The Expressway News Report 09.16.09

Posted by Lucas Wesley on 09.16.2009

With our new date and time, we learn about Sonic Youth rescheduling, the David Bowie spider, Beck's mailing list, the music of Uri Gellar, new Garfunkel and Oates, The Rolling Stones ex post facto release music with B.B. King and the Turner family, Iggy Pop sucks, Barry Manilow is a movie star, Massive Attack tour, and we look at the concept of the musical hiatus. Jump on the Expressway To Yr. Skull and read the news!

Welcome to the technical twelfth week of my column! I think it goes without saying that we've switched days, but I just said it anyway! Because we switched days, the whole "Saturday Morning" part of the title didn't make sense any more. And since the Car-Tune part was a reference to Saturday morning cartoons, well, that had to go, too. So we're back to the original title, riding the Expressway To Yr. Skull. But enough exposition, let's get on with the news!



- Ahem. AAAAHHHHHH. Regardless of the fact it caused audible fright to everyone that just scrolled down, that spider is pretty important. Why? It's species is davidbowie. Yes, named after David Bowie, the rare Heteropoda davidbowie was recently discovered in remote parts of Malaysia. It earned it's name for two reasons: first, there's David Bowie's long lasting spider connection thanks to Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars. Second, the scientist who named the spider, Peter Jäger, feels that by naming the spider after a celebrity, it will receive the attention it requires. It requires said attention due to its place on the endangered species list: only approximately 500 of the species remain. I don't mean to support the destruction of a species, but may I reiterate that thing is terrifying? Aw well, I guess it is harder to kill it when deep down inside you know you're technically killing David Bowie. This marks the second spider to be named after a musician, after Myrmekiaphila neilyoungi. It is also the third species named after a musician, the first being Orectochilus orbisonorum. This ends the creepy crawly musician bug portion of the column. And thank God, if I had to look at one more terrifying picture I might lose it.

- Public Image, LTD, also known as the good band fronted by Johnny Rotten (eat it, Pistols fans!), are reuniting for a few holiday gigs. Unfortunately, it won't be the original lineup, but rather late 80s members Lu Edmonds and Bruce Smith, along with newcomer to the fold, Scott Firth. Much like the original impetus for PiL's formation, Lydon claims this gives him a break and a clean start from the Sex Pistols.

- There's new music on Björk's web siteweb site, but some bad news: it isn't by her. Instead, it's a band of which she's a big fan: Micachu and the Shapes. The song is pretty awesome, actually, and the band is good, it's all good, you know...but I'm still disappointed it isn't new Björk.



- Sonic Youth needed to reschedule five dates on their upcoming tour. Upcoming Arizona and California shows have been moved to the first and second week in January. The reason? Co-lead guitarist Lee Ranaldo has fractured his wrist playing tennis. For a guitarist, that's no small problem. Seriously, how can you still be super cool when it comes out you've played tennis? They've needed to reschedule the dates until the story dies down. I kid. Best wishes to Lee on his recovery.

- Bob Dylan and The Band stands are one of rock's greatest collaborations, but in name, the collective only released two albums. One is the famous Basement Tapes, the other the live collection, Before The Flood. While they aren't planning on releasing any new albums to my knowledge, they are allowing the public to hear some more material. Web site Wolfgang's Vault is streaming one of their famed concerts. The stream is culled from two sets on February 14th, 1974. Woo.



- There's a lot of Nick Cave news about what with the release of his latest album, The Death of Bunny Munroe. To put it as simply as possible, the book will be available on several audible media, being read by Cave with music by Cave and frequently collaborator Warren Ellis . For the philistine's amongst us, though, that don't read the books, there's better news: according to Ellis, the second Grinderman album is coming along nicely and should be out in 2010. Ellis goes on to describe the album as "like stoner rock meets Sly Stone via Amon Duul." Sounds pretty cool to me.

- In my last column, I mentioned Beck has a mailing list, and that I'd get back to you all with the details. Well, I've received an e-mail from Beck, so here's those details. The e-mail is essentially a newsletter notifying of all the site's updates for the week. So, essentially, what I write for this column on a weekly basis, only with pictures. However, there's also a recommendation of an unknown or underrated album. This week's is an album of orchestral music by Uri Gellar. I was shocked, too.

