Clothes: Dress of Laces

Nanci Griffith: Dress of Laces

[purchase]

The well-worn metaphor of a well-worn dress speaks to the weary heart of a girl desperate for love from an absentee father and a debauching mother; I won't give away the ending, but I will say that the moral here seems to be that laces let to wear too thin can snap -- revealing, too late, that which would have kept us from an inevitably rash and regretful end.

The song, written and originally recorded by relatively under-the-radar Texas singer-songwriter Saylor White, was given life on a national scale with the release of Other Voices, Too (A Trip Back to Bountiful), Nanci Griffith's second of two bestselling all-coversong tributes to her musical influences and peers. No less an authority than the oft-cited Oxford American Magazine included Griffith's gorgeous countryfolk ballad on their yearly Southern Sampler way back in 1998, and I think it bears repeating. With Lyle Lovett on harmony vocals for that perfect finishing touch.

Clothes: Pink Triangle

Weezer: Pink Triangle

[purchase]

Well... I thought I'd go ahead and get the obligatory Weezer post out of the way and put up "Undone (The Sweater Song)." Then, I thought I'd go a different way.

"Pink Triangle" is from Weezer's oft-overlooked 1996 album Pinkerton... my favorite Weezer album. Pinkerton was Weezer's ambitious and extremely personal followup to their self-titled debut. Although the album has become a cult favorite, it generally got mixed reviews and was a bit of a commercial failure. "Pink Triangle," the third song released from the album, was actually the band's least successful single.

The story of the song is simple. Guy meets girl. Guy falls for girl. Guy envisions a future with girl involving marriage, children, and white picket fences. Guy sees pink triangle patch on girl's sleeve. Guy is broken-hearted. Her clothes gave her away.

Clothes: Coat Of Many Colors

Dolly Parton: Coat Of Many Colors

[purchase]

I've always admired Dolly Parton. This song in particular gets to the core of how great a songwriter she is, because it's beautiful, simple, and tells a story, and not just any story, but a very personal story that is also inspirational.

My mother always looks a bit misty-eyed when this song is on. Being a farmer's daughter herself, and being the girl wearing the flour sack dress to school and never feeling like she fit in because of it, and now looking back on it she remembers how hard her parents worked to feed and clothe her and her many siblings, she feels sad she never appreciated when she had it. Now she appreciates the difference, the homemade cookies in her lunchbox instead of the store bought ones, the time in the kitchen with her mother, the cherry picking with her sisters, they are all now experiences that she cherishes and feels blessed to have had instead of feeling like she wishes she were like the other girls as she did back then. Dolly puts her feelings into words and we see just how important and proud an article of clothing can make us.

Clothes: Hand In Glove

The Smiths Hand In Glove

[purchase]

From their outstanding debut album, Hand In Glove is a strange and dysfunctional love song. Morrissey sounds deeply smitten, so smitten in fact that the sun shines out of his behind; however, he knows his luck too well and believes that he'll probably never see the object of his love again.

Clothes: Flowered Dresses

Slaid Cleaves: Flowered Dresses

[purchase]

Slaid Cleaves. If it’s folk music you like… he’s your one-stop source. A man well versed in the art of storytelling, Slaid Cleaves evokes that dust-bowl, depression era ambiance as good as anyone. He’s the guy that put music a set of Woody Guthrie lyrics that became the namesake for my blog: This Mornin’ I Am Born Again.

Flowered Dresses was part of Slaid’s most recent (although released in 2006) album, Unsung. It’s a creative concept album in which Slaid worked to compile a group of songs from his peers – artists that opened for him, long time musical friends, etc. – and created an album that sounds as cohesive as any of his own material. Slaid re-tells other people’s songs like they were his own bed-time stories. Flowered Dresses is a song by fellow Austinite Karen Poston – who also penned one of Slaid’s most poignant tunes, Lydia. The two have collaborated often throughout the last decade.

Slaid Cleaves is currently on a West Coast tour and will be back making the rounds in Austin starting with a Halloween gig at the famous Cactus Café on the University of Texas campus. He says he’s got another batch of songs ready for a (partially underway) album tentatively named 'Hard To Believe.' Check out a full Slaid Cleaves artist spotlight here.

