Re: Mixtape, Pt. II

(Part II of II, a review of a Charlie T-to-Spike mixtape)

TRACK 12: Willow Tree- Chad Van Gaalen
You can blame my ears. Clearly they aren't attuned enough, indie enough to love the school of New Warblers on first warble. Yet I've always felt like it's unfair when folks allow a "challenging" voice to automatically disqualify its song. I will come back to you, Chad. Just like I did for Dylan, Neil, Waits, Cohen, Prine, Chesnutt. Those guys not only got me past the "Voice Barrier," but actually converted me to loving their voices. Do you fit in that club, buddy? Well, do you?

TRACK 13: Silver Stallions- Cat Power
I know I'm supposed to worship Chan Marshall. I own three of her records and really like maybe a song or two off of each (The Greatest is, well, the greatest). I've seen her live three times (because I was late on the bandwagon, I never got to see Early Meltdown Chan, though bad sound at last year's Bridge School looked like it might trigger a relapse) and none of the performances slayed me like I hoped they would. I realize, full well, that this is my problem and not Chan's. I'm missing something. Of course I am. But I can't pretend there's something there any more than the Clippers can pretend they're gonna make a playoff run. Maybe someday. But not today.

But, wait. Hold on. I love this song. Love it. Did she write it? Just on first impression, I don't think she did. (UPDATE: It's a Highwaymen song. Thanks, Google.) It's no wonder Cat Power has done a couple of All Covers records.

SPIKE RULE: If you can get the listener to finally give in to an artist they've resisted, you might very well get a medal. You'll have to make it yourself, but don't let anybody tell you don't deserve it.

TRACK 14: Golden Hearts- Conrad Ford
I thought this was Eels before I got the tracklisting. It also feels a little like a less experimental Sparklehorse. (Yes. There was no artwork. Artwork isn't a SPIKE RULE for me, but it'll buy you a heaping Shaq-helping of extra credit.)

TRACK 15: Islands In The Sun (cover)- Feist & The Constantines
SPIKE RULE: Include a good cover, when it fits.
I don't love this cover. Maybe it's because I'm not all that fond of the Kenny/Dolly original (though I have a soft spot for the Bulworth soundtrack's revision. I know: Mya, Pras? What could possibly go bad there? Does it say something terrible about me that I prefer Mya/Pras to Feist/Constantines? Tough. Ghetto superstar/that is what you are.)
SPIKE RULE: Go back. Find the roots. Give the album some context. All good mixtapes need some history. It can be as obvious as the Beatles, as recent as the 90s, as kitschy as 70s country, as obscure as late 60s Brazilian psychedelia, just do it. I suppose you could break this if it's a pure New Music Mixtape. But who wants one of those?
Covers don't count. Unless they're old covers of old songs.

TRACK 16: Monster Ballads (demo)- Josh Ritter
A different version of a familiar song. Always a good mixtape trick. This one is an especially good choice since it might trump the album version. I am a sucker for songs stripped down to their essence like this.

TRACK 17: Ghosts- Laura Marling
A good build. When the drums first come in, I'm onboard. Same with the strings. Still, for some reason, I can't say this song ever asks me to come back for tea. But I don't skip it, which a real mixtape afficionado should never do anyway, because- by nature- TAPES MADE IT A TOTAL PAIN TO EVEN FAST FORWARD (before the fancyboy song-by-song fast forwarders).
SPIKE RULE: (more of a listener than a creator rule) Don't skip tracks. The songs are there for a reason. Give them the time they deserve, a MINIMUM of 4 listens. I credit tapes with helping me appreciate the entirety of albums like Grant Lee Buffalo's Mighty Joe Moon and Freedy Johnston's This Perfect World (among others) in ways that I wouldn't have if I'd had CDs.

UPDATE: I was previously saddling this song with the "Good But Unmemorable" tag. Then, last night, as I was brushing my teeth, the melody came to me. You win, Laura Marling.

