For Squirrels - Example

This album came out while I was in high school.  I loved the lead single, and remember watching its video quite a bit on MTV, but by the time I got my hands on the album and listened to the entire thing, there were six or seven songs I liked even more.  Front to back, this is an album I always loved.  

Tragically, a van accident killed the lead singer and bass player shortly before this album was released, so this band remains rather obscure.  I remember in my early twenties always being surprised when I would meet someone who also had this album.  Usually, if someone had it, they were just about as enthusiastic about it as I was.

Example reminds me of my youth, gone many years ago.  It reminds me of longtime friends,  many of whom are gone in different ways.  It reminds me of driving down 35 or 270 or 33 to go hang out.  It makes me wish I could write a song that makes someone feel the way that "Disenchanted" still makes me feel all these years later.  It makes me wish I could write something with the brilliant simplicity of "Eskimo Sandune".

Also, these lyrics from "Under Smithville" have taken on different meaning for me than they did back in the day:

"And I've been feeling so old / Tell me now who you think I am"

Boyz II Men - Cooleyhighharmony

This album came out in 1991.  I was in junior high school.  I remember that you couldn't get away from the two hit singles on this record.  The more upbeat of them, "Motownphilly", had a video that was on MTV all of the time... you know, back when MTV played videos.  Four young black men, well-dressed, and singing some tight harmonies over a hip hop beat.  I don't remember having heard anything like it.  The other ubiquitous single, "It's So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday", was sung a cappella in four part harmony, with finger snaps being the only percussion.  I didn't know at the time that this was a cover.  What a fantastic choice to do a rendition of this song like this and put it on the album.  Maybe the album doesn't go nine times platinum without this song.

To do my due diligence for this blog post, I went back and listened to this album again.  It sounds very much of the time period from where it came, but it still sounds good.  

Those of you who remember this album might think that I have forgotten to mention "End of the Road", which was another single that you couldn't escape from hearing.  Well, it wasn't originally on this album.  It was a single produced for a movie soundtrack, and it did so well, that the label put it on the re-issue of Cooleyhighharmony that came out in 1993.  (The re-issue contains a fantastic a cappella rendition of "In the Still of the Night", and I remember wishing I could sing like that.  I mean, check out the glory of the nineties in this video.)

Listening these songs again takes me back to wandering the halls of Central Junior High.  I am also reminded of my younger brother, who loved this group and this album.

I have a vegan sister-in-law.  As a present to her, I made reservations at Le Potager de Charlotte when we went to Paris in the spring.  Note that I am definitely NOT vegan... but this place is fantastic, and even if you are an omnivore, if you happen to be in Paris, I recommend you stop by.

First, it's a family run restaurant.  There are two of them... one is in the 17th arrondisement, and the other is in the 9th.  One of the co-owners greeted us at the door and was also our server.  I like to support small businesses, especially the kind where the folks who own the place put so much work and energy into their restaurant.

Second, the food is outstanding.  Here, have a look at the menu. Note that some things on the menu change, based on what kind of vegetation happens to be fresh and in season. 

I started with the chickpea and rice crêpes.  (A side note to the folks at Le Potager de Charlotte... I'm an anglophone, and personally, I think it sounds strange to call these "pancakes".  Sure, they're thicker than your normal French crêpes, but I feel that your English-speaking customers know what a crêpe is without needing to translate it.  Just my opinion.)  You can see a picture of this starter on their website.  That cashew cream filling... wow.  It tasted fatty and cheesy, and the espelette powder on it added just a small background spiciness.  This was outstanding.  As you can see in the picture, it was served on some mixed salad.  No complaints about this course.  For my second course, I had another entrée, the avocado.  This is where I wish I had taken a picture.  It was basically a riff on a hard-boiled egg... but this is a vegan place, so the avocado was standing in for the solidified egg white.  The substance that made up the "yolk" was a deep yellow color, no doubt due to turmeric... and also a creamy and fatty mouth feel... see, this is the challenge with vegan food to me... how to make up for the taste and texture requirements where animal-based fats traditionally exist in a recipe.  These folks were super successful doing so.

