Hopetoun

I have many fond memories of the Hopetoun Hotel but I’m faintly surprised that it lasted as long as it did. I think I first saw a band there in 1986. For comparison, I wonder how many music venues in Sydney from 1963 were still in operation in that year? The old Capitol Theatre, perhaps. This post puts things in perspective.

MJ

Two of my daughters have become Michael Jackson fanatics in the weeks since his death, and the copy of The Essential Michael Jackson I bought for them has been on high rotation, causing me to realise a few things:

• Everything up to and including the singles from Off The Wall is faultless, except for that one note he hits really sharp in “I Want You Back.” And the song “Off The Wall” could probably do without the creepy laughter in the intro.
• Speaking of creepy, “Ben” is a beautiful little ballad, and probably the oddest chart hit in pop history.
• “Rock With You” is sublime. I liked it a lot when I was ten, and now I know why. Those vocal harmonies in the chorus are incredible.
• “Black or White” is surprisingly enjoyable, considering how much I disliked it at the time of its release.
• The girls reckon Bad was when it all started to go wrong. I think it was Thriller. “Billie Jean” and “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” are as good as anything else he did, but the title track and “Beat It” aren’t quite as good.
• It’s strangely fascinating to hear his vocal style as it dissolves into twitches, hiccups and mannerisms.

Sonic Youth T-shirt

[a shivery, whining tinkle, a screwdriver scraped down an electric guitar tuned to a whole-tone scale]

There was this girl
in line for coffee
in a Sonic Youth t-shirt
with the Raymond Pettibon cover from Goo
that I thought was trying too hard to be confronting
when I bought that album.

[creaks and thumps like the sound of the couplings on an old freight car plugged into a Marshall stack]

I never listen
to that record anymore
because my pet rabbit jumped on it
while it was playing
one day in 1993.
The record span down
with a sudden EEEEOOWP.
Much to my rabbit’s surprise.

[EEEEEEEEOOOWP. Silence for 7"]

Rock on,
girl in the Sonic Youth t-shirt.

[Explosion of loud distorted guitar with lots of feedback. Repeat till fade.]

Songs in a Subjunctive Mood II

This is a rerun of an old post, with the extra songs Laura contributed in the comments. Mostly because I want to see if Peter has any extra suggestions.

“If It Be Your Will” – Leonard Cohen
“Your Song” – Elton John and Bernie Taupin
“If I Were a Carpenter” – Bobbie Darin
“Six Ribbons” – Jon English
“If You Could Read My Mind” – Gordon Lightfoot
“If I Can Dream” – Elvis Presley
“If You See Her, Say Hello” – Bob Dylan
“If She Knew What She Wants” – The Bangles
“Time after Time” – Cyndi Lauper
“If I Were a Rich Man”  – Harnick and Bock
“If I Knew You Were Coming I’d’ve Baked a Cake” – Cookie Monster

JB

Poppea

And while we’re on the subject of Barrie Kosky, I should add that his production of Poppea at the Opera House was excellent. Most of the reviews have pointed out that Monteverdi’s audience would have known that Poppea came to a bad end. But so would Mel Brooks’.

Skip to 6.20 if you don’t have time to watch one of the funniest scenes ever filmed.

songsincode

#songsincode is one of the most fun Twitter memes I’ve seen, and on Friday night (Sydney time) it was going nuts.

.leaves { color: #630 } #sky { background-color: #999 }

null $ (filter (== "I'm") love)

(and (fast-p (car you)) (wants-ticket-to-anywhere-p me))

my $milkshake; map { $milkshake->bring_to(address => $yard, person => $_) } @boys;

foldl pass [] dutchie

if( grep /^bustle$/, @hedgerow ) { alarm 0; }

To my Twitter followers: you are very patient. Or nerds. Or both.

Here is an interesting rundown from the folk who started it.

Michael Clark

More Michael Clark

John Hughes R.I.P.

In 1986, a pretty girl who I wasn’t exactly friends with struck up a conversation with me about “this English band called The Smiths who I heard you were into” and asked if I would tape any albums I had, so of course I made her a copy of Meat is Murder and The Queen Is Dead. In hindsight, this odd level of interest in both Smiths and myself was probably due to the influence of John Hughes, although I hadn’t seen any of his work at the time and was merely annoyed at him for the fact that my 7″ copy of New Order’s “Shell-shock” had the words “From the Pretty In Pink Motion Picture Soundtrack” printed on the label. For some reason I found this a bit embarrassing. I can’t remember the girl’s name.

Cecil Taylor

After I got the Cecil Taylor CD I spend a while surfing YouTube for clips of his later concerts. Good grief, why didn’t I know?

The comments are more fun to read than is usually the case. It’s been a very long time since I discovered an artist and then found that other people reckon he’s a portent of the end of civilisation and that people only like him because of hype. They put me in mind of lunar landing conspiracy theorists; whether Taylor’s sounds are to your taste or not it would seem foolish to deny that he’s doing something exceptional.

Look, he’s walking around up there. He’s bringing back ROCKS.

Also on music: Jeremy Denk is a concert pianist with a fun blog. And voting closes tonight for the Hottest 100 Women poll.