Wilco @ MindSay


 

   
Putting it out there
I may have put these lyrics up at some time previously but it sort of hit me again.

So, I'm trying to be an artist. I have always wanted a creative outlet but was hindered by all sorts of things lack of natural tallent being the least of them really. One of the things that always bothered me is how once you create something you can't control what happens with it, around it, because of it, etc. It has a sort of life of it's own and is part of the world. I think WILCO describes this the best:

And if the whole world's singing your songs
and all of your paintings have been hung
just remember that what was yiours is everyone's from now on

And that's not wrong or right
but you can struggle with it all you like
You'll only get uptight


When I heard that for the first time it threw me really, and I was like, "Yeah... that's true isn't it... it's not wrong or right and I'm the one letting it stop me... hmmmnn"

I think phenomina is why it seems that artist of all types seem to be drained if they're popular during their life. Have you ever noticed how musicians, writters, painters, and the like seems so vibrant in their early years and once they reach the end of their careere or life they crash and burn in varrious ways. People suck them dry taking what was theirs untill they have nothing left, or a less agressive way to look at it people accept the gift of the artists creation and perhaps the artist doesn't know how or when to stop so they continue to drain themselves.

I found a great book the other day. two things I have wanted to work on but just didn't know how are my creativity and my prayer life. I found a book called Windows into the Soul which is a book on how to pray through art essentialy [or so it seems thus far] it has chapters that teach some tecnique of opening up and then gives a project. I'm really looking forward to going through this. I feel like I really just have to work at life. I think I have had a notion that life happens but really I am suposed to live. Life isn't somethinig that happens to me its something I do. I'm not sure if this is making sense but it's late and I've been up for a really rediculously long time.

I'm hoping that if I give my cat a big pile of food he won't wake me up at seven to feed him.


Things I want to start doing to help myself be happier

1. Yoga at least 4 days a week. I used to do yoga for an hour every morning and I really got something out of it. I need to be able to talk myself out of bed in time to do it though.
2. Get a set sleap schedule and stick to it. I know from classes and experience that a regular sleap patern helps your body get the most out of the sleep you get and make the most of the time you're awake. Unfortunately with how my work schedule goes I hardly ever get to bed at the same time three nights in a row.
3. I'm going to do a fast when I feel like my prayer life will suport it. I've want to study up on fasts and the spiritual and physical clensing benefits of them. I haven't done one because I believe that a fast without prayer and purpose is just an eating disorder.
4. I want to make time to drink more tea. I know that sounds weird but I want a calming ritual of sorts to help me center and focus. I think I have spent a lot of the last two or three years in a self created fog. It's time that the fog clears and I start to address things in an open and inteinotal manor. [yoga will help with that goal too]
 
 
   
 

Review of Wilco show at Northrup Auditorium, U. of MN, 10-11-07
DSC00002.JPG hosted for free by ImageShack



I'm slowly getting more familiar with the University of Minnesota campus. Last night, my nescience cost me about five songs of Wilco.

I've heard some live cuts from Wilco's shows, and frontman Jeff Tweedy sure is talkative. "What does this mean?" he asked the audience after seeing someone give him a sign. "Okay? It means 'okay?'" he paused. "Hey, you're okay! ... Rock and roll sure has changed," he said, to many laughs from the audience.

Tweedy has a lot of rapport and charisma, which he's willing to use when he performs. His voice was surprisingly good, and I couldn't believe he could belt out song after song without even getting a drink of water.

Our seats -- my brother Paul came -- were excellent: the front row of the balcony, no obstructions at all, which was really lucky, as the place was sold out. The venue seems kind of cavernous, and the sound quality was more "rock show" than intimate than I expected.

With my cell phone, I recorded all of the songs I heard, not for the quality, but just to recall the gist of the songs to recall.

"Jesus don't cry / you can rely on me, honey"

"Impossible Germany / unlikely Japan / wherever you go / wherever you land"

Many of the songs that haven't touched me in album form got to me during the show, like "Too Far Apart", from Wilco's first album A.M.

It was great hearing songs that I just love, like "Shot in the Arm". And the new material, off of the Wilco album Sky Blue Sky came off really well.

Jeff Wilco is so chill; it's great. I think the earth tones can do that to you.


(not my picture)

Tweedy's groove is beautifully offset by lead guitarist Nels Cline, who is insane good and seems close to collapse when he performs a solo. An accomplished jazz guitarist, he mixes technical prowess on hitting his notes with crazy Eric Clapton speed and usually finishes with a crazy reverb noise that is completely unique. He jumps around and gyrates close to paroxysm, seemingly close to getting carpal-tunnel disease.

"The ashtray said / you'd been up all night / when you went to bed / with your darkest mind ... "

Wilco finished with a medley that brought together some of their best songs. They finished pretty early in the night -- 10:30 p.m. -- with "Spiders (Kidsmoke)", their jam song.

