What are you listening to?
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Nanaki Skywalker
Kate Lord of the Sith
- AKA
- Tarkatan Trash
Ⓐaron
Factiō Rēpūblicāna dēlenda est.
- AKA
- The Man, V
Gene Clark – “Some Misunderstanding”
I am genuinely salty that it took a wiki walk after David Crosby’s death (RIP, by the way) for me to find out about this album, No Other, and that I went 39 years of my life without hearing it once, and especially that no one even told me about it. I only discovered it because Crosby and Clark were both erstwhile members of the Byrds; Clark wrote or cowrote many of the band’s early hits that weren’t written by Bob Dylan or Pete Seeger, most notably “I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better” and “Eight Miles High”.
It might be slightly glib to call this the American All Things Must Pass, but the comparison gives you a vaguely accurate idea of what it sounds like. There are elements of rock, folk, country, funk, soul, R&B, gospel, psychedelia, progressive rock, and more, but simply listing the diverse set of influences on the album (Clark singled out Stevie Wonder’s Innervisions and the Rolling Stones’ Goats Head Soup as especially big influences on it) doesn’t remotely do it justice.
Clark and his producer, Thomas Jefferson Kaye, wanted to outdo Brian Wilson and Phil Spector’s production, and I think they succeeded in every way. The songwriting, arrangement, performances, and production quality are all immaculate; it helps that many of Southern California’s finest session musicians played on it.
Nonetheless, the album was a commercial failure upon release, and critics predictably savaged it as bloated and pretentious at the time. It did not help that David Geffen hated the album and refused to promote it; apparently he was salty that the album had only eight tracks, which is especially asinine on his part considering his own label also released Jackson Browne’s Late for the Sky – and here’s the punchline: it came out the exact same month as this album. (For those in the cheap seats, Late for the Sky also has eight tracks.)
It took until the ’00s to undergo a reappraisal, at which point Clark and Kaye were unfortunately long dead. Critics have since called it “a lost masterpiece” and “one of the greatest albums of all time”, and I feel inclined to agree with both statements. It’s one of those albums that already feels like it’s been part of my life forever, even though I only first heard it last month. It also feels like it was made specifically for me. It’s immediately accessible but reveals further depth with each subsequent listen.
The whole album is on YouTube, Apple Music, Spotify, and a bunch of other services. I can’t recommend it enough.
I am genuinely salty that it took a wiki walk after David Crosby’s death (RIP, by the way) for me to find out about this album, No Other, and that I went 39 years of my life without hearing it once, and especially that no one even told me about it. I only discovered it because Crosby and Clark were both erstwhile members of the Byrds; Clark wrote or cowrote many of the band’s early hits that weren’t written by Bob Dylan or Pete Seeger, most notably “I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better” and “Eight Miles High”.
It might be slightly glib to call this the American All Things Must Pass, but the comparison gives you a vaguely accurate idea of what it sounds like. There are elements of rock, folk, country, funk, soul, R&B, gospel, psychedelia, progressive rock, and more, but simply listing the diverse set of influences on the album (Clark singled out Stevie Wonder’s Innervisions and the Rolling Stones’ Goats Head Soup as especially big influences on it) doesn’t remotely do it justice.
Clark and his producer, Thomas Jefferson Kaye, wanted to outdo Brian Wilson and Phil Spector’s production, and I think they succeeded in every way. The songwriting, arrangement, performances, and production quality are all immaculate; it helps that many of Southern California’s finest session musicians played on it.
Nonetheless, the album was a commercial failure upon release, and critics predictably savaged it as bloated and pretentious at the time. It did not help that David Geffen hated the album and refused to promote it; apparently he was salty that the album had only eight tracks, which is especially asinine on his part considering his own label also released Jackson Browne’s Late for the Sky – and here’s the punchline: it came out the exact same month as this album. (For those in the cheap seats, Late for the Sky also has eight tracks.)
It took until the ’00s to undergo a reappraisal, at which point Clark and Kaye were unfortunately long dead. Critics have since called it “a lost masterpiece” and “one of the greatest albums of all time”, and I feel inclined to agree with both statements. It’s one of those albums that already feels like it’s been part of my life forever, even though I only first heard it last month. It also feels like it was made specifically for me. It’s immediately accessible but reveals further depth with each subsequent listen.
