#1422: Big Star – Try Again

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So it appears that every time I’ve written about a Big Star or Big Star-adjacent number on the blog, Chris Bell has been at the forefront of all of them. When he and Alex Chilton were the songwriting duo behind the band’s #1 Record debut, released in 1972, it was the songs by the latter that seemed to get the most praise from critics. That, and the fact that hardly anyone knew the album existed because of extremely poor distribution, frustrated Bell, and he left the band not too long after. I got round to listening to #1 Record in early 2017, about February time, I remember it well, just in my room in the student house during my final year at university. It was dark outside, even though it was early evening, ’cause it was wintertime. I found it was the songs sung by Chris Bell that I gravitated towards. Chilton had a kind of wilting nature in his vocals, Bell had more of the attitude. Tracks like ‘Don’t Lie to Me’ and ‘Feel’? Oh, I was all over those from listen one.

But with ‘Try Again’, I think that one took a little more time. Thing with #1 Record is, after ‘My Life Is Right’, the songs take on a sadder, reflective, dominantly acoustic tone until the album’s end. ‘Try Again’ is Bell’s entry in this little section of the LP. I think it was during COVID-lockdown time when I heard the song again and just found it devastating to listen to. Sure I might have cried to it. So of course it was an instant add to the series. The song is plainly about perseverance. Trying to continue on even when it gets to that point where it feels easier to give up and end it all. The track’s made up of only two verses, both in which Bell earnestly talks to the Lord – he was an ardent Christian, this stuff is real – telling Him that he’s doing what he can to get through the day, though he has his difficulties. Despite this, he resolves his statements by simply saying he’ll try again, which is then followed by a weeping slide-guitar solo surrounded by ringing acoustic guitar chords. It’s sad, but he’s finding a solution at least.

I think it’s fair to say, Chris Bell was probably listening to a lot of George Harrison when writing this song. Particularly All Things Must Pass. Makes sense, as at the time, that would have been the big Harrison album available for purchase. Very sure the starting chords of ‘Try Again’ are the exact same as those that open ‘Isn’t It a Pity’. But not just that. Everything from the chord changes, to the slide-guitar playing, to the addresses to ‘Lord’ throughout, right out of the Harrison playbook. Bell and Chilton didn’t hide that they were massive Beatles fans anyway, so it’s not such a big deal. It is probably the most obvious Beatles nod on the album, though. Interesting to note too that ‘Try Again’ was a leftover from one of Chris Bell’s earlier bands Rock City. The band eventually morphed into Big Star, but were around during the late ’60s, which potentially places Bell at 18 or 19 when he wrote the song. I don’t know about you, but I did not have the emotional depth to write something like this at that age. No way. So damn, all credit to him. It’s beautiful stuff.

#1421: Datarock – True Stories

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As, I don’t know… controversial (?) a company EA Sports may be, I’ve got to thank whoever was in charge of the music team during those mid- to late-2000s because their game soundtracks were on a another level. I was a FIFA player in those times, something I’ve mentioned before, and the playlists they had on the games introduced me to a lot of bands, artists and songs that I would never have known about. They played a big part in the formation of my musical interests, for sure. Datarock were one of those groups. In FIFA 08, their song ‘Fa-Fa-Fa’ was among those playing in the background as I navigated the menus. I liked that one, remember singing along to it many a time. And whoever was on the playlist selection team must have been a fan, because a year later Datarock were part of the soundtrack in FIFA 09 with ‘True Stories’. It was a completely new song, hadn’t been released officially anywhere else and was seemingly a FIFA exclusive.

I liked this one too. Still do now, but you get what I mean. It was an earlier version of the track where the band hadn’t yet written an entirely new second verse, so they just repeated the first again. And the words were easy to remember. “Born under punches / Crosseyed and painless / Slippery people / I’m not in love. Really liked how the melody rises with each line until they reach the peak with “I’m not in love”. Very fun to sing. “Houses in motion / Road to nowhere / Once in a lifetime / I’m not in loooooove”. Good times. Then it gets all disco-ey during the belted-out choruses. The track’s a lot of fun. I can’t remember exactly when it happened. But I was listening one day and thought, “Hmm. ‘Road to Nowhere’, ‘Once in a Lifetime’… Those are songs by Talking Heads… Maybe…” So I went onto Letssingit.com, my lyrics site of choice back then, searched up Talking Heads, went through their song list, and there was my answer. The lyrics to ‘True Stories’ were made entirely of song titles by Talking Heads. The song itself named after a Talking Heads album. The part where Datarock sing ‘Burning down the house’ was censored on FIFA. Probably because they didn’t want arson promotion on their game. But this revelation made me appreciate the song even more. It didn’t really have any meaning. It’s just a massive Talking Heads tribute in dance-punk form. I think the only unique words in the lyrics are “‘Cause”, “Are”, and “Hey”.

