EMPTY: GARBAGE

Empty/Strange Little Birds (2016)

I don't think we have ever had much Garbage on this site. That might seem a dangerous place to start, dismissing the usual advice to quit whilst you're ahead, but no, it's true, I can see little or no reference at all. To the band, that is. (What else could I, or even you, possibly mean?) I loved the band on their breakthrough, a fairly rapid state of affairs, if long in the genesis. At the time the brash and somewhat strident decisiveness of the sound seemed a refreshing adjunct to the murkier tones of the grunge movement that begat the band. And I loved the contrast between the "old" guys* and their "young" singer.

Let's retrace some steps. It is 1993. Butch Vig and Steve Marker, both experienced and successful record producers have their own studio. However they weary of their trademark sonic tone, the shockwaves of the Vig produced Nevermind meaning that everybody had and wanted to sound that way. Bringing in old buddy, Duke Erikson, who had been in a couple of bands with Vig, they become engrossed in the art of the remix, their ethos being primarily to alter the direction and focus of the instrumental dynamic, playing tricks with the bass and guitar lines. From there it seems logical to see if that could apply within a live setting, to: 

"take that remix sensibility and somehow translate it into all of the possibilities of a band setup."

Initial false steps with Vig on vocals prove unsatisfactory, with a joint decision it is a female voice the catalyst missing, seeking a forceful character with a powerful voice without too much screech. Marker comes across the band, Angelfish, enjoying the cut of the jib of their striking front woman, and her characterful tones. This is Shirley Manson, and Angelfish are the new name for Goodbye Mr McKenzie, a Scottish group of a relentlessly indie oeuvre. Manson initially not even their lead vocalist, merely sharing that role until the record company get involved, contracts needing a change of name to keep her at the fore. Cue Marker, who draws her to the attention of his cronies. An unsuccessful audition takes place, Manson too much in awe of the reputation of, especially, Vig, and with her impenetrable Edinburgh accent proving indecipherable to the three americans. That seems the end of that. But luckily she seeks another chance, with the dissolution of Angelfish and Garbage are in the can.

Supervixen/Garbage (1995)

I loved those first two albums, Garbage and Version 2.0, 1995 and 98 respectively, the aggressively clean thrust of the songs a potent clarion, with short songs, garlanded both with hooks and the quirks of the three studio boffins, all exuberantly presented with the brash charisma of Manson, transformed from gauche starlet to banshee. With crossover appeal to assuage both the purists and the poppers, for a while they were unassailable.

I Think I'm Paranoid/Version 2.0 (1998)

The traditional difficult third album, Beautiful Garbage, proved as dictated, nearly sinking the band. Frictions were beginning to appear and it didn't fare so well in the charts. A fourth album, Bleed Like Me, only kept them together by performing above expectation, following which they gave themselves some needed time-off.

Bleed Like Me/Bleed Like Me (2005)

As is the way, 2007's greatest hits package, Absolute Garbage, required some new material, with four new tracks produced, a stimulus for again picking up the pieces and reconvening, recording and touring in and from 2010.

As is also the way, no band is ever now allowed to stop entirely, Garbage no different. A final "new" album, Strange Little Birds, appeared in 2016, and it is from this record that 'Empty' comes. Sadly this is not their high-water mark, much of the studio trickery that so lit up their earlier releases seemingly dissipated and, um, empty. But it is still a good enough songs by any other standard, the vocals a mix of Chrissie Hynde and Alanis Morrissette, with a sturdy backing redolent also of the Pretenders.

No Horses/single (2017)

Fast forward a year or three and the band are on tour, celebrating the twentieth anniversary of Version 2.0 with a tour, along with an extended re-release of the album. Part of this shebang included a new single, 2017's No Horses, which suggests a return to form, effecting a glorious trip-hop vibe. I caught the tail end of that tour, as it hit Birmingham, UK, and my thoughts of that night, my sole live exposure to the band are included here. I am uncertain whether that is it; prior to Covid they were said to be planning new material for a release this year and US dates are pencilled in for summer next year. So, indeed, whatever happened to Garbage?

*Erikson hits 70 in January.

