New contest: Jeff Buckley goodness

Back in 2005, a film festival came to San Jose where I grew up and was living still. Five minutes down the road from the college where I was working, Amazing Grace screened in a theater I’d visited dozens of times. This Jeff Buckley documentary is lauded by fans who have seen it as a gorgeous, heartfelt work about Jeff Buckley and his life.

I remember that as a particularly distracted Spring, and I completely missed the screening — and have spent the next four years compulsively checking the website every couple of months to see when I can watch it on DVD.

The day is finally here.

In honor of the 15th anniversary of the release of Jeff’s masterpiece album Grace, earlier this week the Grace Around the World CD/DVD of previously unreleased live performances hit the shelves. The deluxe edition also includes the Amazing Grace documentary, available for the first time.

The Grace Around The World performances were culled together and produced by Mary Guibert, Jeff’s mom. They are gorgeous renditions of Jeff’s songs taken mostly from his TV performances all over Europe and Asia from 1994-1995. It also comes with a CD of the audio from these performances. There are a couple of renditions of all the songs on Grace, and also a live version of “Vancouver,” which didn’t make it on the album but surfaced on Sketches For My Sweetheart The Drunk.

Rolling Stone has been doing a series of podcasts on this release and the anniversary. This episode lets you hear some of the audio from Grace Around The World, and features commentary from Duncan Sheik, who had worked with Jeff, and wrote the tribute song “A Body Goes Down” for him.

Jeff Buckley Grace Around The World podcast

FUEL/FRIENDS CONTEST: One reader gets the limited-edition deluxe Grace Around The World prize pack which includes –

1) The Grace Around The World DVD featuring previously unreleased TV performances from U.S., UK, Germany, Japan and France
2) Grace Around The World CD featuring audio versions of all the tracks on the DVD, plus two additional previously unreleased tracks
3) A pretty sweet t-shirt.

If you’d like to win, leave me a comment, please, and let’s talk about something you love in Jeff Buckley’s music or live performance. Make me smile this week (or make me cry, or give me shivers, something good). Talk about a lyric, a melody, a song, a performance, a quote, a laugh. For me, it’s still absolutely the ebullient joy in this laugh that is my favorite moment ever of Jeff’s. What’s yours?

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LISTEN TO A FEW OF THE LIVE TRACKS FROM
GRACE AROUND THE WORLD:

[top photo credit Merri Cyr]

Warding off demons with Thao Nguyen (Interview)

“There is a strength and confidence that you have when playing music that to an extent I think the world tries to stomp out of you.
I think it is so tough to be a young girl growing up into a woman in this world, with all the weird pressures and the odd demands and the self-hate. Music is totally an outlet for that for these girls,
and I swear it wards off demons.”
–Thao Nguyen, general badass

Growing up as a Vietnamese-American in the largely white suburb of Falls Church, Virginia with her single mother, Thao Nguyen found a new connection and identity in music at the age of twelve when she first picked up a guitar. After teaching herself to play, she has spent the following thirteen years honing that craft — from the singer-songwriter folk duo she formed with junior high friends, to the accomplished, talented, fearless artist she is today.

Her latest album We Brave Bee Stings And All (2008) is one of my most-listened-to records of last year. Sometimes her songs hit me with playfully familiar roots of girl groups or 1950s classic pop, but then she turns up the fierce, clever rock — just as a hint, Jack White is a fan of her skillful guitar playing.

Along with her raw and earnest vocals, Thao makes music that strikes deep at the heart of truth, and isn’t afraid to mix trombone with beatboxing. Now signed to the venerable Pacific Northwest label Kill Rock Stars, Thao has released two albums with a third due this fall.

Fear and Convenience – Thao Nguyen


Thao is a smarty, and I so enjoyed our time ruminating and intellectually meandering together (two of my favorite pastimes). She studied Sociology and Women’s Studies at the College of William and Mary, and she is one of the most articulate and thoughtful artists I have had the pleasure of speaking with.

You can tell that this is a sharp person who has wrestled to present the very best of her thoughts and talents on her albums and in concert, and to challenge others to rise above prescribed gender roles in music and in life. Everything about her is a delight.

INTERVIEW: THAO NGUYEN
ON THE BROWN PLAID COUCH AT THE HI DIVE, DENVER COLORADO
May 6, 2009

I decide to start the interview with the behemoth that often comes up in her music career and in so much of what others write about her. She is a female in rock music. I am interested in what goes on in those halls as well, and I want to talk to her about it: the pigeonholing, the battle that sometimes feels uphill, the club that at first might seem unwelcoming, even if unintentionally.

