Welcome to New Granada Christmas!
New Granada is Eric Freeman and Jeff Hanson and we have a Holiday gift for you. We started playing together this year and a not one, but two(!) Christmas songs tumbled out.
There’s more music on our Reverbnation site too. We hope to see you around town as we start to take our show to the public.
We wish you and yours a happy and safe holiday season!
- Jeff and Eric
Epic, that’s what I say now every time I get the “how was it” question. Then I fall silent. There’s so much to say, so many stories to tell that I just don’t know where to start. This was year three for me and it almost didn’t happen. After last year I really debated returning. Not that it was bad per se, I just left last year feeling like maybe I was done with burning man. I just read back my 2008 entry and I did have a great time. I think it all comes down to expectations. Year one was so emotionally packed and crazy, just plain overwhelming. It’s hard not to expect the world the second time around, no matter how much I try to tell myself not to. There are some basic reasons why this year was better; better weather, smaller city, great theme. Those are all well and good but I think they are a distraction from the real reason.
The real reason. I am just in a much better place right now. This time last year I was in the process of quitting my job. I had given notice, but was still there (waiting until Sept 22). My USF MNA program was about to start. I was certainly freaking out about making one of the biggest and potentially most disastrous decisions of my life. Things couldn’t be more different this year. The MNA program is awesome. I feel like I’ve gained so much and it’s only half over. I’m not totally freaking out about ever getting a job again (not totally). I love working at SFCV. Love love love it! Getting paid (how ever much it is) also means my “event horizon” has extended considerably. So I’m much more comfortable with the big decision of a year ago.
And this last year has been an astounding revelation for me in the realm of personal connection. At some point last year I realized I had effectively cut myself off from people. 12 years of commuting to Fremont and singing all the time can do that. After effectively rendering myself unavailable to my friends I was struck with the realization that I had to do a little work to get them back. And lo and behold, I have great friends! This may seem too basic to be a “revelation” but it certainly felt like that to me.
That all just goes to say, I went into the big BM this year a much happier and well adjusted person. My expectations were effectively tempered by the 2008 experience and I wasn’t really looking for anything in particular. I think that’s why this was such a great year. (There’s probably some Buddhist out there going “duh!” right now.) By Tuesday I could feel it was going to be a good burn. I remember dancing with Darren, Manda, and others at Boombox that night just pinching myself saying “It’s only Tuesday.” (I still need to find out who was spinning that night.)
Accaplaya was fantastic this year. In accordance with the theme we sang Jocko Homo (”they tell me that God made man, but he used the monkey to do it…”). I love bringing the Devo to people. There were some great moments where audience members realized what we were up to and just went off! It’s hard to pick a favorite gig (there were so many) but have to say that singing on the tiniest stage in the world at P-cubed was pretty wonderful. We were packed so tight that we could hear perfectly and feed off each other so well. Also, folks at P-cubed get it. Yes that is me (or should I say Marlene Dubois) up there. Polly, Peggy and Claudia I owe you three big F-ing time. That dress was more of hit than you could imagine. I think that Marlene is going to be a regular feature on the playa from now on 
Like I said, too many stories to tell. Crazy nights dancing until the sun came up, fantastic art on the playa (the man was so beautiful this year), the emotional roller coaster that is Playa Choir. As I said to someone at a 9am (!) rehearsal, “if you don’t show up totally wrecked at least once, then it’s not really Playa Choir.” Billion Bunny march, the brown sound, neighbors with crappy music (PleasAir I’m looking at you) and neighbors with awesome music (Porkchop!). The noobs were also fantastic (Punch in the face!).
Wow this is starting to get a little inside baseball. Here’s the rest of the pics. There’s a story as long as this blog about every one. That’s good burn. See you on the playa next year!
-e
The Lucksmiths played their final gig yesterday in Melbourne. I know that in this summer of the obit the last thing anyone needs is another bittersweet bag of memories. So rather than wax on about 15 some-odd years of great music and memories I’ll just leave you with a top ten list. (This was hard. When I tried to create my Lucksmiths top ten I ended up with a top 51!)
Enjoy these and just know that at some point I’ll be cornering you with a story about one or more of these songs.
The Great Dividing Range
(Quite possibly my favorite song ever)
T-Shirt Weather
The Golden Age of Aviation
Southernmost
(”Where the sky was swimming pool blue, and the swimming pool was too…”)
Under the Rotunda
Wyoming
(My very first Lucksmiths song, discovered through that newfangled thing called “filesharing” in 1997)
Camera-Shy
(Nicole, this one’s for you )
Guess How Much I Love You
Untidy Towns
Self-Preservation
(PS: here’s the lot)
As most of the world knows by now, John Hughes had a heart attack last Thursday and passed away at the age of 59. There are many tributes and obituaries all over the net so I will refrain from such an attempt. My EW came today with a very nice piece that is as good as any. Instead here are two of the many great moments I had watching his films.