Empty? Maybe, but maybe get this or this instead.

LEFTOVERS: LEAVES: TEA

Let's get this straight, tea is so not my cup of tea. I can't stand the stuff, being an avowedly (instant) coffee man. Yet it is an enduring image in the world of popular song, often used to evoke a peculiar englishness that has, bar the drinking of it, gone. But it gives me the opportunity for a list post, which, in the leftovers pile, will at least avoid any flak for using up "all the ideas" Thus, in time honoured, please warm your pots.......

Cup of Tea/Shack. Lovely peaceful vibes, with a hint of ye olde psychedelia which belies its youth, the song being barely a decade old. Given that it stems from the never more aptly named Head brothers, arguments might exist as to whether this song is about assam or darjeeling. Or indeed anything more exotic, but it has a timeless, restful quality I can drown in.

Penny Royal Tea/Kristin Hersh. I know, I know, it's a Kurt song, but I prefer this version to the original, excepting the Unplugged performance. I wondered quite what Penny Royal tea was, thinking it may even be a brand of teabags available in Walmart or some such, then that the song may have been a play of words, bemoaning the pitiful returns on his song publication rights: royal tea/royalty, right? As ever, wiki is my friend, and it is apparently an often unsuccessful chinese abortifacient...

Tea and Sympathy/Janis Ian. Beautiful string arrangement with typically understated Ian vocals, a wry reflection on loss. And at last a song about tea tea. I would politely endure a cup of tea under the circumstances described, and traditionally have about one cup a year, usually with aged relatives. And similar references, no doubt.

Tea For One/Led Zeppelin. Not an entirely dissimilar concept as above, portrayed and presented a little differently, it's true. Percy missing his missus, tea for one being the metaphor for alone. Whilst I can't imagine vintage Zeppelin drinking anything but (vintage) champagne, OK, maybe brown ale for Bonzo, strangely the idea of the current Plant drinking a mug of tea, probably in a Wolverhampton Wanderers mug, seems entirely apposite.

Tea Leaf Prophecy/Herbie Hancock featuring Joni Mitchell. Her song, mind, but this version has always appealed more, the original still displaying residual vestiges of a folk tendency within this, as we later learnt, decidedly jazz singer. It is also good to have a salient reminder of the erstwhile bonus in every olden days cuppa, that of having your fortune made available courtesy the leaves left in the base of the cup. Try doing that with a teabag, Mr Lipton!

Tea Stain/Tindersticks. Cripes, I love(d) this band. As an instrumental this isn't perhaps the most representative of their output, but does give the european arthouse soundtrack quality they inhabit so well. It's a pity as I can picture their lugubrious singer, Stuart Staples, finding it only too easy to imagine him with old tea stains down the front of a crumpled white shirt. (You wanna hear him sing? Sadly I can find no further tea references, Will coffee do?)

Tea For The Tillerman/Cat Stevens. Bit of vintage Cat when he was still Cat, rather than Yusuf realising he didn't sell so well without a bracketed reminder. This album and the follow up, Teaser and the Firecat, soundtracked my miserable teens, the angst and ennui of his vocals hitting a chord with lonely adolescents everywhere. There seem to be a lot of websites arguing the meaning of the phrase, but I think the picture says it well enough, whether the jovial beardy is the man who tills the soil or pulls the tiller. Personally I think the 1 minute version on the album is probably better.

Tea Leaves/The Snails. I'll be honest. This isn't the song I wanted to include, hoping that a song of equally little-known band UK The Scaremongers might be available on YouTube. It wasn't, but I encourage you look for the song, part of the Sound of Mature Huddersfield as they style themselves.
This song? It OK.

So, that's yer lot. Eight, as anything more might be seen as hogging it, seeking vaingloriously too wide a demographic where at least one song might appeal. (Memo to self, what do they drink in Tarrytown?) No room even for this......

Explore!

