Tag Archives: don’t

#1188: The Flaming Lips – She Don’t Use Jelly

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The first time The Flaming Lips came into my consciousness was around the time that At War with the Mystics was their “new” album that was going to be released soon. Guess that places us in 2006. The video for ‘The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song’ was a regular in the mornings on MTV2. It was a strange video. It was a strange song. But I dug it. To the 11-year-old child I was, it scratched that weird internal itch that I think all young ones have at that age. Because there was this hype for The Flaming Lips going around, their older videos would be played on the channel too. Through this, it’s how I came to know songs like ‘Race for the Prize’, ‘Fight Test’, ‘Do You Realize??’, and today’s featured track ‘She Don’t Use Jelly’.

I was a younger, foolish kid back when I saw the video for ‘Jelly’ for the first time, and I think I cared more about appearances than the music. The first thought I had was how different Wayne Coyne looked compared to all the other videos I’d seen him in. In fact, the whole band looked completely unrecognizable. It appeared to be a much older music video than than the ones for the songs from Bulletin and Yoshimi, so obviously they were younger. They just also happened to look like completely different people. Plus, there appeared to be this other person in the band that by 2006 was not in there anymore. I had a lot of research to do. The track just seemed weird to me. The combination of the audio with the visuals, my little brain couldn’t handle it. I got over that bridge eventually.

The Flaming Lips could have easily been known as the band that did this one song. and then dipped, never to be heard from again. As we all know, they went on to do great things which I think we’re all very grateful for. But there are a lot of one-hit wonders who have worst tracks than this one. ‘She Don’t Use Jelly’ is about three kooky characters, two girls, one guy, all described in three respective verses, who use unusual objects for the completely wrong purposes. There’s choruses per se. Where the choruses would usually be are instead replaced by the crunching guitar riff and loopy slide guitar refrain, which also start the track off. And I like Coyne’s vocal in this too, all bare and untampered with. He’s not the strongest singer, but he gives it feeling, even if the lyrics aren’t meant to be taken all seriously.

#574: The White Stripes – I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself

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Gotta say I don’t have much on the brain about this one….. Nothing on the personal side of things anyway. I think the song’s great don’t get me wrong, The White Stripes achieve a fantastic cover of Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s composition (originally made popular by Dusty Springfield in 1964), but I think I just saw the music video on MTV when I was about nine and thought it was cool. And because I was only nine and still thought girls were icky, I never got the appeal of Kate Moss pole dancing and writhing on a table. The song just simply sounded awesome. That is the official music video by the way for any new readers or listeners, not my doing.

The White Stripes were alright. They have great songs but I’m not a huuuge fan… It always was a big thing when they announced a new single or album though. I recall the video for ‘Icky Thump’ being shown almost every hour on MTV2 in 2007 when it was released. Good times being 12 and everything. Good tune too. Though you wouldn’t find me being the first in line to buy their albums. Was a shame when they split though. Probably still had so much to give.

So anyway, ‘I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself’ appears on the band’s 2003 album Elephant as its fourth track. This track’s tone is what pulls me in every time. There’s something very slinky, sneaky and sly in the way it’s performed. Jack White gets that ashy tone on his guitars and sounds like he’s wailing his vocals about in an empty corridor. Meg White gets all primal on the drums. The contrast between the quiet verses and the sudden release in the choruses. That triumphant ending where the song title’s repeated and everything fades out. Man. This is a great track. Whenever anyone attempts a cover of an old track, I feel they should always adapt it to their style whilst trying to capture the magic of what makes the original. The White Stripes did it here. This is one of those good covers.

#570: Ween – I Don’t Want It

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I was about 18 when I listened to The Mollusk for the first time when looking for new music to get into. That album was released in 1997 so it’s not new by any means, but you know looking out for stuff that I’d just never heard before. I got to love that album but then I never thought about really digging into the rest of the band’s discography.

Fast forward to 2015. Twenty years old, just started a new job for my placement year. Things are going good. I was at home just chilling in the evening as you do before going to work again the next day and out of curiosity I decided to listen to GodWeenSatan: The Oneness on Spotify…… There was no turning back. I dove deeper into the hole that had opened beyond my ears. I’ve been properly listening to Ween for just over two years now, and I am convinced that they might be the greatest band on this planet. No one really knows it though.

And so, the first Ween song I’m able to cover is ‘I Don’t Want It’, the tenth song on the group’s 2003 album Quebec. The album arrived at the end of a dark period during the band’s original run in which drummer Claude Coleman almost died in a severe car accident and lead vocalist Aaron Freeman (Gene Ween) going through a crummy divorce. ‘I Don’t Want It’ is the song about that crummy divorce and depicts Freeman’s feelings about the whole situation. It’s a sad song, to put it straight, perfectly capturing the moment of realisation when a breaking relationship has come to an end. It’s obviously for the best, though the love is still there that you don’t want to let go.

