Welcome to the new Five Songs! The plan is for me to post a weekly thing rather than the previous daily-ish ones. We’ll see how the format is going to develop, but it will for sure include the titular five random songs. As for the rest, feel free to let me know what’s reading well and what isn’t. Anyway, I’m going to try and send this thing on Wednesdays.
A note about playlists, first. When I started Five Songs, more than nine years ago (geez!), I used YouTube to host playlists. It was the best of the various bad choices that were out there. It was publicly accessible without an account, lots of stuff was already uploaded to the site so I could just add the existing songs, I could upload (unlisted!) songs that were missing when necessary, it generally worked OK. There were drawbacks, though. Some songs just couldn’t be uploaded there because the rights holders prevented it. Fair enough, I can’t really complain too vigorously about people wanting to keep their shit off of YouTube. But it was a hassle. It was also a little annoying having to prep each song into a video, but that wasn’t that big a deal. The other problem was really YouTube itself. YouTube sucks! If you don’t have an ad blocker or Premium account, the ads are oppressive. Giving Google more traffic is bad! So, after a while, I did soemthing about it.
What I did was just shove all the music I wanted to put into playlists on my server and then just have a little Javascript widget to play them. The advantage of it is that I could always get the music I wanted up there. The downside is really storage. That much music (thousands and thousands of tracks) takes up a lot space, and I was paying for that. All so that a relative handful of people could listen inline. It was a nice solution, but it was very much overkill. And, honestly, if this site grew its readership, at some point, somebody was bound to notice that I was just hosting this stuff on my site and might make trouble.
As I restart the site (again!), it’s now a static site, which is much, much easier for me to maintain. But I need to have something for playlists again. I’m afraid that I haven’t found anything better than YouTube for this. I guess I’ll see if some of the old problems are still there (I suppose I know that YouTube still sucks). For albums that I feature here, I’ll include links to Bandcamp (where available) which provides an easy way to listen to the albums and buy them if you like them. Bandcamp does appear to be testing a Playlist feature that might work at some point, except that a fair bit of my stuff is from CDs I’ve purchased over the years. So maybe not.
Well, anyway, it’s the best I have for now. We’ll see how it goes. So let’s get into this thing!
What Are You Listening To, Josh?
A sampling of albums that I’m playing regularly, whether older ones or newer ones. Just the things that I think are worth highlighting, and maybe you’d enjoy.
Emeralds, Parlor Greens
This was a dual discovery. I try and pay attention to Coalmine Records, who generally are pretty reliable in their releases, and then Bandcamp featured this record as their album of the day a month or so back. Combining those two things with the preview being great, and it was an easy pre-order. The album when it arrived absolutely lived up to what I was expecting. It’s a breezy organ-driven album of instrumental funk, very much in the vein of late 60s Booker T & the MG’s. The guys in Parlor Greens have been playing in various bands for a while, and they just get right down to business. I suppose I’m not sure if I know how to sell you beyond “like getting a new Booker T & the MG’s record” - either that pitch resonates or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t, I highly recommend going straight from here to firing up an album from those guys. It’s a great time of year to chill outside and just luxuriate in something like this.
The Inhuman Ordeal of Special Agent Gas Huffer, Gas Huffer
Tremendous. Literallly the second thing I write about on the rebooted site, and I immediately hit a record not on Bandcamp. That’s good stuff.
Anyway, Gas Huffer. I was at a party in a dorm (really a bunch of dorks hanging out blasting music) when I seized control of the CD player and got Nirvana’s “Negative Creep” going. A guy I didn’t know got to chatting with me, we asked where we were from (as freshman usually do when first encountering each other), and I mentioned “Washington State”. It was easier to say that to people, even though the conversation went along predictable lines from there. “Seattle?” “No, other side of the state, Spokane.” But Matt’s eyes lit up. “Spokane? Like the Gas Huffer song?” At the time, I didn’t know who that was, but dang it, even though I thought Spokane sucked (still do), I was still excited. I had the tendency of people from homely dumps to be a thirsty dork for any mention of my lousy home town. First chance I got, I hit up a record store and grabbed the first Gas Huffer record. And really liked it!
Gas Huffer was making records in Seattle at the same time as the other grunge explosion bands, and they even featured a Seattle underground legend in the form of Tom Price (U-Men), so it seems like they should have had a path to the limelight. Unfortunately for them, they weren’t making anything you could really squint at and call grunge. Even acknowledging that there wasn’t really that much in common between a bunch of the big bands that got the “g” label, Gas Huffer was very clearly making garage punk. I think they were doing a fantastic job of it, but it was nevertheless a more recognizable thing than the punk/metal hybrid that was developing elsewhere in the city at the time. Matt Wright’s vocals were also unusual, an interesting style that sounded more like something from a garage band from the 60s than the more typical grunts and howls of the early 90s.
At any rate, because they never broke big, they’ve always felt like more of a private discovery to me. They put out seven LPs during their time, and I enjoy them all, but this record from the middle of the run is as good place to start as any.
Congregation, the Afghan Whigs
Why yes, I did just read Everybody Loves Our Town, by Mark Yarm, so stuff related to grunge is on my mind. But, you know, Gas Huffer wasn’t grunge. And the Afghan Whigs weren’t from Seattle, and some people say they weren’t grunge either. But what is grunge? I’m going to not only claim them under that tag but also say that this is the best grunge record that Sub Pop ever released. Hot take! But, that is a carefully worded statement in a weaselly kind of way. It neatly cuts out the last two Nirvana records (both DGC releases), the big Soundgarden records (A&M), all of Pearl Jam (Epic), and even Alice in Chains (Columbia). When you start looking at it, while people think of Sub Pop as THE grunge label, the truth is that most of the big records we think of as grunge classics were released after the gold rush, not before. That’s not to denigrate the records Sub Pop did release! Just that mostly the phenomenon of grunge was actually a major label thing after having been nutured on the independent labels.