Slaid’s Website
Karen’s MySpace

Clothes: I Love My Shirt

Donovan: I Love My Shirt

[purchase]


Do you have a shirt that you really love? Donovan does, with a tune guaranteed to generate earworms world-wide. You can try hating on this song, but it's not going to chase that melody out of your noggin.

Johns: Robert & Johnny, Johnnie & Joe

Robert & Johnny: We Belong Together
Johnnie & Joe: Over the Mountain, Cross the Sea

[purchase]

Both of these come from the Doo Wop Box, a box set my wife picked up at the library a couple months ago which has given us a ton of great doo wop ditties we never would have brought into our collection otherwise. I don't know anything about either of these duos, other than that they fit the theme and they're good songs!

Johns: John Michael Stipe

R.E.M.: Radio Free Europe

[purchase]

Just a quick post to pay tribute to my favorite John... John Michael Stipe of R.E.M.

Here is JMS at his murky, muddy best. "Radio Free Europe" is from R.E.M.'s debut album Murmur.

Also... please be on the lookout for Peter Buck's stolen guitar.

Johns: John Mayall

John Mayall: Have You Heard

[purchase]

I mentioned here that John Mayall was the center of the British blues-rock scene of the 1960s. Most of the major figures in the scene perfected their art in Mayall’s band the Bluesbreakers, before going off on their own. Most notably, that’s Eric Clapton on lead guitar on Have You Heard. Jimmy page also did time in John Mayall’s band. Mayall himself plays harmonica, piano, and rhythm guitar, and does a fine job in each case.

So why isn’t John Mayall better known? First of all, there is his voice. Mayall almost always insists on taking the lead vocals. To be kind, his voice is an acquired taste.

I think there is also another reason. John Mayall’s artistry belonged to a particular time and place. As blues-rock faded from view, Mayall tried to adapt and change his sound to fit the times. He relocated to California and his sound mellowed, but he never sounded comfortable or passionate about what he was doing on his 1970s releases. More recently, he has tried to return to his earlier sound, but he doesn’t seem to be able to recapture the early spark. But, for a brief moment, he created some of the most impassioned music you could ever care to hear.

Bonus Track:

Fleetwood Mac: Drifting

[purchase]

Back here, I made a side comment about Fleetwood Mac starting out as a blues band. Original members included Mick Fleetwood on drums, John McVie on bass, and Peter Green on lead guitar and vocals, as well as Jeremy Spencer on slide guitar. Spencer is the only one who did not come out of John Mayall’s band. Fleetwood and McVie are the only remaining original members, and their last names are where the band got its name.

Johns: John Cafferty

John Cafferty & The Beaver Brown Band: On The Dark Side

[purchase]


Hailing from Narragansett, Rhode Island, John Cafferty & The Beaver Brown Band originated in 1973, starting out as a J. Geils Band clone (Cafferty claims they modeled themselves after the Boston group).

On The Dark Side is from the soundtrack of the 1983 film, Eddie and The Cruisers, which was about a fictional band whose leader, Eddie Wilson, mysteriously disappears after his car crashes over a bridge - his body was never found. Eddie's singing comes from John Cafferty, The Beaver Brown Band fills in musically for The Cruisers.

If you overlook the heavy handed Springsteenesque approach and the fact that this is yet another rewrite of Neil Diamond's Cherry Cherry, it's not bad, it has cheesy Pop appeal. Apparently, the band will soon be appearing on the upcoming reality series, Loder's Run: The Quickening and best of all, they're still available for corporate bookings!

Johns: John Vanderslice

John Vanderslice: Trance Manual

[purchase]

John Vanderslice is a singer-songwriter that makes indie rock that sounds like a more mature version of Death Cab For Cutie. I've had the pleasure of seeing him perform twice now, and both times I was impressed by how unaffected he came off as. Despite his music being rather serious and somber most of the time, he seemed to be all smiles and acted jovial with the crowd.

He has collaborated numerous times with fellow amazingly talented John, John Darnielle of The Mountain Goats, having produced a few of The Mountain Goats' albums and having had Darnielle contribute to the lyrics to his highly acclaimed album "Pixel Revolt", which the track I have here is from. He's an artist that seems to generally fly under the radar of many music fans, including me sometimes, but always surprises me with his talent.

Johns: Johnny Jenkins

Johnny Jenkins: Sick And Tired

[purchase]

Today, Johnny Jenkins is credited as the man who gave Otis Redding his shot. But he was a hard working bluesman and axe slinger in his own right.