- With the first album out, some might expect Garfunkel and Oates to slow down, but instead they've just released another video for another new song. The song is called "Weed Card," about medical marijuana. It's really catchy and fun, as expected.



- Last column was unofficial Rolling Stones week. This time around I only have one story, but I think I like it more than all of the previous ones. The Stones are re-releasing Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out, by many considered amongst the great live rock albums of all time. I always preferred Brussels Affair, so why am I excited? Well, there's more. It will be a three disc set. The first is simply a remaster of the original. The second disc is five cuts from the set originally left off the album. The third, which to me is the kicker, contains tracks from their opening acts: B.B. King and Ike and Tina Turner. I don't know why that excites me most, but it certainly does.

- So there was this movie I heard about like two or three years ago called Suck. It stars various musicians, such as Iggy Pop, Henry Rollins, Alice Cooper and Moby and is about a vampiric rock band. Crazy how one little book can ruin an entire genre of goofy monsters for me. The cast list still supplies a pretty good chance of comedy, though.

- So, the MTV VMA's happened. But then again, it's 2009, so who cares. I can't believe I wasted a bullet on this.



- Another weird combination, kind of: Barry Manilow and Michael Stipe of R.E.M. Stipe, who has previously been in the movie producing business with Being John Malkovich, and is now working with Sandy Stern, Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman on a romantic comedy based on various Manilow songs. The basic plot is that two Manilow fans fall in love and go to a Manilow concert. In a way it sounds hilarious, but I don't think it will be as funny as I want it to. Or, you know, funny at all.

- Elton John is attempting to adopt a Ukrainian baby with his longtime partner David Furnish. This I have no problem with. His logic, however, is a little off. He had previously been averse to the idea due to his advanced age and hefty touring schedule, both valid considerations. However, a friend of his died recently, and...well...quoth John, "What better opportunity to replace someone I lost than to replace him with someone I can give a future to?" I kind of understand in one way, but I think the idea of using a child to "replace" an adult friend might be what we call an ill intention. But that's just me.



- Massive Attack are prepping a tour around the UK and Europe, and they have an opener and perennial guest vocalist for the gig: Martina Topley-Bird, probably best known as vocalist for Tricky in the mid to late 90s. Trip hop is a genre with less than ten "names" attached to it, but boy do they know how to work together.

Star Power

Since I took a hiatus of sorts, I've decided that this week's Star Power will be on he topic of the musical hiatus. Not to mention that with 9/9/09 having just passed, The Beatles have once again been the talk of the musical town. And whenever people talk about how great they are, it's inevitable someone mentions about how they did it all in seven small years, too! It wasn't until 1968 they actually took more than a few months between albums, but even then they constantly recorded music. However, we must remember that this was the work ethic of the time. All of their contemporaries did it too: in the 60s, the Beach Boys released fifteen albums (one more than The Beatles), The Rolling Stones released eight albums, and even the Monkees released eight albums. An album or two a year was standard. This decade, Kanye West, arguably the most commercial pop star around, released four.



Even as time went on, artists with a truly great work ethic continued this trend. Between 1977 and 1986, Elvis Costello released eleven albums. In roughly the same time span, the Ramones released nine. Not quite the commercial powerhouses of the consistent release powerhouses of the 60s, they still proved that work ethic lived strong in some people's minds. So what happened?

At some point, and I really can't pinpoint when, artists didn't feel the need to create constant music anymore. Of course, these days we still get an album every year or two from the worlds most commercial, factory-made pop stars, but any serious artist is taking time with their craft. This is no condemnation, I understand, but people have a tendency to complain when their favorite band hasn't made an album in six years. It's understandable for our older acts like Bob Dylan or The Rolling Stones. They simply have no need to record constant new music, although I might note Dylan has album number two of 2009 just around the corner. Not to mention Neil Young, who has had one of the steadier release schedules around these days.

