Got to type this one quickly ’cause I’m going to my friend’s house soon.
They Might Be Giants are my favourite band. I’ve downloaded most of their albums. The only albums of theirs I own is “The Spine” and “A User’s Guide…” which is a compilation, and so doesn’t really count. So I only own one album.
“Mink Car” is the eighth studio album by the band. It was released on the same day as 9/11, so it may not have received as much attention as it could have.
I downloaded the album in 2011 because I had never heard the songs of it, and they weren’t on YouTube so I uploaded them.
“Bangs” is the first song on the album. I’ve got to say when I first heard the song I mistook the title as a euphemism for another part of the female body. (Two other parts to be exact). But it’s not. It’s about a good haircut that a girl has which impresses the narrator. Shows you how I think.
“Bangs” is one of my favourites. Good melody and stuff. I hope you like it too.
I’m a bit tired, and a little depressed at the moment. I can try and lighten up my mood in the post, and I’ll see how I’m feeling tomorrow. I don’t want to get into it.
At least the post today features a song by my favourite band. Yep.
Around the time that I discovered the music of They Might Be Giants, the album ‘The Spine’ was their most recent release. As time has gone on, that album is known as one of the band’s least popular albums amongst fans. I like it though, it has some great tracks on it. This one is good too.
‘Au Contraire’ is sung by John Linnell, and makes references to David Bowie, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jodie Foster and Mahatma Gandhi. I don’t know what the song is about but from what I hear, the famous people I mention ask a question or state something in the verses to which the narrator doesn’t agree to, and in reply says ‘Au contraire, mon frere.’
That is basically the whole song. There is a little dual guitar solo with a little flute part at the end of it. But, yeah, that is ‘Au Contraire’ from The Spine.
The ending is also quite random too. Random voices just start saying ‘Right on’, almost like some madness mantra. This then results in a crescendo of cheers and applause, everyone is shouting ‘Right on’. Then ‘Damn Good Times’ starts. You should listen to this song and the aforementioned one together, it’s pretty cool. I have a thing for songs which segue into one another, it seems really cool to me.
One of the best They Might Be Giants songs ever. It’s got everything you want. A great chorus, an edgy guitar riff in the verses, and their typical trait of being able to write a melody that gets stuck in your head and never leaves.
The video of this song was one of the first of theirs I saw. I’ve told you guys about the Launchcast site Yahoo had, and how it basically introduced to what is my favourite band. When I saw it, I didn’t know who was singing. Neither John was lip-syncing to the song. The video just gave me everything I needed to know about them. They were synchronising in everything, their pounding on the table, their ‘dancing’, their general (I don’t want to say it) quirkiness just attracted me to them.
I had a good friend in primary school, and I was ten when I watched the video. So seeing that just made me want to force him to watch it so we could mimic the things they did during lunchtime or whatever. Everything is fun when you’re in year five.
Then primary school finished, and it was the summer holidays before I would start year seven. From being the oldest in the school, back to the youngest. I couldn’t handle it. I went out with my sister to Woolworths to buy stationery (pens, pencils, all the stuff) to prepare, and I saw one of my good friends from primary school there. I saw her, but I don’t think she saw me. I realised that’s how it would be from then on. I would never have the same relationship I had with my friends once I moved to my new school. The fact that I was the only person from my school to get into the one I did only emphasised that. I barely saw any of them, when I did it was a small exchange of:
“Hi! How are you?”
“I’m good.”
“Haven’t seen you for aaaaaaages!”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Well, see ya then! :)”
“See ya. :)”
😦 It was never the same.
I remember getting on the bus with my sister after finishing at the shop, ‘Ana Ng’ came into my head and I just kept on humming it and singing it quietly to myself whilst looking out the window feeling the time go by.
‘Ana Ng’ is a really important song for me. It reminds of me of the good times.
Oh my god, I’m so late. Sorry guys. I’ve been revising, so… yeah.
“They Might Be Giants again?” Yes. Deal with it.
It is another song from their debut entitled ‘Alienation’s for the Rich’, one of those songs with a title which would make you immediately think, ‘Oh hohoho. Those Giants and their weird, quirky titles derp derp derp.’