I show her a comic strip that I ripped from the Feminist & Gender Studies newsletter off the bathroom wall at the college where I work:

F/F: So, this. What are your thoughts on this, as it may relate to what you are trying to do as a musician?

Thao: (laughs) I think that there is a very pervasive enveloping stigma about women as musicians, and I think that within my personal experience you are, to a degree, immediately dismissed. I know that only through experience, and that it is unfortunate but it becomes part of the deal – not only are you playing music but you are having to sort of debunk negative stereotypes and myths about women who play. For a long time, I was qualified as “a good guitar player, for being a female”…that was immediately the caveat.

F/F: Did that drive you crazy?

Thao: No, only because I have concerns about my blood pressure, so I try not to absorb it. But of course it does stick with you and float around in your mind. If nothing else, it is a motivator. I want to be good enough that it doesn’t matter what gender I am. That may be the ultimate goal, that we eliminate even the passing thought of it. It’s disturbing how much it plays a factor – but then on the other hand I think it should be totally acknowledged and commended when any woman gains a foothold in any male-dominated industry such as this, that she’s done it as a woman, with no apologies.

It’s a weird line to toe and strange territory to navigate – being proud of being a woman, yet being willing to disregard that fact. And all the while just trying to maintain respect for yourself, and command respect at the same time.

F/F: Amen. I hear that you are volunteering this summer for Rock Camp For Girls?

Thao: That is correct! I am so thrilled, it is in Portland this June. I have dreamt of it for so long, since I found out that it existed, but I have been on tour every summer since I found out about it. My friend Laura Veirs mentioned it once a while back when I was on tour with her. This is the first summer that I have been able to make a window so that I can participate. I’m totally excited – I mean this sincerely, I really need a reminder sometimes to keep going and keep playing music and being involved in the industry, pushing along. I was filling out the application, I remember, and it asked me why I wanted to participate, and I think I started to tear up. It’s that significant to me.

I want girls growing up to have this experience, and I think back to when I was young and I would have been ruined without music. I don’t exaggerate, I think it saved me in a lot of ways. I just want little girls to know that it’s possible, you know? Just help them along. I am going to be a band coach and I am going to teach guitar – they haven’t told me what age yet, but I hope younger so they’re not better than me, because that would be embarrassing. But I just want the opportunity to show that it is possible, just to give them a vague idea of where they want to get to, and the rest is up to you. Just to tell them not to be intimidated.

There is a strength and confidence that you have when playing music that to an extent I think the world tries to stomp out of you. I think it is so tough to be a young girl growing up into a woman in this world, with all the weird pressures and the odd demands and the self-hate. Music is totally an outlet for that for these girls, and I swear it wards off demons.

F/F: For some artists there seems to be a difference between simple performance and true catharsis – really feeling a song. It seems no matter where you perform, from small radio station to big loud club, you always give authentic catharsis, with a lot of yourself.

Thao: I think it’s just the easiest thing for me to do, because however many times you do it, if you don’t hearken back to why you wrote it and how you felt when you did, why you needed to expel it from your body, then it becomes insincere. It is easier for me to just check out and immerse myself in the song, sink into something else, rather than be cognizant of how awkward the show could be. If I don’t do that, I just feel totally stupid — you gotta go all the way or it feels worse. I do sink my teeth into it because they are really personal songs, and if you don’t give that of yourself when you present them to people, then you do the song another injustice. I enjoy it — it is very draining, but I would rather that than be detached from the performance. Also, as people pay to see us, part of my job is to put on a good show. It’s really important for us to build a connection with the audience, and I want to build as honest of an experience as possible.

But [laughs] now that I think about it, you know, that’s kind of fucked up! But part of my job is to wallow in these terrible aspects and experiences. It’s not great for morale. After a while, I don’t want to think about them anymore, but for my job I have to.


F/F: Tell me about your work with the Portland Cello Project, which sounds amazing. You recorded an album recently with cello interpretations of your songs?

Thao: Yeah, well, I am performing with them on the record, so in a way they become my backing band. Willis [the drummer] plays on a few of the songs, and there’s my guitar, with the rest all cello. The songs we contributed were “Beat (Health, Life and Fire),” “Violet,” “Tallymarks,” and “Geography” with them, and the Kill Rockstars label is releasing it in June. It’s a full-length album — The Cello Project has a few songs they’ve contributed just of their own, and then another artist named Justin Power has a few of his songs on there as well. The Portland Cello Project has also recorded with artists like Horse Feathers, Laura Gibson and Mirah.

