in a good way. Vocalist Cedric Bixler Zavala and
guitarist Omar Rodriguez-Lopez keep experimenting with the creation of
alternately punishing and pleasant sonic environments. Their debut EP Tremulant skewed more toward the
spacious and atmospheric, but the Rick Rubin-produced De-Loused is pushier, with jackhammer
drums and screeching guitar providing the foundation for almost every track. They're
aiming for some kind of hybrid of prog-rock fantasia and '70s funk surrealism.
The follow-up Frances
The Mute goes
even further out, propelled by 13-minute tracks that defy logic as they rocket
from atonal drone to furious thrash to whipcrack polyrhythms. As an admirer of
ambitious deviants, I've continued to follow The Mars Volta, even as they've
shifted from merely challenging to outright off-putting, but I miss the
relative directness they started with, and tracks like the prog-at-warp-speed "Drunkship
Of Lanterns."

Martin
Denny, "Stardust"

One
of the neo-cocktail movement's biggest heroes, Martin Denny can be tough to
really dig into, since most of his records are geared more to background
atmospherics than active listening. Still, sometimes those atmospherics alone
are so beautiful and adroitly imagined that you can't do anything but listen to them…usually while
closing your eyes and imagining that you're out on a tiki-torch-festooned patio
on a tropical island.

Marty
Robbins, "El Paso"

Country
music has gone through multiple stretches of pop crossoverdom, including a time
in the late '50s and early '60s when western-inflected story-songs like this
Marty Robbins classic became the rage. Few are as complex as "El Paso" though,
with its spiraling melody, poetic lyrics, and romanticizing of an outlaw's
death. It's a whole movie in four minutes—and one of the best movies of
1959.

Mary
Wells, "Two Lovers"

This
Smokey Robinson-penned-and-produced tune went to #1 on the R&B; charts and
#7 pop in 1962, though it's never become one of the Motown standards. It's a
twist-ending song, about a woman's worldly passion and her concerns about
getting hurt. It opens with Wells singing "I've got two lovers / And I ain't
ashamed" and ends with her singing, "You're a split personality / And in
reality / Both of them are you." Then the song wraps, too quickly. The lyric
would have more power if the revelation about who the two lovers are were moved
up to the middle point, so that the song could explore the ramifications of
living with someone with two sides. Still, musically the song shows Motown's
rapid development in the early '60s. "Two Lovers" is just as simple and smooth
as Wells' prior hit "You Beat Me To The Punch," but the addition of a slick
horn line moves† "Two Lovers"
closer to the sophisticated feel that Motown was shooting for. If you took
Wells' first three hit singles—the first being "The One Who Really Loves
You"—as chapters in a book, it would tell an interesting story about a
woman drawn to relationships with abusive cheaters. (And what does it say that
all three were written by a man? Is Smokey Robinson is describing the kind of
man who always seems to get the girls? Or is he that kind of man?)

Massive
Attack, "Unfinished Sympathy"

I
don't have the deep attachment to Massive Attack that some do—perhaps
because dance/electronica/chillout/house/what-have-you is in no way my area of
expertise—but Blue
Lines is
pretty unassailably great, and this centerpiece song from that record
encompasses the Massive Attack I like best. The synth washes are reminiscent of
mid-'80s techno-pop, the piano and vocals are pure adult contemporary, the
strings are cinematic and the scratches and polyrhythms are from hip-hop. It's
a bubbling bouillabaisse of modern pop sounds.

Matisyahu,
"Fire Of Heaven/Alter Of Earth"

I'm
neither opposed to nor enamored of Matisyahu. I think there's a place in the
world for his kind of positivist, reggae- and rap-inflected frat jams, and
while I wish his music were more eruptive and ecstatic, I find it basically
inoffensive and occasionally catchy. Still, I can't hear Matisyahu without
thinking about two things: the joke in Knocked Up about how Martin Starr's beard makes him look like
Matisyahu, and my own awkward
interview with the dude two years ago. I asked one simple question
about his early days and got a 10-minute recap about his entire career to that
point (all while checking my watch, knowing that I only had 20 minutes tops
scheduled for our phoner), and then to the rest of my questions he mostly
answered in single lines, effectively cutting off the conversation. I had
expected that he might take the opportunity to show that he could be both
orthodox in his religion and a normal, down-to-earth guy, but that wasn't my
experience. He was pleasant enough, but he had his wall up the whole time. If
he couldn't give one of his pat speeches, he wasn't interested.

