Monthly Archives: April 2022

#952: Eels – Novocaine for the Soul

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‘Novocaine for the Soul’ is the first song on Eels’ debut album Beautiful Freak and was the band’s first released single back in ’96. It introduced the world to the detached outlook on life taken by frontman Mark Oliver Everett, commonly referred to as E, a theme would carry on throughout a lot of the band’s work. As a ’90s baby myself, I wouldn’t have come across the song until way later, most likely when its video showed on MTV2 out of the blue one day. The visual of the three band members floating in the air was quite the suitable accompaniment for the music, even if the video static censoring of the word ‘fucking’ in there is a bit much. I’ve had the imagery from the video in my head whenever I hear this one.

What the narrator is this track is asking for when they refer to ‘novocaine for the soul’ is basically anything meaningful to get at the least a bit excited about. I don’t know if the opening lyrics are ‘iconic’, I think that’s words thrown around a lot these days. But an opening line of “Life is hard, and so am I/You better give me something so I don’t die,” that’s a pretty good way to start things off in my eyes. Sets the scene straight. He’s a simple man who doesn’t want to die too soon. He knows he’s gotta go someday, but before then could someone give him something to be happy about. There’s a whole bunch of sarcasm going on, but it’s also very sincere in its ways which was what the ’90s in music was all about when it comes down to it.

Track’s got a nice groove, one that I don’t think you’d usually expect from the usual alternative rock of the ’90s. The three-piece of £ on guitar, Tommy Walter on bass and Butch on drums really lay down that foundation. What properly sets the track apart is the inclusion of these grand strings that appear throughout. Not sure whether it’s a real string quartet or a string-setting on a Mellotron. If it’s the latter, they certainly sound very real. Think that may be down to Jon Brion’s hand in the production. Looking at the things he’s worked on, he’s always been handy in getting some good-sounding strings on a song.

#951: They Might Be Giants – Nothing’s Gonna Change My Clothes

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Hey, this is no joke one of my favourite songs of all time right here. First time I heard ‘Nothing’s Gonna Change My Clothes’ was when I would have been going through They Might Be Giants’ debut album in early 2011 or something. The connection I had with the song from that initial point was instantaneous. The band’s debut album is my personal favourite of theirs, and I believe that this song encapsulates everything the album offers in its two minute runtime. A fun melody, great hooks, undeniable catchiness, little moments that leave you thinking “what the hell was that?” It’s all there. And it’s so darn repeatable, I could listen to it for an hour straight.

There’s an interpretation about this track that I’ve seen online that kinda shocked me a bit. Before I’ll reveal it, I’ll tell you my initial thought, which I was quite happy to go along before I did the further research. Making it quick, I thought it was about a person who was basically happy with their life even though there was all this chaos going on around them. Everyone’s going crazy, yet this narrator looks in the mirror and is happy to be alive – a dancing skeleton in a fleshy overcoat. Although everything actually as great as everyone’s making it out to be, living in an ‘ignorance is bliss’ type state, I guess. The narrator isn’t be the one to bring everyone down. Their just gonna go ahead and live their life. Nothing’s gonna change their world, or in this case, clothes. So when I recently read an idea that the track was actually from the point of view of a dead person in their coffin describing the gifts that have been left in the casket, it left me with some thinking to do.

Whatever the track may or may not be about, I never let it get in the way of how I feel when that swinging high-hat pattern starts. It’s a programmed high-hat, but that doesn’t stop the foot from tapping. Things from then on just come as a bonus. The song’s filled with these small licks and moments that occur for mere seconds, but when you hear them enough they’re very hard to forget. Like those drawn out ‘yooo’ backing vocals, or that ascending guitar riff that comes in before the choruses. Of course, I have to tip my metaphorical hat to John Linnell, who sings the tune with a cool combination of looseness while also staying in time and reaching notes with an incredible tightness. The heavy breakdowns of the chorus endings add another unexpected angle to things and then to add to that John Flanburgh’s “Ever? AAAHHH!” right at the song’s conclusion, makes for one of the most cathartic endings in TMBG’s catalogue. I’m gonna go ahead and link the track’s demo below ’cause it’s just as good, and Linnell sounds even looser than he does on the album.

#950: Billy Talent – Nothing to Lose

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I’ve done something here that I don’t think I’ve done on here before and that’s put a video of bandmembers discussing a song’s background at the beginning of a post, rather than the music video itself or one of those custom official ones with the album track and cover. I’ve never thought that Billy Talent were one of those bands to be lumped in with those bands that everyone labelled as emo in the 2000s. My Chemical Romance, Fall Out Boy, The Used, you know the ones. But when you hear a song like ‘Nothing to Lose’ and realise the track is about suicide, someone might feel the urge to just yell “Emo” and disregard it entirely. Actually hearing the context the track was based on and hearing about how much it has meant to fans in the years that have passed will hopefully warm your hearts to it. Even if it means skipping the next couple paragraphs to watch the official video.

‘Nothing to Lose’ was released as the final single from Billy Talent’s first album, more than a year after the record had been released. It’s also the second to last song on there, and thank goodness for that because it would have been too much of a downer to end things on. If you didn’t watch the video above, the song was written after lead singer Ben Kowalewicz read a story about a boy in high school who was continuously bullied at school. After a kid asked that boy, “Why don’t you just kill yourself,” the boy went home at lunch period and hung himself in his basement. And so the track is an attempt to take on the first-person view of that boy, or anyone who was generally in the same situation. There’s practically no introduction. Just on straight away with Ben’s vocals and Ian D’Sa’s guitar. And with the first verse describing how alone the narrator feels and the chorus further detailing how if the narrator ends their life, nothing lost because no one cared about them, there’s only one way this song is going to go.

