Ah, I've arrived too late to show off my guess work; I knew Bonnie and the Treasures for the same reason Jeff did, but in my notes I said "I bet you this was written by Mann and Weill" for its class issues and its sounding like "Uptown," and I was right. Barry Mann and Cynthia Weill were the Brill Building people most likely to insert class conflict into their lyrics; also wrote the Animals' "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" (of course Ellie Greenwich and Jeff Barry also put class conflict in a couple of their teen tragedies). Anyway, I knew this track but if I hadn't I'd have given it a solid win. (Tom Paxton denounced "Home Of The Brave" in a c. 1965 attack on "folk rock" in Sing Out!, preferring acoustic folk. Entitled the piece "Folk Rot." Don't really know how he managed to associate the Spector sound and folk rock, though maybe it was the incipient protest in the lyrics where he made the connection. Haven't read his piece in something like 36 years, though, so I'm probably not doing it justice, and maybe the "Home Of The Brave" was in someone else's piece.) Christina Aguilera should sing this at a gay pride rally.
Anyhow, I scribbled that track eleven was "someone imitating Ian Hunter," and called track six "a Bananarama type group." I liked this mixtape from start to finish, though I agree with Tom in thinking it too indie, the indie problem for me being not tweeness but that the music is too muffled. My track, "Bongo Bong," which I like fine, is mondo twee but also very visceral, as Manu's got the rhythm down. Anyway, this is how I'd order everything but Bonnie and "Bongo":
win: --Ben Watt f. Estelle (tremendous, not at all twee, more like half brutal and half mournful; its emotions remind me of the stylistically very different "Hustler," by Simian Mobile Disco, which also has the brutal-mournful thing going, and a shoplifter) --Mott (I'm regretting forever that I sold the album with "Death May Be Your Santa Claus") --Ooberman (big lumbering version of what ought to be a Hawaiian beach melody, the clumsiness giving life to the lilt, somehow) --Jorge Ben (d'n'b type beats in what's otherwise coming across as calm resort music; nice feel but needs a better melody)
draw: --Miranda (Argentine indie hi-NRG goofballs, but the beats are mixed too high, so conflict with the melody)
lose: --Data Panik (near miss: lots of funniness in the playing; the guy vocals are frantic and pushy like Go4's Jon King, which adds good tension but is also cloddy and sexless) --Bananarama (party-disco whoos and good funked-up rhythms, but the so-so melody brings this down) --Of Montreal (this is witty and creative and quite enjoyable, prog lounge or something, but I'm not feeling my way into the melody) --Ingenting (breezy but teeming with musical elements, the crowdedness slowing down the breeze; pretty damn interesting for last place)
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timeasmymeasure
Home of the brave, land of the free, oh why don't they let him be what he wants to be?
Date: 2007-03-28 03:14 pm (UTC)Anyhow, I scribbled that track eleven was "someone imitating Ian Hunter," and called track six "a Bananarama type group." I liked this mixtape from start to finish, though I agree with Tom in thinking it too indie, the indie problem for me being not tweeness but that the music is too muffled. My track, "Bongo Bong," which I like fine, is mondo twee but also very visceral, as Manu's got the rhythm down. Anyway, this is how I'd order everything but Bonnie and "Bongo":
win:
--Ben Watt f. Estelle (tremendous, not at all twee, more like half brutal and half mournful; its emotions remind me of the stylistically very different "Hustler," by Simian Mobile Disco, which also has the brutal-mournful thing going, and a shoplifter)
--Mott (I'm regretting forever that I sold the album with "Death May Be Your Santa Claus")
--Ooberman (big lumbering version of what ought to be a Hawaiian beach melody, the clumsiness giving life to the lilt, somehow)
--Jorge Ben (d'n'b type beats in what's otherwise coming across as calm resort music; nice feel but needs a better melody)
draw:
--Miranda (Argentine indie hi-NRG goofballs, but the beats are mixed too high, so conflict with the melody)
lose:
--Data Panik (near miss: lots of funniness in the playing; the guy vocals are frantic and pushy like Go4's Jon King, which adds good tension but is also cloddy and sexless)
--Bananarama (party-disco whoos and good funked-up rhythms, but the so-so melody brings this down)
--Of Montreal (this is witty and creative and quite enjoyable, prog lounge or something, but I'm not feeling my way into the melody)
--Ingenting (breezy but teeming with musical elements, the crowdedness slowing down the breeze; pretty damn interesting for last place)