Record Review 5: Lucinda Williams WEST

Lucinda Williams.... it is hard to listen to ANY Lucinda Williams CD without marveling that she has not stuck a gun in her mouth. The daughter of Arkansa Poet Laureate Miller Williams (not that artsy southern people and their kin ever kill themselves) Lucinda has been writing what is simply some of the most heartfelt, painfully sung music of my lifetime. She is not a pretty lady. She has been hurt by men and hurt by life. She has serious questions about God... but she knows her way around a hook and a melody and her voice is about the most “real” thing I have had the pleasure of hearing live.


Williams had a tough early career starting in 1979 and 1980 with “Ramblin” and “Happy Woman Blues”. These CD’s show the rudiments of her style and showcase her voice but the booze and cigarrettes had not accomplished all of their magic yet. It was not till 8 years later when she released “Lucinda Williams” that some critic began to talk and her recording on “Change The Locks” (an old Silos tune which is simply pne of the BEST break up songs ever) that anything more then critics began to take notice. They say her breakthrough came in 1998 with the BRILLIANT (capital B) “Car Wheels On A Gravel Road” but I (and there is no one more important then me) would patiently (sort of) explain to you that the earlier “Sweet Old World” was really the the CD that put her on every critics list. (and I would be right...again.) “Sweet Old World” was 1992 and “Car Wheels” 1998. One thing she has never been is prolific. In 2001 she put out “Essence” which was for me a foregettable step backwards until hammering another one over the fence with 2003’s “Worl Without Tears”. Now only 4 years later she gives us “West”.





I am a fan. I generally do not review, listen to, or think about any musician (even one I just pick up) without being a fan. Williams songs are all deeply caring about her characters. Many of them seem to be to friends along the way, a lot to men who have wandered in and out of her life. She is not an angry chick, just a weathered one who never seems to learn that men...are just men. “Are You Alright” kicks it off in fine style. The first line, “Are you alright, all of a sudden you went away...” finishing with “Are you alright, cause I need to hear from you,” tell you everything you need to know. But the nice thing about Williams is she loves her characters and she loves that they have been in her life and might come back. The second song...”Mama You Sweet” is sweet. Send it on a mix tape to mom on Mothers day so everyone knows how cool you are. “Learning How To Live” might be a fill for “Are You Alright”. The 4th song “Fancy Funeral” will likely be popular but is a simple ode tonot spending money on a funeral but instead spending it on stuff now and making beautiful but cheap goodbyes. Next is “Unseffer Me” and for me it is the CD’s stopper. She is asking...begging for her lover to make it right. She does this a lot but simply...no one does it better. “Everything has changed” leaves her emotionally dead after another break up. “Come On”...a break up song starts with “Dude Iam So Over You”. I do not know how you feel about these songs as a woman but as a man I wish I could inspire this kind of angst in any woman. “Where Is My Love” is just a voice song...”Is my love in Helena eating sweet potato pie?” Kurt Cobain could not have gotten away with this but with her...it feels good even with the occasionally trite chorus. The next song “Rescue” seems to be that lesson that she can sing about but never learn...”He can’t rescure you, he can’t pull the demons from your head”. Indeed. “What If” is a pretty and politcal ballad. “Wrap My Head Around That” is... you will not believe this...a break up song. It kicks up the artistry a little more though. She has always had a song or two on each CD that through odd pacing and purcussion just...seem to glow (Like “Hot Blood” from “Sweet Old World”). it almost feels like a Lou Reed rap. “Words” is a tribute to the comfort of writing and “West” is a commercial for the California Board of Tourism with a nod to the folks in New Mexico and Arizona as well.