#1. Riding my bike home after watching Breakfast Club.
I don’t remember who’s house it was, what year it was, or much else really. I remember I was hanging out with a friend in high school and was about to go home. His mom asked if we wanted to watch a video tape. She gave us two choices and I had never heard of either; The Killing Fields or The Breakfast Club. In retrospect that choice seems totally absurd. But I seem to remember it took us a while to decide. Of course in the end we decided against Vietnam genocide and for teen angst. We watched the movie and that was that. I don’t remember saying much before hopping on my bike and heading for home. But that bike ride home! That I remember. Like a raging torrent all this stuff started rushing through my head; Little pieces of the movie that had lodged themselves in a crevice somewhere only to be released by the blood coursing through my brain as I pumped the peddles. Holy crap it was a movie about me. That’s all I really remember, but I remember feeling fantastic.
There haven’t been too many films where I’ve seen myself on the screen. I’m not a doctor, lawyer, cop, gangster, or meteor-destroying-tough-but-lovable-fantastically-gorgeous-dock-worker. Not the smartest kid in class or the dumbest either. Not the rich kid or growing up on the wrong side of the tracks, just normal. It must be hard to write normal people into a movie without it getting dull as dishwater. And that’s really not fair, because I know all sorts of normal people who are anything but dull. I think it would be another 10 years before someone handed me a certain Nick Hornby book and I got to have that experience again. It’s truly enjoyable. Some person you’ve never met, who knows nothing about you, your life or where you come from reaches out across the ether, plucks out a piece of your essence and commits it to paper. The Breakfast Club was the first time that happened and that bike ride home was intoxicating!
In retrospect I think the invigorating thing about that “geek” character (yes, of course that was me) is that he doesn’t go through some magic duck-swan transformation. He comes out the other end of the movie the same person he always was. He’s just more OK with it. Interestingly the other 4 characters pair off, leaving him to essentially “hook-up” with himself. I’m still working that bit out.
#2. The opening three minutes of Some Kind of Wonderful.
It still gives me goosebumps. John Hughes knew about music. He was dialed in to the music that was happening then and there. The fact that he would pull an obscure remix of an obscure flash in the pan like Propaganda for these titles blew my mind. It still blows my mind. There’s only one way this could have happened. He must have actually been listening to the music. My favorite quote from the EW article comes from John Cryer (Duckie): “He told me his whole movie career was just an excise to get a record label.”
Having the music be current probably doesn’t sound all that impressive today. These days producers have “kids” on staff to make sure their soundtracks are current. Indie bands know their only chance of breaking even is getting on the next Garden State or Juno soundtrack. Back then there was no infrastructure. You can tell by listening to the soundtracks of other teen movies of the time. Have you ever heard the Fast Times soundtrack? Terrible! It sounds like it was produced by someone’s dad, which it probably was. (As an aside, I just want to give a shout out to Repo Man. One of the best soundtracks ever!). Eventually Hollywood caught up and now sometimes the movie is just an excuse to sell the soundtrack.
This actually kinda fits in with the Breakfast Club thing. It really was something to see these people on screen moving around to music I was actually listening to at the time. I remember my friends and I would play a game of trying to see if we caught all the names of the bands on the posters in the kids rooms. Although in retrospect Ferris Beuller’s soundtrack was not the best, his room was awesome! When that Jesus and Mary Chain song came on I almost went out in the lobby bought some gum and chewed it up so I could then swallow it! In that spirit here are some great John Hughes soundtrack songs. Enjoy.
New Order - Thieves Like Us (Pretty In Pink)
Jesus and Mary Chain - The Hardest Walk (Some Kind of Wonderful)
Altered Images - Happy Birthday (16 Candles)
O.M.D. - If You Leave (Pretty In Pink)
Propaganda - Abuse (Some Kind of Wonderful)
Oingo Boingo - Weird Science (Weird Science)
Psychedelic Furs - Pretty In Pink (Pretty In Pink)
OK this is cheating. They re-recorded this for the film, but I like the original better. At least I can say this is the recording that inspired the movie title.
Yello - Oh Yeah (Ferris Bueller’s Day Off)
Simple Minds - Dont You Forget About Me (Breakfast Club)
The Smiths - Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want (Pretty In Pink)
RIP John Hughes. And Thanks.
