The Big Green House

Embracing My Inner Melonhead

I’ve had this song stuck in my head for something like a month now, and it’s showing no signs of going away. Now I share the joy with you.

Yeah, the video is a little on the cheesy side, but you’ve got to remember that it’s a product of its time. (I’m pretty sure it’s lip-synched, too; I have a bootleg from that period, and the song doesn't fade like that live. Having seen Mr. Melonball on that particular tour, I will say that it matches up pretty well with my memory of what the show was like.) Full disclosure: if I could do those James Brown splits, you can bet your ass I’d be doing them at every opportunity.

I love the way the song sounds. The production is fairly light-handed (for being from the 80s), and the interplay of the fiddle and accordion knocks me out every time. It’s that little riff that’s been buzzing around my skull all this time. And hey, let’s give it up for the fierce background singers – especially the one stage left, with the maracas.

Usually Melonhead’s songs fall down in the lyric department. Dude wrote some really good rock & roll records, but the words weren’t always there. In this particular case, though, I think he did alright. It’s difficult to do the “rocker sliding into adulthood” thing well – there are a couple of other attempts on the same album, The Lonesome Jubilee, that plow the same field and only turn up stones and bad lines:“That’s when a smoke was a smoke / and groovin’ was groovin’ / and dancin’ meant everything / We were young and we were improvin’”, from “Cherry Bomb”, for example. Not bad enough? How about “She had a dream / And boy it was a good one / So she chased after her dream / With much desire” from “Paper In Fire”? They’re both decent-sounding songs, but the lyrics just ain’t getting’ it done.

With “Check It Out”, though, I think ol’ John cut a little closer to the bone. Or maybe it’s just that I’m twenty years older now and it resonates now in a way it didn’t then. I’m officially older than dirt now, so I dunno.

Anyway, there it is.

Hey Ho, Let's Go!

The Ramones, San Francisco City Hall Plaza, 6/8/79

I’m pretty sure that this show was broadcast on KSAN (more on which later). The sound of the recording is pretty good (which would also lend some credence to the KSAN broadcast theory), and Joey gives the station a shout-out at one point (could be because of a simulcast, or it could be due to the fact that KSAN was one of the few stations in the bay area playing The Ramones at the time). Dee Dee’s backing vocals get a little lost in the mix, but his bass is right there (most of the time), as are the all-important “1-2-3-4”s (and the occasional “eine-zwei-drei-vier” – Dee Dee spent part of his time growing up in Germany). The performance is just what you’d expect from The Ramones – tight, fast and loud. Joey has a little fun, stretching out a few syllables (“I’ve gone mental” becomes “I’ve gone may-un-til” at one point), Johnny does his Amazing Human Buzzsaw act, Marky is a metronome, and Dee Dee is, uh, Dee Dee. (For more –much more – on the phenomenon that was The Ramones, go here. Make some coffee first, though.)

I don’t know how much more I really say about the show. I’m not saying that one Ramones show is like any other Ramones show… well, yeah, I am. Sorta. I saw them something like five or six times over the years, and while it was always a good time, it was also one that didn’t usually hold much in the way of surprises. It’s not like they ever stretched out and did the jazz odyssey version of “Blitzkrieg Bop”, y’know. (For which we should all be grateful.) It’s a good record of their set at the time, but I can’t say it’s really all that different from any other live recording of theirs that I’ve heard. If you’re at all interested in the band, you should probably have at least one of their live sets in your collection. You could probably do worse than this one.

A boot up the arse

Oh, hey. Is this thing still on?

Um…

Well, let’s try to catch up, shall we? What have I been up to? The usual: insomnia, melancholia, dyspepsia, apnea. That sort of thing. Oh, I also got new glasses, which means that I can read for fun again. So that’s a plus.

Mostly, though, I’ve been listening to bootlegs. Since there’s generation of cute l’il lemmings sleepwalking over the precipice of indierock in a seemingly non-stop narcoleptic frenzy of twee crayola doodlings and klDSHfkuhaifhrpRP Pahfoannafzobv aporagjas-t AESFOyuYURFAFYGp0WOFEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE EEEE

Wha?

Oh, sorry; I seem to have dozed off there for a moment. What was I talking about? Oh yeah, the fact that “the kids”, as we used to refer to the under-thirties, have now become the boring old farts we’d always accused our elders of being. A temporary glitch in the March of Progress, I’m sure, but it doesn’t leave much for the discerning ear to amuse itself with.

Fortunately, though, there’s been a quasi-new development in the world of music blogs – namely, the bootleg blog. (I suppose we could shorten that to “bootblogs”, but that’s just a little too cutesy to use and not have to check the blood sugar levels.)

Now, I know that some of you are even now recoiling in terror at the idea of half-assed audience recordings of fifth-rate arena-rockers. As well you might. That being said, I’m here to assuage your fears, although I’m drawing the line at hand-holding. Most of what I’ve found has been of a decent enough quality that it doesn’t offend the delicate sensibility one develops listening to studio-only recordings, and a lot of it sounds really quite good. Plus, there’s no money changing hands, so the slightly creepy sense I used to get buying boots of unknown provenance and knowing that not a penny would be seen by the artist who actually, y’know, wrote and performed the music is no longer a problem.