So, if it’s not Congregation, what are the alternatives? The first two Mudhoney records (three if you’re counting Superfuzz Bigmuff in its compilation form) are obviously candidates, but every Mudhoney record has just enough screwing around on it that they don’t quite beat this one out. I adore Love Battery, especially Dayglo, but the extra injection of R&B into Congregation really raises it up. Anyway, it’s a tremendous record that still holds up, and the start of a fantastic run for the Whigs (with Gentlemen being probably my favorite grunge record from anybody on any label). You know. If it counts as grunge.
Let’s Talk New Releases
Records come out every week, and there’s no way to stay on top of them. This isn’t a comprehensive look at everything, just a few things that have caught my ears out of recent releases. Any impressions here are very early!
Sojourn, CAVS
One of the truest facts about your editorial team here at Five Songs International is that they don’t know shit about jazz. And so, you know, there’s not a lot of intelligent commentary you’re going to get out of us here. This album makes me happy though. Might do the same for you. Dunno!
Inside These Walls, Termite
You’re going to get a mix on here of relatively well-mannered stuff like that CAVS records and then stuff like this. This is just pure, uncut hardcore right outta Perth, Australia. Here’s how you know you’re getting the good shit: almost every track on this record starts out with a squall of feedback. That’s how it should work! And the occasional exception, like “Punk CEO”, has a good reason not to go there and instead just rattles into the drums. There’s no subtlety here, no nuance, just 13 tunes in, what, 17 minutes. Get in, get out, leave a cleaned brain behind. Is this going to hang around in the rotation forever? Well, no, probably not, but I’ll have plenty of time with it in the meantime.
The Psycho, Yambag
Look, this section isn’t going to be hardcore all the time. But this time around, as I look at my recent purchases on Bandcamp, I’m feeling the hardcore stuff. Yambag is from Cleveland, they’re here to absolutely bomb through this eight-song EP in under eight minutes, and sure, it’s short. Just means you can play it again.
Five Random Songs
Yes, it’s the “classic” five random songs format. It’s been told before on this blog many times, but basically, on an old forum, people would post the last five songs their shuffle pulled up. I liked it, so I made it into a blog.
“Otro nivel”, Orquesta Akokán
Oh boy, right in the soup off the hop. Orquesta Akokán is a big band playing Cuban music, mambos and such, and look: I joke about not knowing shit about jazz, and it’s largely true, but I super duper don’t know anything about this. It was released on Daptone, it’s very pleasant to listen to, and look - if you like what you hear, check out the album. Josh Says Check It Out!
“Homicide (Instrumental)”, Ghostface Killah
This is from 36 Seasons, Ghostface’s follow-up to the very good Twelve Reasons to Die. While I think the latter is a little better, both records excel as cinematic tours through Ghost’s minds, with this record being more in the blaxploitation vein. Unfortunately, the instrumental here is really just kind of a teaser, without really giving you the full feeling of things. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of records that Ghostface has put out over the years, and I don’t blame you, there are really two peak eras. This is in the middle of the second of those, his collab-driven work where he sounds very focused to me. I’d go with the aforementioned Twelve Reasons as the pick of this era, but these two plus the BadBadNotGood collab forms maybe his best three-album sequence.
“Dyslexicon”, The Mars Volta
Here we go with a cut from the last Mars Volta record before they went back to being At The Drive-In for a little while. And honestly, at this point in the run, they’d gone pretty far with the concept of the Mars Volta. If you weren’t already convinced by the proggy excesses of the previous records, this record sure isn’t going to change your mind. There’s an awful lot going on here - I mean, just listen how Cedric Bixler-Zavala’s vocals go from processed to anthemic singing to the occasional warble that kind of reminds me of Jello Biafra at times. As with a lot of ambitious records, it sometimes sounds like a couple different bands playing at the same time, at least until you’re able to cohere things in your brain. My impression, as out of touch as I am with general critical opinion, is that this is the least liked of the Mars Volta’s initial run, and I guess that’s also where I land. I do wonder if I spent more time with it if that impression would improve, but it doesn’t seem like a thing I’m going to do.
“Captain Sterling’s Little Problem”, The Coup
At this point, Boots Riley might be better known for his movie career than his music career, but around here, we fondly think of the Coup often. This comes from one of the later Coup records, Pick a Bigger Weapon, where Boots’ rubbery funk had evolved pretty far. While this record doesn’t get to the heights of Steal This Record, it’s definitely worth your time if you like the Coup for sure but haven’t given this one a spin. If you haven’t listened to the Coup at all, well, this isn’t a bad song to orient yourself, although I think Boots is a little more agile on the mic on earlier record (even if the arrangements are a little more spare). Be ready for some very clever storytelling and plenty of calls for a Communist revolution.
“Capillaries”, Flying Lotus
You’re Dead was a breakthrough for Flying Lotus thanks to his work with Kendrick Lamar. It was another five years before he’d make another record, Flamagra, which features a track with David Lynch among lots of other stuff. Flying Lotus does a lot of work, across a lot of different types of media, and that sort of creative restlessness also comes through in his albums, which are hard to pin down. And so it is with this one. It’s a long record, 27 tracks, and it’s stuffed with a ton of ideas. That makes it an interesting record to explore, but the length here kind of means I never quite experience it the same way. But I should probably put it on more often, and this track is a good reminder of that.