Music Diary, Vol. -5

For the rationale behind this mad effort, explanations here. The full series of Music Diary posts are here.

Week of Dec. 4-10, 2023

Lyric: Lorde, "Green Light"

Song: Went down a "Skylark" wormhole yesterday, sampling several versions of Hoagy Carmichael's bottomless standard, with its unfussily wandering melody and expansive harmony, and that mind-blowing bridge. Can't pick a favorite so I made a playlist.

Album: Punk has always owed a debt to early rock and pop, though only some punk acts are as transparent about it as Shilpa Ray, for whom Patti Smith and Cramps references are apt. This 2015 release also happens to be an essential New York record.

Lyric: Ella Logan (Gershwins), "Love Is Here to Stay"

Song: The lyrics in this Sharon Van Etten track are self-punishing enough, but as always it's the music that tells the story: the maj7 chord under the lyrics "Break my legs" etc. throbs like an open wound, and the exultant chorus hits like a car crash.

Album: Part of what makes DO THE RIGHT THING great is a certain too-muchness, an immersive oversaturation, and one key element of that bounty is Bill Lee’s old-school blues-symphonic score, a glorious listen by itself.

Lyric: Cosima, "Close to You (Moonlighting)"

Song: Realizing that one reason I love this La Doña single in particular is that its happy marriage of cumbia and pop/rock sounds reminds me of a favorite genre, Peruvian chicha. It may also be the sunniest tune about economic precarity that I know.

Album: If you’re a Caroline Polachek fan, you’ve probably already checked out her earlier incarnation as Ramona Lisa. If not, you definitely should: The music is as satisfyingly odd and tuneful as her last two records, just a bit artier and spacier. 

Lyric: Mitski, "My Love Mine All Mine"

Song: As a sucker for well-done descriptive music, I love not only the phone ring sound Stan Getz wrings out of a trill at the top, but also the way Astrud Gilberto phrases the anxious, winding stop/start melody. It’s music your ear chases, happily.

Album: Used to own this on vinyl, always loved spinning it. The band is off the hook, yes, but it's Emmylou who rules the roost, with weepy ballads as well as with speedy shuffles, culminating (on the original LP) with Gram Parsons' majestic "Wheels."

Lyric: Patsy Cline (Stevenson/Miller), "Three Cigarettes in an Ashtray" 

Song: Ben E. King and Lavern Baker only recorded a few songs together, but the relaxed give and take and sweet harmonies of this lovely 1960 B-side make me wish they’d made a whole duet album. I also recommend their “A Help-Each-Other Romance.”

Album: I vividly recall the first time I heard Rubén González’s piano. In late 1997, Ry Cooder was talking on KPFK about a new record he’d made in Cuba; he played “Pueblo Nuevo” and I was smitten. So this was the first Buena Vista spinoff I bought.

Lyric: Björk, "Violently Happy"

Song: This 1920s cut from the Secret Museum of Mankind CD collection (played by two Indian brothers, one on mandolin, the other on tuned porcelain bowls) is a burst of unadulterated joy, miraculously speeding up past what seems humanly possible.

Album: The album that introduced me to U2—hearing “11 O’Clock Tick Tock” on the radio led me to this cassette at the “special low price.” Wish I still had it, as it included the “Send in the Clowns” riff in “Electric Co.” removed from later releases.

Lyric: David Ackles, "Family Band"

Song: The original version of this song with my former band Millhouse was slower, grungier, and full of time signature changes; this one is faster, a bit more ska, and features saxophonist Frank Fontaine.

Album: The severity, surprise, and beauty of Machaut’s polyphony is always bracing. In the religious context it’s positively otherworldly and, as in this mass from around 1360, often ecstatically prayerful.