You should have told me yourself

Dear friends,

1. It's Wednesday which means videos!

I swear I really am working on an interminable piece about Amy Winehouse. Much like my interminable pieces on Thom Yorke (that one surfaced) and Boubacar Traore (did not) I am stuck between my own conflicting opinions on the artist, their pre-occupations and whether or not they mean it, man. I care very much about sincerity. I even like my insincerity to be sincere (see: "I fake it so real/I am beyond fake") this is a trait I can't explain. Grad Psych majors, hit me with your best shot.

She certainly captures the eye. Her camera stare in recent photos, ratty beehive, black eyeshadow tilting up at the corners in the shape of bat's wings, tattoo-ed pool hall broad from the 60's costume, ranges from defiant to awkward. Does she want to tell you she's loved you all this time or does she want to smash you on the head with a bottle? It's hard to say. So instead I focus on the sound, the aching vulnerability in her voice. Like an ashtray and booze sportin' Dinah Washington, forever staring out the window at the cars while the record skips in the background.

Heard It Through The Grapevine/Amy Winehouse and Paul Weller (video)



If she sang along to this song at home, I can't imagine that it would be much different than this performance. Despite the tabloid image trappings; the tottering heels, the pulling up the skimpy dress*, the boozy unfocused look in the eyes - it sounds real. I'm not saying I believe she heard about her man cheating her and now she's going to lose her mind. No. I mean that it sounds like she's lost in the song, like it's pleasure.

2. It's Wednesday which means MP3 Flashbacks!

Since I've been babbling on Soft Communication for a few years now about songs and artists that I never included mp3s or even weblinks for**, I thought I might include a feature now and again where I revisit old posts and let you hear the songs I was prattling on about then. Here is a holiday themed entry from '05, called Give a toast to now featuring tiny, unknown acts Radiohead and Queen.

Love, D

* Interestingly, as concerned as she is with keeping the dress from falling down, she spends a lot of time in this performance channeling Gypsy Rose Lee and flashing thigh. It's rather endearing.

** Uh, 'cause I didn't know how and I kinda still don't?

In the light I saw

Dear friends,

1. I had a post idea up and ready but am missing the necessary mp3s* to make it happen. It's a story about blasting music out the window at your neighbor. It will have to wait until Wednesday.

2. Spent Saturday playing Carioca with Moms** and The Monkey. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony was playing in the background. She looked up from her cards at the screen and said, "Isn't that the guy that sings with the whites of his eyes?" (In Spanish this makes much more sense) to which I replied, "Si." She meant Eddie Vedder, who, as you may recall, has a habit of rolling his eyes when he's feeling particularly impassioned during a vocal so that all you see are two white slits, like a zombie.

Jeremy/Pearl Jam (video)



See what I'm talking about?

I won't front, I loved me some Pearl Jam back in the day and while I don't hate them now or anything, I find it interesting that I never listen to their cds anymore. Not even in nostalgia. I don't know if it's because the music didn't age well for me OR because the vocal progeny of the Vedder vibrato are just SO AWFUL that listening to Pearl Jam would be a painful reminder of the fact. Think about it. Vedder is indirectly responsible for most of the horrible, horrible "modern rock" singers that you accidentally hear on the radio or see on MTV/VH1, in a video where they sing a ballad in a studio or in the freakin' rain. I know it's not his fault and yet, it is. Still, on Saturday night, I felt kinder to Vedder than I have in years when he said, in his sweet fan kid induction speech for REM, that he listened to Murmur about twelve thousand times***. Suddenly, it all made sense. The bleat, the marbles in the mouth. I am going to transfer that anger towards Michael Stipe instead. It's all his fault.

Moon River/Pretty Persuasion/REM (video from Old Grey Whistle Test)



Ah, but isn't that nice?

It was great to see Bill Berry playing with them. Despite his brain going boom, he looks way better than Peter Buck who is still rocking that kicked off a plane look. I love you though Bucky, you and your Rickenbacker are cool beans.

Mike Mills will outlive us all.

A commercial for the new Amy Winehouse came on several times during the broadcast. My mom said "I like her. Who is that?" I told her, even though I knew she wouldn't remember her name the next day or that she even asked. This is no knock on my mom's memory, which is elephantine about most things, it's just that, unlike her spawn, she's not an obsessive. Which means she doesn't know the names of the people in her favorite bands because she really doesn't need to. The song is enough. She used to stare at me in bemusement when I was a kid, endlessly alphabetizing all my cassette tapes. She said I must've gotten the trait from her father, who collected tango 45s and used to sweep her up in his arms and dance her around the kitchen whenever she came in from playing outside. I realized that if I ever have a child, they may not care to remember the name of the drummer in New Order or who Donnie Hathaway is. They may just ask me now and again, "Who is that? I like them." and immediately forget after I tell them. And that's just fine.

You Know I'm No Good/Amy Winehouse (video)



I have more to say about Miss Winehouse but I'll save that for the proper album review.

Love, D

* The cds are at mi mami's

** Yes, I know I was just there. I forgot to take them. I am a space cadet.

*** I can't say I listened to it as many times as Vedder but I did listen to Murmur quite a bit. Enough to still get the line "So much more attractive/inside a moral kiosk." stuck in my head every now and again, on an endless loop. Yes, it is as painful as it sounds.