Teenage kicks, so hard to beat

I'd like to say a word for Mr. John Peel, 1939-2004.

I always found him fascinating; he was a radio disc jockey that for some reason accrued all this respect from bands and listeners, and I didn't know why. He just played records, didn't he? Well, yes. But it's what he did to nurture fresh talent. It's how he batted off critics who said his devotion to the un- and only just- signed acts proved he didn't think mainstream music was cool enough. He said his position was such that he could bring great music to a wider public's attention, and that he would stick with bands for longer but a) they didn't need him when they were famous and b) there was a bottomless well of talent there to be discovered, so his work was never done.

It was his eclecticism: he was so unpredictable he was almost annoying. Almost. Many people said he was overrated, and I was always brought up to think so. In fact, if I'm honest, I only very rarely caught his show because it was so uncompromisingly weird. It seems silly, and a total contradiction, that I have a CD (2002's FABRICLIVE.07), compiled by the man himself, that I listen to all the time. Perhaps I should have stuck with him for longer.

Still, there's something very cool about being sixteen in a mate's car, hearing a Glenn Miller-esque big band 78, followed by Dizzee Rascal, topped off with some obscure underground Russian trance or something. Whether or not you find that sort of eclecticism big or clever, one thing's for sure: only John could to get away with it.

I hope the Kop Choir pay their respects at the next match, he'd have loved that.

Well, think of this as an after-dinner mint...

Yesterday's entry of A Kiss After Supper coincides with evidence that soundtracks are settling somewhat from their bloated Judgement Night and fatuous Batman Forever days, becoming a less intrusive addition to the films they score. Not only do they maintain their cachet among the cognoscenti, they're also introducing new generations (as well as those older folks relegated to the coma-inducing Top 40 and other such radio formats) to interesting music.

Jon Brion, responsible for the carbonated I Heart Huckabees soundtrack, has gotten a lot of press lately with Tom Moon's thoughful write-up in the Philadelphia Inquirer as well as a review on Pitchfork. Have we entered a new era of film scoring for hip, artistic, and small pictures? Will Brion and Mark Mothersbaugh ultimately usurp the terrain formerly held by Ennio Morricone? Will composers, while scoring a battle sequences, never ask themselves, "What would John Williams do?" again? Or will this all be forgotten when auteurs like Wes Anderson, David O. Russell, Michel Gondry, Spike Jonze and Sophia Coppola get swallowed up by the mass-market Leviathan? Is The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou the beginning of the end?

Lucky, lucky you

If you are lucky enough to have a job that allows you to listen to music of your choice during the day, be thankful. As a longtime employee in the retail enviornment, I am at the mercy of whatever in-store playlist happens to be in effect on any particular day. And since I travel to different stores each day, it's always something new. One store has a definite 80s thing goin' on (Men w/o hats, Soft Cell), another is all teen-pop and Blink182 type stuff. The worst are the stores whose playlist repeats after only a few hours, forcing the same songs on me more than once. Please indulge me, as I'd like to share an hour or so of what I must endure.

Cher-Right Now
Al Green-Let's Stay Together
Push Stars-Crazy (I)
Dire Straits-Sultans of Swing
James Taylor_Jump Up(I)
Stevie Nicks-?
Peabo Bryson & Roberta Flack-Looking Like Love(I)
Jimmy Buffet-Mexico
Association-Cherish
Eric Clapton-It was You
Badfinger-No Matter What
Sheena Easton-Too Many Walls(I)
10,000 Maniacs-Trouble Me
Harpers Bizarre-Feelin Groovy

..and so on. The (I) indicates where the song was interrupted by an in-store commercial. You'll notice the gods were kind enough to let both the Association and Badfinger to go unmolested, and for that I am grateful.

Today was a good day, as Ice Cube might say, but tomorrow...who knows? Throughout the day, I am subjected to the ridiculous (Gloria Estefan) and the sublime (Todd Rundgren) and often on the ride home, I just turn on NPR to flush the involuntary music from my brain. So enjoy your choices if you have them and say a prayer for those of us who have none.

Rack 'em up

As a music enthusiast, I occasionally find myself staring at my CD collection in it's slightly naff racking, underneath my hi-fi, centre stage in the grand scheme of my room. Unlike John Cusack's character in High Fidelity, I'm not interested in methods of ordering and the variety of methods doesn't interest me any more than is natural for someone with a life. My CDs are alphabetized by artist, and then date ordered by discography. Just like they should be. I seem to remember that in Nick Hornby's book (was it in the film as well? Bothered?), he ends up re-organising them according to the key moments in which his character became as inane as Hornby himself.

