Shatterday Night Live, 1978

Recently Papa J and I have been going through the earliest seasons of Saturday Night Live, mostly just to watch the musical guests.  There have been some great moments and some not-so-great moments, which I'll probably write more on later, but for this particular episode (Season 4, Episode 1) we decided to sit through the entire thing.  This particular episode featured the Rolling Stones as both host and musical guest, and after the 67 minutes of chaos that it was, I fear I may never watch early SNL ever again.  I'm afraid my fragile brain won't be able to handle it.  Let me explain:

The episode opens with a monologue from at-the-time NYC mayor Ed Koch giving John Belushi a certificate of merit.  John Belushi does a bit.  It goes on for a while, but at least there's a clear joke, which probably makes this the peak of the episode, along with the commercial parody that follows it.  Immediately after this, things get more and more off the rails and never recover.  There's a parody of The Tomorrow Show where Mick Jagger is interviewed as himself, which isn't especially funny, but then again I've never seen The Tomorrow Show.  There's also this really bizarre sketch about a refrigerator where Bill Murray and Gilda Radner spend about half the runtime making cracks (ahem) about an electrician's butt.  The other two main sketches are even harder to follow; one is a sequel to the Olympia Café sketch (I didn't even know there were more than one of these) that goes nowhere and one is something called "Danger Probe" which is the final sketch of the night and was apparently written in a fever dream where nothing makes sense.  There was also a "Schiller's reel" that was equally incomprehensible.  This whole episode felt like it was being beamed in from another planet.

"Weekend Update" wasn't any better.  I already like Colin Jost and Michael Che a lot, but seeing Jane Curtin and Bill Murray's complete non-chemistry behind the desk really makes me appreciate the modern "Update" so much more.  Yikes.

The real pièce de résistance of the episode was, of course, the Stones' performance, which was just as bizarre and fun to watch as I had hoped.  Mick is in front the whole time doing his thing, with Keith Richards and Ron Wood behind him.  Ron plays with a cigarette in his mouth.  Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts are barely visible, and often barely audible.  (The mixing isn't great.)  What I love about this set so much is that within the span of three songs the band descends into complete nonsense.  They start with "Beast of Burden", which is a great song, but the mellowness juxtaposes against Mick's stage theatrics in a funny way.  After that they play "Respectable" which I had never heard before and which sounds like bad bar karaoke, and then they end with "Shattered" which is one of those songs that's just so hilariously bad that watching them play it is a joy.  Mick's giving like 200 percent onstage while the rest of the band seems content to be running at 20 percent.  He tears his shirt up slowly; he licks Ron's face and drunkenly hits him with his jacket, and Ron doesn't seem prepared for it at all.  It's such a strangely amateurish performance to come from a band that's been one of the world's most famous for 12 or 13 years at this point.

Hot.

My new albums

I just released a couple new albums! They're very cool and good and you should listen to them right now!! (Click the titles to go to my bandcamp)

Frantic Lore From the Puddle of Conscience

This one is an eclectic, experimental, often lo-fi loose concept album about gender and identity and the subconscious, but don't look too hard for a narrative thread or anything, it's really more of a jumping off point for the music and only slightly more obvious in the lyrics.  This album's pretty all over the place with elements of hypnagogic pop, HexD, psych rock, sound collage and more.  There are some vocal features and noises from friends at various points, too. There can be lots of layers of lofi-ness and lobit-ness to these songs, particularly the first six, for example the vocals I recorded to cassette on track 4 before bitcrushing, exporting as a low quality mp3, bitcrushing and mp3ing again so it's basically incomprehensible. 

Also the last track on here probably took me longer to complete than any other track I've ever recorded. I started in April and only finished it yesterday, so it took me probably 5 months in total on & off (for comparison, Neo-Geocitys Nitrogen Tank took me 5 weeks and that song is more than 24 times as long as this one.) 

I'm very happy with the way this album turned out and although it's certainly self indulgent and strange I think there's at least a little something for everyone on this album. 

"fuck dance, let's art"

Superball

Here's the sister album.  I made this one over the course of 5 days back in March for probably like 10 hours a day.  Structurally it's kind of like a DJ mix, it's a giant 50-minute series of dance mashups and stuff increasing in speed as it goes, until the end which is a lot more chaotic and which I made on a cassette.  Everything is bitcrushed, which I found is a useful way to make everything feel cohesive given there's samples from over 100 songs on here.  But like Frantic Lore, this is a very eclectic album, it's got everything from Strong Bad to Perfume to an entire krautrock section.  It's really fun and honestly I'm really really proud of the way it turned out.  I hope you enjoy it too!

"fuck art, let's dance"

Ten Songs That Make Me Happy to Be Alive

1. Yumi Arai, "Rouge no Dengon" (1975)

Memorably included as the opening theme to my favorite movie of all time, Kiki's Delivery Service, "Rouge no Dengon" fits perfectly as a song that overtakes me with joy whenever it's on.  The retro (even for the time) girl-group instrumentation is a fantastic foundation for Yumi's voice, which sounds as sweet as ever.  I'm only just starting to really explore her discography but I could just have easily included five other songs of hers on this list; the reason I chose this one in particular was the amazing video. 