TRACKS 18 & 19: Wisconsin/For Emma (myspace transmission)- Bon Iver
SPIKE RULE: Set up the finish with your penultimate track. That means, if it's quiet, you might want to go loud. Or if it's a big bang, ramp up to it. You just need to do SOMETHING that gives the last song its proper Last Song Gravity. This rule is breakable on punk compilations, which should be decidedly noncomformist. Whatever that means.
Bon Iver's For Emma, Forever Ago was my favorite album last year. So this was a no-brainer. I already had the Myspace Transmissions sessions, which are really really good and a pleasant departure from the album arrangements. Charlie T does an interesting thing in pairing songs by the same artist in Twofers. I don't have a rule against it (though I don't do it), but I am curious as to the motivation behind it. Were you raised on classic rock Two-For-Tuesdays, Charlie T? Are you the guy that will get suckered into buying the 2-pack of Dran-O, even though you'll maybe use it twice a year? Growing up, was your favorite show My Two Dads? Were you, like Dwight Schrute, supposed to be a twin, except you resorbed the other fetus and now have the strength of a grown man and a little baby? What is it about twos, man?



TRACK 2o: Long May You Run (Neil Young cover)- Josh Ritter & Sarah Harmer
SPIKE RULE: Close strong. No matter what.
SPIKE RULE: Include a good cover, when it fits.
Done and done. Love Neil Young. Love Josh Ritter. Love Sarah Harmer, one of the underrated voices and writers of the last decade or so. Her vocals on Great Lake Swimmers' I Became Awake kill me every single time. So does her song Coffee Stain. And so does her duet cover of Long May You Run.

Re: Mixtape, Pt. I

In High Fidelity, we get this bit of Hornbian wisdom:

"...Making a tape is like writing a letter. There's a lot of erasing and rethinking and starting again. A good compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do. You've got to kick off with a corker, to hold the attention, and then you've got to up it a notch, or cool it a notch, and you can't have white music and black music together, unless the white music sounds like black music, and you can't have two tracks by the same artist side by side, unless you've done the whole thing in pairs and...oh, there are loads of rules."

In an unveiled stab at coverting me to the Church of Our Lord of Loops, Polysyllabicism, & Birds Named Andy, Charlie T. gave me a mixtape. Actually a "mix CD" but that just doesn't sound right. To aged brontosauri like myself, they'll always be mixtapes. You could embed digital media on playable piece of salami and I'd still call it a mixtape.

Making/receiving a mixtape is tricky business. Clearly, the simplest transaction is between two love interests- the goal of which is to either a) help the person fall in love with you, b) create a soundtrack to your relationship, c) introduce them to good music while giving them a little something to read between the lines that you may or may not be ready to come out and say just yet, d) narrow down that ever elusive "Our Song," or e) all of the above. That I'm aware of, Charlie T is not making passes at me, so we can eliminate that right off the bat.

Once you're past the sweet simplicity of a love-based mixtape, your options are endless. Are you just trying to get somebody into the music you like? Do you even know what they like? Does it matter? Is your idea of how to sequence a mixtape anywhere near theirs? Do you believe in mixtape rules? Does it have a theme? Does it have to have a theme? Is artwork necessary? Do you try to maximize the space on the cd? Or are you disciplined enough to believe in the power of "6 Songs That Fit Together Perfectly? This line of questioning could go on for days. But I think my drift is caught. Charlie T made me a (in full disclosure, this is the second and better) mixtape. Like I said earlier, part of it was Andrew Bird Proselytization. Listening was rewarding and an interesting study in what different (but, I think we would both admit, pretty similar) people look for in a mixtape.

It's also a bit of a tricky task reviewing a mixtape because you readers- unless your tastes align perfectly with Charlie T's- don't have all the songs. And we're not yet up to posting zip files and the like. Go find them on iTunes or eMusic. Oh well. Let's dive in. Here's my review/reaction/whatever.

TRACK 1: Knotty Pine- David Byrne & Dirty Projectors
At 1st listen, I wasn't really feeling this song. But 2nd and 3rd and 8th listens have endeared it to me. Byrne + Projectors could not = anything but quirky. The quirk delivers. An interesting choice for the all-crucial, pacesetter of Track 1.
SPIKE RULE: Kick it off with a song that the recipient isn't familiar with but you are almost entirely sure they'll want to come back to.
Ask Hornby: you gotta kick it off with a killer. This song wasn't a no-brainer for me, but then maybe Charlie T is working on a different set of hipster rules that my low indie pay grade doesn't give me access to. If it didn't floor me, it at least intrigued me as to where this mixtape was gonna take/drag/fly me.

