Music Diary, Vol. -1

This past week I started keeping a diary of my musical social shares for this space going forward. But as I've been doing this for around two years now, I have a backlog, and as I'm a music obsessive, I'm going to backfill the diary as best I can (and label it with negative numbers going backward, like B.C.E. or something). The full playlist (again on YouTube so I could include Neil Young) is above and also here. If you get something out of it, I welcome you! If not, this is mainly for me anyway. It's the pebble, not the stream.

Week of Jan. 1-7, 2024

Lyric: Neil Young, "After the Gold Rush"
Song: Building its accompaniment off the show’s iconic theme song, this Joe Raposo deep cut from the original Sesame Street record goes behind and beyond the sunny day cheer to explore some of the complications of just getting through the day. 
Album: One of my fave records, not on any of the streaming services, is this lushly gritty glam rock trip from 1987, the only full length by Opal (David Roback pre-Mazzy Star, Kendra Smith post-Dream Syndicate). I can never listen to just one track.

Lyric: Fiona Apple, "Every Single Night"
Song: I’m quite fond of the new a.s.o. record, but this is clearly the standout single—all the trip-hop bells and whistles in the world can’t conceal what a sleekly crafted pop banger (and an unbiddable declaration of romantic independence) it is.
Album: This Tito Puente masterpiece from 1960, bursting with percussion compositions in a variety of modes and moods, isn’t available in full on streaming, so I made a playlist. You’re welcome.

Lyric: Suzanne Vega, "In the Eye"
Song: Afropop/funk with the heaviness of rock—just try to sit still for this chugging track by Jupiter & Okwess, which alternates spare and chunky guitar lines with stomping grace (and listen for the subtle organ liftoff in the last third).
Album: In the early 1970s, they crashed Paul Simon’s NYU songwriting class, and soon Maggie and Terre Roche were singing backup on his “Was a Sunny Day” and he was co-producing their first LP, an overlooked classic that predates THE ROCHES by 4 years.

Lyric: Townes Van Zandt, "Pancho and Lefty"
Song: I go back and forth on what I love most in this Dylan classic: the Old-West-meets-noir lyric, the insinuating Andalusian cadence, Emmylou’s exquisite harmony. Today my choice is the vocal trill on every line of the verse—perfect Gothic filigree.
Album: Haven’t seen it in ages so I can’t say how I’d rank it now, but for a number of years I considered CRY-BABY a fave film—indeed, a fave musical, thanks to a delightful soundtrack mixing vintage novelties and excellent originals by Dave Alvin.

Lyric: Kacey Musgraves, "Follow Your Arrow"
Song: Can a chord progression be disturbing in and of itself? Submitted for your approval, this chilling CCR album closer, in which the descent from a G to a twanging E7 every third bar is at least as menacing as the incendiary lyric.
Album: The Bees came late to the Britpop party and not many critics took positive notice, but for my money this 2004 record—which Pitchfork slammed with a 4.9—is a retro-rock classic. “Chicken Payback” is the high point but the whole thing slaps.

Lyric: Glynis Johns (the Sherman Brothers), "Sister Suffragette"
Song: One of the saddest, sweetest songs from any Broadway musical gets an unhurried, unforced, intent reading by Tony Bennett and Bill Evans that somehow makes it soul-lifting rather than lachrymose.
Album: There are plenty of other contenders, but this remains my fave Dylan disc, the one on which his imagination is indistinguishable from his memory and the songs sound both like they have no author and that their only possible author could be him.

Lyric: Mahalia Jackson (Kenneth Morris), "My God Is Real"
Song: Love this bittersweet Mapache cover of the Albert Brumley gospel standard, which brings out the tune’s yearning, vulnerable, even supplicant quality. This is faith as a wish, a hope, a cry, rather than a firm amen.
Album: Is being God-haunted the same as having faith? Is mercy secretly the toughest kind of tough love? Why are bodies? Just some of the questions raised for me by Julien Baker’s raw, beautiful, often harrowing debut record.