This is out on the “Lost Highways” imprint which is Universals noble but ultimately stupid effort to have a pretentious alt-country, indie label to give it some credibility in that market. They have some great artist but a lot of it is forced...this is not. She put together some good musicians for this one. Doug Pettibone is a pretty guitar player and Jim Keltner has been “drummer for the stars” since i have been listening to music. She throws in the classic Bill Frisell and adds Gary Louris (Jayhawks) for some background vocals and it is all just...pretty. This is a good CD. It has been long awaited like all her CD’s so it is critically acclaimed. She just has so much talent and so much angst and that...that voice. You get the feeling on every CD that there is just so much crazy shit going on her head every day that it really must be hard just dealing every day.
One of the great things about a new CD from Lucinda is the chance you get to go back into the catalogue and look at what she has done. Although not prolific it is a solid body of work. In that regard I give this only 7 out of 10 Sliders. Also as a new feature I am providing....since I do go back and review the whole catalogue, a new feature and that is the artists essentail iTunes composite which you can go download. That is why I am here. Here goes:

1. Change The Locks
2. Steal Your Love
3. Get Right With God
4. Passionate Kisses
5. Car Wheels On A Gravel Road
6. Six Blocks Away
7. Right In Time
8. Unsuffer Me
9. Are You Alright
10. Bleeding Fingers
11. Fruits of My Labor
12. Those Three Days
13. Pineola
14. Hot Blooded
That would not be a bad 14 bucks to spend.

Shaved and Crazy

What makes people go nuts? Booze? Drugs? Loss of privacy? Lack of sleep? Britneys’s well publicized melt down the other day is not all that instructive. The thing about celebrities is that we see them. They are covered, they are followed by paparazzi but are they any crazier then the rest of us? This diner thinkest not.

Celebrity brings it’s own share of nightmares. You have no privacy. As Britney has shown your relationships, weight gain, divorce, babies, shaved genitalia, partying, failure to have hit in 3 years, having baby with an idiot, finances, relaqtionship with your mother etc...etc...etc... There is no privacy and that would have to assist in making you.... I believe the legal term is “more crazier.”

Also celebrities are encouraged to act out and make headlines. With the web you can almost watch them any time of day...or more likely night. When they do something weird or stupid it is covered and under the theory that no publicity is bad publicity they do dumb and sometimes morally questionable things to get coverage and exposure (i.e. Britney’s recent “upskirt” shots and of course the Paris Hilton sex video.

When you add booze and drugs to the mix...well, then you get Anna Nicole Smith.

But I really do believe that these people are no different then any of us. Sure, most of them are prettier and they become mega wealthy but I think if you put the average 18 year old, from Ladue...or Arnold...or Chesterfield in the position that she is in....disaster cometh...and it cometh four thou. Think about the madness that is around us every day. Seemingly rationale people get divorced...and go crazy. Damaging their spouses, their children and themselves without a thought to the consequences. Rich people get bored with the lack of strife in their life and so turn to “recreational” drugs to liven things up. People with the lottery and some...fall apart.



I don’t know. I look at Britney like everyone else and shake my head. Pretty, reasonably talented, unbelievably rich. What a waste. I worry about her two kids. But really, is she any different then anyone else? Should i be more worried about the person I work with every day who seems to be having a hard time? Should I be more concerned about a family member who I can actually help? Britney is a car wreck. You cannot look away and what we are seeing right now is pretty sad but take lesson from it and look around. People are fragile. Take care of the ones God throws into your life.

Book review #3 The Book of Dave

Will Self: The Book of Dave

Will Self is one of my favorite authors. Other then being British (hate them) he has written some of the more disturbing and alienated prose in modern english ficition...at least fiction that was not scribbled on subway or bathroom walls or spray painted on rail cars. His book of short stories, “The Quantity Theory of Insanity” was one of the best collections I ever read and he has recently visited such classic themes as a planet of the apes “Great Apes” and the picture of Dorian Gray, “Dorian.” He is dark, he is twisted. I like him.

The new book is “The Book of Dave.” It is really hard and really annoying to read...but totally worth it. Without giving too much away Dave is a modern english cabby who mentally falls apart after having a child with a model and marrying her. He gets divorced and loses visitation rights to his child and goes into a slow, mentally ill rage that burns through the book. he also joins a fathers rights group that although he loathes it...shapes and reinforces some of his demented views regarding marriage and child rearing.

Amid all the craziness and injustices he writes his own "book' in a prozhac induced rage and has the pages engraved on steel plates which he buries in his ex wifes yard for his son Carl to find....at some time in the future. The awkward part is that somewhere between that and some other time...the apocalypse comes. The book switches back and forth between Dave in England...and 500 years later where his “book” is the center of modern religion and his crazy screeds regarding relationships between men and women are now governing. They are conservative. They are inflexible. The "book" of Dave is their Bibble or Koran and there are liturgical references toeverything related to being a cabby and all believers are "fares." Their liturgy is all the "points and runs" of the various routes to get from one place to another in London and these are chanted at all religious observances.