His 1970 album, Ton Ton Macoute!, was originally to be a Duane Allman solo project. Duane went with the Allman Brothers instead but did lend his slide guitar to about half of this Nawlins, swamp blues, voodoo-drenched disc.

Johns: Jonatha Brooke

Jonatha Brooke: Made of Gold

[purchase]

When I told my wife what this week's theme was here at SMM, the first thing she asked me was, "So... does Jonatha Brooke count?" Then she made me promise that I would offer up some of Jonatha's music for everyone. Jonatha is one of my wife's favorite artists, and someone who I have come to enjoy over the past couple of years as well.

Jonatha Brooke began her career in the early '80s by pairing with vocalist Jennifer Kimball while the two were both freshmen at Amherst College in Massachusetts. After a few years of playing the local circuit billed as Jonatha and Jennifer, the duo (now known as The Story) released their first album, Grace in Gravity, in 1991.

By 1994, however, Brooke and Kimball had split. 1995's Plumb, although it is credited as Jonatha Brooke & The Story, is actually Jonatha's first solo record. The track I have offered here, "Made of Gold," is the song that introduced me to Jonatha's music, and has grown to be one of my favorite tracks from her. It's a powerful song that Jonatha says was written at a time when many women she knew were struggling through some sort of physical or emotional abuse. A great example of her songwriting talents.

Side note: Jonatha Brooke's latest album was released last month. It's a collection of songs featuring Woody Guthrie's words set to Jonatha's music.

Johns: John Gorka

I am amazed that John Gorka is still available on day 4 of Johns week. In honor of that fact, I thought I would post four of his songs, to give an idea of his consistency. Gorka has a wonderful baritone voice, and his lyrics always manage to put across his ideas beautifully. His melodies and guitar playing never call attention to themselves, but always serve the song perfectly. As it happens, the four songs I have present a fifteen year span in exactly five year intervals.

John Gorka: Jack‘s Crows

[purchase]

John Gorka hit the ground running. 1991 saw the release of the album Jack’s Crows, which included what has become one of his signature tunes, I’m From New Jersey, which was presented during Fifty States week. Here is the title track.

John Gorka: My Invisible Gun

[purchase]

Of all the songs I am presenting, My Invisible Gun, released in 1996 on the album Between Five And Seven, shows Gorka working with the fullest arrangement. The production on this sounds to me like an attempt at crossover success, but is still an enjoyable track.

John Gorka: Let Them In

[purchase]

By 2001, on the album The Company You Keep, Gorka was back to using sparer arrangements. Guests on this album included Ani DiFranco and Mary Chapin Carpenter. Let Them In is a political song from an artist who is not usually known for them.

John Gorka: The Lock Keeper

[purchase]

Finally, 2006 saw the release of Writing in the Margins. The Lock Keeper has the sparest arrangement of any of the tracks I am presenting. The song features little more than voice and guitar, but little else is needed.

Johns: J. J. Cale vs. John Cale

J. J. Cale: Closer To You

[purchase]

John Cale: Adelaide

[purchase]

According to our usual sources, John W. Cale changed his name to "J. J." way back in the mid sixties at the urging of a "sunset strip nightclub owner" so as not to be confused with John Cale of the Velvet Underground. To be honest, it's hard to mistake the former Cale's seminal swamp of laidback southern/cajun bluesrock, which helped define the Tulsa Sound, for any of the various genre incarnations, from seventies folk-pop to the stylized artrock and protopunk of the eighties and nineties, that the latter Cale turned to after leaving the Velvet Underground at the end of that same decade. But I suppose it would be a bit startling to show up at some venue expecting to hear J.J.'s expansive, improvisational original takes on the songs that made other people famous -- Clapton's After Midnight and Cocaine, Lynard Skynard's Call Me The Breeze -- only to be confronted with a weird dude playing noisy experimental dronerock on the electric viola.

More likely comparisons would put J. J. Cale against fellow guitarslinging bluesrock jamsmen Clapton and Mark Knopfler, while the vast bulk of the work of John Cale might be more easily confusable with anyone from John Cage to Patti Smith, both of whom he's collaborated with in the past. That said, John Cale's early work has a bit of the same summery rock and roll sound that has made J. J.'s career, and J.J.'s not afraid to experiment. Here's the evidence for both.