The whole album is on YouTube, Apple Music, Spotify, and a bunch of other services. I can’t recommend it enough.
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Nanaki Skywalker
Kate Lord of the Sith
- AKA
- Tarkatan Trash
Ⓐaron
Factiō Rēpūblicāna dēlenda est.
- AKA
- The Man, V
Get a box of tissues, then sit down and strap in for this one. It’s nine and a half minutes long. The length isn’t the reason you need to strap in, though; you’ll be too busy dealing with a heavy emotional reaction from it.
(content warning: frank discussion of thoughts of self-loathing, self-harm, suicide, etc., plus other physical and mental health issues. This video has an ultimately positive message, but it shouldn’t be a replacement for actual therapy.)
So, I’d never heard of Ren until a few weeks ago. This track features just his voice and acoustic guitar, and its video was recorded in a single take along with the audio. He’s not lip-synching; you can clearly see the mic setup at one point near the end, which I won’t spoil because it deserves to be experienced for itself.
I must’ve listened to this track at least two dozen times in the past two days alone, and every single time, it hits me like a goddamn Mack truck. It’s easily one of the most powerful performances I’ve seen in any medium and one of the most important pieces of art produced this decade¹.
I’ll spoiler tag the rest of my discussion of this track. Watch the video before you open the spoiler.
¹The only other musical work I’ve encountered from this decade that I’d consider to be of comparable importance, for very different reasons, is Ashenspire’s Hostile Architecture. I’ve written a lengthy exegesis of that album that the band themselves liked enough to link on the blue bird site and the Faceplace, which I’ll link to eventually.
(Sorry for these being in reverse order, but the second footnote needed to be within the spoiler tag.)
(content warning: frank discussion of thoughts of self-loathing, self-harm, suicide, etc., plus other physical and mental health issues. This video has an ultimately positive message, but it shouldn’t be a replacement for actual therapy.)
So, I’d never heard of Ren until a few weeks ago. This track features just his voice and acoustic guitar, and its video was recorded in a single take along with the audio. He’s not lip-synching; you can clearly see the mic setup at one point near the end, which I won’t spoil because it deserves to be experienced for itself.
I must’ve listened to this track at least two dozen times in the past two days alone, and every single time, it hits me like a goddamn Mack truck. It’s easily one of the most powerful performances I’ve seen in any medium and one of the most important pieces of art produced this decade¹.
I’ll spoiler tag the rest of my discussion of this track. Watch the video before you open the spoiler.
Ren is Ren Gill, a Welsh musician based out of Brighton formerly known for his work with the band The Big Push. In 2010, he signed with Sony Records, and shortly after, he became severely ill, which resulted in his being dropped from the label. After a decade of being misdiagnosed (which he discusses in more detail in his other songs), he finally was correctly diagnosed with Lyme disease and received a stem cell transplant. He is currently in Canada receiving further treatment for the disease.
He has also suffered from auditory and visual hallucinations, which heavily inspired this track. He explains:
I’ve never experienced a more honest and truthful description of the doubts that must plague every creative person. There’s always the nagging thought in the back of one’s mind, “You don’t do this as well as other people do; everything you’ve ever done is ripped off from others, and you’re worthless.” That voice isn’t true. But it never really goes away. The triumph isn’t to quiet the voice; the triumph is to not listen to it.
The two most powerful passages for me are these.
Even reading it gives me goosebumps. The fact that he actually stands up after spending most of the song in a wheelchair moves me to tears. Every goddamn time. Then his singing. Even writing about it has me a mess.
The other passage is the ending.
Brief tangent: coincidentally (or not), he uses the name of a game I’ve spent years working on five different times throughout his track. And one of Eternal’s central themes is exactly this: the need for balance. The balance of power, the balance between order and chaos, and especially the balance within oneself. This reflects a struggle much older than us; and trying too hard to be good, to be perfect, just makes us more flawed. I don’t think I could’ve articulated it more eloquently than he did if I’d tried, though.
