...an event?" Says I, to the kind, middle-aged housewife from Iowa on the phone at TicketWeb. "Sure, what's the event?".... and here's where it goes all so wrong.
Me: Well, I'm going to see a band, "Holy Fuck," sorry that's their name! Her: Oh (deadpan) Me: It really is their name, I'm not being vulgar, I'm so sorry (turning more than red, feeling sheepish and like I've just exposed somebody's mother to ebaumsworld.. no, do not google it if you don't know.) Her: Ok, well, if that's their name, I guess it's not your fault. (not a hint of humor in this yet AT ALL) Me: Uh, yeah, sorry again about that (complete humiliation achieved, thank you very much guys).
The things we will do to see good music. This conversation lasted a good 10 mins. with all the necessary credit card number tracing, checking with supervisor on the files - between Meatpocket and I, we sometimes get our accounts confused and I had no idea who's credit card I had used. So at the end, I'm sure Mrs. Iowa housewife thought I was not only some weirdo female pervert but one that was committing credit card fraud to do my evil deeds as well! I may be a perv, but I'm certainly not a criminal one. In fact this week I was named "the fleshy pincushion of the blogosphere" in comments on another site (which shall go nameless, I've given him enough credit over here!). I took that as quite a compliment! I like to flirt, and online personas are good fun, and in a world where so much is impersonal, reverting to feminine whiles is not in itself a bad thing. Is it? Besides, who wouldn't want to be a major tart out here in music blog land? Most of you bloggers are men, how else does one join the "good old boys club" without the necessary equipment? Go ahead, give me a poke, I dare ya ;) And no, it's not a photo of me below, I remain anonymous thus far. So it's Friday, and I've got a show to go to, this time with my lovely Meatpocket at my side. We'll see how the dear wife holds up to Holy Fuck. I'll keep you posted. And yeah, this last picture is for a certain pizza blogger, it kinds looks like the guy in it is actually considering going in, eh? Ewww. SafariHoly Fuck EP buy it!
Pop over to the great blog, Fong Songs and hear how the author atteneded the world premiere of the rock doc It Might Get Loud at the Toronto Film Fest. It's a cool story and he was actually in the audience with Jimmy Page, Jack White, and The Edge. He includes a recording of some of the Q&A at the end of the screening... totally cool!
I hate silence, yet I work best in silence, it's such a cruel joke. Gradually, I'm hoping to train my brain to receive data, I mean thick, theoretical data, while listening to ambient music. Other people can do it, even with music that has lyrics. Surely I can make my mind do it, no? Just to be able to go to a coffeeshop and read would be a serious pleasure. Yesterday's Hauschka almost worked, after about the fifteenth go round I stopped listening to it. Here's something a bit angrier today, let's give it a go.
It's also chosen in light of my ongoing effort to switch webhosts, and transfer the small amount of music I've got here on the blog over. Turns out setting up a new file system, (this time correctly, I hope), does actually cause one (intermittently) to want to commit murder. But the kind 12 year old techs enslaved into windowless, brightly lit, carpeted, basement rooms over at the mega conglomerate web hosting site are really very kind when my memory of UNIX file permissions protocols temporarily fails. So, in any event, let us not deny corporate America their child labor and do let me know if the files are downloading slower or faster than before if you notice such things.
As for New Order, this is a track I pulled from a huge gift from the Pup. He's given me a Joy Division/New Order syllabus this past week in the Tart's-School-of-Music 102 (I did come to the table with some knowledge of my own). No, I've barely cracked the cover of it; yes, I'm getting to it as soon as I return properly from my foray into UNIX land. So, this track is all you get, and with very little explanation other than it suits my needs, has a fitting title for my mood, and I quite like the sound of it. Ha! What was I listening to instead of New Order in 1987? Probably the Smiths, Tom Petty, and I must admit Poison or Whitesnake, eeek! xoxoxo
I'm needing some peace and quiet here lately, and I'm finding myself turning to an interesting fellow named Volker Bertelmann, for you can't really have a quiet house or you'd surely go mad. I stumbled across Hauschka, as he is more generally known, awhile back on someone's blog, (before I knew better than to not keep track of where I was getting things so as to be prepared to thank them here.) I always loved piano pieces. Classical music was never a love, however. But piano music was somehow different and I could lose myself in anything that came out of a piano for hours or days. photo credit: bhollins
Hauschka does odd things to his piano. He plays a prepared piano, something created conceptually by the great John Cage. It's adulterated by all sorts of objects, thrown in, tied into, and otherwise mucking up the striking of hammers and tweaking of strings inside the instrument, thereby creating an altered sound. I love the idea of that when I'm feeling rather mucked up inside. But more importantly I love the sound that Hauschka makes and the elements of other instruments he blends into these pieces. It's good music for a quiet day, a day to just give my fucking head a rest.
Happy Wednesday, get over the hump with me, gently... save the exertions for this evening ;)
Haushka Room To Expand 2007
La Dilettante Chicago Morning
Hauskha's webpage more downloads there buy Room To Expand
At the new album by Joan Osborne, Little Wild One, out today, it's beautiful and wonderful and takes her back to herself as I first met her; a soulful, bluesy, sing-it-down-from-the-bottom-of-your-gut kinda woman. Damn that's sexy!