I had small tastes of what my wife and her sister had ordered.  One of them got soup.  It was good, but could have used more salt. I forget what the other one got... suffice it to say that every bite I had was delicious.  Again, let me repeat... I am NOT vegan.

As for dessert... well, the description doesn't do it justice.  The picture doesn't either, but here it is anyway:

Coconut whipped cream... and the texture was fantastic.  Roasted hazelnuts.  Beautiful flowers (yes, I ate them).  Chocolate powder.  Under all of that stuff was this substance that strongly resembled chocolate mousse... turns out they make that with avocado... they need the fat for the right texture... but you couldn't taste avocado, it tasted like chocolate mousse.  This dessert was delicate and flavorful, and I would eat it again any day.

Wonderful food aside, let me tell a brief story about our arrival experience in order to show just how great the folks were here.  The day we had this reservation was our first day in the country, and I made the reservation at a normal French dinner time (read: very late for your average American) in order to force us all to be awake and active all day so we could sleep well that first night and beat the jet lag.  Well, through no fault of my own, we were running quite late to dinner.  No worries, I called the restaurant and told them that we would be late.  See, the restaurants are small, so if someone misses a reservation, that costs them money... they combat this by charging your credit card if you don't show up.  Well, when I called from the phone of the apartment we had rented, I managed to call the wrong location.  They are a small enough business that they could handle this... the very nice lady who I talked to said she would pass the message along.

Fast forward.  We are late, and we take Métro line 12 to Notre-Dame-de-Lorette.  Now, I've been to Paris many times, and know my way around some parts of town very very well... well enough that on more than one occasion, I have been able to give directions to actual French people.  This part of town is not one of the ones I know.  I had never been to this Métro station, nor had I been to this part of the 9th.  When we exit the Métro... chaos.  It's one of those odd French intersections where multiple roads converge in a less-than-logical fashion.  On top of that, there is construction.  On top of that, the street signage leaves much to be desired.  We get lost.  I am not often lost in Paris, so this was frustrating.  We wander one way, and when that clearly is wrong, we wander another way... and then I decide to wander into a local hotel to ask for directions.  The folks in the hotel are not familiar with this restaurant, and are also not familiar with the street it is on... but I was able to point out to them on one of their hotel tourist maps where I thought it was, and they were able to tell us how to walk in that direction.  Ok, finally headed the right way... and from that point, it's only about 15 minutes to get to the place.  We get there, and we are so late... very much later than we had possibly foreseen.  We're so late that they have locked the front door, as they're not letting any more folks into the restaurant.. However, upon seeing us, they open the door and ask if I am Mike.  I say that I am and explain that we got terribly lost getting there on foot, and profusely apologize in the most respectful French I could summon.  The very kind co-owner gentleman who I mentioned before lets a sigh of relief and immediately shows us to the table that had been reserved for us.  We received a fantastically warm welcome.

To sum up... food outstanding, service outstanding, experience unforgettable, you should go here if ever you are in Paris.

Loud as a jet engine being fired up, while also dropping incredibly catchy earworms.  That was Mondolux.

I saw them many times... at Canal Street Tavern, at El Diablo (anyone remember that spot), in a tiny room upstairs at Southgate House.  They were my first live experience with punk-adjacent music.  I say "punk-adjacent" because the songs were generally hooky rock and roll with all kinds of pop sensibilities... just played really really loud and usually rather fast.  Also, recently, I was watching a video of The Clash playing live, and recognized many of the musician stances and mannerisms as something I had seen at Mondolux shows... these guys must have loved The Clash.

Alas, this band is no more... and you can't find a great deal of their music online.  Here is one of my favorite of their songs, called "Memphis Lung".  What's not to like here?  This one has a nifty little swagger to it, a fantastic groove, and Eric Purtle's charisma comes across just fine in this recording... but that's nothing compared to what it was like to see them do this live.

