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My iPod #560: Wilco – I Am Trying to Break Your Heart

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The story goes that Wilco were going through some inner turmoil during the making of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, particularly between lead singer and guitarist Jeff Tweedy and fellow guitarist and composer Jay Bennett. Their original record label weren’t so impressed with the final result of their work, rejected it and told the band to get out of their faces, leaving them with an album to provide but no label to release it. Eventually things all fell into place. Wilco got signed again. The album, originally slated for September 2001, was physically released to the masses months later in May 2002. Critics ate it up, fans loved it. Still do to this day. It has gone down as one of the best albums of the opening decade of this century.

‘I Am Trying to Break Your Heart’ is the album’s opener. It’s seven minutes long. It takes about a minute of that time for the song’s main chord progression to make itself known after a sort of instrumental prelude of pianos, percussion and organs. Tweedy’s mellow voice comes in with the album’s first (and possibly most quoted) lines “I am an American aquarium drinker/I assassin down the avenue/I’m hiding out in the big city blinking/What was I thinking when I let go of you?”, and it all goes on from there really. You have to listen to it for that full experience.

Tweedy doesn’t have the greatest singing voice. Not soulful, or belting from the stomach or whatever. But it’s just perfect for the whole mood of the track. And the album in general. The vocal melody is the most simple thing. But it’s great. It will get in your head. And accompanied by the very full mix provided by Jim O’Rourke, it’s an enrapturing listen. It’s hard to not find yourself in a bit of a trance when hearing this. You probably won’t feel it on your first listen. It’ll sink in.

Above is the supposed demo of the tune, as recorded by Jay Bennett before it went through remixing for the album. Some prominent smooth Rhodes(?) piano in there, but not quite the same.

My iPod #524: They Might Be Giants – Hey, Mr. DJ, I Thought You Said We Had a Deal

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“Hey, Mr. DJ, I Thought You Said We Had a Deal” was originally going to be released on the Purple Toupee EP, when the title track was to be released as a single in 1989. For some reason the EP was shelved and the song was later placed as the opener to the band’s B Side/Remix compilation Miscellaneous T, two years later in 1991. The compilation is loved by many a They fan due to the fact that for a B Side album, the stuff on there are as brilliantly written and performed as any other song you would find on the three albums they had released by that time.

The song is a tale of a lad who is eager to get his new song on the radio, going to the local DJ to see if he can sort some things out. From the wordy title, you can probably tell that things don’t go as planned. The tale is told accompanied by catchy rhythms, an infectious melody and a delightful Carribean-like (xylophone? glockenspiel?) line and backed up by the witty lyrics of John Linnell. Notice how he cleverly pulls of a ‘Glass Onion’ and sneaks in some references to other TMBG songs in a verse. So much fun.

I could imagine this being a lead single for any album. Seeing as it was to be released with “Purple Toupee”, I assume that it was recorded during the Lincoln sessions. Goodness. I enjoy Lincoln enough as it is, but it would have been cool to have this on there. Though it’s title would have stuck out like a sore thumb on the track list.

My iPod #517: The Explosion – Here I Am

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“Here I Am” was the first single by American punk rock band The Explosion, and appeared as the third track on their second album Black Tape. Like the majority of tracks on that album it focuses on a theme of greed and corruption in our society, and here it is the police who are the subject matter. Though the narrator wonders on ‘the golden age’ of yesterday when things weren’t so bad, he soon realises that those times are gone and that the present is what he should really be focusing on.

Being a punk rock song there is nothing but guitars, bass and drums delivered to you, but it’s quite different in that the music is very melodic and addictive to listen to. The lead guitar riff catches your attention straight away – it is buried in the mix a bit on the album version but it is at the forefront of the mix in the video – and lead singer Matt Hock’s raspy vocals are a perfect fit to the song’s elating instrumentation.

This song sound familiar to you? Did you own Tony Hawk’s Underground 2, Burnout 3: Takedown, and Pixar’s Cars on the PlayStation 2? There’s your answer.

My iPod #449: Eels – Going to Your Funeral Part I

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Going to Your Funeral Part I is the second track on Electro-Shock Blues, the second album by the alternative band Eels. Recorded during a period in which several friends and members of frontman E’s family passed away, the album is regarded to be the band’s best work because of the brutal honesty and sincerity within each of the sixteen tracks on it.

Preceding this song is “Elizabeth on the Bathroom Floor“, a lullaby-like track with lyrics taken from E’s sister’s personal journal before she unfortunately ended her own life some time after. “Going to Your Funeral Part I” depicts the scene bluntly stated in the title after the tragic event. You’d think that coming right after it, it would only concern the funeral of his sister and that’s what we’re made to believe for the first and second verses, but it is only until the final verse which has E almost screaming into a megaphone about remembering an old friend he used to hang out with behind their old school.

Beginning with an ominous drone that pans from left to right and quickly fades out, the track then gets to a crawling start carried by an unsettling groove led by an intense but very slack bass line that oozes from one note to the other. E comes in with a light falsetto vocal after, but over the dark bass line and overall atmosphere still isn’t able to to make the track less dissonant than it already is. The style changes during the choruses where cute xylophones and backwards slide guitars enter the mix; those only appear for a short time before returning to the grungy sound again.

Only five minutes into the album, the listener is already provided with two tracks that sound the complete opposite to one another. Though the first hints at the unsettling feel with light music and heavy lyrics, “Going to Your Funeral Part I” really hits it home.

If you want to know why it’s specifically labelled as “Part I”, here is “Part II”.

My iPod #341: Goldhawks – Everytime I See You Cry

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Have you heard of Goldhawks? If so, I congratulate you. If not, I don’t blame you. I don’t think there is a large amount of people out there who do. Their debut album “Trick of Light” was released in 2010. Did you hear anything about this from the television? I certainly didn’t. I was watching The Jonathan Ross show when a sample of a song of theirs was used alongside a compilation of Andre Agassi playing tennis. “Everytime I See You Cry” was not that song. But if it wasn’t for that I definitely would not be typing this, or have any knowledge of this band whatsoever. The album doesn’t even have a Wikipedia article, so I can’t link it to you. They do have a channel on YouTube though.

What do Goldhawks sound like? A bit like an indie rock version of U2 with a singer who sounds like Gaz Coombes from Supergrass. You interested? I’m glad. I would also say that their music is actually represented well by the album cover. Why I feel their music is best to be played when strolling in the city during night time with lots of bright lights is probably depicted all in that one beautiful picture.

“Everytime I See You Cry” greatly sets off the mood, being the opening track on “Trick of Light”. Though it’s about feeling guilty about having to leave a partner for work (in this case, I’ll say it’s about touring or something), the ‘get ready’ refrain and rocking music is very encouraging and inspiriting.

Goldhawks may not become very popular. But I’ve got to get the word out somehow. We can all listen together.