On the evenings in which my social life dwindles slightly, I have noticed in my racks some dubious and often downright preposterous relationships between neighbouring albums. Sure, Nick Drake sits pretty comfortably next to Dylan (as I imagine he'd always have wanted it), and the date ordering system even means his later, solitary work rubs shoulders with Dylan's similarly lone, organic stuff. I guess it's also appropriate that Drake backs on to Cohen, but less so that you have to go through De La Soul and (ahem) Dodgy to get to and fro.

Conversely, in F's, Fairport Convention, Faithless, the Ben Folds Five and Franz Ferdinand all stand together in one huge(ly) disposable cabaret of forgotten dreams, ill-conceived dreams, and well - just dreams. There's a huge indie mish-mash down in S as Supergrass, The Strokes, Super Furry Animals, The Stone Roses and The Smiths strum away over half a shelf (with some friends). Just looking in that direction, I wonder where I went wrong as Talk Talk's sublime soundscaping burns holes in the first Thrills record.

There are a few other good couplings (The Beautiful South like proud parents of their post-grad kids, Belle & Sebastian), Björk and The Beta Band making music to take drugs to make...etc, and two generations country closing the set (Neil Young and Wilco). But there are also some terrible ones: Johnny Cash and Cast (bought when I was a nipper, and I don't ever weed records out), Damon Albarn's Mali Music and the Manic Street Preachers, Morrissey and Motown, Shine 5 and Talvin Singh?

Since these pairings look so uncomfortable, I'm lead to think that maybe Hornby's protagonist had the right idea. What do other Stylus writers think, what unorthodox methods of ordering are used, and what are your best/worst pairings?

Southern Smoke 10

This isn't new or anything (in fact Gel and Weave posted the tracklist back in May and Southern Smoke 14 is already out) but I'm not sure that there's a better single-disc mixtape to represent southern hip-hop in 2004. Its hosted by Bubba Sparxxx and its got pretty much everything you want in a southern comp - A lot of the tracks on this are already hits or are on their way to being hits - "Nolia Clap remix," "Three Kings," "I Want it U Got It," "Knuck if you Buck," "What They Gon' Do," etc. If you're wondering why the new Eminem single is so crappy, Lil Jon and Eminem's "Crunk Juice (40oz)" won't make things any clearer because it bangs and Eminem sounds a lot hungrier and less bored than on his single. Its also got a whole bunch of Bun B verses (what mixtape this year doesn't...) but he's always welcome to drop them - even this far into his career and minus Pimp C he's still killing it.

Southern Smoke 11 was interesting because it was T.I. live from prison but it definitely doesn't have the same number of hot tracks that ten does. I haven't heard Southern Smoke 12 w/ Juvie but a quick scan of the tracklist suggests it isn't quite as good either.

I haven't been paying attention to mixtapes much since I got to school but if you get one CD of southern hip-hop this year, this wouldn't be a bad choice.

Buy Southern Smoke 10 or check the tracklist here.

Eminem - "Just Lose It"

I knew it was a great choice for a single when my girlfriend said she thought he’d gone completely mad upon seeing the video (Madonna / MC Hammer rips, dancing kids, comedy projectile vomit, nudity et al), but I’d suspected already that it was a good sign when everyone else seemed so put out by it. “Just Lose It” is bizarre even by Eminem’s standards, stealing hooks from himself, from Lisa Simpson’s tyrannical tapdance teacher, playing gay, playing dumb, using a stupid laughing sample as the fulcrum of the chorus…

He’s always played comedy dramatics perfectly, giving the sociologists something to talk excitedly about, the kids something to shout excitedly about and the conservatives something to complain excitedly about. Now he’s fucked up his own fans, shifting lyrical emphasis from murder fantasies to homosexuals and vicodin to fame to this bizarre, deliberately crap melange of homosexual club-oriented meta-bio. But if people are pissed at this then they’re not listening properly – sure, the beat’s not the best he’s ever used, but “Just Lose It” is a procession of hooks from start to finish, and even if Em isn’t spitting hate and frustration and OTT bile, he’s still making people raise eyebrows and ask “what the fuck?”. Is he on the verge of coming out? Is he making a bid to alienate the people who made him famous (and thus made his life even more of a hell)? Is he just fucking with us and playing our expectations before we’ve had a chance to hear Encore? He’s not dropped a bad album yet, and I don’t imagine for one minute that “Just Lose It” is a sign that he’s lost it.

Music for the Sick

As I am currently a bit under the weather, I was wondering what everyone tends to listen to when they're sick. I frequently can't listen to music at all, especially when it's a fever...