Most of the future part of the book takes place on the island of Ham where they are ruled or governed by a religious "Driver" who decrees how they live their life in day to day observance of faith which includes all manner of sexual seperation later augmented with the rape and physical abuse of woman. The people of Ham "Hamsters" are fairly innocent sheeplike people who live with strange creatures called motos which we are told are vaguely human though much larger and have the functional intelligence of two year olds. It is all...very odd. The relationship between Hamsters and their Motos is one of caqring codependence which culminates in the religious slaughter and rendering of the Moto.

It is also annoying because Self in his typical “look no hands,” “I can write anything I want and it is brilliant” style, he invents his own phonetic but incredibly hard to read language that they speak post apocalypse. It took about 200 pages before I could get into the rhythm of the book. It is really difficult to read and tiring but when I got into it...i thought it was like all of his stuff. Brilliant and troubling. If you are religious...and I am...the book is a harsh indictment of all the doctrine that governs my faith. It does not bother me but...it does make you examine your faith and why you believe all the unbelievable things that faith requires.

He never answers a lot of questions (or perhaps I could not read it closely enough to decipher all the clues) basic questions that hound the simple minded diner. What was the apocalypse for example. Why did people in the future have a lot the same paternal names as the present day characters? Is there a God? He never gets to a lot of that stuff and in the end it is a great critique of religion and society and a great overview of the main characters life taking us through agony and heartbreak and coming to a little peace in a very tumultuous life. It is not Self's best work but it is hard to fault a guy who is this good.
7 1/2 Sliders out of 10.




BACK OF WILL SELF'S HEAD

iTunes

iTunes


So....we music heads have had iTunes for quite a while now. At least since 2001 and it along with the iPod has been thoroughly assimilated and almost as thoroughly accepted by pretentious music heads as well as the general populace of radio listening, MTV watching slouches and know nothings. My son, the pretentious indie rock snob would no more do without his iPod then he would go without food and shelter. But iTunes drives the system. Originally I flirted with and actually (shamefully) had a relationship with Musicmatch which was at the time a sad jukebox program which required (in the dark ages) not just copying the CD onto your computer (we had not formalized the language of piracy as of yet to call this “ripping”) but then arduously having to fill in the information regarding track title, artist and album in the appropriate boxes. In light of the process now it was the rough equivalent pf scribbling with chalk pictures of bison on a cage wall. Now I pop a CD in the disc drive and it asks me if I want to import...or it just imports and it pops up in my iTunes library alphabetized by artist. Very handy.

The CD ripping project started on Musicmatch and then had to be replicated all over again when I got iTunes and finally, magically my Apple Computer. I had 15,000 songs on itunes when I got rid of my first Apple. I had backed them up on an external hard drive but that hard drive is not governed by iTunes so the reimporting process in inexact and requires more discipline then I currently posess. I now have 11,599 songs on my iTunes library and I would guess that about 200 of them are doubles I have been too lazy to delete but it could be as many as 500. It took months of sitting at the computer every night. Going to the basement, grabbing CD’s I wanted on there (and some that I did not really want on there but new that if another pretentious music snob looked on my computer I would want to have them on there. Not that it would ever happen but your cant be too careful when you are a pretentios music snob.) and then ripping then one disc at a time with it taking a few minutes a disk. Perfect work to watch TV by and the library grew and grew.

At first it was magical having this much music at my disposal but on my first 40 gig Mac it really did effect the computers speed having ALL memory sucked up by these music files. Still I persevered. In college and after I had always been a huge mix tape maker (once again in the dark land of the forgotten past of “cassettes”) and when we moved to digital music, mobile digital music, the fairly short lived discman portable cd players, it was a real hassle to make mix CD’s. I even bought a CD burner component for my stereo never even sensing that we were two years away from having high speed burners on our computers. So when I got the Mac I was able to start cranking out playlists and mix CD’s for the car and....life was sweet. looking at the library with its extensive (somewhat obsessive) compilations of music by Alejandro Escovedo (52 songs), Ani Difranco (82 songs), Beatles (88 songs) Bob Dylan (245 songs)...you get the idea. It was heaven. Obscure stuff. Mainstream stuff. Whatever I wanted. Multiple cuts of the same song (23 versions of the Pixies “Wave of Mutilation”), odd musicians and combinations of musicians illegal downloaded in that earlier age through the goldem time with Napster. All manner of those things musically Becker.