Thank the lord they played "California Stars", which was a singalong.

Overall, Wilco offers a truly positive vibe to their live show. There's a dearth of poseur antics, and the songs are offered up as no more than nice things to enjoy. Tweedy's dark material turns into a picture of the human psyche when placed next to his fun songs and interaction with the crowd. This band has no enemies and no bad blood, which contrasts beautifully with our political climate today.

"She fell in love with the drummer / another then another / I miss the innocence I've known"

Money well spent.

By the way, geez, it would be awesome to teach at the U of M. Nice urban campus.
 
 
 

   
Three Reviews of New Albums: Wilco, Spoon, White Stripes

Wilco, Sky Blue Sky



Wilco's 2007 album Sky Blue Sky combines a more heartfelt and earnest songcraft from Jeff Tweedy with a band that is better than the best jam bands. Guitarist Nels Cline, who usually earns his keep playing jazz, is an absolute wizard whose notes reverberate off of the sentiment of Tweedy's songs powerfully.

Tweedy himself has turned his melodies of pop music ecstasy into cogent investigations of human relationships. Before, in a song like "Reservations" from Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, the listener would feel a bit depressed. In Sky Blue Sky, that same emotional frailty rests alongside the promise of hope and family.

Tweedy's playful side also comes out, in the hilarious "Hate It Here," which reminds me of Wilco's early, fun music. As a songwriter, Tweedy's strength may be the Janus-face of the speaker of the songs he has created. Different songs all represent differing sides of what it means to be an American adult male in this day in age: being a father, being distant from family, being emotionally spotty, being playful, dealing with war, experiencing domestic life, and of course, the evanescent nature of love.

There's a lot more hope in this album than previously for Wilco, and the band has truly gelled. I love this album, and its influences I also love: "What Light" might be called a sequel to Bob Dylan's "Forever Young," "Hate It Here" is the song John Lennon never got to write (and the "Beatles" guitar sound in that song is so refreshing), and "Impossible Germany" shows that geography can be used as a signifier to express the complex emotions of love.

Wilco's Sky Blue Sky: what a band, what strong songs.


Spoon, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga



It's sometimes said that Spoon is one of the few bands that one could say is "saving rock and roll," and I agree, but these three albums here reviewed show that rock is not dying.

My favorite thing about this album is that it takes the best of "Spoon-ness" and implants it into each song and each minute sound in the album -- down to the fraction of a second. The purposeful transparency of the studio editing process is one of those Spoon-nesses. Another is the hollering-in-the-street feel of the songs. Each song has the outward energy of meeting interesting new people, and telling stories in bars.

I'd say Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga is an attempt at what I'd call "audio collage." One thing that's really difficult is to be both fun and serious, and Spoon does this. These songs are just absolute fun:

3. You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb
4. Don't You Evah
5. Rhythm and Soul
6. Eddie's Ragga
8. My Little Japanese Cigarette Case
9. Finer Feelings

And of course, that's the bulk of the album. The songs represent what it's like to grow older, yet yearn for new experiences, always trying to be cool but knowing you're a dork, and making something lasting that's true.

This album is so "Spoon." My favorite is the "You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb" 1960s Motor City sound and the "Finer Feelings" narrative of what it's like to leave home (for Spoon, Austin, Texas) and find one's identity changed while memories stay the same.

This album is about hitting the pavement -- "Black Like Me" says "My boots are on the mend / and they ain't walking home / Street tar in summer will do a job on your soul" -- and trying to find something unidentifiable, which, for this band, is a comfort.


White Stripes, Icky Thump



I thought Jack White had reached his artistic height and forgotten something. The last White Stripes album, Get Behind Me Satan, just didn't interest me. The songwriting wasn't there. Then Jack's side project The Raconteurs didn't match his skills or his energy.

Icky Thump sees Jack and Meg return to form, in an album most closely like 2000's De Stijl. Jack's narrative creativity returns, when in "A Martyr For My Love For You" an adult man must tell the teenage girl he loves they cannot have contact. This song could be said to be a sequel to "Truth Doesn't Make a Noise" from De Stijl, since the structure of the songs as well as the narratives are so close. But it's not redundancy if one's copying something that works.

Then Jack White comes up with a musical theme or "conceit" that just should not work, like two songs based on bagpipes, or a song with flamenco horns. And of course, the songs totally work, on the same album where garage rock, bluesy power riffs, and banging drums exist alongside.

More than a return to form, this album feels like the instantiation of the tradition of rock music. Wow. The songs are just excellent -- White talks about the immigration debate in a topical-yet-not way in "Icky Thump" and the hilarious "Effect and Cause" recalls the Southern-tinged acoustic sound in "Your Southern Can Is Mine" from De Stijl.