And it’s not just live tapes, either. The really exciting stuff, for me, anyway, is the demos and outtakes I’ve been able to find. It’s truly fascinating (in a fairly geeky fanboy way, I suppose) to hear the changes an artist will put a song through before finding the right approach. The most striking example of that would be the outtakes from Dylan’s Blood On The Tracks. The demo for “Tangled Up In Blue”, for example has a somewhat tentative, melancholy feel to it, whereas the released version is full of confident vigor.

And yadda yadda. What’s all this got to do with anything? Well, my plan, for the moment, is to maybe take a closer look at some of these boots I’ve found here and there. Since new music has sorta gotten stinky lately, why not? I’ll still weigh in with new stuff that passes the boredom test, of course. Ideally we’d have a “boot of the week”, but it’s much more likely that it’ll be the “boot of the fortnight”. Possibly even “boot of the month”, although I really do want to write more frequently. I can feel my brain going all soft from the lack of use. It’s not a good feeling.

So look for something maybe by the end of the week, unless I surprise myself and finish it sooner rather than later. Hey, it could happen.

In the meantime, have a look at some of the cool places I’ve been gleaning all these recordings from. (And if anybody follows these links back: I will make every attempt to identify where I picked up whatever recording I’m writing about, and to link back to that particular post when possible. I’m not trying to take credit for anybody else’s work.) This is by no means an exhaustive list – just a few off the top of my head.

Nargo the Bort's Deviant Subculture
Nargo Too
The Ultimate Bootleg Experience
Captain's Dead
rbally

Content to come

What a resurrection really feels like

I’m listening to The Hold Steady a lot these days. I know I’m kinda late on the bandwagon. I was scared off by all those people saying “Ah, they’re just Springsteen wannabes”. I mean, I checked ‘em out first, of course; unfortunately the track I heard was “Stuck Between Stations”, which is the most Bruce-alicious song on the new(ish) album. So, I passed.

I don’t recall now what it was that made me go back and give ‘em another shot, but I’m glad I did. Yeah, there’s a bit of a Bruce thing going on, but it’s not nearly as pronounced as I was first led to believe. It’s really down to two things: the verbose nature of Craig Finn’s lyrics, and the piano/organ stylings of mustachioed keyboard dude Franz Nicolay, and the anthemic nature of most of their music. OK, that’s three things. Really, though, the Bruce comparisons aren’t really all that accurate. And The Replacements thing… both bands have/had members from Minneapolis, both bands write/wrote about getting loaded. That’s about it. Science Girl says she hears The Jam in there. Me, I just hear a really good rock & roll band.

So anyway, I really dig ‘em. Snagged both Boys and Girls in America and Separation Sunday from eMusic, and both rock like all get out.

Hush, you muskies!

Hey kids! How many times has this happened to you: you find yourself replaying your copy of Nuggets for the umpteenth time and thinking, “Gosh, I sure wish someone would put together another kick-ass compilation like this, but this time featuring Canadian bands”. Well, those days are over, my friends. Feast your ears on Wyld Canada, Volumes 1-4. (Pssst. Here’s Volume 5) The host for the files is a little wonky – it took me something like five or six tries to get Volume 4 – but it’s worth it if you dig the garage-rock sound. And if you don’t, you’re in the wrong place. I haven’t had a chance to listen to all of it yet, but so far I’m liking it a lot.

Any Major Dude Will Tell You

I’ve been spending some time with the Citizen Steely Dan box set lately, and I’m finding myself obsessed with the song “Any Major Dude Will Tell You”. Aside from the typically groovy Dan arrangement (I love the way the guitar and electric piano double each other on the hook), it’s just about the only number in the whole Steely Dan songbook that doesn’t reek of doom:

Goodnight, Sir

It is my sad duty to report that we had to have Martin put down this weekend. He'd just gotten to the point where he couldn't get around anymore, and was obviously Not Well At All.

I've been trying to write up a proper eulogy for him. It's been difficult. It wasn't a surprise that his time had come, but it's still proving difficult to process.

Anyway, if you're so inclined, please raise a glass to a good cat gone. Play some jazz when you do so; he liked jazz. Sonny Rollins, Miles... no free jazz, though. He disapproved of that.

This is Radio Nowhere - is there anybody alive out there?

I think I said something about updating more often a while back, didn’t I? See, the thing is, I think about writing every day. When it comes down to it, though, there’s really nothing I want to write about. Music is dire – a point which I’ve pretty well beaten into the ground by now. I don’t do politics well. I can’t remember the last novel I read. My personal life is of no interest to anyone other than Science Girl or myself, and we already know what’s going on. We have been doing a lot of hiking lately; I suppose I could write about that, but the few people who bother to check in here with any sort of regularity don’t live anywhere near Washington, for the most part, so I don’t know how much use that would be.

All of which is to say that I am at loose ends with regards to The Big Green House. I don’t necessarily want to hang it up. Certainly not to the point of taking it off-line, anyway. I suspect that at some point I’ll want to pick it back up again – maybe tomorrow, maybe next week, or maybe a long, long time from now. I just don’t have any plans, of any sort, at the moment. I would like to be writing, but I’m not gonna just jabber on for the sake of it.

I am a slug

Trust me, you wouldn't want to read what I'd be writing these days.