So, yes, the song’s about suicide and bullying and the horrible things a teenager can go through in high school when it really gets to that horrible level. But what I’ve always thought sets it aside from all of those other songs that are about those very things is just how damn passionate it is. Some might find Kowalewicz’s vocals grating, I’m sure I’ve read a few reviews who can’t help but mention their opinion on them, but you can’t say that he doesn’t sound like he cares. And when he’s screaming from his chest during the final choruses, I can’t help but feel those goosebumps. I barely like songs that have screaming in them anymore, but when the final choruses hit here I always nod my head gently and really feel it, you know? It’s very powerful. And plus I’ve got to give a nod to Ian D’Sa’s guitar playing as I do in every Billy Talent post. I can’t help it, his style’s consistently awesome. Just the chords he chooses and the way he plays them, there’s a lot to keep you engaged.

#949: Tame Impala – Nothing That Has Happened So Far Has Been Anything We Could Control

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Very well might be the song with the longest title that I’ve covered on here so far. ‘Nothing That Has Happened So Far Has Been Anything We Could Control’ is the penultimate track on Tame Impala’s 2012 album, Lonerism, a record whose mesh of psychedelia and hard rock with these spiralling synths and accessible melodies warmed a lot of people’s hearts upon its release and to this day. Kevin Parker embarked on going into a more pop-orientated direction, starting with 2015’s Currents and making itself more apparent on The Slow Rush, and sometimes there’ll be a comment or two that I see wishing that his music was more like the Lonerism days. It probably won’t happen. But I silently wish it too just a little. Though maybe he’ll surprise us all.

‘Nothing That Has Happened’ carries a theme that, thinking about it, would be further echoed in the first track of Tame Impala’s next record. Things that arise in life are at the most by chance, and really we have to just let these things happen (nudge-nudge, wink-wink). Tells you everything you need to know about the theme in the title to be honest. But when it comes to the music, it’s a swirling, twisting and turning six-minute experience. What I’ve always envisioned when hearing this song, is it being played live at a concert where people are high and having a good time. But for the narrator here it all gets a bit too much. He freaks out, leaves the room, gets calmed down by his girlfriend (spoken interlude here provided by Melody Prochet of Melody’s Echo Chamber) and goes back in chiller than before, but still having a bit of an existential crisis. And it’s just brilliant how this is all reflected in the production, like how the music goes quieter during the interlude, almost like its playing behind some doors before increasing in volume again. Or how the synthesizers upon the narrator’s ‘return’ to the room, get all hazy and pan all over the place in the ears. Simply a great passage of music to get lost in.

Think a shout-out should be made to Kevin Parker’s drumming throughout the whole song. I remember seeing a video where someone described his fills as the sound of a drumkit ‘falling down the stairs’, and I think that’s quite the accurate way to portray it. I think the same fill pattern is replayed over and over during the verses, but the way they fall from the snare to the toms and then are finished off with the cymbal crashes on each guitar strum is pretty wicked. Hard not to flail along and air-drum to them. Like other songs on Lonerism, the track has a rather long instrumental jam – one where the synthesizers are allowed to do their own thing, blipping in and out of the soundscape and doing some genuinely freaky stuff among the intensifying drums, before proceeding to undergo a solo that leads right back to the song’s introduction. So nice how circular the song is, and its probably the musical climax of the entire album before things slow down for its closer.

#948: Sum 41 – Nothing on My Back

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Here’s another fill of early-2000s pop-punk for ya. ‘Nothing on My Back’ is the first real track on Sum 41’s 2001 debut, All Killer No Filler. The combination of this track and the jokey faux-heavy metal speech ‘Introduction to Destruction’ delivered by drummer Steve Jocz properly introduced listeners to the band’s world. That is of course if they had gone blindly into it and somehow not heard ‘Fat Lip’ being played everywhere before the album’s release date.

And it kicks off with a riff in 7/4 time. I’ve always thought that was an interesting move. I didn’t get to listening to the album in full until about 2010, when I thought about downloading other LPs that weren’t in my own personal collection of CDs. Standard pop-punk it might be, but that opening riff at least differentiated a bit from other bands I knew like Blink-182 or Green Day. Can’t think off the top of my head of any of their songs which mess around with timing a bit.
The riff ends, going into this tom-tom heavy breakdown, before transitioning into the first verse in which the song’s theme is sort of established: Feeling low and sad when there’s nothing to really be sad about. It becomes a lot clearer in the choruses. With nothing on the narrator’s back, there’s still something out there that brings them down. I’ve always appreciated how the second verse took on a completely different melody from the first. Usually you’d just repeat the first verse melody, very sure that’s how it goes most of the time. Just another small thing that’s got my attention over time.

I think the big highlight of the whole track is the instrumental breakdown that occurs after the second chorus is over. Steve Jocz pounds on the tom-toms accompanied by Cone McCaslin’s bass, the guitars join in, forcing out these strident chords and ringing harmonics alongside every heavy thrash of the cymbals. And it’s not until Deryck Whibley starts singing again that you realise that the song’s key has changed entirely and gone up a few notches. It changes right when the breakdown begins, but it’s so subtle that it doesn’t come off as those typical cheesy key changes. With Whibley now singing the chorus with a more intense delivery, the whole musical aspect brings a thrilling conclusion to what’s been a fantastic opening to the album so far. Just when you think the guitars will fade out, they fade in again and abruptly end to give way to following track ‘Never Wake Up’ – a hyper sub-minute song that I’ve written about before. Judging by the album’s first three songs, its title wasn’t something to laugh off.