Geeked

I recently sent a mix CD to Dr. Geek, in response to several he’s made me (I’m a slow and ungrateful mix exchange partner. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.) and he posted about it here. Because I’m longwinded, my response was too long for his comments, so I’m putting it over here instead.

I like to think of mix exchanging as a sort of conversation, although it’s not often these days that I have the kind of time I’d like to put into them. I’ve been dumping tunes in a playlist for Dr. Geek for a while, but haven’t had a chance to do anything about it until recently. Working on my taxes turned out to be a good companion activity to mix-making.

This mix is a direct reply to the mixes Dr. Geek has sent me (the most recent of which I’ve written about here and here. I set out to do a mix of bluegrass and jazz, which tends to be connected at some background level by blues chord changes. As usual, the mix took on its own life and developed some themes I didn’t anticipate.

Dr. Geek has kindly allowed me to include his post below interspersed with my comments (his is in plain text, my response is in italics), because I thought it would be easier to read in one place than by flipping back and forth. But please visit Dr. Geek. He’s an excellent blogger and stand-up guy, and also he’s had a really lousy week. So stop by and say hello.

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Nickel Creek: Smoothie Song. I must confess that my initial, first glance reaction to the track list on the mix was completely wrong. I was confusing Nickel Creek (a name I knew I’d heard) with Nickelback, and I was thinking that this was going to be some kind of noisy alt-rock mix. But no, Nickel Creek is an entirely different creature: acoustic, and newgrass-inspired. I knew their name because I’ve been hearing this song on the radio off and on for the last few years. A nice start to the mix.

You are not the first person to whom I’ve sent Nickel Creek who has mixed up the two bands, which really couldn’t be much more different. This is the first son of theirs I heard too, but I liked it enough to go digging. I found a band of CHILDREN who had been produced by one of my all time favorite fiddle players, Alison Krauss. And I did something unheard of for me. The very day I first heard “The Smoothie Song,” I downloaded two of their albums. And I’ve never been sorry. The quality of musicianship is excellent. I do, however, have a particular affinity for their instrumental tracks. It’s not their voices that bother me – far from it – but I’m not always too keen on the lyrics. Still, definitely a group worth exploring.

Zach Brock and the Coffee Achievers: In Thoughts and Dreams. This second track takes the mix in a new direction. It’s a jazzy mediation with a fiddle paired with a wordless vocal in the lead. This track would be great movie soundtrack music. Just hearing it makes me think that I’m watching some kind of heist or caper movie: it’s the end of the second act, the hero has temporarily lost the faith and confidence of the woman in his life, and he’s putting numerous technical details for the big score in motion, all the while hoping that he can get her back

This is another band I discovered on the radio. We have a fantastic local jazz station here (although it’s sufficiently unlocal that I sometimes need to resort to internet listening) and they seem to like this track a lot. I like it too. Also, I have a thing for jazz fiddle players (see Stephane Grappelli below and previous posts (that I’m too lazy to link to) on Johnny Frigo, who played at my wedding). This song makes me want to dance and somehow it works its way onto many of my mixes. . I hadn’t thought of the soundtrack aspect, but I think you’re absolutely right. More and more, lately, I find myself gravitating toward music that somehow conjures up an imaginary narrative. I think that’s actually an unintentional theme of the music on this disk, actually.

R.E.M.: Rotary Ten. My collection of R.E.M. discs runs toward the latter days of the Bill Berry era: Life’s Rich Pageant, Automatic For The People, and Monster. I have little or no acquaintance with their later work as a trio… and this track couldn’t be much more different than I would expect from them. Fusion jazz is the best label I can come up with. A good continuation of the jazzy vibe in the last track, and a good bridge to the next one.