2. Car Seat Headrest, "Something Soon" (2015)

If there's one thing I know for sure, it's that Will Toledo knows how to make a song climax like nobody else.  CSH are great at easing you into the first few minutes of a song before making sure your heart is exploding by the time it's over, as happens on songs such as "Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales", "Drugs With Friends" and especially "Something Soon", which gives me goosebumps every time I hear it.  Toledo may be a fantastic lyricist but no lyrics have ever carried quite as much emotion as his gorgeous, nearly incomprehensible wailing that closes the track.  Stunning.

3. Bruce Springsteen, "Born to Run" (1975)

My second favorite Springsteen song, "Born to Run" rivals "Something Soon" in the power of its outro.  Unlike "Something Soon", though, it doesn't slowly build; rather, "Born to Run" starts with the pedal to the metal and stays that way for the duration of the track.  There are few pieces of music in the world that will ever feel half as triumphant as this song, and few performers that could ever sell it with as much conviction, emotion and power as the Boss.

4. Talking Heads, "What a Day That Was" (1984)

Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense is often regarded as the best concert film of all time, and rightly so - the energy is infectious and the musicians seem to be having an absolute blast.  Perhaps the centerpiece of the concert is their performance of "What a Day That Was", originally written for David Byrne's The Catherine Wheel soundtrack but most definitively performed by the Talking Heads here.  It's rare that I'll proclaim a live-only song to be a band's best, but this may very well be the highest point in the Talking Heads catalog, and this is the band that did "The Great Curve"! There are a million things I could point out as highlights of this performance, but I'll keep it to two words: Steve Scales.

5. Pizzicato Five, "Twiggy Twiggy" (1991)

Pizzicato Five's unique amalgamation of lounge, surf, alternative dance and vocal jazz is so quintessentially '90s and yet timeless.  "Twiggy Twiggy" stands out as both impossibly catchy and impossibly cool, with lead singer Maki Nomiya delivering one of the most flawless vocals I've ever heard.  I was in love with this song the moment I first heard it as a kid and I'm even more in love with it today.  I promise I'm not merely picking these songs for their music videos, but this one happens to come with an amazing one as well.  Check it out:

6. Joan Jett, "Bad Reputation" (1980)

They say nobody's perfect, but clearly Joan Jett is the exception to the rule.  What I wouldn't give to spend one day in her shoes!  (Or, studded leather boots.)  What always struck me about Ms. Jett is how she was able to keep her punk rock edge through her entire career, long after she had moved on to hard rock and power pop from her roots in the Runaways.  "Bad Reputation" is definitely her most punk-rock solo hit, though, and I never cease to be floored by its fierce energy and singalong-ability.  If any song deserves to be the Freaks and Geeks opening theme, it's definitely this.

7. CSLSX, "Futuretapes" (2010)

Every time I hear this song I find myself asking if this may well be the best song ever made.  I've listened to this forgotten electropop gem about a million times and I still don't know what almost any of the words are, but who needs quotables when you've got the sweetest robot vocals this side of a Zapp album?  Every melody in this song is golden and every beat is pristine.  The perfect space-age groove to shake your cybernetic hips to.

8. Kyary Pamyu Pamyu, "Furisodeshon" (2013)

The language barrier seems to be the only logical reason that Kyary Pamyu Pamyu was never as big a sensation in the Western hemisphere as she was in Japan, but I can't think of any excuse that would justify "Furisodeshon" not hitting the top 40.  This song is gorgeous beyond words.  I could make a list of 50 KPP songs that make me happy to be alive, but this is without question my favorite song of hers; it evokes a bliss in me that can only be equaled by a Tillie Walden graphic novel.

9. Kirin J Callinan & Alex Cameron, "Big Enough" (2017)

One of those songs that feel just like one big celebration, lists like this are what "Big Enough" is tailor-made for.  I played the music video for my dad the other day and it was great watching him fall in love with this song in real time.  It's got plenty of humor (see Jimmy Barnes' disco-diva screaming) but it's got even more heart.  By the time Callinan & Cameron pose the question "This town! This world! Are you big enough?" it truly comes off like an invitation for the entire world to come and party.  This song could melt the bitterness off of even the most cynical bastard, and I bet if you played it for all world leaders we could achieve world peace.

10. Andrew W.K., "The Moving Room" (2006)

Would this list really be complete without Andrew W.K.?  It's no surprise that AWK is a motivational speaker on the side, because so much of his discography makes me want to give the world a bear hug.  "The Moving Room" is pretty simple: a 3-minute wave of euphoria that doesn't let up.  Seemingly a nod to Springsteen sonically, AWK takes things to the extreme (as usual) with a huge, jubilant wall of guitars and piano that closes his Close Calls With Brick Walls album in a most rocktagious way.