Johns: Ms. John Soda

Ms. John Soda: Plenty Of

[purchase]

Back in Horns Week, writing about the Tied & Tickled Trio, I mentioned the little solar system of bands that surround German electronica/post-rockers the Notwist. Well, here's another planetoid: Ms. John Soda. Michael Acher, a principal in both the Notwist and the TTT, is present once again as half of this duo. Acher programs the beats and composes most of the songs while Stephanie Bohm (keyboardist in the instrumental band Couch) incants her icy cold vocals over top. Most of their songs are a little bouncier than the one I've chosen—uptempo mixtures of IDM and guitar rock, not too far from the Notwist's sound, but with Bohm's near-monotone voice carrying every song. "Plenty Of" is the closer from their most recent album, 2006's Notes and the Like. It's among my favorites the band has ever done, largely because of the ominous, hypnotic feel.

Johns: John Flynn

John Flynn: Dover

[purchase Two Wolves]

Back here, I described the workings of a successful political song. John Flynn, with Dover, has provided a remarkable example. The song manages the neat trick of honoring our fallen soldiers in Iraq while also delivering a strong message against the war.

John Flynn is based in the Philadelphia area, and can often be heard on the wonderful station WXPN, where I first heard him. In addition to his adult material, Flynn is also responsible for some wonderful kid’s music.

Purchase note: I have provided the link to purchase the album directly from John Flynn’s web site. It’s a little pricy, but Flynn is a self-everything indie artist who needs the support.

Johns: Jonathan Richman

Jonathan Richman: Amazing Grace

[purchase]

I can't believe I made it all the way to Tuesday and I still get Jonathan Richman!

Here is the closing track from his 1976 self-titled album. Richman's personality and song delivery is always off-kilter, tentative, stripped to the threads of what holds a song together. I still remember how I felt when I heard this song for the first time: after an album's worth of kinda kooky songs—"Abominable Snowman in the Market," "Hey There Little Insect," "Here Come the Martian Martians"—he closes with this simple, affecting interpretation of the classic. Hearing Richman's interpretation is like hearing the song for the first time. It's almost childlike—innocent, free of pretense, pure.

Johns: Johnny Horton

Johnny Horton: Cherokee Boogie

[purchase]

This isn't the most P.C. song, but (musically) it sounds good to my ears. Cherokee Boogie was released on Johnny Horton's last record, The Spectacular Johnny Horton, which came out in 1960. That same year, Johnny Horton was killed in a head-on collision caused by a drunk driver on a Texas bridge.

Wikipedia reports some interesting "facts" related to Horton's death:

"Johnny Horton reportedly had experienced premonitions several months before his own death about the possibility of dying in a car crash caused by a drunk driver. He always said that if he was in a head-on situation to drive into the ditch. His accident took place on a bridge so there was no ditch for which to head.

In connection with these premonitions, a story circulates that Horton, known to detest musicians who drank, had agreed to send his friend Merle Kilgore a message from beyond the grave. Ten years later, Kilgore heard from a group of psychics from New York of an apparition in a cowboy hat, whose message was 'the drummer is a rummer and can't hold the beat.' (recounted in "The View From Nashville", by Ralph Emery)

Both Horton and Hank Williams were married to the same woman [Billie Jean Jones] at the time of their death, and played their last shows at the Skyline Club in Austin, Texas."

Johns: John Forte'

John Forte' - Hungry (feat. Ben taylor)

[purchase]

I am hopping on an airplane for Boston tomorrow morning so this will be my final contribution of the week. The one comes from ex-Fugee member/current Fort Dix Federal Prison inmate, John Forte'.

As the title of one the tracks on John's 2002 album, I, John, states; what a difference a day makes. Almost like a scene right off a VH1 Behind The Music special, one day John is a Grammy nominated producer living the high life in the club scene with a promising brand new solo deal. Next, some shakeups at the record label leave an album with no promotion and have an artist struggling to make ends meet on the road in back alley clubs. Artist meets drug dealer...drug dealer needs female drug couriers...artist knows many a female...couriers get busted...roll over on dealer and artist...sting nets artist with 1.5 million dollars of liquid cocaine...14 years federal pound you in the ass prison.

During John's trail and while under house arrest John recorded what would become I, John. Personally, it's one of my favorite hip-hop albums. It has great flow, excellent guest spots and an undercurrent theme of someone analyzing their life while facing 14 years.

John is eligible for parole in 2013.