So it was a good part of a year that I was sitting around and playing FIFA 09 whenever time permitted. Before I knew it, 2008 was over, we were now in the year 2009, and FIFA 10 was the new game in the series. Of course I got that too. And wouldn’t you know it, Datarock were in the game’s soundtrack again with ‘Give It Up’. Their third consecutive appearance. By the time of FIFA 10‘s, the duo had released their new, second album Red. ‘True Stories’ is on there as the third track, a little different from the version that was on FIFA 09. In its album form, the song sounds like it had a newly recorded bass line and re-recorded vocals. But the main thing was that it now had a new second verse, obviously consisting of more Talking Heads song titles, including ‘Psycho Killer’, ‘Television Man’, ‘Seen and Not Seen’ and others. This album version got the music video treatment, of which you can see above. And that’s really all I have on Datarock. A liking of football brought me to them, I got to know some great songs in return. All I could ask for.

#1420: Weezer – Troublemaker

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2008. What a year. Things that happened in it off the top of my head… The Beijing Olympics. Barack Obama was elected president. The financial crisis. The Dark Knight. I don’t what it says about me that those are the moments that stand out. It’s all a preamble to the fact that Weezer’s third self-titled album, commonly referred to as the Red Album, was released that year too. The record hasn’t gone down as one of the most important in the band’s catalogue. I mainly remember that Weezer era because Rivers Cuomo had a moustache. At the time, I feel like the overriding opinion was that the album was just okay, but anything they did was always going to be better than Make Believe. I followed how the band was doing via the releases of the album’s singles. ‘Pork and Beans’ was the comeback song, was very excited when that was around. And then ‘Troublemaker’ came along, but only digitally, and didn’t have a music video for three months. It was getting to 2009 when I was hearing the song regularly.

‘Troublemaker’ starts off the Red Album, a track of nerdy bravado – probably ironic, but wouldn’t be surprised if it’s completely sincere – that only Rivers Cuomo could somehow pull off. You read the words, they give off a “14-year-old-self-nominated-bad-kid-on-the-block” energy. Very funny coming from Cuomo, who would have been 37 at the time of the song’s recording and had written songs like ‘Island in the Sun’ and ‘Buddy Holly’. Him singing ‘Troublemaker’ shouldn’t work. But it just does. It’s so simple, so catchy. Mainly made up of two chords and a two note melody, it’s very easy for the entire song to get stuck in your heard on the first listen, even if you’re not trying to absorb anything. It was originally going to be the album’s first single. Would have been a reasonable selection. ‘Pork and Beans’ was chosen instead. A solid, solid choice. I think of it now, they did the two-note melody / chord trick in ‘Back to the Shack’, but the chorus alternated between two notes instead. ‘Troublemaker’ does it better. ‘Least I think so.

Don’t really know what else there is to say in regards to the song. Guess I can just provide some thoughts and opinions. Weezer aren’t too bad when it comes to album openers. Up to the Red Album, tracks under that category included classics like ‘My Name is Jonas’, ‘Tired of Sex’, and – a classic in my eyes – ‘American Gigolo’. Say what you want about ‘Beverly Hills’, but I couldn’t see it anywhere else on Make Believe. ‘Troublemaker’ was now part of the gang. Yes, the way Cuomo sings “Marrying a beyootch / Having seven kiooods” is very funny. Bending those words like that so they rhyme with ‘god’ in the next line should be illegal. But it’s Rivers Cuomo. That’s all I have on that. And the “How’s this for arts and crafts? / Wununununnunun” part… I like that quite a bit. Because of the middling reception the Red Album got and the lack of talk it gets today, I’ve never listened to the whole thing from start to finish. I just assume it may be a case where the singles – shout out to ‘The Greatest Man That Ever Lived’ – were the best it had to offer, and everything else was so-so. But any Redheads out there, tell me wrong. I’m always down for a new experience.

#1419: Eels – Trouble with Dreams

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Very sure this right here was the first song by Eels I ever heard. Despite ‘Trouble with Dreams’ not being an official commercial single from the band’s 2005 Blinking Lights and Other Revelations double album, a music video was made for the track. It was that which I came across on the TV one day. According to Discogs, the promotional single was released in October 2005, so I’ll say I saw the video around that time. Earlier that year, Weezer had released Make Believe. They were on the TV quite regularly. And seeing ‘Trouble with Dreams’, I thought this was a new Weezer song and Rivers Cuomo had grown out a beard. I was ten years old, just bear in mind. But, no. This was Mark Oliver Everett, known as E in the music business. It was the shared thick-frame glasses look that fooled me. And Eels were a totally different group altogether. Maybe saw the video a couple, three times more before it disappeared from circulation? Some years later I remembered the song existed, downloaded it right away, and now I’m here to relay my feelings about it to you.