Here's a video taken from one of their live shows.

This song is "TJ Swann", and is on their last album.  A pop song.  Catchy, with the volume cranked.  That was Mondolux.

Elbow - Asleep in the Back

I talked about my most recent live experience with Elbow in a previous blog post.  This is the album that got me hooked on them.

A coworker of mine turned me on to this album in 2001.  This was one of the five compact discs I took with me on my spring 2002 trip to France.  The trip was mostly for a friend's wedding, but I managed to move around a bit while I was in Europe... I had a nice trip out to Chamonix for a couple of days, and also dropped by Bruxelles and Bruges.

I spent plenty of time alone with my thoughts and this record playing in my headphones.  On long train trips... on a lift up a mountain... strolling through the forest a short distance from the Arve.  Really, every time I hear these songs, my brief visit to the Alps comes rushing back.  My favorite track on this album was "Newborn"... and today it is probably a tie between "Newborn" and "Scattered Black and Whites".  Guy Garvey's way of painting a picture, evoking an emotion, harnessing a mood with his lyrics... that's a skill I am attempting to develop.

The first time I saw La Joconde was 1999.  (English speakers generally know her by a different name.)  She was small and dark, but out there in the open, and you could get as close to her as you wanted.  Things have changed... she is still small and dark, but is now protected by some thick glass and special lighting and a railing, and you can't get close anymore.

A couple of years later I wrote a song about her.  By this time, I had learned some rudimentary bass skills, and I wrote a lot of songs.  Most of them were garbage, and were discarded as such.  This one, I liked enough to actually type it and print it... and I wrote the chords on the sheet in pen.  The song didn't have a name at the time.  It disappeared.

Many many years later... in fact, I don't even remember when exactly... at least ten years had passed.... anyway, I was doing some cleaning, and I found this folded up piece of paper.  I unfolded it, and behold!  Lyrics.  Chords noted.  I didn't have a song title, and didn't even remember writing it... but I knew who it was about because I had included an inside joke for myself in the lyrics, calling her "mysteriously jocular", a play on words with her name.  There is only one person I would describe that way.

When I finally got around to making an album, I felt like this song had to be on it.  This is really what drove me to come up with a title.  Why is it called "Every Last Time Is like the First"?  Well, like the lyrics say, I have come around again and again, walking through those marble halls... and she's always there with that sly little smile, surrounded by dozens of people taking pictures with their flashes turned  off.  The last time I saw her was in April.  (This was the first time for my wife.)  I stayed at the back of the crowd, I had no reason to attempt to get close... I'll never be able to get as close as I did the first time I saw her.  But every last time I get some small measure of satisfaction from being back in her home, in her city.

This happened almost twenty years ago.  Mobile phones weren't ubiquitous.  No social media.  Cameras used actual film.  What follows is a verbatim excerpt from the travel journal I was keeping.  (To clarify, the "money problems" I mention are due to me leaving my wallet in a cab exactly one week prior.  I only had $15 US cash in there - which was not useful, as the currency one needed was francs - but I also had my bank card in there, and my plans to withdraw money from the ATM as needed took a big hit.  Also, at this point in the trip I was staying with some friends in Lyon, so had to travel to get to the show.)

***

MERCREDI le 27 Octobre 1999

11:04h  I'm up and preparing for the trip to Paris.  I am very much looking forward to the concert, I'll be able to forget about my money problems at least for a couple of hours.

19:29h At the concert.  Security temporarily confiscates my camera. It is like the Newport , but smaller, darker, no balcony.  I remember that Europeans don't mosh. I wish I had some cash on me, because this atmosphere is just screaming for a beer.  There is no opening act.  I met a guy on the crew.  Chris will play for ninety minutes.  I met some other Americans... girls from Wisconsin.  They had backstage passes... girls always get backstage passes.  The place is filling up... if it's not sold out, it sure is close.  This concert brought to us by OUI 102.3 FM, rock radio Paris.  They are doing a live TV appearance tomorrow on Canal+, according to the crew.