No.
I have to say, it did take me quite some time to actually get into this song. I would listen to the album, and it was so quick. You would be listening to songs with great melodies and eclectic instrumentation but they would be over so quickly before you realised.
Then ‘Alienation’ would start, and it just sounded so slow compared to the others. I was even like ‘Alienation’s for the Rich, like wh… what does that mean?’ It was a song on the album that I would skip over quite a bit.
After listening to it a few more times, I have realised that it is probably one of the best songs out of the last five of the album, Rhythm Section Want Ad takes first place. Do you want to know why I changed my mind?
I will tell you anyway.
Yes, the first section of the song is pretty much samey samey, but it definitely captures the ‘couch-potato, lazy sod’ emotion and attitude that the ‘narrator’ is in. To me, just from the lyrics, it’s about someone who ‘needs a job’ and needs to ‘get some pay’, but he doesn’t give a shit and he feels fine.
John Flansburgh is a very underrated vocalist. I think that needs to be said. Both Johns are. They are very good singers. In this case, Flansburgh has a very wide range of vocal ability, ranging from girly-sounded whispers to a giant yelling his triumphs high from the hills. And he is able to use it well in any kind of song.
That is when the song completely changes. With a sudden key change after the instrumental bridge, Flansburgh starts belting out the second verse at the top of his lungs! I don’t really know how to say it to you, I’m listening to the song in my head and trying to write how it sounds.
It’s just brings a real elation to the track. You realise that the narrator is not miserable in the state he is in, but is damn proud of it. He really doesn’t care. I mean, listen to the maniacal laughter at the end. LISTEN TO IT.
I mentioned this already in a previous post, but I’ll just remind you again.
Years ago, Yahoo! owned this website/company called LAUNCHcast which was a radio/video music site where you could mark your favourite bands and listen to radio stations based on your preferences.
If it wasn’t for that site, I don’t think I would have any interest in They Might Be Giants as I do now. It doesn’t exist anymore, but I shall thank it for eternity. This is what it looked like for anyone who cares.
AKA Driver was one of the three songs from ‘John Henry’ that I remember playing on a radio station that I would listen to, with the others being ‘Destination Moon’ and ‘The End of the Tour’.
Does anyone remember MSN Spaces? For anyone who doesn’t Windows Live Messenger, formerly MSN, had this blogging network too, similar to this, where you could post anything you wanted and type in the music you liked in these huge lists that you could give names to. I remember putting ‘AKA Driver’ into a list, bearing in mind that I had only listened to it once and never listened to it again until 2010.
MSN Spaces died too. Just like LAUNCHcast. Why does every cool internet thing I encounter die 😦
I digress.
Autumn 2010 was They Might Be Giants season for me. I downloaded almost every album by them during that time. Apparently ‘John Henry’ isn’t a favourite for some TMBG fans because that is when they were considered to have sold out, because before then the band had only performed as a duo comprising of the two Johns.
But I don’t understand that. Yes they did incorporate a full band, but that only added to their sound. The two main guys were still there, but the (then new) real rhythm section just added an extra depth and a fuller sound.
I remember listening to ‘AKA Driver’ in 2010, five years after first finding it, thinking, ‘So this is what it sounded like!’ John Flansburgh sings this one, don’t worry I do like Linnell’s songs too, and it comes right after the song ‘Unrelated Thing’, a much slower song on the album.
‘Driver’ is quite fast paced. It’s got a driving, no pun intended, beat which gets your head bobbing.
And it’s only a song about driving whilst on drugs/intoxicated. I mean, how cool is that!
It is not. I will say that. Don’t do it. Don’t drink and drive. Don’t do drugs either.
It’s only got two verses, a bitchin’ solo and a lot of repeated choruses and motifs: “It’s just a full day’s drive away”, “Heeeeeeeey Nyquil Driver’. But it is still a highlight from the album. Look out for the change in mood of the song near the end, where the electric guitars are replaced by acoustic guitars and a theremin-type instrument whilst still keeping the momentum that the song has already set.
John Henry is a great album. Give it a chance guys.
The Music in My Ears 