But now I have assimilated this technology. I take it for granted that the favored part of the CD library (because I still have not put all of the 1400 or so discs on a computer) is at my fingertips or available for my ears whenever I want. With this familiarity has come the hated contempt. Now having several thousand songs at your disposal at any given moment seems inadequate. It seems like there are only so many mixes I can put together without them rutting into a numbing sameness. the fact that the list is alhabetized leads to a lot of CDs starting with songs by the Afghan Whigs or Alejandro Escovedo. there is always newer music to put on but evidently all this digital music at my fingers, or just growing old, or just growing broke and buying fewer CDs has caused me to listen to less new music...which is ashame.



Thene there is the iTunes music store....the financial engine that drives this free service. If you don’t know what your looking for it will find it for you. It will look at your music library and “suggest “ things. It is insisious and expensive. Would I EVER go out and buy a CD with King Harvest’s “Dancing In The Moonlight”? NO. WOuld i click and pay 99 cents for it on a whim? ABSOLUTELY. I think I did that about 300 times in 2006. I even bought a few full length CD’s online but of course the ancient snob in me still likes to have the jewel box and they still have not found a good way to download liner notes and CD art. Early on I explained to my son that the world was divided into two groups of people, those who read liner noes, and those who did not. Still the ease of say...hearing the song “Click, Click Boom” on TV or the Sopranos theme “Got Myself A Gun” and then jumping online and buying it is too much of a temptation.

There is a laziness to this digitized music that the purist music lover in me holds in contempt. I remember back when I was twelve making mix tapes on 8 Tracks. 8 Tracks, those clunky tapes that had 4 diferent “tracks on them which on an 80 minute tape meant four 20 minute segments to program which meant adding up the times of the songs to do it right and not have the irritating “clunk” suddenly end a song. Cueing up 33’s and occasionally a 45 from ine or my brothers collection laboriously timing the hitting of the “RECORD” button with the start of hissing needle finally getting to the song. Ahhh...suffering for art. now it is click, click, click and done. I can do a mix CD for any occasion and looking at the playlists it appears I do with CD mixes made for trips, events, months, sporting events, any “occasion”. I plunk out CD’s for friends that they do not even want just to go through the exercise. My most recent compilation (being a hater of Christian rock) is a compilation of songs by secular artists that appeal to my bent brand of Christianity including songs like Johnny Cash’ Cover of Depeche Mode’s song “Personal Jesus” and Tom Wait’s “Jesus Gonna Be Here.” Eclectic, pointless and all mine. Very sad. I am, if nothing else a complainer.

I do not know where it takes me next. My next computer and iPod will likely have the capacity for me to have all my arcane CD and album library at my disposal. 30,000 or so songs. And in time that too will become inadequate. Like me.

Corrections

Sadly it sometimes becomes the job of this diner to admit one of his many faults and ackowledge errors, mis-statements or other problems (other then spelling errors and typose which do not count in cyber space) with this otherwise flawless piece of digital stream of consciousness bullshit. Today is such a day as it was brought to my attent, rather bluntly by the dreaded Splittsville that I had...errored. In my review of the Courtesy Diner I defaulted to sausage as a breakfast meet!

Those of you who have the misfortune of knowing myself and my family know that although we highly revere the sausage (and indeed all products rendered from the pig) that bacon is certainly #1 in the heirarchy of pork. Sausage, especially breakfast sausage and especially breakfast sausage in patties (those east coast people love their fat link sausage...blech!) is certainly one of God's great gifts to the pantheon of breakfast meet but bacon...

Well my friends in this Diner's household bacon is the the language of love. We express affection for one another by making bacon, and sometimes by "leaving" a [iece of bacon for another family member. Generally at family breakfast we like to cook two pounds for the five of us and if greasy fingerprints are not left everywhere it is not a successful meal.

