Category Archives: night music

Night Music: Forest for the Trees, “Dream”

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There are many things wrong with this song, or maybe I should say there are things that seem wrong at first that start to cohere (in a dreamy incoherent way), once it gets into your earworm. Carl Stephenson, the brains here, was Beck’s collaborator on Mellow Gold, co-writer of Loser, which launched a giant career that wasn’t Stephenson’s. As Beck broke he had a nervous breakdown, though I have no idea if there’s any causation there.

I thought of this tune after playing the Vintage Caravan’s excellent tune, “Expand Your Mind” over and over the other day. I think the video (which is someone’s art project) is trippier than the tune, but I like the tune, which percolates in a world music way, a lot.

Night Music: Animal Crackers, “Hooray for Captain Spaulding”

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About a year ago my friend Lisa’s husband died. Tonight there was a memorial for him in the Great Hall at Cooper Union, where his friends and family talked about his especially vibrant life.

Not neglected was his love of movies and comedy. Oh, and the Marx Brothers, who so often combined the two.

Good night, Peter.

Night Music: The Troggs, “Wild Thing”

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Came upon this funny homemade video featuring feral women like Barbara Bach, her husband Ringo Starr, and Charlton Heston, for the Troggs’ No. 1 US hit, the song that got Reg Presley out of the building trades. This is a song we’ve all heard about a million times too many, and I don’t mind it at all.

Night Music: The Temptations, “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone”

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There are songs I remember hearing for the first time.

This one came when I was sitting in my mother’s car outside the Grand Union, while she picked up some groceries.

It was dark and my daddy had moved out. We lived in the suburbs, but I’d spent time in Harlem working on some church urban regeneration projects. I knew the city the way any 14 year old from Long Island might. Through the pages of Life magazine.

What I remember about hearing this song the first time was all the space in it. I didn’t really think then about mix, but this wasn’t a crafted Motown tune that used every available track in a maximal way. This was a Motown tune that did its best to open up every bit of sound for the better whole. Motown meets Beatles, you might say.

I think this is a great riff and a great mix of a fine rifftastic song, but not so much a great song. But really, who cares. I could listen to it all night.

Night Music: Brother D with Collective Effort, “How We Gonna Make a Black Nation Rise”

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Those opaque Good Rats’ lyrics about going to the city and organizing reminded me of this highly pleasurable bit of agitprop from 1980. And I’m not kidding.

And when Brother D says, “Look at the so called Indian, look what happened to him,” he might well have been talking about the Good Rats’ Injun Joe. Right?

Dibbe dibbe dize.

Up All Night! More Dimaggio. Via Pomplamoose.

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The music making entity called Pomplamoose has been around for a while. They do cute covers of classic songs, with clever arrangements that build off their cute parts. She’s a cute singer. He’s a cute musician.

Their videos have generated 100s of millions of YouTube hits, which is good for them, and they recently went on tour to support their new album. I know nothing about the album or the tour, but they posted an accounting yesterday on Medium of what it means financially to be an internet sensation on the rock touring road.

Interestingly, they hired a real band to accompany them, which was expensive. And I think reflects well on their motives. It was also probably the reason they lost money.

All in all, I’m not a fan. Too cute. But as far as too cute goes, I like them, which I think is too their credit (since I have great taste). And not only did they go all transparent about their tour, which is a good thing, but they happened to cover Simon and Garfunkel’s Mrs. Robinson, which is a pretty good Joe Dimaggio song. Yesterday was his 100th birthday, if he was alive.

Night Music: Wilco and Billy Bragg (Woody Guthrie), “Joe Dimaggio’s Done It Again”

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Joe Dimaggio was born 100 years ago today. Last year we posted the great Teddy Powell Band tune, Joltin’ Joe.

This year, Wilco and Billy Bragg’s rendering of Woody Guthrie’s lyrics, from their second Mermaid Avenue album. Happy Birthday, Joe.

I don’t know why Joe Dimaggio has so many songs. There is, of course, that Simon and Garfunkel song, and Les Brown’s original hit recording of Joltin’ Joe. I think I prefer the Teddy Powell version.