F/F: That sounds brilliant. Cellos are such honest, sad, gorgeous instruments, and I’m curious to hear what they bring out of your songs.

Thao: Yeah, they definitely bring out the sadness in my music, I’ll tell you that.


F/F: Your record We Brave Bee Stings and All (on the formidable Kill Rock Stars label), is one of my favorites of the last year. I understand that you guys are putting the final touches on the new album?

Thao: That is correct, we have one more week of working on it in July, and then it will be released in October. It is tentatively titled Know Better Learn Faster, but I am not completely sure on that yet. I’ll decide when they make me. The record is primarily a response to the end of a relationship, so a lot of it is pretty reactionary. It’s trying to be introspective, but there’s always got to be a little “fuck you” in there – or, sometimes there’s a lot. I am excited about the emotional content of it and how we tried to convey our live performance and that level of energy that we have now. On We Brave, we didn’t have that, because when we recorded it we weren’t really a band yet.


F/F: I heard one new song performed in Austin, and I read that you’ve been interested in exploring new sounds and instruments and songwriting techniques. What are you most excited about with the new album?

Thao: Lyrically I think the new album is a lot more straightforward than We Brave, because on that album I just danced around a lot of things, it wasn’t a total confrontation. But this new record was very intense and emotional to write and it all came out very quickly, in a month or so. I think the album is a lot more intense and energetic and straightforward.

We’ve been playing three of the new songs on the road, “Goodbye Good Luck,” “Body,” and “Easy,” and the album has 12 or 13 songs on it total. On this record, we’ve got a female choir, a lot more organ, more horns, a lot of trumpet, slide guitar.

There’s one song that’s only handclaps and stomping, it’s a very short song, and we’re calling it “The Clap.” That’s the title – and I’m not changing it.

[this interview was originally done in conjunction with gigbot.com [R.I.P.], with great photos taken by Todd Roeth]

And all the music seeping through

This brightened my morning immeasurably. There was a time I had considered naming this blog “all the music seeping through,” or some other derivation from this, potentially my favorite of all Paul Simon songs. I love the lyrics, the bass, the clackety percussion — just everything about it.

Seeing Paul Simon backed by The Roots, who put on one of the most ebullient live shows I’ve ever seen, does a body good this morning.

PAUL SIMON W/ THE ROOTS: “LATE IN THE EVENING”

there’s a war outside still raging / …it ain’t ours anymore to win

I spoke with a representative from the Pearl Jam Ten Club management today on the phone for about thirty minutes, responding back to a voicemail he left on my cell phone yesterday shortly after my amended post went up, saying they were “saddened” by the developments and asking if I would please call them back. Yesterday was a long day, and life being what it is, I had real-job responsibilities to finish up and a sunburned little kindergartener to pick up from summer camp, so I didn’t get a chance to call them back until lunch hour today. A lot of spiraling has happened since then, all over the internet.

Ultimately I will concede that Pearl Jam has the right to control the way that their material is heard by and unveiled to the fans, and my opinion about how they should make business decisions (which they are simply that — business decisions) is not as important to the rest of the world as it is to me. Fair enough. They have a plan, and crappy-quality fan recordings are not part of that plan anymore.

Yesterday I amended the original post to remove reference to censorship, as I learned more about what unfolded. The deleted written posts around the internet stemmed from a violation of the non-disclosure agreement regarding the deal and commercial with Target for exclusive big-box distribution of their new album, a model that they have worked on for years and are excited about. Pearl Jam wanted it to be unveiled “properly.” Rather than adapt and unveil this news on Friday when rumors of the shoot started leaking, management made the decision to quell discussion until they could release the information on Monday in the manner they had intended. Again, fair enough. Their decision.

We discussed the band’s change in policy, from the years of supported cassette trading among fans to a bigger, brighter, shinier internet that disseminates information to millions with a click, and how this affects the way that their new music is experienced. The term he used was “opening the presents before Christmastime.” My opinions on the effects of hearing live, pre-release fan recordings differs from that of the band and the management.

As this blog has grown, I have found myself with a leg in both worlds of the fandom where this all began and the industry side, and I’m not always quite sure where my personal enthusiasm stops and responsibility to whatever platform I have must begin. After some initial unfortunate very harsh words in the phone call (apparently Fuel/Friends is, and I quote, “a shitty blog”), the representative of the band reiterated that the support of fans and sites like mine are “very important” to the band and to the Ten Club, and asked if there was anything they could do to amend the breakup.

