The house on Sandusky

I only lived there for about eighteen months. My first real "home" in Tulsa after moving there in 1980. Built in the 1930s and featuring a black glass art deco fireplace surround, my strongest memories of living there revolve around the music that I was listening to at that time. As a frame of reference consider Talking Heads - Remain In Light; EC and the Attractions - Trust; the Police - Zenyattà Mondatta.

At the time a little-known Kiwi band was making some noise in the US. Split Enz got some radio traffic with their 1980 single I've Got You. In 1981 their LP Waiata was released and immediately got some music videos playing on that new-fangled MTV channel. I was (and still am) very enamoured by that record. In fact I don't believe they ever released a better record. The radio hit One Step Ahead is a standout, but there are at least half a dozen other songs of equal quality on that album.

Which brings me to I Don't Wanna Dance, which appears snuggly in the middle of side one. The opening salvo of synths and drums leads to the first verse in which songwriter and vocalist Tim Finn makes the complex melody line seem simple. At 2:20 Neil Finn lets loose with an intense guitar solo that does not let up until the end of the song, and the complexion of the song changes dramatically. The angst inherent in the lyrics come front and center as the synthesizer chords build and build. The chorus returns and when repeated a second time, at just about 2:51, a moment of transfiguration occurs when the harmony is changed and Mr. Finn sings the line "I don't wanna dance.... tonight....". It is that rare moment in pop music where the perfect chord, the perfectly sung lyric, and the emotion of the moment take this song into another realm.

I drove by that house at the corner of Sandusky and 12th in the summer of 2009 and was happy to see that the current owners have spruced it up. I wonder if they kept the art deco fireplace, and what sort of music they listen to.

She doesn't have anything you want to steal

Just a short post today to thank my friends Caroline and Lisa for taking me to the Psychedelic Furs concert last night. Both the Furs and the opening band She Wants Revenge were in fine form. Richard Butler has to have one of the most distinctive voices in all of rock, and he was a virtual perpetual motion machine during the show, jumping, pogo-ing, and gesturing wildly throughout the show.

Here is a video for the original version (imho much better) of Pretty In Pink. Caroline (my friend, not the subject of the song) is pretty sure the song is about a drag queen, and now that I have read the lyrics I must say I think she is spot on. Just like all of those great Lou Reed songs about transvestites, Pretty In Pink casts a shimmering soft light on its subject and treats her with great respect.

caroline laughs and it's raining all day
she loves to be one of the girls
she lives in the place in the side of our lives
where nothing is ever put straight

the one who insists he was first in the line
is the last to remember her name
he's walking around in this dress that she wore
she is gone but the joke's the same

A little goth Saturday

As a card-carrying Carhartt Okie, the last trend my friends would identify me with is the goth scene. And I certainly never ran in those circles or wore the trademark all-black. But every once in a while in indulge myself with the music of Siouxsie and the Banshees. Over the course their first ten or so years they released a bevy of singles that still find their way to my turntable on a regular basis. Insistent, spooky, dark, cloaked in sometimes candy-coated coverings, their best work reminds me very little of the punk/new wave movement from which they sprang. That is one of the oft-forgotten joys of that 1976-1982 period when just about anything different was lumped under the heading of "punk".

Some day I must write about Peek-a-boo, a disturbing song with an art house video in which Siouxsee Sioux dons a killer Louise Brooks bob. But today I am listening to Spellbound, a single from 1981. From the point the percussion (courtesy of Budgie) and acoustic guitar make their entrance about 30 seconds in I am hooked. The fast guitar strumming with interesting chord changes is a hallmark of this song. Reminds me of The Who and Aztec Camera. Listen and enjoy.

When are they gonna stop all of these victory processions

When Trust came out in 1981 the backlash against Elvis Costello's cringe-inducing racist comment was in full force. The momentum of his career was affected enough that the album was treated with mostly indifference by the press and public, and for the first time since his first album no singles made the charts in the UK.

Knowledgeable reviewers knew the score though - this was EC's finest album to date. The power pop of This Year's Model, the orchestrated sweep of Armed Forces, and the compressed soulfulness of Get Happy all came together in a mature collage of lyrics and melodies. And the Attractions were at an absolute peak, giving each song a sound universe befitting the generally downbeat lyrics.

Just about every tune on this LP is a keeper, even the near rockabilly Luxemburg. For my money the absolute standout track it New Lace Sleeves with its shifting rhythms and harmonic movements that take it into new unexplored territory. The bass, percussion, and keyboard work are so fine I cannot bring justice to them with mere words. The final staccato organ chords keep coming back again and again as the song trails off. The first half deals with the aftermath of a less than successful tryst and then pulls in the media circus around politicians and their penchant for indiscreet rendevous. In the second half EC wags his finger at the British empire and its pursuant warmongering. At least that is how I read it, as on this album Mr. MacManus becomes even more opaque and obscure, but the rhythm and the poetry of the lyrics stand up even if they have become nearly indecipherable.

Jonestown Punch

I was a late-comer to the rock'n'roll show. Sure, as a nine year old I mowed my grandparent's lawn to earn enough to buy a ticket to the premier of The Beatles A Hard Day's Night in 1964. But by 1967 the US TV debut of the Strawberry Fields Forever/Penny Lane promo film left me lost in translation. Of course I have since come around to recognize it as a pinnacle of the Beatles work, but at the time I just was not ready. So I drifted away from rock until my sophmore year in college. Of course by then the 60s were well over and the rock establishment was petrifying.

So when New Wave/Punk hit, I was so there, buying every new release that I read about in the rock press. My college crowd was there with me, trading homemade cassettes of Elvis Costello, Lena Lovich, Television, Talking Heads, etc. The Pretenders walked a fine line between the old and the new. During the time frame of their two albums and assorted singles released by the original members, there was not a better band. Chrissie Hynde was (and sometimes still is) a fabulous songwriter, and as a singer she could move me with barely a whisper. Her husky voice never strained or screamed, yet managed to become one of the true original voices in R&R. James Honeyman-Scott was a guitarist of unlimited potential, able to produce pure ringing tones as well as blistering solos. Pete Farndon (bass) Martin Chambers (drums) were an exceptional rhythm section, able to fill the space between the vocals and guitar and yet also understanding the importance of empty beats.

In the summer of 1981 I was lucky enough to see the Pretenders live at the Oklahoma City Zoo Ampitheater with some of my friends. A yet-to-become-famous Go Gos - who wore matching polka dresses - put on a killer opening set. But the real deal was yet to come. Frankly I was so delirious at seeing Chrissie and company in person that I remember very little of the actual music other than that they were tight, aggressive, and had an amazing stage presence.

The following video has been on and off of YouTube for several years. I am sure this will get pulled soon so take a look while you can, to see a band that had it all for a few brief months before twin tragedies would occur.



p.s. the blog posting title comes from the heinous concocotion that my college friends put together (grape koolaid and everclear) for the infamous Enid Oklahoma punk roller skating party of 1980.