This tune is taken from Dead Letter Office, which is an album of outtakes from REM’s IRS years (1981-87, I think). I was an early adopter of REM – I’ve been listening since the early 80s – and between us Mr. Spy and I own most of their albums (not yet the new one, though, but it’s only a matter of time), some in multiple formats. Despite my relatively wide knowledge, each time this tune cycles up on my iPod, I end up checking to see who it is, because it doesn’t quite sound like them. And yet it does, once you know it. Aesthetically, it seemed like a good fit for this mix and a, I thought, a nice transition to the next selection.

Neko Case: Look for Me (I’ll Be Around). This tune shifts the mix in a dark, luxurious, film noir direction. The closest I can think of is Angelo Badalamenti and the Twin Peaks soundtrack. A beautiful torch song voice.

I avoided Neko Case for quite a while, mainly because I’d heard a little too much about her, which always makes me suspect I won’t like the music. But a couple of tracks have come to me in mixes and I discovered I like her voice and her songwriting. This song, though, is not one of those mix discoveries. I’m pretty sure I heard it in the soundtrack of a movie I was watching, but I no longer remember which movie it was. I didn’t immediately recognize it as Case. This is quite a different style of music than the other style of song I’d heard from her. I’d recently downloaded the next song and its moodiness reminded me a lot of it. And it’s funny you mention Twin Peaks, because I almost used a track from the soundtrack for filler, but I ended up taking it out.

Tom Waits: Jockey Full Of Bourbon. Tom Waits and I have been dancing around each other for quite a while — a roommate in the mid-90’s was a fan of Waits. I need to break down and buy some of his stuff. I’m most familiar with the version of this tune from Wicked Grin, the John Hammond disc that Waits produced of Waits’ songs. I like both versions, now that I’ve heard the original.

Tom Waits is, for me, all over the map. I can love him or hate him but I never find him dull. My favorite music of his is the soundtrack he did for Jim Jarmusch’s film Night on Earth, which is also one of my favorite films for its sheer moodiness. This song captures the same kind of moodiness perfectly. Now if only they’d put the soundtrack to Night on Earth back in print.

Lucinda Williams: Can’t Let Go. This song takes me back to the late 90’s when I was in grad school. Back in those days, I listened to a local indie radio station that pioneered the Americana radio format. It was named in a Rolling Stone article as one of the “Top Ten Independent Radio Stations That Don’t Suck” in America. I got the disc, but I haven’t dug it out in a long time. I think it’s time to dust it off.

Like Tom Waits, Lucinda Williams is, for me, hit or miss. Mr. Spy loves this whole album, Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, but this is definitely my favorite track. It’s the perfect song for a road trip. This song came to me via my friend Cranky. I realized I didn’t know any Lucinda Williams and I downloaded a song that had been recommended to me, “Minneapolis.” And I hated it. I asked Cranky what all the fuss was about and she recommended this album. Totally changed my mind about Williams. Her newest album, though, not so much.

Lyle Lovett: I’ve Been To Memphis. This song takes me back even further. It was my first year of grad school, and I was living in an apartment with three other guys. I’d found this record shop downtown, that no longer exists. I got the disc that this song is from (it had just come out), put it in my trusty Sony Discman, and listened to it as I ate some leftover stir-fried chicken for dinner. I spilled a little soy sauce on the liner notes. The disc is an essential in my collection.

I was late to the Lyle Lovett party as well. In fact, Cranky just sent me this album, Joshua Judges Ruth a month or so ago. I had, however, been gradually acquiring it track by track. I believe you contributed a track or two to my collection as well. It is a remarkably well constructed whole with some fabulous individual tunes. One of the best albums in my collection as well.

The Magnetic Fields: A Chicken with Its Head Cut Off. This track is an interesting juxtaposition of styles and ideas. The basic sound is so very 80’s that I keep imagining the final character montage of a John Hughes movie prior to the start of the final credits. The lyrics are so alt-quirky that it cannot help but be a creature of the 90’s (it came out in ‘99). I like it.