“The more intensely that the light shone, the darker the shadow it casts” is a close paraphrase of a line from Carl Jung² describing an example of enantiodromia, the tendency of things to turn into their opposites, which is a central theme of Eternal (as is the shadow archetype as a whole). Enantiodromia is a central theme of this song as well, as is the idea that the perfect is the enemy of the good. Allowing ourselves to be consumed by the idea of perfection prevents us from actually living our lives, from making the mistakes that are necessary for the creative process.
Moreover, refusing to accept our flaws as human beings is itself a flaw. Admitting a flaw is the first step towards correcting it. Remembering that we are human and allowing ourselves to admit to our flaws is necessary for us to work to correct them, or to compensate for them in some other way.
This track is a master class on every level. It deserves all the hype and acclaim it’s received and then some.
________________
²“It is a psychological rule that the brighter the light, the blacker the shadow,” from Jung’s introduction to Fanny Moser’s Spuk: Irraglaube oder Wharglaube (Ghosts: False Belief or True).
He has also suffered from auditory and visual hallucinations, which heavily inspired this track. He explains:
I’ve never experienced a more honest and truthful description of the doubts that must plague every creative person. There’s always the nagging thought in the back of one’s mind, “You don’t do this as well as other people do; everything you’ve ever done is ripped off from others, and you’re worthless.” That voice isn’t true. But it never really goes away. The triumph isn’t to quiet the voice; the triumph is to not listen to it.
The two most powerful passages for me are these.
Even reading it gives me goosebumps. The fact that he actually stands up after spending most of the song in a wheelchair moves me to tears. Every goddamn time. Then his singing. Even writing about it has me a mess.
The other passage is the ending.
Brief tangent: coincidentally (or not), he uses the name of a game I’ve spent years working on five different times throughout his track. And one of Eternal’s central themes is exactly this: the need for balance. The balance of power, the balance between order and chaos, and especially the balance within oneself. This reflects a struggle much older than us; and trying too hard to be good, to be perfect, just makes us more flawed. I don’t think I could’ve articulated it more eloquently than he did if I’d tried, though.
“The more intensely that the light shone, the darker the shadow it casts” is a close paraphrase of a line from Carl Jung² describing an example of enantiodromia, the tendency of things to turn into their opposites, which is a central theme of Eternal (as is the shadow archetype as a whole). Enantiodromia is a central theme of this song as well, as is the idea that the perfect is the enemy of the good. Allowing ourselves to be consumed by the idea of perfection prevents us from actually living our lives, from making the mistakes that are necessary for the creative process.
Moreover, refusing to accept our flaws as human beings is itself a flaw. Admitting a flaw is the first step towards correcting it. Remembering that we are human and allowing ourselves to admit to our flaws is necessary for us to work to correct them, or to compensate for them in some other way.
This track is a master class on every level. It deserves all the hype and acclaim it’s received and then some.
________________
²“It is a psychological rule that the brighter the light, the blacker the shadow,” from Jung’s introduction to Fanny Moser’s Spuk: Irraglaube oder Wharglaube (Ghosts: False Belief or True).
¹The only other musical work I’ve encountered from this decade that I’d consider to be of comparable importance, for very different reasons, is Ashenspire’s Hostile Architecture. I’ve written a lengthy exegesis of that album that the band themselves liked enough to link on the blue bird site and the Faceplace, which I’ll link to eventually.
(Sorry for these being in reverse order, but the second footnote needed to be within the spoiler tag.)
Ⓐaron
Factiō Rēpūblicāna dēlenda est.
- AKA
- The Man, V
it’s utterly baffling to me that this doesn’t have like, 100x the number of views and likes that it currently does. these arrangements and performances are sublime.
and on an unrelated note…
…as promised, since my copy of the LP finally came in yesterday, here’s the link to my lengthy exegesis of the album. The band had this to say in response:
I can’t recommend this album highly enough to people that like metal.
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D
Deleted member 13557
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ForceStealer
Double Growth
Nandemoyasan
Standing guard
- AKA
- Johnny
So, the premise of this is that the guy performing it wrote it to sound like what English sounds like to non-native English speakers. The lyrics are complete gibberish, so don't worry if you don't speak Italian
Dawnbreaker
~The Other Side of Fear~
Why are you hangin' on
So tight
To the rope that I'm hangin' from
Off this island?