I was struck by a song off Camera Obscura’s latest album My Maudlin Career . (I’ll take any excuse to talk about this record. It is my favorite so far of 2009 and worth picking up.) The song is simply entitled James. I didn’t realize at first why my ears pricked up, but then I noticed something about it. The lead singer is a woman singing directly to a man and calling him out by name. That sort of bold assertion from a female singer surprised me. Intrigued, I started polling my friends. My poor MNA cohort were the first to suffer through this High Fidelity-esque navel gazing. I asked them if they could think of any others. The only solid answer I got was Me and Bobby McGee. This turned out to be a repeating pattern. I had this conversation with others on-line and in person. That Janis Joplin song was always the first to come up. After that the pickings get pretty slim. Some people even start naming songs by men directed toward men.
Camera Obscura - James
Janis Joplin - Me and Bobby McGee
Now I do not claim by any stretch of the imagination to be an encyclopedia of pop music. I am a living example that a large record collection does not make one an expert. But I do think the difficulty I had with this quest says something. I’m sure these songs are out there. I did remember one excellent example in my stacks. PJ Harvey sings directly to her ex-lover in C’mon Billy. But that’s PJ Harvey, right? She’s an exceptional woman with a very unique, bold writing style. There’s also Goodbye Earl by the Dixie Chicks. But now we are verging on “winking” songs. It’s a great song, but more of a kiss-off song. Plus it is written in 3rd person which adds a certain distance between author and subject. Still, hats off to the DCs for bucking the trend. I’m not their number one fan but I love the fact they wrote this song.
PJ Harvey - C’mon Billy
The Dixie Chicks - Goodbye Earl
Now for comparison I give you exhibit A. In a recent episode of Family Guy, Brian delivers the inverse proposition better than I ever could so I’ll let him have at it:
Now women have been writing and performing songs all this time, right? And it’s not like they don’t sing love songs right? So this takes me to the other interesting trend I noticed. Women do write songs to men, but they almost always refer to them obliquely. The first example that jumps to mind is Leader of the Pack, written by Jeff Barry, Ellie Greenwich and George Morton. The singer refers to the subject as him, he, and of course with the moniker Leader of the Pack. Barry and Greenwich collaborated on other girl group hits that seem to following this pattern; Be My Baby, Baby I Love You, Then He Kissed Me and Da Doo Ron Ron (at least Bill gets a shoutout in the last one). Fast forward about 16 years to Sheena Easton singing “My Baby takes the morning train…” in a song written by Susan Bridget Inskip. Lots of songs where the men are referred to as “Baby,” Hrmmm… interesting. And somewhere along the line we have Carley telling someone (we think it’s Mick Jagger, right) about their vanity. These are just examples, but it was much easier to find songs like this that it was to find songs with the fellahs name in the title.
The Shangri-Las - Leader of the Pack
Sheena Easton - Morning Train (AKA 9 to 5)
Carley Simon - You’re So Vain
Now what the heck is going on, right? I have a few theories, but of course I’d like to hear yours. There is of course something here about the way boys use pop songs to get girls. There’s a certain boldness in calling a woman directly in the expectation that she will come hither. Now why no reciprocal arrangement? I know, I know, some men do not like assertive women. It’s not very girly I guess. I’ve never understood this, being a sucker for strong women myself. I guess if a woman is writing for demographics they need to soften their approach. One interesting trend is women writing songs in which they are to speaking to other women about a guy. Even the women are writing to a female audience.
When you say something directly to someone using their name you are demanding their attention. The classic example is the use of full names by parents upset with their children. “Warren Gamaliel Harding I want you to come here right this instant!” At work when someone assigns an action to you by name you are compelled to respond. In a way when someone uses your name they are claiming some ownership over you. You are forced to accept or reject the control they have over you at that moment. Pop music is full of men hoping to posses women, seeing them as objects to achieve or conquests to win. Me Tarzan, you Jane. Maybe that’s why the softer approach is used by the women songwriters. Me Jane, you Tarzan would certainly put some men off.
Well, what do you think? And do you know any other songs that fit in this rare category? I’d be interested to hear your experience trolling through your records trying to find examples. For now I will just be happy that Camera Obscura exists and listen to My Maudlin Career one more time
-e
Bonus Track! OK, this one is sort of cheating. The title is a reference to Lloyd Cole, but what the heck it’s an awesome song so listen to it anyway!
Camera Obscura - Hey Lloyd, I’m Ready to Be Heartbroken