Blood: Blood and Roses

The Smithereens: Blood and Roses [purchase]
[Or go for the 30th Anniversary edition]

From 1986, when I first heard the great “Blood and Roses,” from their debut album Especially For You, until 2011, when someone asked me about “The Smithereens,” I thought of the excellent band from New Jersey, whose British Invasion-influenced alternative sound helped to define the music I listened to during that period. After 2011, though, when I heard those words, I thought instead about the Smith College a capella group that gave my daughter so much pleasure during her college years. To be fair, I’ve only seen the rockers once, opening for Los Lobos at the legendary Pier in New York back in the 80s, while I’ve seen one of the oldest all-female a capella groups (formed at least a decade before the Jersey boys were even born) many times. And unlike my friend Lee, I’m not on a first name basis with any of the band, while members of the older group have slept in my house.

That all being said, I’ve made no bones about the fact that I’ve never been a big fan of a capella music, although I certainly enjoyed seeing my daughter and her friends perform. While they were very good, it is way, way more likely that I’d take affirmative steps to listen to the performers of our feature song than to listen to a performance of “Softly.” (But I still check out “Chicago” occasionally....)

“Blood and Roses” is a typical Smithereens song—catchy, but with depth, an intelligent, brooding reflection on love gone bad, and it was successful—included in the soundtrack of a forgotten film, and then a top 20 hit on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart and a popular video on MTV (you know, back when.....), it introduced the band to a wide audience. Produced by Don Dixon, whose relationship with R.E.M. probably helped get the band airplay, Especially For You is a fine album from top to bottom and is widely reported to have been a favorite of Kurt Cobain’s, so if you want to draw a line from The Smithereens to Nirvana, go right ahead.

The Smithereens released a number of excellent albums in the late 1980s and early 1990s, but by the middle of the decade, the world of alternative rock had changed, mostly due to the ascendancy of grunge (spearheaded, ironically, by Nirvana), and the band withdrew from recording, although they continued to tour for a while before taking time off. Lead singer Pat DiNizio made a run for Senate from New Jersey on the Reform Party ticket and, not surprisingly, did not win. On their return to the studio and the road (they opened for Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers a couple of years ago and are on the road right now), they have released a couple of albums of new material, a Christmas album, and a few cover collections to some critical, but little commercial, success.

That’s really too bad. Because these guys were, and are, good, and deserve to be better remembered. They had a sound that, while filled with recognizable influences, was distinctive, and their songwriting was strong. And, maybe best of all, and certainly compared to the older, all-female group, they play instruments when they sing.

Songs South: Honky Tonk Blues

Hank Williams, "Honky Tonk Blues"
Honky Tonky Blues, purchase

I lived ‘down South’ for a number of years, but I hated Southern music, or “Country” as it should be properly named. Wouldn’t even entertain it. Granted, I was down there when Grunge was bitch-slapping the popular music scene and Nirvana was sitting atop a new Olympus.

Country music was the stuff the sorority girls who wouldn’t give me a second glance were listening to. My general impression of country music was of those girls heading to Walnut Creek Amphitheater in straw cowboy hats, mini skirts and boots. Or rednecks in pickups.

I defined country music by the those who listened to it, with no understanding or knowledge of the roots and history, the depth or multitudinous of genres and styles, and I failed to read its influence on almost everything else I was listening to.

But, to be fair, my strongest impression of ‘country’ music at that time was Alan Jackson’s “Chattahoochee”, which made brave but strange reference to ‘hootchie coochie’, among other things my misplaced northern soul just couldn’t cotton to…

Which is too bad, as I feel I came to a grand tradition pretty late, and have been trying to make-up ground for a long time.

Luckily, I found Hank Williams, listened to more than the radio hits of the Allmans, and Lynyrd Skynyrd; I found Cash—but we all did, at some point. I found a lot of good stuff, mostly through what I was already listening to and following the influences of bands in the alt-country scene that I’d learned to love, like Uncle Tupelo, Wilco, and The Jawhawks. It is strange, in retrospect, how much I loved those bands yet still took such a circuitous route to country music.

However crooked, or slow, I did find my way.

And I can’t think of a better song to fit this month’s category of “South”, than Hank Williams’ “Honky Tonk Blues”.

