Two out of three ain’t Lazy Saturday

Before we dive into tunes today, I wanted to pass along two wildly unrelated (and potentially , but hopefully not actually, uninteresting) things that happened today.

1. It was a great mail day, the kind of day that makes up for Columbus Day, when I received no mail.  I got two things in the mail that are awesome.  First, I won an ebay auction for the above pictured Sebadoh 7 inch single.  It’s on clear vinyl, which is completely badass, and sounds excellent.  The best part?  I bought it from Paul Lukas, head honcho at the excellent Uni Watch, which I read with pleasure daily.  So, I have a cool artifact from the collection of a cool guy.  The second piece of excellent mail (not pictured) is the soon to be released six song EP from Citizen Dick favorite Blood Red Dancers; I’ve been waiting for this thing like Ralphie waited for that decoder ring.  Expect a critical statement on it sometime this week.  (I’m listening now.  It is good.  More to come.)

2. The battery in my ipod died during the day, so I was stuck with local radio on my way home.  Sports talk was on commercial, NPR is fundraising,  and death metal was on the college station; as such, I was confined to jumping around the dial, hoping for something good.  I caught the last third of “Renegade” on WNCX, which was quickly followed by “The Grand Illusion,” forcing me to fear that something horrible had happened to Dennis DeYoung.  (Why on Earth would a radio station play two Styx songs in a row?  Only in the event that DeYoung fell off a cliff, right?)  Michael Stanley popped on, told me that it was a “double-shot” weekend,” allaying all of my Styx-based fears.  I jumped to 92.3 and caught the last half of the worst cover ever.  Something called “My Chemical Romance” was singing “Under Pressure.”  Sweet Jesus.  This is why I don’t listen to the radio; it was all I could do not to rip the damn thing out of the dash.  I kept listening, until the god-awful conclusion, only because I was stunned into submission.  I literally couldn’t reach the radio knob.  It was like someone hit me in the face with a hammer.  I can only assume that David Bowie is on the way to to wherever these asshats are, intent on laying the smack down, Thin White Duke style.  Go get ‘em Dave!  Show those bastards they don’t mess with Queen!

On with the Lazy Saturday.

First up is State Bird, a duo from Dover, Ohio that I recently stumbled across while investigating something else.  (You’re probably already hip to them because you read “music blogs” and are “clued-in” and/or “up on the scene.”)  They play music that owes something to the outer edges of folk music, but also references African poly-rhythms and a sort of semi-undefinable free jazz aesthetic.  To say that I love it is selling it short.  The tunes are consistently surprising, taking odd left turns when they’re least expected.  Dudes are clearly talented and I’m glad that I’ve jumped on the bandwagon (admittedly late).   You can snag four songs (including the one below) at The Record Machine.  In the meantime, I’ll be eagerly anticipating new material. (Or a live appearance in Cleveland, which really isn’t that far from Dover.  I’m guessing that guys who look like this put on a decent live show.)  As an aside, I usually find the “naming a song like Prince is in the band” thing twee (see: It Beats 4 U).  For no good reason, I find it endearing here.

State Bird – I Don’t Love U Anymore

I know nothing about Warpaint other than the information that was in the press release that found its way to my e-mail yesterday.  ( The gist: Warpaint is three women from Los Angeles and their last record was mixed by John Frusciante.)  I haven’t heard a single song from them other than the one below.  For me, Warpaint is an entity entirely encapsulated in the six odd minutes of music that make up “Billie Holiday.”  To a certain degree, I don’t want to know more.  “Billie Holiday” is a moody masterpiece of creepy ennui, wildly and irrevocably subverting Mary Wells’ “My Guy,” which you’ll never be able to listen to again.  There’s an re-release of their self-released EP coming soon from Manimal, and I’ll listen to it, but it’s going to have to be pretty amazing to hit me as hard as “Billie Holiday” did.  It’s a perfect song for fall and one that I’ll, no doubt, be playing a ton while I’m raking leaves.  It makes me feel sad, in the same way that falling leaves do.  There is no surf rock around my crib when it’s cold; it’s all introspective navel-gazing until the sun comes out.

Warpaint – Billie Holiday

Live music this weekend from Morphine, one of the pivotal bands of my youth.  Mark Sandman shuffled off way too soon, as evidenced by the sheer brilliance of (more or less) the entire Morphine catalog.  Dude was better in person, exuding the kind of wild magnetism you associate with cult leaders more than jazz-rock bass players.  “Sharks” might be the most cynical song ever written, but it’s also one of the best.  (”Don’t you worry about the day-glo orange life preserver, it won’t save you.”)  “Cure for Pain” is one of the most morose things in the canon, but it still makes me smile.  We’ll do what we did with P-Funk and roll out a few Morphine songs for the next couple of weeks.  Enjoy.

Morphine – Sharks – Live, 1997

Morphine – Cure for Pain – Live, 1997