20:05h  The set list just got taped down.  

20:17h  It's on now....

Sunshower
Can't Change Me
Flutter Girl (key bass)
Mission (key bass)
Preaching...
Seasons (no keys 2 guitar)
When I'm Down
Pillow of Your Bones
Fell On.... (solo, for Kurt)
Moonchild
Sweet Euphoria  (for Paris, no drummer or bass)
Like Suicide
Follow My Way
-------
All Night Thing
Steel Rain

JEUDI le 28 Octobre 1999

07:29h  It's a six hour ride to Lyon, and I have to change trains in Dijon.  Hope that goes smoothly.  The good thing is that my railpass covers it.  I had expected to get more miles out of my railpass, but I have been rendered rather sedentary.  Last night's concert was great... the only thing that could have improved it would have been meeting Chris.  Chris kept up a good-natured banter with the crowd... in English.  Most of the younger crowd at the concert definitely understands English.  Highlights were the rockin' "Pillow of Your Bones", the crowd sing-along on "Fell On Black Days" and "Like Suicide", and the signature Chris Cornell scream/wail on "Steel Rain".  The crowd was very unfamiliar with the new songs, but they were very enthusiastic.  European concert goers don't heckle like their American counterparts.  And no moshing... everyone is in there all tight, and people kind of dance or headbang a little, but there isn't any real bodily contact.

***

So, those are the thoughts of the 21-year-old version of me.  Looking back, what a fantastic set.  Chris mentioned that he happened to be in that very building - Elysée Montmartre - when he got the news that Kurt Cobain had died, so he dedicated "Fell On Black Days" to Kurt.  He also remarked more than once that Paris is a very beautiful city, and dedicated "Sweet Euphoria" to the city and people of Paris.  As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I had been listening to the Euphoria Mourning album a great deal, so I was quite familiar with all of the new songs.  I would go on to eventually see Chris Cornell solo two more times... but this show topped them.  This is definitely one of the most memorable nights of music in my life.

Also, I miss Chris Cornell about as much as someone can miss a person who they have never met.

When you miss somebody 
You tell yourself a hundred thousand times 
Nobody ever lives forever 
So you give it one more try 
To wave goodbye, wave goodbye

Well said, Chris.  Well said.

When I was in my early twenties, I stayed with a friend a couple of times in the 15th arrondisement in Paris.  Because I spent so much time in that part of town, I became familiar with an Italian restaurant there, and I would visit them on every return trip.  This was one of my go-to lunch spots in Paris.  I liked it because it was out of the path of the crowds of tourists... a normal neighborhood restaurant, and at no point had I ever seen any other Americans there.  It is, therefore, with just a little bit of sadness that I must admit this restaurant has been replaced.

On my spring trip to Paris, my corporate colleague Guido was kind enough to take the time to meet me for lunch one day near our apartment in the 14th.  (We ate at a Lebanese place, but that's a story for another blog entry.)  Guido lives in Paris, but he is Italian, from the north, near Lake Como.  I showed him a picture of the pizza I had consumed at the aforementioned Italian restaurant in the 15th.  Guido was disappointed in my selection.  He then recommended an alternative.  He said to go to Arrivaderci.  He's Italian.  I'm not.  He would know better.  

I dragged my wife and my in-laws with me to Arrivaderci on Thursday 11th April.  It's in the 5th.  We arrived near the end of lunch time, but managed to get there before the restaurant closed.  Upon entering, I was greeted with a hearty "Buon Giorno!".  I replied in kind, and then said that there were four of us in the best Italian I could manage.  Then, I immediately switched back to French and apologized for not speaking decent Italian.  

We were seated.  We were brought menus.  Dish names in Italian.  Descriptions in French.  Ok.  

I started with the salmon carpaccio.  THIS salmon carpaccio:

It was outstanding.  