The song is perfect: a strutting, ramble-rhythm, fiddles in the back pushing the melody, the purring shimmy of the pedal steel and Williams’ inimitable lamenting warble—I can’t call it a yodel. That voice was the veritable personification of pain and misery, light coming though it like a half-empty whiskey bottle on the windowsill. To say he yodeled would be to diminish the palpable spirit he brought to song. That voice, a transcendent, plaintive howl, personifies in a single instance, the searching earnestness of all his pain, misery, mischief, and occasional happiness. Some might hear Williams pull that ‘country shit’ and think, no, not for me. But, they are missing out on what amounts to pure poetry.

“Honky Tonk Blues” is exactly what it is: a shuffling lament of leaving the country for the big town, and wanting nothing more than to get back home. It’s ‘country mouse, city mouse’, a tale told and retold. It’s William’s warning about straying too far from what you know, but then, when you take Williams’ hard luck myth and real life blues, all of his songs are some kind of warning. Hank ‘s legend sometimes outshines the simple, sad elegance of his music. But songs like “Honky Tonk Blues” are pure magic, and do more than cast a spell. Rather, his music spells out the blueprint for country music.  He reminds me of all the stuff I missed when I was down South, and make me want to get back as soon as I can. Honky Tonk blues, indeed.

Medical Conditions: The Aneurysm Edition

Nirvana: Aneurysm

[purchase]

The older Kurt Cobain got the more obsessed he seemed to become with the human anatomy, bodily functions and medical procedures, and references to all three were rife in his lyrics and artwork.

This original version of Aneurysm appeared on the Smells Like Teen Spirit single in 1991 and on the tour EP Hormoaning a year later, as well as on the With The Lights Out box set in 2004. While certainly good, this version somewhat lacks the intensity of this one:

Nirvana: Aneurysm (BBC Session)

[purchase]

A shorter, faster take recorded for the BBC's The Evening Session and was included on the Incesticide rarities compilation in 1992.

In 1996, two years after Cobain's death, the live album From The Muddy Banks Of The Wishkah came out and a version of Aneurysm (recorded in California on December 28th 1991) was released as a single.

Nirvana: Aneurysm (live in Del Mar, CA)

[purchase]

And just so we can hear the evolution of the song, here's an earlier live version of it, which features slighty different lyrics. A bootleg recording from the Off Ramp in Seattle on November 25th 1990.

Nirvana: Aneurysm (live in Seattle, WA)

There´s Something About Mary: Molly´s Lips

The Vaselines: Molly´s Lips

[purchase]

That Molly is a short form of Mary was news to me actually, but I guess one is never to old to learn. And hey, it gives us the chance to put the spotlight on late eighties indie legends the Vaselines.

This shambling brainchild of Scottish duo Eugene ´Eugenius´ Kelly and Frances McKee fell apart after recording only one album and a handful of sharp singles, but one Kurt Cobain made sure their sweet sounds weren´t forgotten anytime soon. Nirvana covered three of their songs - Molly´s Lips, Son Of A Gun and Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam - in fine style, probably providing Kelly and McKee with some nice royalties in the process.

And to end with a trivia fact: the 1 minute and 44 seconds of naive pop bliss that is Molly´s Lips was apparently inspired by Molly Wier, a famous Scottish TV personality whose Tea-Time Tales show was avidly watched by the budding Vaselines.

Washington: Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge On Seattle / Olympia

Nirvana: Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge On Seattle

[purchase]

Hole: Olympia

[purchase]

Here are a couple of tracks from the First Couple of grunge music. Not the usual SMM fodder, but music that is intrinsically tied to my teenage years...I sometimes forget how much I love this kind of music until I listen! Fear not, I shall be back with something more 'fitting' in my next post.

N.B. If you follow the 'purchase' link to Hole's Live Through This, you will not see Olympia listed...fear not, it is there, but it was part of that whole 90s 'secret track' phenomenon.

Right, I'm off to bed...1.39am here in the UK!

My First: Nevermind

Nirvana: Polly

[purchase]

I bought this one as a gift for my brother. He introduced me to everything back then, and I somehow managed to overhear about this record that he somehow didn't have yet. He was a serious Nirvana fan. I've always enjoyed their songs over their sound. But I remember exactly where I was when I heard about Kurdt's death.