and you know what you do to me, my London lover. Sometimes it takes a song to transverse that ocean and make more real what I see when I look at you, what I feel when your eyes are on me. Come Christmastime I want your hands on me, your lips on me.... everywhere. Let's make it happen, my darling xx
You moved like honey in my dream last night Yeah, some old fires were burning You came near to me and you endeared to me But you couldn't quite discern me
Does that scare you? Ill let you run away But your heart will not oblige you You'll remember me like a melody Yeah, I'll haunt the world inside you
And my big secret - gonna win you over Slow like honey, heavy with mood
I'll let you see me, I'll covet your regard I'll invade your demeanor And you'll yield to me like a scent in the breeze And you'll wonder what it is about me
It's my big secret - keeping you coming Slow like honey, heavy with mood
Though dreams can be deceiving Like faces are to hearts They serve for sweet relieving When fantasy and reality lie too far apart
So I stretch myself across, like a bridge And I pull you to the edge And stand there waiting Trying to attain The end to satisfy the story Shall I release you? Must I release you? As I rise to meet my glory
But my big secret Gonna hover over your life Gonna keep you reaching When I'm gone like yesterday When I'm high like heaven When I'm strong like music cuz I'm slow like honey, and Heavy with mood
[Edit: Just confirmed, Samatha and The Midnight Shivers will be at the Double Door here in Chicago on Oct. 17 with Will Hodge, the everybody fields, and McCarthy Trenching]
If you've never been to O.K., well... that's the best introduction I can think of for it. And Samantha Crain might become the best singer to comeout of it since Woody Guthrie.I say become because this tiny person with this great big voice that echoed all the way up to my seat in the balcony tonight is only 21. Now to you who've seen the YouTube vid above that's not so shocking, but if you've only heard the songs, well, you'd be as shocked as I was.
Disclaimer: I'm a lover of folk music, but bad folk music is worse than even bad punk music and I've no qualms about walking out on a bad gig. No worries here, however with Samantha Crain. Tonight she gave a great solo performance, no... I take that back, tonight she gave a fan-fucking-tastic performance! She sauntered out on stage in her red cowgirl boots and blew us away with "Devils In Boston" featuring her wailing vocals and a damn fine harmonica.
I soon snuck an envelope outta my pocket and a pen and wrote down all the songs she sang, for being in the balcony I knew I'd never make it to the stage in time to swipe the setlist if she even had one. Sure enough, I never even saw it. I did get to speak to her after the show and hastily grabbed my crumpled and scrawled upon little paper, "oh and here's my attempt to keep track of what you sang!" I squealed a bit too loudly into her angelic face. "But of course, that's a bit crazy, isn't it?!" and I trailed off the end of that sentence with a laugh, to which she replied, "well a bit, but you can email me and I'll try and remember it for you." Sweet kid, this Samantha Crain, and I say that with no sarcasm in the least.
So, I'm embarrassed to email the girl from O.K. and here is what I can make out of what she sang for a captive and attentive audience tonight, who all applauded and some of us cheered and whistled, and one older woman in the balcony even sang along on the one's she knew and got an autographed poster, for she already had the EP, thanks "Campfires and Battlefields" and Matthew over on Song, by Toad:
Devils In Boston - a foot stamping, rowdy opener, she shone righteously doing this for us.
something with the chorus of "What will I do?"
Get The Fever Out - go find this song and listen to it, it's beautiful.
Calm Down - unknown to me, a slow and almost melodramatic tune, really lovely and yes, I can't help myself but say it, ...haunting.
The River - with an introduction instructing us that indeed it is a comedic song, at least in O.K. where a preacher drowning children while baptizing them in the river really does hit the funny bone, from The Confiscation EP
Traipsing Through The Aisles- from The Confiscation EP
Where Will You Go? - this was a real and rare treat, a debut of a new song, never before played before an audience and she confessed to being quite nervous about it. I asked her after the show what the name was, this was the working title she gave me, but agreed that it was in flux still. The song was brilliant, full of passion, and I know that's kind of a cliche with her work, but honest to goddess, this song was so real, so full of force, you could see in her body how close to the surface it was for her, how new and raw it was. I think it gave us both chills, her to perform it (she kind of shook it off afterward, like when you get out of a cold pool of water and your flesh is all tingly) and us to receive it, we felt the electricity in the air this evening then.
I Wish The Dam Would Break - introduced as a real "Oklahoma kind of sad song" and it truly was.
the last song she played was the second song she ever wrote. I didn't get the title, I wish I had, for it reminded me of some of the early Indigo Girls songs, before they became known and when they just wrote folk music like their heroines did. The chorus went, "It ain't over yet... What you say, we hold each other up?" And it was gorgeous and simple and young and honest.
Go and buy Samantha's EP, it's only got five songs, it's all she could afford to do at the time, but there's more to come and it's going to be brilliant. She's heading back into the recording studio as we speak, with her band.
But more importantly go see her and The Midnight Shivers, she's wonderful to hear in person, her voice has incredible range, a tone and shape that is unique and interesting and just jarring enough to be so interesting that you want to keep listening to it for another hour or so to try to see what she'll do with it next, and she's gracious and unassuming on stage, a rare treat in so many ways! Lyrically, her songs travel to all those places of heartache, sadness, melancholy, bittersweet and remembrances long past due. You want to go there with her. You need to go there with her. Go see her. You have received your orders. xoxoxo
The River, The Confiscation EP, Samantha Crain and the Midnight Shivers 2007
Change Your Mind, Demos, Samantha Crain 2007
I Don't Wanna Know, Strange Fire, Indigo Girls 1987
buy The Confiscation EP her MySpace (Yes, two very different kinds of folk music for you today, but something about them goes together in my mind, ... the early rawness of an emerging woman artist perhaps)
Needless to say, the music on this site is for evaluational purposes & will only be available for a limited time. If you hear something you like, please support the artists by purchasing their music & going to a gig. If you represent an artist featured on this site and would like their file removed, please email: atartytart (at) gmail (dot) com. If you take a track leave a comment, it's just the cool thing to do.
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