Matt
Pond PA, "Promise The Bite"

Singer-songwriter
Matt Pond grew up in New Hampshire, but added a "PA" to the end of his name
when he moved to Philadelphia, as a way of recognizing the regular set of
Pennsylvania musicians who comprise his pop orchestra. The assemblage works in
the mode of Amerindie fellow travelers Beulah and Lambchop, reworking Pond's songs
through complex arrangements and studio treatments until they become balladic
soundscapes, where strings and horns coarse through percussive guitar-and-drum
constructions with the thickness and vitality of blood. Pond's half-gulped,
half-crooned vocals are reminiscent of Peter Gabriel and can be difficult to
discern, but the intelligible lines show that he's another one of those young
songwriters who's dedicated his art to the obstacles that stymie relationships.
It's music for moody intellectuals with poetic souls, and Matt Pond PA serves
it up with a sweetness that's easy to swallow, and a structural complexity that
smartens up the mixture. The compact, textured pop of "Promise The Bite" is
like a distillation of the essence of Nick Drake or R.E.M., without the thorny
personalities (or their attendant depth). In providing tasteful wallows in
morose sentimentality, with gentle melodies enhanced by fashionable sonic
affectation, Matt Pond PA have been farming Sufjan Stevens' territory since
well before Stevens was getting profiled on NPR. And while Pond has lost some
juice over time, there's no reason why Stevens fans shouldn't find their way to
Pond's lovely albums Measure and The Green Fury.

Maxïmo
Park, "Going Missing"

For
some reason I had minimal interest in Maxïmo Park until I saw Stranger Than Fiction and heard "Going Missing"
over the closing credits, and by the time I caught up with their debut album A Certain Trigger, the follow-up was about a
month way from release. Our
Earthly Pleasures
doesn't quite measure up to A Certain Trigger—it's more Pretenders II than The Bends—but it's in keeping with the kind of purposeful
strides forward that the band's Tyne-and-Wear mates The Futureheads and Field
Music have delivered. Still, there's nothing on there that builds and explodes
like "Going Missing," a song that moves beyond mere post-punk revivalism.

MC5,
"Kick Out The Jams"

I
had a lot of occasions as a young rock fan to read about legendary bands before
I actually heard them, but I think I went longer between reading about and
listening to the MC5 than any other act. Because they were favorites of Lester
Bangs and Dave Marsh—and because the were prominently featured in a
handful of rock history books I'd read—I knew all about their sound,
their politics, their legacy, and their groundbreaking embrace of the word "motherfucker"
on their signature anthem "Kick Out The Jams." But their records weren't easy
to find, and when I finally came across "Kick Out The Jams" on the soundtrack
to some movie I can't recall the name of, I was a little disappointed. It
sounded commonplace—just another amped-up white boy boogie. Later, I
started to get more into sync with the MC5, as I heard more of their music and
the music surrounding them, and began to understand the context. Which brings
up the same question I asked in the Mekons entry above: Did I turn around on
MC5 because I smartened up, or because I bought the company line? I think it's
the former, but either way, I'm not sure it matters. I enjoy the music. That's
enough.

Me'shell
Ndegeocello, "Mary Magdalene"

Just
as with hip-hop and electronica, I went through a phase of picking up each
year's most critically acclaimed neo-soul albums, hoping to find something that
would resonate with me the way classic '70s soul albums had in the past. My
collection is littered with Angie Stones and Jill Scotts and Terence Trent
D'Arbys, and a couple of records by neo-soul oddball Me'shell Ndegeocello, who
followed D'Arby's lead by recording a moderately successful debut album with a
catchy hit single and then returning with a self-indulgent record littered with
weird song titles and elusive religious references. I admire her guts, even if
I rarely listen to the record, which never really emerges from the confines of
her head.

Meco,
"Star Wars Theme"

Yes,
this disco-fied take on John Williams is bright orange artificial cheese, but
any kid who was a Star
Wars fan in
the late '70s should understand how awesome it was that this movie kept giving
and giving. For me, it was like my stack of Justice League Of America comics had suddenly become so
popular that there were songs about them on the radio and special TV episodes
dedicated to the characters and the phenomenon. I begged my mom to take me to
see Star Wars because I thought the
commercial looked cool—"It's got spaceships, and a big monkey!" I
remember saying—and the fact that it became such a merchandising bonanza
seemed to validate my taste.

Mel
& Tim, "Starting All Over Again"

When
you're thinking about getting back together with your ex, who better to ask for
advice then your skeptical-but-supportive best friend?