For the most part the track is played straight. Verse, chorus, verse, chorus. Things slow down afterwards, a short break occurs, and then suddenly a burst of guitar feedback kicks in leading into one of the most glorious guitar solos I’ve heard, drowning out almost every other instrument, echoing into the abyss and backed by some heavenly ‘aah’ vocals. For a time I did think it was lead guitarist Mickey Melchiondo (Dean Ween) doing this solo. Why not? If there’s a solo in any other Ween song, it’s usually him who pulls them off. Then it dawned on me that it could possibly be Freeman himself… Turned out that it was, which made it all the more powerful and heartbreaking to me. It’s perfect.

#569: Chris Bell – I Don’t Know

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You might remember that the title track of Chris Bell’s posthumous album I Am the Cosmos</em> started of the ‘I’ section of this ongoing song series. Well, here is Mr. Bell again with another song from that album – the tenth one on there – entitled ‘I Don’t Know’.

Earlier this year I had a phase of listening to Big Star, after really enjoying the band’s first LP #1 Record and ended up reading about the band’s history and watching a documentary detailing the group’s career which is a good watch and one I would recommend to anybody interested. Just doing the general stuff you do when you really get into an artist you’ve properly listened to for the first time.

Making a long story short Chris Bell left Big Star after their first album release, disillusioned with the lack of its success and being in a band in general, and embarked on solo endeavours. His material wasn’t released in album form until 1992, over a decade after his tragic death. Listening to I Am the Cosmos and then hearing Radio City, the album Big Star made after Bell’s departure, it becomes apparent who may have been behind the band’s large, clean and anthemic sound that made #1 Record such a bold effort.

‘I Don’t Know’ explodes right out of the gate with a soaring intro of jangling guitars, crashing cymbals and powerful drums that segue into Bell’s vocals. The track sees the man in a state of confusion as to why he’s sticking around in a relationship that he doesn’t really want to be in, but still finds himself very much attracted to his lady. It’s a song of contradiction and inner conflict, themes that appear throughout the entire album, but it’s a blast to listen to – an energetic and cathartic three and a half minute wonder.

Another strange thing to note is that this song actually appears twice on the album, appearing with a slower tempo and completely different arrangement under the name ‘Get Away’. Now why Bell chose to do this no one will ever know. Isn’t that cheating in some kind of way? Then again… he wasn’t around to pick what songs went on his album. As a result, the deluxe version of the I Am the Cosmos album contains four takes of what are essentially the same song.

Obviously, the vibes are different between the two but maybe the lyrics are to be taken differently even though their completely the same in both songs. I don’t know. Just a guess.

#568: Fall Out Boy – I Don’t Care

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A lot of Fall Out Boy’s stuff I don’t care for anymore, though there was a time (as I’m sure there were for many going through their teenage years) when I thought all of their songs were great. I had friends in secondary school and we would talk about their stuff, casual sing-alongs here and there when we should have been listening to the teacher. Now I can say that some songs of theirs have aged much better than others. ‘Dance, Dance‘, ‘Sugar, We’re Goin’ Down‘, and ‘This Ain’t a Scene, It’s an Arms Race‘ are three in particular which I just can’t listen to anymore. The majority of From Under the Cork Tree and some of Infinity on High I haven’t listened to in years.

Folie à Deux, however…. Man. That album still holds up today. I think it’s the band’s best one, though fans seemed to hate it when it was released in 2008. I haven’t listened to it in full for ages either, but I feel as if it was the album that the band had always wanted to make at that point in time. It has great production, the songs just flow right into each other, Patrick Stump is singing melodies all over and Wentz’s lyrics aren’t so angsty. They are actually quite funny in some places. Unfortunately they burned themselves out creatively and personally, which resulted in a break-up the following year. They returned in 2013 with a new sound and single, but by then I was listening to other stuff. Though along with My Chemical Romance and Linkin Park, Fall Out Boy will always be a source of nostalgia.

Oh yeah, the song.

So ‘I Don’t Care’ is the second song on Folie à Deux, and was released as the album’s first single. Being a thirteen year-old then, I felt the video was amazing. The band members acting like pricks and cameos from Mark Hoppus and Pharrell? Get outta here. That stuff was funny. Doesn’t really match the song which is essentially about someone who shares no compassion for other people and thinks they’re the shit. But still, the band actually looked cool and sounded slick. It marked a somewhat darker era for the group which I kinda wish they could have gone further down, but hey those are the brokes.

One thing I have against the track is that the whole call-response ‘I Don’t Care’ bridge goes on for a bit too long, but it’s worth it just for that drop into that final chorus with the ending guitar solo.