TRACK 2: Buenos Aires Beach- War On Drugs
The epiphany, the moment of truth, the beautiful bomb (war reference half-intentional) struck precisely at the 2 Minute Mark. For a song that's 3 1/2 minutes long, that's keeping your virtue longer than most, more insecure (and more radio-ready) pop songs do. But when the band drops "the moment" on you, it's like that scene in all those terrible teen movies where suddenly the protagonist discovers that the best friend has hidden charms and, oh my, SHE'S SMOKING HOT WITHOUT HER GLASSES ON! I knew I was supposed to like War On Drugs; Craig Finn told me so. This particular song is a good lo-fi ramble. I left my Hippie Psychedelic-->English dictionary in the car, so the lyrics aren't sinking in yet. A little like Bob Dylan (stream of consciousness/poetry lyrics and quirky delivery) with 13th Floor Elevators (ramshackle) and whatever indie band I'm supposed to namedrop here.
SPIKE RULE: Track 2 should almost always be better than Track 1 so as to give the listener a sense that this is A-Game, not D-League. I believe you can tell a lot about an album by its Track 2. (Track 7s are also telling, but we'll save that for another day.) Anyone can stick their Big Gun at #1. But what else have you got?
Apparently, the War On Drugs.

TRACK 3: As Tall As Cliffs- Margot and the Nuclear So-And-Sos
In my judgmental heart and ears, I thought I knew what M&NSS would sound like (indie jamband maybe? emo-disguised-as-power-pop?) . I was wrong, thank goodness. This was the first track that I pushed repeat on. I love it.
SPIKE RULE: If the listener hasn't found a song that they can't WAIT to get back to by Track 5, you have failed.

TRACKS 4 & 5: Fitz & Dizzspells/Tenousness- Andrew Bird
Here we have the crux of the mixtape. Its very reason for existing. Charlie T knows I have some rather potent anti-hipster/anti-hype prejudice against Mr. Bird. He also knows that I am willing to be wrong (as I was when I finally got past the hype and learned to love Arcade Fire, The National, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah....the list is longer) Charlie T shows his hand relatively early and I can respect somebody who gets to the point. They are unfortunately weighted with the expectation of a guy like Darko, who didn't ask to be drafted so high in an otherwise incredible draft and then was saddled with colossal expectations.

I will say these things about these particular Andrew Bird songsand move on, as I don't want to belabor the point of the mixtape and can't possibly give them anything remotely near the pulpit-pounding conversion story that might sell. Thoughts:
:: Hearing him in my headphones is much preferred to trying to like him while dodging a parade of posing (and talky) hipsters.
:: I can't decide if I love or hate the wordiness. Lots of syllables. I can respect a literary bent. I just don't know if I appreciate or resent this one.
:: I also can't decide if the wordiness is art for art's sake or if he's trying to really get something across in traditional poetry form. I do, after consulting with Charlie T, know that his NY Times songwriting blog puts him in a very favorable, creative, thinker light.
:: I do know that I love the line (and its delivery) "Can't stand to stand, can't stand to sit, and who would want to know this?" So maybe the previous bulleted point is moot.
:: The music is very, very good. After taking passes on Armchair Apocrypha and the one about the eggs, maybe I have...finally....(spit it out) come around to Andrew Bird. (Fittingly, on an album that all the hipsters would say is not his best and on and on. I love the hipster backlash.)

TRACK 6: Mobile Parts 1 and 2- Glenn Kotche
SPIKE RULE: Challenge the listener at least once, if it won't disrupt the theme or flow too much. Take them out of their comfort zone.
I'm a huge Wilco fan. Of course I am sold. But the instrumentality of this makes it an outlier, but a smart one (with its melodicism and Wilco connection). The last minute is a little too much for me, though. I suppose a love of my eardrums hurts my ability to appreciate it. But 5 out of 6 minutes ain't bad.

TRACKS 7 & 8: Knuckles/For Boston- The Hold Steady
Also a huge Hold Steady fan, as we've documented with our Stay Positive joint review. Knuckles' narrator is so great- that pathetic Kobe-esque "You can call me Black Mamba" self-proclamation that continually fails is great, great writing. The parallel of the names he's trying to be called versus the names he's getting called is pure storytelling. Maybe Andrew Bird could take a narrative lesson.