This song was recommended to me by one of my illustrious readers, but I no longer remember who. And I totally agree with you about the styles. If there’s another theme to this mix, it’s about how seemingly disjunct styles often have more in common than you think. I like the mellow groove and the bass-leaning melody, which is catchy enough to get stuck in my head, but not so catchy that it drives me insane when it gets there. And the words are definitely quirky.

Nickel Creek: Robin and Marian. Here we return to the opening newgrass feel of the mix with a banjo and fiddle reel from Nickel Creek. That indie radio station I mentioned a few tunes back used to play this eclectic mix of blues, bluegrass, hawaiian slack key, comedy records, and old-timey white gospel on Sunday nights… they’d have loved this tune. (The promo for that show taught me the joke “Q: What do you call perfect pitch? A: That’s when you toss the banjo in the dumpster and it lands on the middle of accordion.”)

I learned that joke with the answer, “when you toss a viola in the dumpster and it doesn’t hit the sides.” This tune has no violas, but there’s mandolin and a very strong Celtic bias. It’s from Nickel Creek’s eponymous first album – still my favorite – which is a little more traditional than This Side, from which “The Smoothie Song” is taken. This song works its way into my Celtic mixes and early music mixes as well.

Great Lakes Myth Society: Summer Bonfire. Part old time call and response work song and power pop, this track has a dense, lovely sound. Some nice, upbeat bounce.

I first heard this song on the radio last summer on a new releases show and went home and downloaded the tune. It’s become a real favorite in the Spy house. It reminds me of the 60s/70s era British folk rock – groups like Steeleye Span and the Fairport Convention. Also, the geek in me likes the way the lyrics leave out the final rhyming word of each verse, leaving it to the audience to apply the appropriate one. I’d like to hear more of this group, but as of now, this is the only song of theirs that I know.

PJ Harvey: Wait. Ms. Harvey is another of those artists that my roomate in the mid-90’s really liked. To be honest, I remember seeing him watch a few of her videos on MTV’s 120 Minutes and thinking that she probably wasn’t my cup of tea. This track may force me to re-assess that feeling. Yes, it’s got a four chord punk sensibility… but I like the melody line and the lyric.

I’ve been a fan of Polly Jean for a long time, but it’s hard to recommend her to others, because she’s so mercurial. This is a bonus track off her latest album, White Chalk. I love the moodiness and the spareness of that album, but this song is absolutely nothing like anything else on it. It’s pretty traditional, straight up voice and guitar, which is fairly unusual for Harvey. But she does this idiom well too, just like she does everything.

XTC: The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul. Oh, if I could just count the times that I’ve considered getting Oranges and Lemons and Skylarking by XTC, not knowing too much about them, but thinking… they should be good, very good. Oh, if only more of late 80’s pop was this good, I might have listened to the radio more.

I listened to a lot of XTC in college, where I was introduced to it by a friend (and later roommate) who was a music fanatic and had a show on the college’s radio station (she’s now a music buyer for that big website for buying books and other stuff). I recently picked up Skylarking, from which this song is taken, in a fit of nostalgia and I’ve been enjoying getting reacquainted with these songs from a 21st century perspective. They wear well. And the jazz-influenced flute line made it fit well on this mix.

Django Reinhardt et al.: The Peanut Vendor. The quality of this recording is lousy… but the performance is stellar. I know that Harri3t must have included it because of all the John Jorgensen I’ve been telling her about. Reinhardt and Grappelli were magic. I listened to this at work and had to get up to go to the printer… I couldn’t help whistling the tune as I walked, without even thinking about it.

Jorgenson is exactly why this song made it onto the CD, and also, it provides some nice historic background for Zach Brock. This is another of my favorite albums, Django in Rome, 1949/1950. Django Reinhardt is, of course, the legendary guitarist and his longtime partner Stephane Grappelli provides the fiddle solo. The recording is not the best, as you note. It’s tinny and old and sounds kind of like someone held a microphone up to a Victrola. But it all works as part of the atmosphere for me. But I’m used to it from listening to the whole album. Perhaps it doesn’t work as well in an album with more contemporary songs. In any case, I think the album is a must have for any jazz aficionado. It’s full of incredible renditions of standards.