Mel
Tormé, "Too Close For Comfort"

Because
of Night
Court, I spent
years thinking that Mel Tormé was a joke—the epitome of easy listening
schmaltz, and an icon to the unhip—but something compelled me to pick up
a Tormé anthology when I found it in the bin full of bargain jazz CDs that I
raided so frequently in college. (I think I bought it because it was there alongside Duke
Ellington and Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane, and I wanted to understand the
connection.) That best-of turned me around on Tormé . With a voice that smooth,
he could've sung just about anything, but he strove to mesh his instrument with
the compositional advancements being made in jazz, and while Tormé was hardly
avant-garde, his ingratiating presence went a long way toward dragging pop out
of the syrup and into the light.

Melvins,
"Revolve"

The
lines between hardcore punk, heavy metal and grunge were made more indistinct
by bands like the Melvins, who flew the flannel and thrashed hard at the same
time. As an outsider to the metal and hardcore scenes (and a doubter when it
comes to grunge), I've always wondered what kind of audience is drawn to the
Melvins. Aren't they too sloppy for the metalheads, or too heavy for hardcore?
Or do they find the sweet spot that unites?

The
Mendoza Line, "Mysterious In Black"

Mendoza
Line co-leaders Timothy Bracy and Peter Hoffman—with permanent guest
vocalist/songwriter Shannon McArdle—had a solid reputation for
explicating the American way of love through vivid country-rock story-songs.
(Then divorce broke up the band, perhaps inevitably.) They never broke beyond
the cult level, perhaps because they lacked the distinctive personality of the
similar-sounding Rilo Kiley or Wilco. But they left behind an eclectic
discography well-worth mining, including songs like the stinging "Mysterious In
Black," which uses detective imagery as metaphors for a relationship.

Regrettably
unremarked upon:
Marc Ribot, Margo Guryan, Maria Muldaur, Mark Isham, Mark Knopfler, Mark
Lanegan, Mark Ronson, Mark Sandman, Martha & The Vandellas, Marty Stuart,
The Marvelettes, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Mary Jane Girls, Mary Timony, Mates Of
State, Maura O'Connell, The Mavericks, The Maytals, Mclusky, Me First & The
Gimme Gimmes, Meat Loaf, Mecca Normal, Medeski Martin & Wood, Memphis and
Menomena

Also
listened to:
Marbles, Marc Black, Marc Broussard, Marc
Cohn, Marcia Griffiths, Marcos Silva, Marcus Carl
Franklin, Marcy Caldwell, Marcy
Playground, Margareth Menezes, mari, Maria Bethânia, Maria
Taylor, Marie Knight, Mariee Sioux, The Marigolds,
Marion Black, Marisa Monte, Marissa Nadler, Maritime, Marius
Constant, Marjorie Fair, Mark Geary, Mark Lee Scott, Mark Lindsay, Mark
Mallman, Mark McGrath, Mark Mulcahy, Mark Suozzo, The Marked
Men, Markéta Irglová, Marley's Ghost, The Marlins, The Marmalade, Marnie Stern, Maroon 5, Mars Arizona,
Marshall Chapman, Martha Scanlan, Martin Wolfson, Martin
Zellar, Martino Da Vila, Marty Raybon, Mary
Karlzen, Mary Love, Marya Josie, MaryKate O'Neil, The
Mascots, Masha Qrella, The Masked Marvel,
Mason Jennings, Mason Proper, Mass, The
Master's Apprentice, Masterplan, Matt & Kim, Matt Coogan, Matt
Elliot, Matt Lax & Nearly Beloved, Matt Nathanson,
Matt Sharp, Matt Suggs, Matthew Friedberger, Matthew Ryan, Maurice Davis, Maurício
Pereira, Max Gregor & Orchestra, Max Wall, Maxine Nightingale, Maxwell
Street Jimmy Davis, Mayday, Mayflies USA, Mazarin, Maze, MC
Hammer, MC Honky, MC Lyte, MC Sleazy, McCarthy, The McCoury Brothers, Mcenroe,
McFadden & Whitehead, The Meat Purveyors, Meat Whiplash, Mecca Headz, Meiki
Kaji, Mel Henke, Melle Mel, Mellow, Mellowdrone, Melodians, Melody
Unit, Melonie Cannon, The Members, Memphis Slim, Men Without Hats, Men's Recovery Project, Menahan Street Band, Meneguar, The
Mercury Program and Mercury Radio Theater

Next
week: From Merle Haggard to The Monkees, plus a few words on faith-based rock
initiatives.