Ultimately what I take away from the conversation (other than reluctantly tear-streaked cheeks) is that I can see the perspective of a man and a business that is trying to make it work for them as well. We simply have two very different vantage points: that of the fans who will always want more and more in our excitement, and that of the band trying to manage a career purposefully and deliberately, on their terms. Ultimately, they win and don’t owe me anything. It’s their band, their decisions.

I guess sometimes we think that earnest fandom means we can do whatever we want as bloggers, and enthusiasm will smooth over a multitude of transgressions. And it’s not always so in an increasingly legalized internet world. I must have been hasty to publicize –or frankly even have– personal feelings about all this when, to them, I think it’s just business.

Monday Music Roundup

This weekend was a complete derailment of all intended rock-and-roll-lifestyle plans of official musical merriment, but what is late Spring all about if not sitting on patios for hours, sipping some sort of cherry juice concoction and getting sunburned? Or standing under gorgeous old trees in a backyard, barbequeing hot dogs and …bison (!). All in all, a fabulous weekend — ‘cuz summer’s almost here.

Here’s the new songs I am listening to, as we welcome June with the windows down.

Song Away
Hockey
Here’s my full dork disclosure. When I hear a new song I really like, I’ve been known to burn it onto a CD and listen to it on repeat all the way on the drive up to Denver on a Friday night. That’s an hour, kids — an hour of completely unrestrained overindulgence. I don’t know any other way. This is my new favorite song of the moment, from Portland’s Hockey, which boasts a little bit of Talking Heads, some classic solid pop riffs, all in a jittery danceable blast. It promises (and delivers) a truthful song over an eighties groove, with lines like “This is believe me music, this is forget me music / This is who can love me you know, this ain’t no roxy music…” — SOLD. Mind Chaos is out August 25th on Capitol.

Two Weeks of Hip Hop (Dead Prez vs. Grizzly Bear)
The Hood Internet
Since we’re on the subject of flawless summer party songs, I’m also just gonna admit that this song makes me dance around in a ridiculously white-girl, totally inappropriate manner in my kitchen, bedroom, what have you — the kind of moves that make people who can actually dance uncomfortable. The Hood Internet from Chicago takes on Grizzly Bear and Dead Prez together in one mashup, and make something completely irresistible. It’s the only time you’ll hear those sublime oceanside harmonies of “Two Weeks” with musings about who shot Biggie Smalls. Enjoy it. [img via]

Bodies
Savoir Adore
My trusted friend Eryc forwarded me this press release, with heady words: “Holy crap! Have you heard this little EP? You’re gonna love it! You’re gonna blog about it! You’re gonna dry hump it!” He’s right on many of those assertions — Brooklyn’s Savoir Adore has put together a punchy, potent EP that rambles and clatters right across my speakers. Just the exuberant opening percussion parade on this song is enough to make me fall in love, even before those immense guitar riffs start drilling and the male/female vocals start enchanting. Their Machines EP is available now for free download, and their debut full-length In The Wooded Forest is due August 25th on Cantora Records (who brought us MGMT and Violens, who I love). Woot!

College Town Boy
Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele
Dainon waxed on and on about seeing this Dent May fella and his instrument of wonder at Sasquatch over Memorial Day Weekend, and anyone with coke bottle glasses and wryly ironic ditties (accompanied by most humble of idyllic stringed instruments) can earn a listen from me. This song is a note-perfect caricature of a slacker with aspirations between hanging out at the local townie bar and regretting that he never studied abroad. The Good Feeling Music Of Dent May And His Magnificent Ukulele is out now on Paw Tracks Records, and this tune was first on his charming EP A Brush With Velvet. Also – for more of Dent, check his Daytrotter session.

Rattle, Room
Porlolo
One of Colorado’s most stirring female musicians, Porlolo‘s Erin Roberts has an earthy, elegant current to her music. The latest release Meadows presents eleven orchestral folk-Americana songs that run the gamut from the bluesy “I Don’t Know” to the playfully earnest “Animals Should Live Forever.” But here over gorgeously elegiac strings and trumpets, Roberts sounds like she would be more at home in an Irish castle in a city ending with “-derry,” perhaps late at night by a flickering fire.

Before Porlolo takes off across the country next week to some big-deal cities like Chicago and NYC, Porlolo is playing this Thursday night at Denver’s Hi-Dive with Houses (adored previously) and The Wheel, and I do plan to be there, thank you.

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Oh! And!! www.mulletlikeme.com. You’re welcome.