Which reminds me...so let me digress to the three important things I hope to impart to my children before they leave the fold. Most of you are already familiar with the three rules but humor me and feel free to email additions as you see fit. The three rules are:
1. Never eat anything bigger then your head
2 Never...EVER run unless you are being chased (I violated this rule recently much to my detriment); and
3. Never fry bacon in the nude.
For a long time there were only two rules but the third was added after I heard it uttered by a drunken man (10:00 A.M.) at a vegas poker table.



But back to bacon. Bacon properly cooked, if of high quality is one of the purest joys of life. As one can see by my picture of my breakfast at the Courtesy, I prefer sausage...AND bacon with my breakfast but bacon in diners is a chancy proposition. Not all diners order the highest quality bacon, not all diner cooks understand that there is a proper place between limp and burnt that a piece of bacon must be cooked to bring out all of it's fabulous qualities. At the Courtesy, if you are a regular and ask, you can get the "Bacon Report". Often on Saturday mornings I have had to call in the bacon report to friends and family much as you call them regarding inclement weather or the birth of a child.

Anyway...thhe bottom line is that this humble diner must apologize for my slighting of bacon. I believe in all future dining reviews there will be paragraph devoted to the bacon of the establishment. It is the only right thing to do. Please forward any additions to the essential rules of life or your own ode to bacon (since it is Valentines Day today to me at wantonbecker@gmail.com.

First Official Diner Review

THE COURTESY ON HAMPTON DINER REVIEW ONE:

The Courtesy on Hampton has been my primary morning home since it opened...around ten years ago. It is on Hampton right where the old Arena used to be and up the street from Arena Liquors. The son rises over the Salvation Army building across the street. There are seven booths, the two on the left marked “not smoking” and the other five to the right go all the way down to the bathrooms. It is a classy place. They have a mens room and a womans room. There are 12 stools and of course everything is prepared right behind the counter.


I get there at some ungodly time and there are always a group of older guys, nice huys who sit at the counter and smoke and read the paper and talk about the weather, politics, sports and of course the morning jumble...whatever. It is some fascinating stuff. I did not join them at the counter so I was considered kind of “standoffish” but...they were kind and never beat me up or mocked me. Over the years several of them have croaked...probably because of their diet.

A lady named Janice used to rule the roost there. Janice was a fifty something...180 plus pound woman with hair dyed an off color of...well...I guess it was red or rust or reddish...anyway...Janice was crazy as the proverbial shit house rat. She had a gruff personality but when she liked you she took care of you and over time...she liked me. janice disappeared a few years ago the way the marginally crazy people on the fringes of society often do. There are only about 4 or 5 women who work there in the morning and they are excellent. Recently I have only been going there in Fridays and Saturdays and I have the same girls who cook and serve and they are very kind, often even making me a fresh pot of tea of every morning because...I like to drink iced tea in the morning.



I have been eating the same thing there almost every time I go there for all that time. Hashbrowns with cheese and white onions, two sausage patties and white toast. That and an iced tea. Now sometimes when things get wild and weird...I will have a half order of biscuits and gravy with a couple sausage patties....and and iced tea. The food is hot, the food is fresh. They of course also have the slinger, with Edmunds chili...beans or no beans, whatever you want. The bottom line is that the Courtesy...they are just good people. Most people smoke. The food is hot and fresh and they do a pretty good job taking care of people....especially the regulars.

The decor is...lovely. It is one of the newest diners around and they did it in retro style. It is all black and white with some red trim. The booths are hard plastic and the stools are a VERY classy red vinal. The lighting is properly florescent. It is all good and it is centrally located on the 40 corridor and frankly...it is all good. 9/10 Slingers.

Rants

So for a number of years...say 20, I have been a fan of a genre of music known by various affectations including Alt-Country, Americana, Roots, Twang et-cetera, et-cetera, et-cetera...I like it. It speaks to me. Alt Country took me back a long time ago to “doscover” the beauty of Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, Buck Owens, The Carter Family, The Louvin Brothers and many, many, more. Alt-Country was about to “break through” and become mainstream with the movie “Oh Brother Where Art Thou” but...didn’t quite, although the songs “Oh Death” and “Man of Constant Sorrows” along with the beautiful crooning of Gillian Welch we finally spotlighted for a larger audience. Alt Country has as its foundation the old time vocal and musical and lyrical traditions of gospel and country. I would say the Carter family might be the fount out of which my twang flows. This basic, stripped down beauty was discovered in the lat 80s and early nineties by various kids playing punck rock (including but not limited to Belleville’s own Uncle Tupelo) where you had this beautiful, powerfully angry and disenfranchised music. Hee Haw meets Black Flag. It was a beautiful thing, angry and awkward but still graceful and always...always respectful of the music. The immediate roots paid homage to Neil Young but once you scraped back the first layer of Crazy Horse feedback you started to see all those layers of country imagery, coal mines, working people, drunks and...people...just real people.
Wikipedia as always does a fairly nice job with it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alt_country

