Negativland

Kind of a mess today.

Negativland, “Proud To Be An American (Lip-Sync)”

Yes, we’ve hit a new low here. This live track is mostly Negativland lip-syncing to this song, which of course, we can’t see. Five Songs International apologizes for the inconvenience.

Crystalized Movements, “Close Your Eyes”

And let’s follow that up with 9+ minutes of psychedelic guitar wankery. The biggest problem the Crystallized Movements always had was that their vocals were mixed weird, often far too high in the mix. Also, this album has some of the worst cover art ever inflicted on the record buying public.

Stick with this, it gets good.

Negativland, “The Copyright Law (Part 2)”

The opener to the second disc of the bootleg/semi-official Negativconcertland, and while I think live albums are mostly pointless, a live album of Negativland (which had a big mixed-media audio/visual show) is extra pointless. Feel free to skip this one, y’all.

Snoop Dogg, “10 Lil’ Crips”

The Blue Carpet Treatment had multiple moments where Snoop didn’t sound totally sleepy, which means it’s one of the better late career albums for him. And then I looked, and he’s had, like, a billion albums since that one. So, this is now kind of mid-career.

One of these songs is not like the others.

Negativland, “Ain’t No Baby”

Another piece from Deathsentences of the Polished And Structurally Weak. This album was really more about creating a mood and atmosphere than it was about anything as conventional as songs. It’s a pure exploration of sound for its own sake, and as such, forms quite an interesting experiment.

Jan Jelinek, “They, Them”

From one experimental electronic artist to another. Jelinek works with small bits and pieces of sounds, up to and especially including glitchy noises and artifacts, and reassembles them into warm, understated songs. This track, from the magnificent Loop-Finding-Jazz-Records, is a great example of the kind of music he creates. Subtlety is an underappreciated skill for musicians.

Happy Halloween! This is coming to you late, because I forgot to put it together before now. Well, better late than never.

Radiohead, “The Numbers”

You know, up until this track came up, I had kind of forgotten that A Moon Shaped Pool existed. I pre-ordered it, and then forgot to listen to it when it arrived. Well, no time like the present! Dig those strings!

(NB: I pulled up a live version, because the studio version seems to be missing.)

Without noticing, I passed six moths of doing this stuff. Nice. Here’s today’s tunes.

Unsteady, “Me”

Another track from Unsteady’s fantastic Double or Nothing, this sarcastic song contains the genius line “I’m a blessed martyr to the church inside my head”, which I think about a lot. Anyway, the ratio of “how much I like this album” to “how much the rest of the world has heard of this album” is just about as high as it gets on this record.

Back and forth between cerebral stuff and straightforward things. It’s the Five Songs way!

The Jam, “Boy About Town”

From Sound Affects, this is just a great song. I could listen to this stuff all day long.

Negativland, “I Believe It’s L”

Negativland’s 1997 album Dispepsi was all about advertising, with a focus on the “cola wars” between Coke and Pepsi. Constructed out of bits of found sound and with a fair number of things that might actually pass for songs, it’s one of the most accessible Negativland albums, along with Escape From Noise and Free. It’s still not normal, mind you, but I’m grading on a curve here. I doubt that this record would resonate with anybody who didn’t grow up surrounded by these ads.

Where else can you get a TMBG kids’ song and a wordless Negativland piece?

De La Soul, “De La Orgee”

So, uh, 14-year-old Josh was PRETTY BIG into this song. I actually greatly preferred the second half of 3 Feet High and Rising, and would usually play it over and over again. Not just because this was on it, of course, but the second half also started with my favorite song from them (“Say No Go”), had “Plug Tunin’” and “My Myself and I”, and, um, “Buddy”. I’m just saying, I was 14.

Sorry I get sloppy on the weekends sometimes. I need to figure out the automated post capability on this thing. Or, not. Nobody looking through the archive is ever going to notice! And nobody is going to look at the archive! Whatever, here’s some songs.

Superchunk, “Not Tomorrow”

The attributes that made Superchunk one of the truly great bands were all present on the debut album. The catchiness, the energy, the tight songs, and the sheer fun were all there, and showed what the band would turn into. But it’s all just a little sloppier, and a little muddier, and just not quite firing on all cylinders yet. The next album would be the big step up, but the debut album is still a worthy listen.