B - Boy Bouillabaise - The Beastie Boys - Paul's Boutique - 1989

I work right outside the NYC side entrance to the Holland Tunnel. Me and several of my coworkers just spent a solid 10 minutes looking at a traffic accident out our window, that caused traffic to back up for blocks. We couldn't actually see any damage to either car, we didn't hear a crash, yet several people (and one baby)were taken out of the front car in stretchers. Curious...

On another note, here is the last track on the Beastie's breakthrough and (in my opinion) still best album. They seem to be borrowing a trick from The Beatles here by releasing a suite of half completed songs as a single song...unless of course you get the new reissue which separates each segment as an individual song...much the same that the CD version of Abbey Road does to side two. In the interest of simplicity, I've only included the link for the first song in the suite.

B - Pinback - Offcell - EP

B!!!! I made it to B! That's right haters, doubters, mimes and Rance, I made it to the letter B and it only took me a year and a half. Ugh.

Well, at least I'm not in the A's anymore.

Anyway, gotta love Rob Crowe's "white guy attempting to deliver a dancehall rant" on this puppy. If it weren't for that odd machine noise intro, this would be one of my favorite Pinback songs actually.

I've always assumed the title was a reference to the key the song was played in, but with these guys you just never know and my ear isn't good enough to tell you for a fact that this song is actually in B. Whatever, it definitely displays Pinback's rockier side, and for me that's their stronger side.

Awoo - The Hidden Cameras - Awoo - 2006

So, I'm experimenting with adding Amazon links to my blog, should anyone wish to actually buy the songs I'm (occasionally) writing about. One of my co-workers was bored today and told me I should do this, so I figured "why not?".

Anyway, Awoo (the album) is one of those things that I downloaded after reading a good review listened to once or twice and liked well enough and then promptly never ever listened to again. It pops up on random from time to time and I find myself enjoying it just enough to not delete it...plus I seem to recall that there were a couple songs on this album that I was into...just not this one.

Not much of a recommendation, but hey...if you want to check them out, click the Amazon link.

Awkward Duet - Sons & Daughters - Love the Cup - 2004

A surprisingly delicate cut from S&D, from back in the days when the guitar player used to sing too and pop sheen wasn't there foremost target. I saw these guys open up for Clinic at a CMJ show in 2003 and was thoroughly impressed with their girl/boy harmonies, ability to combine rockabilly instincts with dark noir undertones, and of course the completely unabashed Scottish accents that has since become a much more acceptable strategy (The Twilight Sad and Frightened Rabbits, I'm looking at you!).

So I went to go see Polvo in concert at The Belle House last night with some of my long time friends. The show was good, and it was nice to see 90's math rock getting it's due...but my concert experience was definitely shaded by a middle aged, totally sloshed Brit who insisted on wearing his narrow brim fedora through the whole show. Seriously dude, take off your fucking hat! Some of us would actually like to watch the show and not have our view constantly obstructed by your obnoxious affectation. I've never understood the need to display your personality through wardrobe. Why not display your personality through your words and actio...on second though, you're probably an asshole...just take the hat off during a concert so the rest of us can see the show, you limey douchebag.

Awful Bliss - Guided By Voices - Bee Thousand - 1994

So I have a really awful story to go along with this song. Like a really, really embarrassing and shameful story, but frankly, it is what I think about when I hear this song and will be what I think about when I hear this song until the day I die...so I pretty much have to tell this story.

The song itself is relatively simple. One of the small handful of GBV tracks sung by reedy voiced "Classic Lineup" guitar player Tobin Sprout, it clocks in at barely over 1 minute long. It's a sad, acoustic ballad in the middle of an album of Pollard's bombastic triumphs. And it's really just one verse and a single line repeated a few times as a chorus, but epic song lengths were not GBV's forte.

So...about that story...it was the weekend before Thanksgiving of 99. I was living my last year in Cincinnati, saving money to move to NYC the following summer. My girlfriend at the time was visiting her family in Ecuador, and I decided to go grab a bite to eat with one of my friends. As there is jack-shit to do in Cincy, we ended up at the TGI Friday's in Kenwood drinking and eating Jack Daniel's Chicken Strips (Cuisine was not high on Cincy's list in the 90's...though my mother assures me it's gotten better). After a few we headed our separate ways.

Cut to Tuesday night by which point both myself and my friend have easily the worst food poisoning either of us have ever, ever had. It was so bad in fact that I couldn't drive to my family's thanksgiving celebration, because I was in the bathroom every 20 minutes AROUND THE CLOCK. And it's this around the clock thing that really brings us back to this song.