This was an escape plan (This was an escape plan)
Carefully timed it
So let me go
And dive into the waves below
Who tends the orchards?
Who fixes up the gables?
Emotional torture
From the head of your high table
Who fetches the water
From the rocky mountain spring?
And walk back down again
To feel your words and their sharp sting?
And I'm gettin' fuckin' tired
The capillaries in my eyes are bursting
If our love died, would that be the worst thing?
For somebody I thought was my saviour
You sure make me do a whole lot of labour
The calloused skin on my hands is crackin'
If our love ends, would that be a bad thing?
And the silence haunts our bed chamber
You make me do too much labour
(You make me do too much labour)
Apologies from my tongue
Never yours
Busy lapping from flowing cup
And stabbing with your fork
I know you're a smart man (I know you're a smart man)
And weaponise
The false incompetence
It's dominance under guise
If we had a daughter
I'd watch and could not save her
The emotional torture
From the head of your high table
She'd do what you taught her
She'd meet the same cruel fate
So now I've gotta run
So I can undo this mistake
At least I've gotta try
The capillaries in my eyes are bursting
If our love died, would that be the worst thing?
For somebody I thought was my saviour
You sure make me do a whole lot of labour
The calloused skin on my hands is crackin'
If our love ends, would that be a bad thing?
And the silence haunts our bed chamber
You make me do too much labour
All day, every day, therapist, mother, maid
Nymph, then a virgin, nurse, then a servant
Just an appendage, live to attend him
So that he never lifts a finger
Twenty-four-seven baby machine
So he can live out his picket fence dreams
It's not an act of love if you make her
You make me do too much labour
All day, every day, therapist, mother, maid
Nymph, then a virgin, nurse, then a servant
Just an appendage, live to attend him
So that he never lifts a finger
Twenty-four-seven baby machine
So he can live out his picket fence dreams
It's not an act of love if you make her
You make me do too much labour
[Labour]
So tight
To the rope that I'm hangin' from
Off this island?
This was an escape plan (This was an escape plan)
Carefully timed it
So let me go
And dive into the waves below
Who tends the orchards?
Who fixes up the gables?
Emotional torture
From the head of your high table
Who fetches the water
From the rocky mountain spring?
And walk back down again
To feel your words and their sharp sting?
And I'm gettin' fuckin' tired
The capillaries in my eyes are bursting
If our love died, would that be the worst thing?
For somebody I thought was my saviour
You sure make me do a whole lot of labour
The calloused skin on my hands is crackin'
If our love ends, would that be a bad thing?
And the silence haunts our bed chamber
You make me do too much labour
(You make me do too much labour)
Apologies from my tongue
Never yours
Busy lapping from flowing cup
And stabbing with your fork
I know you're a smart man (I know you're a smart man)
And weaponise
The false incompetence
It's dominance under guise
If we had a daughter
I'd watch and could not save her
The emotional torture
From the head of your high table
She'd do what you taught her
She'd meet the same cruel fate
So now I've gotta run
So I can undo this mistake
At least I've gotta try
The capillaries in my eyes are bursting
If our love died, would that be the worst thing?
For somebody I thought was my saviour
You sure make me do a whole lot of labour
The calloused skin on my hands is crackin'
If our love ends, would that be a bad thing?
And the silence haunts our bed chamber
You make me do too much labour
All day, every day, therapist, mother, maid
Nymph, then a virgin, nurse, then a servant
Just an appendage, live to attend him
So that he never lifts a finger
Twenty-four-seven baby machine
So he can live out his picket fence dreams
It's not an act of love if you make her
You make me do too much labour
All day, every day, therapist, mother, maid
Nymph, then a virgin, nurse, then a servant
Just an appendage, live to attend him
So that he never lifts a finger
Twenty-four-seven baby machine
So he can live out his picket fence dreams
It's not an act of love if you make her
You make me do too much labour
[Labour]
Nanaki Skywalker
Kate Lord of the Sith
- AKA
- Tarkatan Trash
D
Deleted member 13557
Guest
Been listening to a bunch of Nightwish lately. One of my favs.