Jules Shear: Too Much Between Us. This song reminds of two cherished tracks from nearly 20 years ago: I Don’t Mind At All by Bourgeois Tagg and Don’t Dream It’s Over by Crowded House.

I first heard this song as recorded by Windham Hill pianist George Winston as a bonus track on an album I got for AJ. Although the arrangement was bland, I loved the lyrics and the chord changes, especially that long slow descending sequence. The song was originally written and recorded by Procol Harum of “Whiter Shade of Pale” fame, but I’ve never managed to track down a copy of that version of the song. I love Jules Shear’s take on it, though. I hadn’t thought of the Crowded House song in years, but the melody line is similar in its unexpected combinations of major and minor and its reaching over the top of the line when you expect it to descend.

Bill Fox: My Baby Crying. This song is an interesting combination of interesting 60’s styles: a Dylan-esque lo-fi folk ethic with complex lyrics combined with a lush Beatles-esque melody line. This one bears further investigation.

This song comes from the CD that came with The Believer’s last music issue (The Believer, in case you’re not familiar, is a literary magazine under the aegis of Dave Eggers and McSweeney’s). I know nothing about the artist, but I like the song for all the same reasons you stated.

Nickel Creek: Pastures New. The last of the trio of Nickel Creek songs on the disc, the dark guitar and fiddle combination takes me back to a pair of Indigo Girls tunes: the guitar much like Amy Ray’s playing on a track like Fugitive and the fiddle has the dark lonely quality like the opening of The Wood Song (both off of Swamp Ophelia). Guess I’ve got to get this disc.

This track is another Celtic-inspired tune off Nickel Creek’s first album. I use this in all kinds of mixes, including those I play for yoga and meditation. But I have little patience for most music designed for meditation. This song is peaceful — it calms things down nicely to move into the next track — but the violin gives it enough of an emotional edge. I think it’s lovely. It’s instrumental, but it sounds like it could have words. I find myself wanting to sing along. I haven’t listened to the Indigo Girls since their early days and have never heard Swamp Ophelia. Guess I’ll have to check that one out!

Holly Cole: Waters of March. Holly Cole is an artist I’ve heard of, but never heard before now. This tune is definitely pop in its conception and construction, but is heavily informed by jazz. Again, someone I need to examine more closely.

Holly Cole is another artist who is hit or miss for me. I love her voice, and her musicianship is incredible, but her arrangements are sometimes a little too pop for my taste. I love this one, though, in part for its complete transformation of the original Jobim bossa nova. It sounds like a different song, and yet not. In any case, it made me hear a very familiar song in an entirely new way, which is what covering a song should be all about, in my opinion. I won’t go into too much detail, as I’ve written about this tune elsewhere. But Cole is definitely worth exploring. As a place to start, you might try listening to her interview with Terry Gross on Fresh Air, which is where I first heard this song.

Mark Eitzel: Stunned and Frozen. The mix finally winds down… or is it winds up? Mark Eitzel turns in an energetic little ditty in waltz time, drawing the singer/songwriter and Americana threads running through the mix together for one last time.

I absolutely adore Mark Eitzel, one of my all-time favorite singer-songwriters. Great lyrics (many of which work their way into my post titles), great and unexpected tunes. I haven’t heard his more recent stuff (although to be honest, until just now when I looked up the name of the second album, I didn’t know he even had more recent stuff), but you can’t miss with this album, West, or even better, the less succinctly titled Caught in a Trap and I Can’t Back Out ‘Cause I Love You Too Much, Baby. As for winding down or winding up, I’ve always liked the way your mixes loop well, so that if you want to keep it on autorepeat (which I do a lot, especially when I’m getting to know a new disk), there is a smooth transition.

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