Now, I don't know if you've ever gone a few days straight sleeping only in little 15 minute bursts...but let me tell you, you start to go a little loopy. You live in a fog where the whole world is strange. It's like the worst drug you've ever EVER taken. I remember laying on my couch, Thanksgiving Day, trying to watch the Macy's Parade and drifting in and out of consciousness between trips to the toilet. (Again, I apologize for the scatological nature of this post)...and for some strange reason for that whole period, I just had that one single line "And I wouldn't dare to bring out this awful bliss" running in my head...over and over. I'm fairly certain it's what madness feels like. Like maybe Manson just kept hearing "Helter-Skelter" in his head, just like that...granted I wasn't homicidal...if anything I mostly just wanted to die...but still...

Anyway, by Friday I had to go to the ER and be rehydrated and given some anti-biotics. It took me about a week after that to get back on solid food, and I will honestly say without fear of exaggeration that nearly 10 years later...my stomach has never fully recovered...and I will never hear this song again without thinking about that just awful, awful 4 days.

Away with Murder - Camera Obscura - My Maudlin Career - 2009

Despite their move away from Merge records (a decision I will never support) Camera Obscura continues to do what they do and do it very well. Mopey, girl-group inflected, Scottish accented pop. Traceyanne Campbell continues to have the lowest self esteem in the world, but that, along with a wonderfully forlorn voice, is how she works. This particular song adds nice little country touches like the organ and peddle steel, all of which work well to increase the sad-sack vibe.

Away From The Numbers - The Jam - In The City - 1977

And so The Jam continues it's odd stranglehold on the "A's"...with a solid rocking number from their first album, when they were still a post-punk band. Though again, the preponderance of Jam songs in the first letter of the alphabet gives the impression that I'm a bigger Jam fan than I actually am. Still this is a good song.

So, I ran into a former co-worker on the street...and it just baffles me how some people's lives are just destined for drama. Granted, I occasionally have an interesting and exciting life, I live in NYC: I go out a bit and work at a somewhat unorthodox company...but most nights I go home and watch movies with my girlfriend, watch soccer with my boys, or play video games alone...but this girl...well, granted, she's 11 years younger than me and most would consider her a looker, but the amount of crazy things that happen to her do tend to leave me shaking my head.

On this particular occasion she informed me (I hadn't seen her since April or so) that she had recently gotten married. Though I'm used to her surprises, this one definitely caught me out of the blue, as last time I saw her she was complaining about the fact that she hadn't had a date in years. Additionally she was not wearing a ring. When I mentioned this fact to her, she just laughed and pointed out that she was marrying an old family friend so that he could get his papers and that she was being very well paid for it.

Now why doesn't this shit ever happen to me? Baffling.

Award Tour - A Tribe Called Quest - Midnight Marauders - 1993

And so speaking of the frustration of following things that used to be a cool little niche that are now more and more mainstream...it's actually become harder and harder for me to be an American soccer fan (A soccer fan who is American, not a fan of the generally awful MLS).

Again, like Indie Rock, it's counter-intuitive. I would have thought, 10 years ago, that living in a world in which everyone knew who Pavement and The Pixies were would be AWESOME! But instead, I find it sort of troubling and frustrating. Well, Soccer has sort of become the same way. With EPL games becoming increasingly broadcast on Fox Soccer Channel, Setanta Sports and starting this season ESPN2 I have more opportunities than I ever did to watch the sport I love...but the problem with this came up yesterday.

Arsenal played the first round of the Champions League group stages yesterday against Belgian Champions Standard Liege. The game was live at 245 and was being shown on FSC at 5 PM. I set my TiVo, stayed away from the Internet in the afternoon and prepared to go home and watch my game. As it turned out, do to some collasally stupid defending Arsenal went down two goals in the first five minutes of the game (This is exceptionally fast, for those that don't know)...and within ten minutes after that I received all sorts of messages from various friends and acquaintances that know of my strange obsessions "Dude, sorry about your team", "Are you watching this, yikes!" and "Yeah, you may not want to watch this game..."

Now fortunately, we did come back to win 2-3, but...even as little as 3 years ago, no one I knew, besides my fellow soccer fans would have had any clue that there was a game on. And certainly none of them would have been watching...but there it was.

It's hard being me.

Anyway, this Tribe song is a further result of my girlfriend's attempt to broaden my horizons. It's fun, I don't hate it...that's about all you can ask, right?