Regardless, not everyone keeps up. And of course, some people have excuses. Part of the reason groups needed to create new music all the time was so they wouldn't be forgotten. If The Beatles hadn't released two albums a year and a single a month, believe it or not, it's possible that by the time the next album came out, no one would care. With the right work ethic, we might all be talking about how Gerry & The Pacemakers are the best group ever. Michael Jackson certainly believed this philosophy: the reason he created certain rumors about himself was to keep himself in the spotlight between albums. If you aren't constantly releasing things, people forget. Of course, this isn't always the case. The Beastie Boys can and do still sell despite putting five years between each real album. Sean Lennon doesn't exactly need to be in the media, he has forty years of history on his side.

Then there's certain people who allow generations between albums. Granted, I can only think of two, but I thought of two. These are the two longest gaps between albums by popular artists that I've ever discovered. The first gap was based on a folk performer becoming upset with the industry and quitting before her career even started. Years later, the new folk crowd discovered they loved her and invited them to record with them. Suddenly she liked recording again, and album number two came 35 years later. I'm speaking of Vashti Bunyan, whose two albums were called Just Another Diamond Day and Lookafterling. Both albums came with fair acclaim, but of course no commercial success, since they came so long apart. The other example of an artist releasing his material a generation apart has a slightly different story.



That's right, the longest gap between albums that I can think of comes from our friend William Shatner. First we had 1968's The Transformed Man, followed 36 years later by 2004's Has Been. And talk about an increase in quality! But really, for any commercial artist, it would be career suicide to release albums that far apart. It's telling that the third longest gap between releases that I can think of is Leonard Cohen's nine-year gap, and it took a major religious conversion to facilitate that. Surely there's longer and bigger, but it's telling the best I can think of in terms of length. Commercial artists just can't take a break like that and survive.

Which I guess brings me to the point...am I commercial enough to have survived that past week and a half? I would have to hope so.

Farewell Song(s)

Since I skipped last week, we'll double up this time around as to not lose continuity.

1969, the number. I'll probably make that joke again for 1979, and definitely 1989. 1999 will be all about partying. But yes, that's the year of the week. Plenty of great albums were released this year, so naturally plenty of great songs were released as well. Legendary numbers, such as Suspicious Minds, Whole Lotta Love, Space Oddity, Fortunate Son, Honky Tonk Women, Gimme Shelter, I Wanna Be Your Dog, Kick Out The Jams, The Boxer, The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down, Here Comes The Sun, It's Your Thing, Cinnamon Girl, Oh, Happy Day, A Boy Named Sue...there's just so many. Some by seasoned veterans, some by future legends that were just starting out at the time. You'll notice, however, all are by adults, at least on some loose definition of the term. However, the song of the year is by children. One of the best pop songs of all time and a top ten vocal performance of all time, can I even be coy about this? It's so obviously "I Want You Back."

The album of the year, to me, is equally obvious. It ranks amongst my all time favorites, and often I call it the best album of all time. In fact, many people do this. You may see me do this again and with more explanation if certain pieces ever materialize. If not, well, let the album speak for itself. The album of 1969 is Abbey Road by The Beatles.

1970 is less interesting a number. No Public Enemy songs start that way. However, another slew of all time great albums were released, along with a great deal of fantastic songs. The song of the year is one that I can never quite describe my love for. It comes from an album where the love is easier to profess. Firstly, many people share it, but secondly, it's truly that good. A wonderful slice of folk music, occasionally mislabeled as either folk rock or soft rock just because of the artist's name more or less requiring some "rock" get involved. The song is too delicate for that word, though, and I refuse to tag it along so baselessly. The song has a lightness and kindness to it that few others come near. Of course I'm speaking of "Birds" by Neil Young.

As I kind of alluded to, the album the song appears on is pretty spectacular, too. In fact, the album of 1970 is After The Gold Rush, again by Neil Young.

That does it for this week's edition of the Expressway to Yr. Skull. If history repeats itself, we'll have a punnier, probably technically better title next week, but it'll be the same time and place. No more changing it up without telling you, I promise! But yeah, thanks for joining us and I hope to see you again next week on the Expressway To Yr. Skull!