The folks here take pride in their pizza, and an actual Italian told me that it was good, so I had to try it.  Mine looked like this:

Now, I've read about Neapolitan style pizza, mostly due to pizza enthusiast Keith Law.  This was my first experience with the real thing.  I had always wondered what the taste and texture was like when he would describe the center as being "wet"... well, now I know.  Also, LOOK at that char on the crust.  This was the best pizza I have ever had.  Not close.  So yeah, apologies to the folks in the 15th, but I won't be visiting you for pizza anymore.  This is my new favorite Italian restaurant in Paris.

We were there well after closing time, and we saw the staff leave one-by-one.  Some of them might head back to the restaurant for the dinner service, some of them perhaps had other jobs.  I apologized on our behalf for keeping them there well past when they would normally have closed up shop, began cleaning, and taken their afternoon rest.  Upon mentioning that I am a musician, Gaitano and Antonio immediately found my album and started streaming it on the restaurant speakers.  That was a very cool life moment.

I listened to the staff talk to each other... yes, all in Italian.  Antonio told me that the only ingredient they have in the place that is French (local) is the water... which comes out of the tap.  All of their ingredients, they import from Italy.  I totally understand why my colleague Guido comes here.  If he is feeling homesick, this has to be the spot.

There is no shortage of Italian restaurants in Paris.  There are surely hundreds and hundreds of places you can get pizza.  I strongly doubt you'll find a better one than here.  Outstanding food, very friendly staff.  I can't wait to go back.

I am nearly 100% certain that I first heard this band in 1997, driving home to Xenia from my call center job in Kettering.  On Sunday nights, one of the local radio stations had a local music program.  I recently wrote about another local band I first heard on this program.  Today, I write about Shrug.  One of the songs in rotation just about every week on the program was "Diary".  I didn't know it at the time, but that's the lead track to Shrug's second album, Everything Blowing Up Roses.

I found out that Shrug was going to play at show at Canal Street Tavern.  I liked what I had heard from them on the radio, so I went to see them play.  This was my first experience with live local music.  I don't remember all that much from the show... I can't tell you who else was on the bill.  I don't remember how much it cost, though if I were to guess, I'd say five dollars.  I don't even remember which songs they played... maybe I heard "Diary" that night, maybe I didn't.  What I do remember was meeting the three members of the band... Tod Weidner, Dan Stahl, Adam Edwards.  They were nice to me.  I wandered into a music venue alone, without knowing anyone, feeling slightly out of place, and was well received.  Between that and enjoying the music, I decided to see Shrug again.  And again.  And again.  Eventually, as is the case in a tight-knit music community when you see the same face a few times, the guys in the band remembered my name.

Fast forward to now.  On 6th July, Shrug will release their sixth studio album, Easy is the New Hard. This is the first time they are releasing music on vinyl, and this one will be a double album in that medium.  If you want to pre-order it, you could do that here.

Like the sticker says, Shrug has been a band since 1994.  There aren't many rock bands in these parts who have been around that long.  They have had their lineup changes, their instrumentation changes (at one point they didn't harm any electric guitars on stage), and of course we are all much older... but they still play like they mean it, and they're still nice to everyone.

Personally speaking, this band has had two major influences on my life in general.  First, I have been introduced to a great deal of music through Shrug shows that I otherwise might not have listened to.  They used to do a fantastic cover of "Dancing Barefoot" (please bring that one back), and that's how I discovered Patti Smith.  They would cover a few Elvis Costello songs, and this moved me to check out a few of his albums.  Their blistering version of "The Seeker" made me pick up The Who's greatest hits album.  Second, I might not have ever gotten around to recording my own music were it not for Shrug.  I clearly remember Tod saying this brief phrase at some point about folks who are timid about sharing their music: "if it sounds good, it is good".  I threw away so many songs over the years, but sometimes I would write something, and think to myself "that sounds pretty good"...  eventually, I gathered the courage to share my art with others.

