Music Of The Weak: It’s Starting to Sound a Lot Like 1987. Except, Without M/A/R/R/S.

U2 – “Get On Your Boots”

Only U2 could cap a novelty song with the line, “You don’t know how beautiful you are.”  What do we do with these guys?  They’re not exactly treading water, what with the mildly abrasive guitar intro and the constant structural change-ups—“Get On Your Boots” shifts from a bass-driven rant up to a thorny electric guitar workout up to a Springsteen-style, arena-ready drum breakdown.  On the other hand, they’re not making any stylistic choices that could in any way alienate their fan base (not that that would have worked for them either, cf. Pop and Zooropa.)  Then again, they’re obviously not interested in making Art either—looking like they’re making it, yes, but not actually making it.  Perhaps U2 is just lost in the rabbit hole.  Bono oscillates between bargain basement pick-up lines and tongue-in-cheek apocalyptic prognostications like “Satan loves a bomb scare.”  The guy apparently has to sound political without being political (otherwise, he would lose all of his political credibility), so his lyrics form one long piss take—like instead of crafting an album, he secretly just wanted to remake An Inconvenient Truth as a John Waters film.  But the worst part about “Get On Your Boots” is that it takes so many qualities of great music—rhythm, momentum, incongruous parts forming a cohesive whole, band dynamics centered around one guy who has obviously lost his fucking mind—and makes them sound like something that would inspire someone to, I don’t know, eat an English muffin.  This is what Bono meant when told us to live up to our ambitions.  It may also be what he meant when he said, “If you turn on the light fast enough, you can see what the dark looks like.”

The Whitest Boy Alive – “Island”

Last year’s Fred Falke remix of The Whitest Boy Alive’s “Golden Cage” got us mad pumped to reinvestigate Erland Øye’s side project from Kings of Convenience.  “Island” makes us think he may have a shot at consuming a good deal of our time in 2009.  With the slinky groove and Øye’s delicate vocals running in two opposite directions, it sounds designed for a one man projector party with a ton of film footage shot from the back of a moving truck.

The RZA – “Whar (Feat. Kool G Rap, Ghostface & Tash Mahogany)”

Of course, it was always inevitable that Samuel L. Jackson would star in an animated blaxploitation kung fu series.  And that there would be a sequel.  While we search for a way to blame the degradation of Samuel L.’s career on the Bush administration, we take solace in the fact that The RZA also returned to do the soundtrack to Afro Samuri: The Resurrection.  “Whar” sounds so little like a cast-off that it may already be a favorite for Wu-related track of the year.  The Fader has a set-up where you can watch the trailer for the cartoon on mute while listening to the song, but if you close your eyes you can hear Ghostface silently angling for a cameo in Iron Man II.  Oh, and Tash Mahogany sounds an awful lot like Inspektah Deck.

Ghosts of Pasha – “Hi Pink Gorilla”

A friend of mine once told me a story about a class he took in college, maybe it was a physics class.  He showed up the first day and took his seat.  The teacher walked to the front of the room, to the chalk board and stood in front of it for a second, staring at the chalk board.  The teacher then picked up a piece of chalk, and, with one fluid motion, drew an enormous circle.  He ended with the chalk in the exact spot where it began.  The teacher lowered his hand, took a step back, and looked at the circle.  “Oh my god,” he said, “That’s a perfect circle.” He turned around to face the class and said, “I’ve been trying to do that all my life.”  Apparently, he had begun every class he ever taught by drawing a circle on the chalk board, and he had finally gotten it exactly, unerringly right.

Ghosts of Pasha--AKA the band that played the Best Gig Ever--come from the Guided By Voices school of churning out albums and albums worth of material at a time.  Double albums.  Triple albums.  Albums packed with two minute sketches of songs.  “Hi Pink Gorilla” might just be their perfect circle.

Morrissey – “I’m Throwing My Arms Around Paris”

Does anyone else think that this is legitimately about Paris Hilton?  Like, maybe Morrissey has a soft spot for her.  Nobody else needs his love more than she does.  After all, she’s looking for a new BFF.  Maybe nobody wants his love now that he’s given it to her. Like, maybe he’s absent of her love and absent of human touch because she’s a sociopathic robot (made of stone.)  Like, maybe he also really misses the Gin Blossoms?

-Martin Brown, 2009

Comments

[Jim Kingman]

Re: U2, what are you gonna do once the song grows on you?

[Kenny]

Marty! I sooooo owe you an e-mail! I've been traveling like non-stop in the past few weeks.

Anyway, I have nothing to add here! lol I need to check out that RZA track because Ghostface equals an automatic instant classic anytime he shows up! Best wishes for 09! I look forward to a lot more music coverage on the Factual and I'll be e-mailing you once I get some free minutes!

[Marty]

Jim,

I think the odds of that happening are pretty slim, but let's play pretend. If "Get On Your Boots" grows on me, I'll probably... admit it by including it on my end of the year mix?

Kenny,

No worries, my friend. You do need to check out that RZA track, though. The second time I heard it was completely out of context and I thought it was some classic Wu-Tang deep cut that I'd forgotten I loved.