See also their non definitive list of Alt-Country artists: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Alternative_country_musicians
About the same time these new country stars started coming on the scene. Vince Gill, Toby Keith, that Mc Graw fellow, Kenney Chesney, Keith Urban, Brad Paisley...the list goes on and on and we will not even get to the women. Bands like Alabama, Lonestar and most recently Rascal Flats. All these bands had several things in common, big pretty hats, big pretty teeth, big belt buckles and...oh yes...they all sounded like the Eagles. I do not mean in a general way...they sounded like the Eagles in very specific, totally ripped off ways. Do not get me wrong. I loved the eagles and I respected the genre of country rock embodies by bands like theirs and Poco, the Byrds, the great Gram Parsons... this was good stuff in the 70s and it carried me into high school with sweet songs and steel guitars and just a little L.A. (and I do not mean lower Arnold) polish. But the Eagles with hotel California changed. Henley took over the band and they found a formula that sold billions and...well, that was that. Jow Walsh who was ihteresting as a solo act was a side show, Henley ran the show with pretty psuedo deep songs and talented guys like Timothy B. Schmidt (formerly of Poco) all sang and harmonized and followed along...and made millions.

These Big hat country bands grabbed the sound as their own but everyone over looked the fact that this was not country music at all. It was slick, LA country rock. Sure these guys moved to Nashville but only as a marketing ploy. Then came 9-11 and they all became Big Hat patriots...and then I really got sick. Country music as much as Jazz and Rock are Americas root contribution to the world of Music. Country music is about struggling with your demons (and losing a lot). It is about dark truths, alcoholism, failed marriages (not just unhappy relationships), God, the devil, addictions, failures, hard truths, real life. I mean it was a real Country tragedy when a married Johnnie Cash went public with June Carter. Broke her families heart that she could sin like that. Got him banned from the sacred Ryman auditorium. Forced him to write “Ring of Fire” to document his main. These new Big Hat country boys are pretty but they understood none of the angst that goes with being country. As the band the Hangdogs in their critique of this genre said:

“You give Hank his do but sound more Eagles-esque with every breath
If your so country...drink yourself to death.”
Indeed.

So, if you like this music I feel sad and dismissive of you and that is pretentious and likely unforgivable but...it just feels to the humble diner reviewer that it has neither soul nor substance. I love America and I guess everyone loves Chevy trucks but they do not move me like when Jay Farrar (The Wagner “voggner” of alt country) sings:

“Catching an all night station. Somewhere in Louisiana, sounds like 1963 but for now...sounds like heaven.”
In Son Volts “Windfall” That is good stuff. It is also a genre that can make fun of itself with Robbie Fulks odes to “Roots Rock Wierdos” and “Countrier The Thou” making fun of pretentious turds like myself.


Beware of pretty people pretending to sing country music. These people have not suffered rejection and pain enough as the ugly alt country boys. Alajandro Escovedo (former mex/L.A./punker is certainly as bad looking as any ugly badger. Farar looks like every kids you made fun of in the schools Audio/Visual “club” and if he would not have discovered guitar would certainly have been a king hell Dungeons and dragons player. Jeff Tweedy (now of non alt country Wilco but formerly of Tupelo) now looks like an angry Hobbit, Robbie Fulks and elongated Howdie Doody, Lucinda Williams an ageing crack whore, Walter Silas Humara (Silos) a bad skinned Cuban thug, gary Louris of the Jayhawks is the ageing Tiny Tim, Bryan Henneman of the Bottlerockets (the original angry Hobbit)...the point being that these are not pretty people. Ugly people sing better songs. There. I said it.