Of course, since I consider the gentlemen in Shrug to be friends, it's hard for me to be objective about their music.  That said, sometimes they make artistic decisions that I don't necessarily like.  A few that come to mind are the Wilco-ization of "Age Nowhere" (does anyone else remember the original version of that song?), the disappearance of any of their original songs written before 2000 from their live shows, and the fact that I don't own a recording of "Cling", "Media Blackout", "Frozen Gasoline", or "Cosmonaut".  It's ok.  I still love them just the way they are.

Do you like your music to feature intelligent, carefully chosen lyrics?  How about a serious approach to songcraft?  What is your feeling about a sing-along chorus that gets stuck in your head?  If you like these things, go find Shrug's music.  You won't be disappointed. 

I bought tickets a few days ago to see Sleater-Kinney when they come to Columbus this fall.  I've seen them before, 19 years ago.

For a few years in my youth, I had a subscription to Rolling Stone.  That particular magazine helped me to discover a lot of bands that weren’t getting played on mainstream radio.  That’s how I learned about Sleater-Kinney. I seem to remember very favorable reviews of Dig Me Out, which was their third album.  I bought the album. I loved it. I then bought their first two albums, Sleater-Kinney and Call the Doctor. I was hooked. 

I picked up each new album as they were released… and then they went on tour in support of All Hands on the Bad One.  They were going to make a stop at Southgate House, which was my favorite venue at the time. (A brief aside about Southgate House.  It was a house built in 1812… no, not just a house, a big old mansion. The person who invented the Tommy Gun was born in this house. I don’t mention this to glorify firearms or warfare, just to point out that this is a genuinely historic building.  Shows were usually held in what was called “the ballroom”, but there were plenty of other rooms in the house where music would happen during the larger festival-type events.)

The show ended up being sold out.  I got to the venue incredibly early, as is my normal habit, and there was a line down the sidewalk out front of other folks waiting to get in.  I remember not knowing who the opening act would be... it turns out that the opener was a regional band from a few hours' drive up north on I-75... they were called The White Stripes. I was kind of surprised that there were only two of them when they took the stage... and I was a little dismayed because they didn't have a bass player, and you know, that's my instrument.  Then again, Sleater-Kinney doesn't have a bass player, and I liked them just fine.  That said, I was puzzled by the overwhelming simplicity of the drums, as I was used to Janet Weiss. I didn't realize at the time that the simplicity was the point.  I'll be honest, I wasn't all that impressed with the openers, but I thought it was interesting that they coordinated their outfits.  (When they were done playing Jack and Meg retired to the side of the ballroom - not backstage - and were just kind of by themselves for awhile.  If I had known what was going to become of them, I probably would have gone and made friends... then again, maybe not.)

Sleater-Kinney were great.  Here's the setlist from the show. Fantastic.

I watched this show from the balcony, and this was the first time I'd ever done that for an entire show at Southgate House.  The venue was small enough that being in the balcony still had you rather close to the stage, and it sounded great up there as well.  After the show, I made my way down to the stage, as I wanted to tell the ladies how much I enjoyed their show.  Now, I was a great deal younger then, and these days I know better than to bug a band full of strangers while they are trying to load out... but there I was over at the side of the stage... and Carrie Brownstein was headed in my general direction.  I will also mention that at this point, I hadn't been playing music longer than a couple of years, and I was still generally in awe of professional musicians, seeing them less as actual people than as otherworldly talented beings.  I expressed how great I felt the show was.  Carrie walked over, shook my hand, said "thank you very much", and asked for my name.  She was striking in person in a way that the pictures in the CDs do not capture.  I was kind of awestruck.  Looking back on it, she and her bandmates were quite busy, and she certainly didn't need to take the time to acknowledge me, but acknowledge me she did.  That's something I will always remember.

So yeah, Sleater-Kinney are back on the road, with a new album dropping soon, and I'm looking forward to seeing them again.