There are a lot of rock songs I’ve written about on this blog. You think of rock songs, they usually have electric guitars in them. Those are the usual go-to instruments you’d find in those types of musical compositions. Not in ‘Trouble with Dreams’, though. I’d consider the track to be a rock song. But replacing what would probably be electric guitars, if it were your usual rock band doing the usual thing, are a variety of keyboards. A celesta, what sounds like a harpsichord, organs, choir vocals which I also think are keyboard generated. It’s all about the keys in ‘Trouble with Dreams’. Sets it apart from a lot of songs out there, or at least in the collection of tracks I’ve written and will go on to write about. In the song, E sings about wanting to be with someone he’s affectionate for, but he can only dream about such a thing and can’t imagine the relationship happening for real. His dreams seem to always leave him hanging. So while he fantasizes about this ideal get-together, in reality, he’s spending a lot of days alone and apparently a little stressed out. If you’re a dreamer and found yours have come true, E makes sure to warn that they may not turn out how you wanted them to. You can see where the trouble with them comes into frame.

I think the mood of the track is perfectly complemented by the visuals in the music video. The spooky, minor-key verses – consisting of the ticking of a clock, the circular riff on the celesta and descending melody of the bass guitar – do give off man-aimlessly-walking-through-house-at-night-with-candle vibes, as E does in the clip. And then the soundscape opens up for the brighter, major-key choruses, it’s daytime, you open the door and see the blue sky and sun, before realizing you don’t like the outside so much. You shut the door and go back to your aimless wandering around the house. I really like E’s voice on the track, how he starts off sort of all mumble-like, before ramping up the intensity for the next line and then really bringing out the melody what I’d guess you’d call the choruses. Has a fine husk in his voice, nothing like Rivers Cuomo. And I say ‘guess you’d call the choruses’ because those melodic parts just sound like the culminations of the respective verses they appear at the end of. By the time all the verses, of which there are only three, are over, there’s still two minutes of the song to go, so the band shake out the jams for the rest of the song out until layer-by-layer it dissipates and the celesta and bass guitar play into silence. Really enjoy this one. Good for a Halloween playlist. And I should listen to Blinking Lights… again one day. It’s been years since the last time.

#1418: Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks – Troubbble

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Stephen Malkmus by Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks again? Ah, okay then. You can understand, I don’t have anything new to add in regards for an introduction, considering the literal previous post was about another song from the album. But let’s see… let’s see. The first song from the album I covered on this blog was ‘Deado’, in a post dated the 19th March 2014, so clearly I was aware of the album by that point. A website archiving the radio shows I did in university exists. Not just mine, but you get the idea. Hearing my 18-year-old voice, not so much fun. On one show I hosted on 19th January 2014, I had ‘Jo Jo’s Jacket’ in the playlist. I was definitely listening to the Jicks’ Mirror Traffic in late 2013, so maybe Stephen Malkmus was in the iTunes library at that point too? If only my old laptop got itself together, I could have some concrete facts to give. It’s very frustrating. But to sum up, somewhere along the way, ‘Troubbble’ dug itself into the brain after album revisitations. Might have even happened around the same time ‘Trojan Curfew’ did.

‘Troubbble’ starts off the second half of the self-titled album, a bit of a punky, freakout session to kick things off again after ‘Discretion Grove’. I always think of ‘Troubbble’ as being an indication of how Malkmus’s spirits were at the time. There weren’t any signs of its kind of fun, throw-at-the-wall-see-what-sticks feeling to be found on Terror Twilight, which I love as an album, but it’s definitely moody in places. And at this point, Malkmus was freed from his shackles and able to just let loose a little. The lift of the Pavement burden was off his shoulders, and it was reflected in the music. It’s a sentiment I’m sure I’ve shared in similar words before, only because I really think it’s true. ‘Troubbble’, I really have no clue what it’s about. It may just be a lyrical exercise that Malkmus made to fit the music. A bit of existential stuff going on with “The world passes by in a flash / From the birth of the earth to the curse of your desperate math.” A great line, some catchy rhyming. Otherwise, it’s anyone’s guess. Here’s the demo. It doesn’t remotely clear anything up. Very interesting to hear, though.

You know, I found out sometime last year, Stephen Malkmus played the drums on Pavement song ‘Speak, See, Remember’ on Terror Twilight. I know it was initially said he took charge of almost every instrument on that album. I don’t think that’s true. But he did say in an interview that he played drums on one. Wasn’t expecting it to be ‘Speak, See…’. John Moen is credited as drummer on Stephen Malkmus, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Malkmus recorded everything on ‘Troubbble’ at least. I really like how those drums sound like a kid’s playing them during the verses before kicking into a proper driving momentum for the choruses. It’s a great change-up. And in general, ‘Troubbble’ is a track filled with oddities. All the squirty synthesizer work that goes on throughout adds to the playfulness of everything. There’s that moment where, I don’t know if it’s feedback or what, there’s that little melody that arrives after Malkmus sings ‘Literal swine drop’. In the background, an overdubbed Malkmus belts out “IF HE COULDN’T STAND YA” at the same time his singing counterpart delivers the line. I could describe more things, but it’s best for you to discover. What I’ll say is, for a song that doesn’t reach two minutes in length, I think there’s something new to hear in ‘Troubbble’ with each successive listen.