WANTS: Freddy Knuckles IS: Right Said Fred
WANTS: Freddy Mercury IS: Right Said Fred
WANTS: Sunny D IS: Five Alive (even better because he professes to have offed 5 people, but people know he's all talk)
WANTS: Johnny Rotten IS: Freddy Fresh

I lived in Boston for about a half year once. So For Boston is nice. "Heaven is a place you can never find your cigarettes." The Hold Steady will have to make an awfully crappy record for me to turn on their playing and Craig's writing. It would require an Isiah Thomas Caliber killer.

TRACKS 9: Salome- Old 97's
I am in the rare (and much maligned) school that prefers solo Rhett Miller (with Jon Brion) to the Old 97's. I catch some heat, but, hey, I think the songs and production are better. I probably like this one because it feels like a song that could be on The Instigator.

TRACK 10: Part- Trent Belnap
You are allowed to have pet artists that you unabashedly push. It's part of being a music fan. You take every chance to spread the gospel of ____ to whoever will listen. Recipients of your mixtapes know that, somewhere in there, they're gonna get a taste of ___.
SPIKE RULE: Keep indulgences to a minimum. It's your mixtape, but you've gotta be considerate of your audience. So, yeah, indulge a little. But be wary as to where and when.
One of Charlie T's pets is Trent Belnap, somewhere below Josh Ritter, Jake Plummer, Built To Spill, and Dawn Wells in the world of Idahoan celebrities. Trent's voice is a powerhouse, evoking old school country in both its delivery and the song itself. Is this my favorite Trent Belnap song? No. But it's good and I can see why Charlie T digs it.


TRACK 11: Backwards Walk (daytrotter piano version) - Frightened Rabbit
SPIKE RULE: There's nothing wrong with including a song that the person already know (and loves). Placement, however, is key. Correct placement can build trust and help bridge the listener to the next less-familiar song.
Charlie T. dropped this song in the perfect spot, with a twist. He knew I love, love, love this song. So its inclusion is smart on its own, but he upped the ante by including a version that might actually be better than the album version AND that I had never heard. Perfect placement, right in the middle to get me back in the groove for the second half.

Part II coming next. Try to contain your enthusiasm.

In Just 5 Easy Steps

Hi my name is Charlie T. and I like Andrew Bird. Hi Charlie T.

As I sit here trying to rank the songs on the Dark Was The Night compilation, I came across a track by Andrew Bird. As you all know, since I gave up on any more dates to the Merriweather Post Pavilion, I have been spend my free time with the author of the Noblest Beast thus far in 2009.

Bird is more mysterious of a creature than he should be, especially for Spike W. So folks, I am unveiling my foolproof 5 step plan to get Spike to give AB the time of day. And since verbal persuasion doesn't work I will have to leave that one off the list.

1. Make a mix CD with an Andrew Bird song or two hidden in there
I need to decide whether or not I want to include more than two AB songs. Probably not since I only get roughly 70 minutes on one disc and Spike's attention span is about 1/10th that. The songs will definitely include Fitz & Dizzyspells for the pop leanings and catchy hooks, not to mention the violin during the whistling solo. And I can't decide between Tenuosness or Oh No. They will both be a gametime decision.

2. Give the CD to Spike while having either Thai food or burritos
It never hurts to make sure the other party has a full stomach when persuading them. Thats how Jermaine O'Neal got Larry Legend to give him that ridiculous contract which the Heat are now saddled with. The difference is Spike's stomach won't be full of strip club hot wings and Andrew Bird is not highway robbery.

3. Talk of The Giant Of Illinois; could be referring to the current US president, Air Jordan, Tweedy & Co. or the Bird track on DWTN.
This is the step where I relentlessly mention Bird's collaboration with Wilco durning many of their live shows and how its not a coincidence that the consistently choose him. I will also put a Glenn Kotche song on the afore mentioned mixtapecd to get Spike excited about the reality of Mr. Kotche's solo/collaboration work.

4. Ask about the highlights of the mix CD
You always follow up. There has to be accountability. Not sure how this will make him listen but it will sure as heck make him accountable. Until he becomes calloused to saying "No, I haven't yet" a la Baron Davis to his personal trainer when she asks about his home workout routine.

5. Make references to Jon Brion, whom is named in the liner notes
Spike is a JB lifer. I am hoping this sweet spot, as the last resort, can be the gateway drug.

So this is my plan. I would love for Spike to just go to a show, which was my gateway drug. Now I am all over the Birdman like Gilbert Arenas is all over knee surgeries.