The phrase "in the pocket" refers to bands that are just together, and in Icky Thump they are in the pocket. Jack and Meg White have returned to the format and the songs that suit them best, and place them in the company of rock music's historical greats.

I especially love Meg's backing vocals. Icky Thump returns us to the sponge that is Jack White -- the sponge that takes everything in and then has something smart to say.

-----

Taken as a whole, these three albums have restored my faith in rock music, and have reminded me of why I scour the internet for good tunes.
 
 
   
 

Furiosity Killed the Alternative Band

As I ride the train into Chicago I am listening to my mp3 player on shuffle. So far bands such as biohazard, hatebreed, and job for a cowboy have permeated through my ear drums while I read what may be the most asinine music magazine ever - Paiste. This magazine exemplifies a music/lifestyle genre of the worst kind, something - call hippie/indie/faggy/scruffy haired pussy rock. The only reason I'm reading this magazine is because it comes to my house monthly free of charge; there's no way in hell I'd pay a penny for this magazine. Every month I stare at the cover at the likes of Elvis Costello, wilco, and a bunch of other so called musicians and artists and ponder how many wigs could be made and given to cancer patients if this magazine's target audience would get a haircut, shave of their dreads, get rid of the chin beard, etc. The type of music popularized by these people is the bane of my existence. I am moved to tears as I think of the great 40-year old virgin quote "know how I know you're gay? You like coldplay." My mind is racing as I picture some femme wanna be jack Johnson complete with long hair protruding from a ski cap, jeans with a hole in the knee, woven bracelets on both wrists, and a t-shirt from some microbrewery in Portland playing his acoustic guitar and singing a lame song in front of 20 or some of his closest naturalist friends at a bonfire. Now I'm starting to get really pissed - I hate the whole existence of these people. The people need a dose of morbid angel to wake them the hell up.

 
 
 

   
Fill up your mind with all it can know...
Don't forget that your body will let it all go
Fill up your mind with all it can know
'Cause what would love be without wishful thinking...


Alas! I scream thy name into the cloudless noonday sky. Alas...

These are but the warm spring days of my discontent for it has become the stinging flying insects that are looking for new homes time of the year...

This is also the time of the year whence the lawn doth need trimmed. And being that I have a love/hate relationship with this task, I have entered another realm of my discontent. I love the fact that I am alone with my thoughts though I hate the fact that I have to do it on a somewhat regular basis if I wish to stand a chance of accomplishing this task...

And the thoughts that swirl about whence I am a slave to the lawn. For I have often wonder why my thought processes are as they are and I cannot find the answer to this dilemma I face...

As I sit upon this stool in the workplace of my discontent, I wonder as to what direction this life should be heading in. I wonder about the dream that has turned into an obsession. I wonder about the things in this life that having wondering if this particular life is stranger than fiction. This Blog, all the WebSites I created, all the years I spent on the UseNet have forced me to continually peer deep within my soul search for the answers to all the mysteries that surround me, are within me. Searching, always searching for the Truth, and the searching only leads me to more questions that seem to point me away from the Truth, and yet I know that in the Circle of Life, they are in fact leading me in a round about way to the answers I seek. I just never thought the Circle was so big...

And such is my existence in a nutshell and there will be those who will say that within every nutshell is a nut, but in this PC world where that term may be one that hurts my feelings, I prefer to be called a non-traditional thinker, thank you...

So don't hurt my feelin's, dammit, well unless you really want to for the use of words against me has little if any impact upon what I think of myself. I shall never empower those who wish to do me harm with words. And that's the way it is...

So I will sit upon this stool, and think about the things that I wish to think of even if these things happen to be about a dream I had last though I prefer not to write my personal thoughts as to the meaning of it for I do know that either it was a vision or it was my brain telling me something that I should be thinking about for I did study Freud for I was once a Psych major so many years gone by and I know what he'd say on the matter...

At this moment that I find myself sitting upon this stool, I find myself longing for the next round of the PoetryChallenge to begin for I feel as if left to itself, my mind begins to loop - always revolving around what is central to my thoughts and spinning around until I end at the place I began...

This is the Word of the AntiCrust...

Praise be ye who Read the Word for ye are Blessed amongst humans...
 
 
   
 

Showing 1 - 5.   [ Next ]
 
Latest Comment
Re: Collge Orientation @ Calvin - thanks for visiting our blog today...i am the mrs. so how are things...

Read...


 
© 2005-2007 MindSay Interactive LLC
| Terms of Service
| Privacy Policy
My Account
Inbox
Account Settings
Lost Password?
Logout
Blog
Update Blog
Edit Old Entries
Pick a Theme
Customize Design
Modify Plugins
Community
Your Profile
Wiki Pages
MindSay Tags
Video & Photos
Geographic Directory
Inside MindSay
About MindSay
MindSay and RSS
Report Spam
Contact Us
Help